Scout Moves

This stretch between Christmas and New Year's, and the few days on either side of the holidays, usually has my family traveling. This year was no exception. Last week, the four of us flew to Atlanta to spend a few days with my side of the clan—we met at my mother's house, my sisters and their families and my bunch. We sat around and told stories and laughed and had the big meal and laughed and opened presents and laughed. We like to laugh, and I'm not talking about muffled chuckles. Sometimes our cackling could startle a rabbit, whatever that means. This Christmas was our last in my mother's house because she's about to move in with my sister. If this house were our family homestead, where we had all grown up, that might have been sort of traumatic for us, but my parents moved into this house after we had all left. I have no childhood memories related to it, and I don't think I'll miss it, but my mother was troubled. Despite knowing next year will be differe...

Today is all about packing and sorting out the house because we're leaving for Georgia. We go there every year for Christmas because most of my family lives there. My sister from Chicago will join us as always so that all four of the Wells Girls (my sisters and me) will be together. That feat only happens at Christmas, and I look forward to it all year long. Eustacia has been home from school for about a week, and No. 1 just arrived last night. We opened our presents from each other right away, talked for a while and then called it a night. So, now we'll combine our family unit with the other family units down south. This gathering is a tradition that we've maintained since 1974, and it has evolved as people have joined the family through marriage or birth, but this year, I wonder if we're being stretched a little at the seams. One sister has been estranged from her husband for years, but he continues to share Christmas with us because he's like a brother, and he ha...

Last Thursday, the English class met for one last session before the holiday break. Between illness and work schedules and social agency programs, only four students could attend, as the teacher suspected, so we had a light schedule. Actually, we had no schedule at all except that I showed them how to make origami Christmas wreaths . We all sat around the table and folded paper and talked and talked. The teacher asked everyone what they wanted for Christmas, and that single question led to such a discussion, we all ended up a little teary eyed. Each one of the students talked about their families, including the ones left behind in Puerto Rico and Guatemala, and how all they want is for peace and security for the ones they love. Life is good, they said, and their children are happy, and they all have everything they need, but they miss family. One of them told us her mother died when she was a little girl, and when she was just 11, her father was murdered, and she went to work in a litt...

Husband and I went to a performance of Handel's Messiah this afternoon—excerpts from, of course. Not the entire thing. It's an annual event in Small Town, with my orchestra and a community choir performing. Most of the soloists were local as well, although there was one soloist I didn't recognize. Instead of holding it in the performing arts center, it's performed in a large church, which makes it a cozy concert. The Messiah isn't as big a draw as I thought it might be around here, so gathering in a church sanctuary is about right to handle the crowd. I went to this performance last year, and I remember being put off by the tenor, who sounded as if his shoes were pinching his tiny feet and his bow tie might have been a tad snug. But this year, the soloist who replaced him was anything but pinched. He was a big man, broad in the shoulders like the side of a barn so that when he stood up, his arms hung out away from his torso. He was the only man in the choir not wea...

We aren't really the party types—we only host one or two a year, and we only attend one or two a year at somebody else's house. But this week is a week for parties. The holidays do that to you, I suppose, make you gussy up and go out on a night you when you would normally sit at home with your feet up on the ottoman, a second glass of wine in hand and a cat on your lap. This week, Husband's company hosted its Christmas party, which is always held at a lodge outside of town. The place is a lovely setting, with the entrance lined with lights that contrast against the dark and snow-covered grounds, like you're driving into a winter wonderland somewhere in the wilderness. It's actually a camp ground, but you forget that in the dark and in December. We have the dinner catered by a local restaurant that makes great appetizers and desserts people actually fight over, in a nice way. With a blazing fire in the center of the room, everyone sits around with their friends from ...

I wrote about The Autobiography of Mark Twain in yesterday's edition of Small Town Newspaper. You can read it here , if you want. This is the photograph I had in mind while I read Clemens' dictations. He really was a masterful storyteller, even when rambling on about the poorly designed door knobs in Florence or in describing the Countess Massiglia, who he described as a "pestiferous character." About her, he said, “She is excitable, malicious, malignant, vengeful, unforgiving, selfish, stingy, avaricious, coarse, vulgar, profane, obscene, a furious blusterer on the outside and at heart a coward.” And I laughed out loud.

This past weekend was just dripping with Christmas. Eustacia came home Friday for her winter break from school, which started it all off. Then the orchestra rehearsed that evening for our Christmas concert—at some point, the new performing arts center will feel less new, I assume, but at the moment, it still seems brand spanking, and I get excited just walking through the door. Then we performed the concert Saturday evening after one more rehearsal. And Sunday was filled with tree decorating and cookie baking and movie watching. As far as horn playing goes, the Christmas concert is never very challenging. A childrens' chorus is the feature, and they belt out tunes they have rehearsed for weeks. One of the boys sang a solo like a cherub—Once in royal David's city stood a lowly cattle shed—and he created such a lovely, quiet setting with just his clear and simple voice. All the other kids stood on risers and fidgeted with their hands and tugged at their clothes. They picked their...

