Scout Moves

I was talking to No. 1, (Katie) on the phone this afternoon, and she was describing an assignment she has in a class in which she is a TA. She’s a grad student at UT Austin and just began her first semester there, the smarty pants. The assignment has to do with unusual forms of communication, and she’s gathering ideas—I suggested the old codes hobos used in the early 1900s to warn other wanderers about the nature of people in various houses. I’ve written about that before . Those codes got me ta thinkin’, in the vernacular of someone who might have hiked from town to town carrying nothing but a hobo sack over his shoulder. When I was a kid, around 12 or so, the last of my sisters moved out—two were married, one was in college, and all three lived in a different state, three different states, actually. And I was left alone to deal with our dear mother who was not always kind, or stable. Some days, she was just as inclined to smack you upside the head as to speak to you, if you get my ...

Of all the things I thought I’d be doing with my free time, I didn’t imagine this—I made rosaries over the weekend. The other day, I was talking to my friend Katy about how I have this collection of pre-Colonial African trade beads. For a couple of years, I designed book covers for a non-profit American publisher that sells books in English-speaking countries in Africa, and because I did the work pro bono, they paid me in trade beads (my suggestion). My husband visited Nigeria once and brought back strings of these beads, and I love the things. I have used these beads to make all sorts of stuff—earrings, bracelets, necklaces, pendents. to decorate purses… Katy asked if I would make a rosary for her. Of course, I would. So, she gave me one I could use for parts, and I got to work. A rosary needs a cross or crucifix and a charm of Mary with three links, and the beads are strung just so. The dangly part has five beads—two Our Father beads and three Hail Mary beads. Then comes the...

I did a little shopping at the local farm market yesterday. It’s a full-blown farm market, with licensed farmers and growers selling their goods—every imaginable fruit and vegetable that grows in Ohio, fresh honey, locally raised chicken, lamb and beef, and all kinds of baked goods including dog treats. As I was waiting at a tent to pick up some ground beef, I was delighted to see local popcorn, too. So, I bought a bag from the farmer who grew the corn. In our house, we don’t eat a lot of popcorn, and it’s microwaved when we do. But I know how to make popcorn from the kernels. Hmmm, let me see…Ah, it was October 1, 1975…I remember it well. It was a chilly night on the shores of Lake Michigan, and I was in the tenth grade. My parents and I were settled in the old ranch house after dinner and waiting for the big fight, The Thrilla in Manila—Muhammad Ali vs. Joe Frazier. My mother was a huge sports fan, and we watched everything that ever aired on the major networks and WGN out ...

A couple of weeks ago, Emily and I bought okra at the farm market. We were walking along the path looking at the stalls and trying to decide what to buy, and she pointed and said, “Okra!” So I bought a pound of it, brought it home, set it on the counter, and that’s where it sat until today. Southern food is part of my heritage. Even though I grew up in Northwest Indiana—and among some in my family, I’m considered a Yankee—my fondest childhood memories involve southern food. And one of my favorites has always been fried okra. Yes, southerners fry everything, but okra, when not in gumbo, needs to be fried. Otherwise, it isn’t edible. Actually, that isn’t wholly true—this weird little pod was brought over to the colonies by slaves who introduced it to Europeans/Americans, and it eventually became part of the Soul Food canon. Slaves took it to Brazil, too, and it was there, in Salvador, that I had an okra sauce over rice as part of an Africa-inspired meal. Really good. But in my yout...

In honor of Julia Child's birthday (she would have been 100 today), I am re-posting something from May, 2008, part of my Motherload series I was writing then. Now that this tired blog has had its own birthday—6 years!—don't be surprised if you run across some retreads here now and then. THE MOTHERLOAD PART 5 Julia Child was quite a cook, wasn't she? She was likely the first "celebrity chef" that got people interested in cooking beyond making macaroni and cheese and tuna casserole for the family dinner table. She hosted popular cooking shows and wrote cookbooks that still serve as culinary bibles, but she was so much more. Julia was born into a privileged class—the "leisure class," she called it—in Pasadena, California in 1912 in an age when women weren't expected to do anything but reproduce, be an accessory to their husbands, and roll bandages for a cause. She floated through school and went to Smith College in Massachusetts, the fami...

The Greco Band Playing A Street Festival Small Town has an Italian festival about this time every year. We fought for it, too, because it used to be held in the town next door until someone lured the committee over to our side of the border. We shut down the main drag for a couple of days and fill it with inflatable rides for little kids, food trucks selling Stromboli and Italian sausage, a beer garden and tables where people sell Indian dresses. What Indian dresses have to do with our local Italian heritage is anybody’s guess. There is a wine making contest, spaghetti eating contest, tomato sauce making contest and grape stomping. On the final night of this thing, my big summer band plays Italian music, mostly. We played tonight, with our set up placed right in the middle of main street. Just as we sat down and organized the music in our folders with clothespins to keep the sheets from blowing away, it was announced that one of our former members, Raymond “Skeet” Botdorf, die...

