Lost and Found

The mystery is solved. I lost a recipe card today and Laura and I searched high and low for it. Finally I went up to the computer and retrieved from a file the information that I had the foresight to type in. However I was saddened. The original recipe was handwritten on a card by a close friend. It is a sweet reminder every time I pull it out of that person and her specialness to me. Her penmanship is beautiful and the little added tips that she contributed to the recipe speak of her personality.

I have many similar recipe cards--some splattered from use, some on decorative cards, some written on scraps of paper. The most special ones are handwritten by the person who I got it from, and these I treasure above the newspaper clippings and magazine versions with full-color photos. Some are written by people no longer alive, and the cards are yellowing with each passing decade.

Sure, it is prudent to type them into a computer file. If the card did get lost, at least the culinary treasure is not. But the printed out version, though neat and legible, is utterly sanitary and sterile. It won't have any life to it until it gets smudged, aged and tattered.

There is a happy ending. I did find my original card. I must have left it on the counter when I pulled it out to complete my grocery shopping list. It got swept into the dishwasher and survived a full washing cycle, mostly due to the fact that I had tucked it into a clear plastic sleeve to help preserve it. Soaked clear through, it was miraculously still quite legible; the ink didn't run and the card didn't tear as I carefully pulled it out of its sleeve to dry it. I thought about all the fussing and fuming I did in the kitchen upon its disappearance. During all that emotional aggravation, it was within arms reach, but out of sight!

It was lost, cherished more dearly in its absence, and reverently pressed between towels when found.

Queasy Uneasy

Yeasty bubbling
almost cramping
not liking smells
or the thought of eating

stomach flip-flops
mucky-taste mouth
too much swallowing
too little craving

not quite nauseated
it's the queasy uneasy
belly kneading
prelude to something

The Great White Expanse

Outside my window is a great white expanse--a snowy field. The temperatures will doom this clean whiteboard slate to an dreary, dead, brownish green by week's end. The snow will melt off so gradually that from moment to moment one would hardly notice.

Ahead in my life is a great white expanse. A whiteboard of classes, lesson preparation and paper correcting. I've made it through one class already. More coops start up this week, and in February the last one I work with begins. My life will hum along, full and somewhat hectic. But at last one day I will look up and the dreary, dead green of late winter will have arrived and spring will be around the corner.

At the moment it hardly seems possible. But the melting snow promises me it will be so.

Procrastination part three

Two days into grinding it out and there's still more to get done. My brain is feeling like over-cooked cauliflower and my rear-end, perfectly molded into the swivel chair, now feels a part of the furniture. I long to move around, to escape, to fly away--but there is enough discipline left to remind me that I did that first, and now I must earn it. When one goes on vacation, one must still pay the bills for it when once back at home again.

I long to make my lesson plans adventurous, eye-popping and a joy. If some plans are more drudge than elation, I feel a sense of failure. As the sand slips through the hourglass, so escapes the opportunity to dig deeper, search more thoroughly, to hack more vigorously through the jungle of possibilities. Every explorer has their near misses. If we had only swung a little more to the east, then the secret burial grounds of the African elephant and all the riches of ivory would have been ours. But instead we turned back--the call of the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches of life was too strong. The glory will be for another time, and the PB & J will have to do.

Procrastination part two

Today I am in the purely perspiration state of things. Not much time left. Now I really have to just dig and sweat and grind out some work. At this point, it will just be ugly. When inspiration doesn't come, and time is running low, you just have to make due with some less-than-stellar ideas and a dim bulb instead of brilliance.

Procrastination, Inspiration and Perspiration

Sometimes you just can't make something happen until it's ready to happen. It would be easy to say that true procrastination is this. That would be laziness. I'm willing to suggest that sometimes it is not procrastination, but a prolonged pondering of what to do. Those of you who have read The War of Art will probably get all over my case about this. Sorry. I have just experienced sometimes that I can put off and put off because I'm stumped. Then finally the idea comes, the inspiration. At last I'm ready for the perspiration in getting it all together.

Examining My White Christmas

I recently read a book that was entirely about snow crystals, more familiarly known as snowflakes. It was fascinating, and made me realize this common fluffy stuff is way overlooked--literally. Do yourself a favor. Get a magnifying glass and step outside someday with it and a piece of dark paper to catch the crystals on. Look at them closely. The big fluffy ones are merely clusters of smaller stars. Individual stars are amazing. Be patient. Many are broken. They melt quickly. If you don't gasp at the beauty, or even wonder at their symmetry, you have my deepest sympathies.