The English class for which I tutor will be having a Christmas party next week, and we always exchange gifts. The teachers and volunteers give handmade gifts, and the students pool their money and give us each something like chocolate or a mug. Last year, I think they gave me a mug filled with chocolate, actually, and it was very nice. The main teacher always makes miniature loaves of banana nut bread because she's good at that sort of thing, and last year I made cookies for everyone. But this year, I thought I'd try something different. My friend Kyle, who writes for a weekly paper and is a wealth of information about gardening and art and cooking, included a recipe for applesauce cinnamon ornaments in her article last week, so I thought I'd give those a shot. I've never made them before but have always wanted to know how. In this recipe , you mix applesauce, cinnamon and white glue, roll, cut out with cookie cutters and bake all day long at 175˚on a baking sheet spray...

You may be wondering how my kitchen appliance dilemma was resolved, or maybe not. Maybe you have more pressing things to think about other than whether or not I have a functioning stove. Well, I'll tell you about the repair process. We bought all of our appliances at Sears years ago, so when they all began to malfunction, I called Sears repair service for one huge repair visit. Of course, because we have different types of appliances needing help, Sears sent two different repairmen, which meant two different fees for the visit. You know, they charge you for coming to your house even if they don't fix anything. The first guy was here to fix the ice maker in the freezer. It works, actually, but the bin that collects the ice has been broken for a while. So, he ordered a replacement bin, which will be here later this week. About an hour later, the other repairman came. He listened to my imitation of the sound my washing machine makes and immediately declared it to be the bearings, ...

I'm a cook. I plan meals, and I prepare them from scratch, mostly, and I enjoy it as long as I get a break now and then. I use both ovens and all four burners and generally have a good time in the kitchen. But at the moment, I feel as though I'm all thumbs. Or maybe I have no thumbs at all. And I'm wearing mittens. Picture a standard poodle, or maybe a Labrador, standing on its hind legs in front of a stove wearing mittens, an apron and a blind fold. The problem is, my stove/oven is broken, and a repairman won't be here until tomorrow afternoon to fix it. It happened on Saturday evening when I came home from orchestra rehearsal. I knew I would only have a couple of hours between the rehearsal and concert to provide dinner and get dressed, so I had made a casserole using up leftover turkey ahead of time. I turned on the top oven, and within a minute or so, sparks were flying. A small flame was working its way around the heating element and spitting like a sparkler on the...

This photo is borrowed from a friend who was seated in the audience. You won't be able to spot me here—I'm perfectly framed by the top of the red drape but camouflaged by the base drum. I swear, that thing was so forceful at one point, my hair actually moved with the sound waves. Weird. My orchestra performed one hell of a concert last night. I was going to say "heck," but the situation calls for a full-blown cuss. We inaugurated the new performing arts center with the first concert of our season, and we did it the right way—very well. The hall seats 1,100, and all tickets sold out days before the performance. We opened with Beethoven's Consecration of the House, which the horn section transposed. It has never been made clear to me exactly why, but composers used to write horn parts in keys other than F on occasion, and now modern-day horn players have to transpose on the spot. If the note on the page is an F, for example, we actually play a lower C. If it's ...

In today's edition of Small Town Newspaper: My county's branch of Kent State University has built a beautiful new performing arts center, and my orchestra will inaugurate it this coming Saturday with our first performance of the season. We'll be playing fun little pieces with acrobats performing a trapeze act above our heads. We'll be playing a lovely concerto with a guest pianist. And we'll generally be playing our hearts out in a brand new hall as if it were built just for us. It wasn't, actually, because they've got all kinds of performances on the schedule, but it does seem to suit us very well. Here is today's column in response: The new performing arts center at Kent State Tuscarawas is about to open to an awaiting public, and I’m hanging high hopes on its success. The building is a promising jewel on so many levels, and adding it to our community is something for which we can all be proud. It isn’t just a structure on a plot of land like our other...

A couple of weeks ago while I was visiting my mother in Georgia, I took some time to see the details of her guest room where I stayed. My mother is going to be moving in with one of my sisters after Christmas, and she's thinking about what to take and what to leave behind. The plan is to rent her house out to missionaries who return to the States for a kind of temporary furlough, so she won't need to completely move out, just take the essentials and the things she can't stand to part with. As I looked around the room, these are a few things I found that I would keep. They have no real monetary value, but they hold generations of family history, and they remind me of childhood visits to my grandparents' house. Older people keep their houses as warm as an oven. It's not just toasty in there. It's a toaster. My bed was layered with blankets, and this is one of them, a quilt my mother has had for as long as I can remember: This is a braided rug my grandmother made f...

I got to do something really fun last night, even if it didn't last very long. Here's what happened: A few weeks ago, I got a letter in the mail (actually delivered to my mailbox) asking if I'd provide music for a local event. Every year, our hospital auxiliary hosts a Christmas tree festival at a wood carver's museum in Small Town. Groups decorate artificial trees and wreaths, display them at the museum and sell them as a fund raiser for the auxiliary. It's a lovely thing because the trees are all really well done—some are classic, some themed with things like toys or footballs (really) and some are just fun. The event lasts for about a week, and musicians provide background music in hour-long segments while people stroll room by room and ooh and aah over festive trees. Well, I couldn't imagine sitting in the corner and playing my horn all by myself, so I called a couple of friends and asked if they'd like to revive our trio we used to form. They would, th...