As I mentioned the other day, while the Witches and I were at Put-in-Bay, we sat through a set or two of Alex Bevan, a folk singer here who is beloved by all. Everyone says he's best known for his early hit "Skinny Little Boy from Cleveland, Ohio," but seriously the man is currently promoting his 26th album. He's no slacker, and does not rest on his laurels. He's got at least one guitar in the Rock-n-Roll Hall of Fame, runs a pickle and bread business with his wife and is an all-around talented guy. You can learn more about him and his music at his website . And you can listen to him here being fun for us—don't mind the giggling and cackling in the background. I don't know who that is.  

I didn’t write a post here all last week. Did you notice? I just didn’t have much to say, had other things to do and then decided to take a little break. Three of my good friends and I escaped to an island retreat for a few days, sort of like The Witches Hit Middle Bass. Here’s what I mean: I’ve got these friends, and we get together periodically for cocktails and conversation. This is a great group of women—no gossip, no backbiting, no pettiness. We are loyal and loving confidants capable of drawing the very last breath out of a wide range of topics; and when we get together, we occasionally like to refer to ourselves as the Wyrd Sisters (a Terry Pratchett reference) or The Witches, as in “You witches free this Wednesday for margaritas? All but one of The Witches packed up and headed north for Lake Erie because Katy has a house on Middle Bass Island and had invited us to go there Friday through Sunday. Lake Erie has a series of little islands accessible by ferry. Middle Bass is wh...

I’ve been reading through all the grousing posts my Facebook friends have been writing about the Chick-fil-A gay marriage flap, and I’ve resisted the urge to comment on either side. My conservative friends are having a fit to support the chicken joint, and my liberal friends are having a fit protesting it. Both sides feel morally compelled and indignant. I feel compelled just to speak my piece about this whole thing. So… I support the cause of marriage equality. I believe gay couples should be granted the right to be married by their individual states. Allowing gay marriage doesn’t weaken the institution as we know it these days—heterosexual couples have done a pretty good job of that on our own. And it doesn't threaten a conservative Christian's understanding of a God-based covenant any more than the marriage of atheists or Hindus or Buddhists does. I also support the cause of free speech, and if a guy who owns a national chain of fast-food restaurants wants to say pub...

While I was walking Baxter along the road beside the park, an old man in a truck pulled up and hung an elbow out the window: Old man: “I’ll give you a million dollars for that dog.” Me: “I love my dog. He’s not for sale.” Old man: “Nobody ever takes me up on my offer. Ba ha ha.” I imagine that man amuses himself by driving all over town and throwing out this line to anyone with a dog, and no one ever bites because 1) he isn’t serious and 2) they love their dogs and don’t care to part with them. Later in the evening, I relayed this exchange at home, and Husband’s eyes opened wide. “I assume you’d sell the dog for a real offer of $1 million,” he said. “Of course, not,” says I. “You don’t sell your family members, no matter how high the offer.” But he’s not family, he’s a dog, and you can always get another dog just like him for a few hundred dollars, he tried to explain. But that’s not how I see it. I suppose if I were desperately poor and needed cash for food and shelter, I’d ...

I took the dog out for a little romp in the yard—he likes to chase a particular squeaky toy and roll around in the grass from time to time. We exited the house through the garage door and rounded the corner toward the front yard when I spotted a small black cat darting east along the mulch line. I followed the little guy’s trail down the sidewalk and brick steps, assuming Baxter would be right behind me or even about to dash ahead to catch the intruder animal. He does like to chase cats, that dog of mine. But when I turned to locate the dog, I saw him well behind me, nose to the ground, tracking the cat that he never saw but could clearly smell. I called Baxter to follow me, but he was intent on locating the source of the unusual scent and didn’t appear to hear me, or wasn’t interested in my call, more likely. Emily spotted the cat from a basement window and went out the east door to get a closer look, which only made the cat make a quick 180 and head back west, right past me and...

I’m sticking with this low-carb eating business, which can be translated as high-protein and fat, because it works, for me. As a general rule, I eat a carb/protein balance that allows me to lose two pounds a week, although sometimes, for unknown reasons, I have a zero loss week. If this coming week is typical, by next Saturday I will have lost 20 pounds with plenty more to go. Yay for me. I used to avoid the bathroom scale—seriously, the only reason it wasn’t caked in dust was because Husband would occasional step onto it. But now the scale isn’t a source of dread, it’s a source of encouragement. I can see results nearly every day, and that’s enough to keep me going. In fact, I’ve reached the stage where I recoil at even the sight of a carb and am not tempted by them at all. You’ve got cake, you say, and maybe I’d like a lovely slice with an icing flower? Crispy potatoes, perhaps? How about a slice of wood-fired organic pizza made by the funky guy at the farm market? Away with you ...

I’m trying to understand the hoopla over the uniforms to be worn by the US Olympic team. It's come out that their clothes are made in China, and now people are pitching a fit. It’s an outrage! Inexcusable! Burn them! (the clothes, not the people) Politicians from both parties are delivering melodramatic speeches calling for drastic measures. Here’s what I don’t get—the athletes represent their country as ambassadors of sorts, and don’t most of us wear clothes made in China or Sri Lanka or Bangladesh? The shirt I’m wearing as I type was made in India, my shoes were made in Brazil, and my pants were made in…that’s right…China. I’m not a traitor to my country, and I haven’t abandoned the cause of the American labor force. I’m a typical American, buying clothes at typical stores at average prices, and finding American-made clothing is close to impossible. I’m old enough to recall the days when most clothes were made in America—remember the Look for the Union Label commercials? An...

For a few days now, I have had a hankering for lobster because I found a recipe that seemed too good to pass up. Lobster, corn, lemon, butter, grilling. See what I mean? I finally followed through last night to great success. With one exception, Bon Appetit , I only buy magazines occasionally and only on my iPad—and usually when I’m traveling. At home with no travel plans, I have discovered that Martha Stewart Living for the iPad is one kick-ass magazine. I never bothered with it in paper form because I find Martha Stewart to be a bit too anal, but the iPad version offers a sensory surprise with every swipe of the screen. It moves and plays music and is embedded with links. Even if I never make or do a single thing in an issue, I’ll download it just for the moment-by-moment amusement it provides. In the latest issue, I found a recipe for grilled lobster and corn on the cob and knew I had to make it. I bought two lobsters at my local grocery store, which has them shipped in—t...

"Writing of the Declaration of Independence" Jean Leon Gerome Ferris It's the Fourth of July in America, the day we celebrate the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776. "When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation," wrote Thomas Jefferson in his opening statement. I am as proud of this commemorative day as any American, but I question the salutes I've been reading as posted by some Facebook friends. We are so quick, we heavy handed and heavy footed patriots, to credit our military at any opportunity. Support our troops! Of course, I do support our troops, and I recognize t...

I’ve been 50 years old for a full week now, so I’ll ask the question people seem to ask on this occasion—how does it feel to be 50? Well, I’ll tell ya, it feels about like what it felt to be 49. This week, my back has hurt the way it sometimes did at my younger ages, so when I make old-woman noises while in the process of sitting down and standing back up—and lord help us all if I sneeze—that’s nothing new. I have been flitting from project to project this week doing what I call “work” because I don’t have a real job, but I’ve been doing that for years. I haven’t had a 9-to-5 job for some time now—I’ll confess it was always more like 8-to-3 anyway. And now I spend time typesetting ebooks a little here, designing a logo there, fitting in a brochure for a bed and breakfast a friend has opened on one day and a bookcover for a non-profit publisher on another. This week, “work” has been more about the orchestra, which is my preference. On Monday, I hauled Conductor Eric around the cou...

So, this is what 50 feels like—stiff muscles, sore throat, general feeling of unsettlement (a new word, maybe?). I woke up yesterday morning feeling exhausted because I had hardly slept the night before, unable to turn off my stimulated brain. And as the day wore on, I felt worse so that by bedtime, I was sure I had the flu. Even my skin hurt, which is the insufficient phrase I use to describe that feeling you get when you do actually have the flu, and every inch of you feels just wrong. This morning, the “unsettlement” feeling continues, but I have a full day ahead of being lazy. Working backwards… My 50th birthday was this past Thursday, and I spent the day cleaning my house, for the most part. I mopped everything I could reach with the mop and dusted and tidied up, which is why my back muscles are scowling the scowl of abuse. I talked to a few dear friends, and I waited in anticipation of the party to be held the next day. On Friday, I herded the animals into the car and dropp...

It’s my birthday week! OK, I’m not so self-absorbed that I think I deserve a whole week to acknowledge my birthday, but I do love when my birthday rolls around. Just ask my local friends—I usually text them in the morning and say “happy birthday to me!” On Thursday, I’ll turn 50. That’s half a century. That’s five full decades. That’s 30 years shy of the end based on life expectancy in the US—80.6 for women—or lights out based on life expectancy in Cameroon. I’d like to say that 50 is just a number, but honestly I’m wallowing in the digits. Here I am at what’s supposed to be some kind of milestone or an apex with downhill the only direction left to go, but I think I’m still climbing. Life expectancy be damned. Middle age my ass. At 50, I’m working on a major weight adjustment (aiming for less of it), consequently buying new clothes a little at a time, reading books I’ve never read before, stretching my creative muscle with new projects, looking forward to decades more of discover...