This is in today's edition of Small Town Newspaper : Today is America Recycles Day, set aside to encourage us to recycle more than we already do and to make a point of buying more products made from recycled material. If there’s one thing we’re all good at, it’s buying more products. Even in a recession, or something that feels like one at least, we are known as a nation of consumers, and our voracious appetite has left us with a glut of trash. Recycling household trash has become increasingly efficient and economical, but it will take more to change our disposable culture into one that values all of its resources. Fortunately, some innovative people have figured out ways to reuse our trash, and while their craftiness is just a drop in the landfill, it does show we’re beginning to rethink our throw-it-out ways. People turn old bottles into decorative lamps, spent wine barrels into planters and nubby T-shirts into reusable shopping bags. Candy wrappers become purses, old tires becom...

It seems inappropriate to precede Veteran's Day with a word like "Happy," like it's your birthday or something, so I thought it would be best just to point out the day is today. Veteran's Day. Armistice Day. Remembrance Day. The end of World War I. I was sent on assignment yesterday for a Small Town Newspaper article, and I found myself in a Catholic school cafeteria full of veterans all eat spaghetti served by students in uniform. (Sometimes I type a sentence and read it back to myself and think I could never make this stuff up. That last sentence is one of them.) The school hosts veterans for lunch every year, and then they have a program to honor them. My job was to talk to as many as I could and then sit through a presentation delivered by a historian who portrays Gen. George S. Patton, so I went looking for WWII vets who might have been under Patton's command. I found a few, and they were so gracious and willing to talk to me. My father was in North Afric...

My mother will turn 85 tomorrow, so my family hosted a grand party for her this past Saturday at my sister Karen's house in Georgia. Most of my family lives near there, so it was a convenient spot. We arranged for an open house to run from 2 to 4 in the afternoon, and we thought people would come and go as they tend to do at open houses, but they all came at once and stayed the entire two hours. It was lovely, especially for my mother who enjoyed being the center of attention, surrounded by her lady friends. There were nearly 30 people there, including the hosts—Karen, my sister Myra, my niece-in-law Hannah, and me. We have another sister, Melanie who lives in Chicago, but she wasn't able to make it. This was a lovely southern ladies' event. We hired a caterer to make what we probably would have made ourselves—tea sandwiches (open-faced cucumber, pimento and cheese, chicken salad), crab dip, fruit and cheese, spanakopita, ham biscuits with black pepper and honey. We also ha...

In today's edition of Small Town Newspaper: As a volunteer at the Greater Dover-New Philadelphia Food Pantry, I have been assigned different jobs each week. One time I might hand out bags of onions and potatoes, and then another maybe some sweet peppers or apple juice. But recently, I was assigned an unexpected job—I was to ask a specific question of each person in line and have him or her write the answer on a paper plate. The exercise was part of the Ohio Paper Plate Campaign, a program sponsored by HARCATUS* and the Ohio Association of Second Harvest Foodbanks. Plates loaded with personal messages from food bank recipients around the state will be gathered and sent to state legislators to impress upon them the importance of funding for food bank programs. The question I asked was this: what does food mean to you? Being in a slight hurry, a few respondents quickly stated the obvious, that food is a necessity, and it keeps their bellies full. Some recognized food as a source of co...

My mother is about to turn 85 years old. Her birthday is next Thursday, Veteran's Day, but we can't celebrate in the middle of the week, so tomorrow, my sisters and I will be hosting an open house in her honor. Most of my family lives near Atlanta, so I'll be flying down there later today, and I'll be sleeping in my mother's guest room for a few days. It's furnished with my grandmother's four-poster bed and matching dressers, lace curtains and a braided rug made by my grandmother years and years ago. She used scraps from her sewing to make rugs for every room in the house. My sister, Karen, who lives near my mother, is opening up her house for the party, and since she's invited nearly 30 women, we're doing an open house instead of a more formal sit-down affair. We're all capable of making food for this sort of thing, but we decided to give ourselves a break and have it catered, complete with a traditional coconut cake. I've got to tell you, a...

As part of my Autumn in the Kitchen festival, I looked for recipes that use pumpkin puree. I made a loaf of pumpkin chocolate chip bread that was wonderful, and then I found this recipe for pumpkin scones meant to be like Starbucks scones. I've never had these scones at Starbucks, so I can't compare, but I love these and plan on making them again. Enjoy. 2 cups all-purpose flour 7 tablespoons sugar 1 tablespoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger 6 tablespoons cold butter 1/2 cup canned pumpkin 3 tablespoons half-and-half 1 large egg Powdered Sugar Glaze 1 cup powdered sugar 1 tablespoon powdered sugar 2 tablespoons whole milk Spiced Glaze 1 cup powdered sugar 3 tablespoons powdered sugar 2 tablespoons whole milk 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1 pinch ginger 1 pinch ground cloves Directions: Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Li...