A Small Blog

Looking at Life in Small Pieces

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I hope you enjoy Jack’s and my stories. Remembering is hard work. I’m a retired Development Director, Communications Mgr. all for nonprofits. Jack worked at Whole Earth and he cooked.

  • Wade in the Water

    This is from the bible verses of John 5:1-10.  There was a pool in Bethesda surrounded by five colonnades.  A great number of diseased, lame, or otherwise afflicted persons lay by the pool. At certain seasons, an angel of the Lord would go down and trouble, or agitate, the waters.  Those who made it into the waters as they were roiling, would be healed.

    There was one paralyzed man who had lain by the pool for 38 years.  His physical state did not allow him to ever make it down to the pool in time to be healed. When Jesus asked him why he had been there so long without being able get in the water on time to be healed the man said, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.”

    Now sometimes this verse gets the negative treatment. What’s wrong with this guy he can’t drag himself down to the water in 38 years. Everyone else can get down there. What a whiner, he expects someone to help him down to the pool. After all “God helps those who helps themselves.” Those people on welfare and food stamps, they should just get off the couch and go get a job. They’re just lazy and looking for a handout. All those kids with no health insurance. So what if that single-mom is working two jobs just to provide the basics. We shouldn’t have to pay for those kids healthcare. Certain politicians think the way to balance the budget is by cutting all human services programs.

    Everyone needs a little help sometimes. After all, Jesus didn’t berate this man, he healed him. It’s hard to pick oneself up by the bootstraps if you don’t have boots. Sometimes it’s hard for us to ask for help as it can be interpreted as a sign of weakness.
    The platitude that states “God won’t give you more than you can handle” doesn’t mean you can’t ask for help from your fellow humans as well as the spiritual implications.

    It’s ok to give help–joyfully, and without judgment.  It’s ok to ask for help without guilt or supplication.

    OK, that’s my rant for the day.

  • This week according to two

    Posted two blogs this week, attended two holiday mixers, and worked out at the gym two days. This must have been my ‘two’ week as I was then ‘too’ exhausted for much else.

    Managed to get myself released from the HOA board. Just couldn’t take the stress any longer. Feel much better. Will vote “no” to all proposals at the emergency financial meeting for all homeowners, just to be the Scrooge.

    The cat somehow got his neck and front paw hooked in the bag with the big jingle bells and raced around the house clattering like crazy. He was sorely traumatized, as was I from trying to catch him before he twisted it around his neck and hung himself.

    What else? Work is busy right now as we are getting ready for the two (there’s that number again) week holiday break. Submitting ads and articles and generally getting our ducks (two) in a row, so when we come back we can hit the door running.

    Getting ready to take our two mile Sunday morning walk on the trail.

    How was your week?

    my sleeping kitty
    After the jingle bell rock trauma

  • Yo Quiero Camaro

    The San Antonio Camaro Club said, “show us your Camaros and your loaded Bel Aires, and tricked out Crown Vics and Chevys, too.”

    Never thought I say it, but I really enjoyed the Camaro Club’s car show this weekend at Providence. There were lots of cool cars from my generation and oldies music, and nice people having fun.

  • Why Girls Matter

    Over the past few years, I’ve read some pretty enlightening and emotionally heavy books about the treatment of girls and women in some cultures around the world. It started with Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi, A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini, The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seirstad, and finally, Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristoff and Sheryl WuDunn. I had the pleasure of hearing both Sheryl WuDunn and Isabel Allende speak in person about their advocacy of empowering girls and women to bring about more equitable treatment and socioeconomic advances for their communities.

    Along the way, the difference girls and women can make in a society is confirmed again and again. Some of the how that happens is by working to bring an awareness to the causes that fight to end sex-trafficking and genital mutilation; provide basic education, job training and micro-lending. It’s absolutely amazing to me that there is still so much gender inequality in the world. In many countries females just don’t matter. Even though, the truth is, that not only do girls and women matter, but often hold the key to the entire community’s prosperity, their family’s well-being, the socioeconomic evolution of subsequent generations.

    This video by The Girl Effect lays it right out for you!

  • Banana Nut Bread with a Story

    Or, how I got my Fannie Farmer Cookbook (1969 edition)

    In 1966, during my sophomore year at college, I was invited to participate in the work-study program. I was paired with the new sociology professor, Dr. Bullion-yes, like the cube. During our initial conversation, he pulled out the bottom drawer of his file cabinet, handed me a magazine, and asked “What do you think of these?” Gracing the cover were pictures of young women volleyball players, inside were more athletic women–all totally naked. A quick mental assessment made me think “This is probably a test.” I said, “Nice, while they look very healthy, I’m not interested.” I must have passed, as I went on to work for him for 3 years with no other offers to view naughty magazines.

    In those days, on the Southwest Texas College campus, students mostly came from small, rural towns. The guys were studying agriculture, the women aspiring to become teachers. There were no blacks on campus. Dr. Bullion spent several years opening minds and hearts on the civil right issues in his classes. He held the first class on Black History and introduced us to African-American writers and poets. Bullion would stand on his desk and holler out Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Du Bois. Quite impressive. He instituted the first, and I think only, student exchange week with Prairie View A&M, which at that time was an all black college near Houston.

    But for all that liberal attitude about race, he somehow missed the part about women’s rights. For graduation, he gave me a copy of the Fannie Farmer Cookbook. Even then, I thought something about that was wrong, wrong, wrong. Was he telling me ‘now you have a college degree, but you really need a husband?’ Am I supposed forget about a career and learn to cook so I can be the perfect little wife? I was incensed, but kept the book as a memento of Dr. Bullion and his insightful, action-filled teaching style.

    So, as life if full irony, I eventually grew to rely on, and love my Fannie Farmer Cookbook (not necessarily just to cook for the men in my life). It was the only cookbook in my home, until I married a chef and his gazillion cookbooks. It’s cover has long been missing. Some of the pages are attached with paper clips, torn and stained with spots of ingredients past. It’s simple and easy with timeless recipes that never fail me.

    Here is the recipe for banana nut bread that now my grandkids love to make.

    Banana Nut Bread

    Some like to add 2 tablespoons melted butter to the batter. (I do)

    Mix in a bowl

    3 ripe bananas, well mashed

    2 eggs, beaten until light

    Sift together

    2 cups of flour

    3/4 cup sugar

    1 teaspoon salt

    1 teaspoon baking soda

    Add to the first mixture. Add 1/2 cup nut meats, coarsely chopped. Being Texan, we always add pecans.

    Stir well. Put in a buttered 9×5 loaf pan.

    Bake 1 hour at 350°

    Enjoy every morsel.

  • Foreign Films — a small review

    I have a new weekend hobby–watching foreign films on TV through Netflix streaming video via ROKU. Foreign movies give a bit of insight into other countries’ people, customs and sociological convention. Also, climate, dress, and even food. I hear a foreign tongue, see them eat tongue, and watch them tongue each other while having sex. (Foreign movies having much more naked and writhing bodies than your typical Hollywood films.) I like the subtitles, since my partial deafness usually gives me difficulty during low-speaking or breathy dialogues.

    Here are a few films I’ve seen lately.

    “Jar City” an Icelandic film–a pretty good murder mystery. The main character is an older detective with a complicated personal life and a nice, young associate detective. Did you know you can get sheep’s head through the fast food drive-up window in Iceland? And, of course it’s very cold and bleak. Not the sheep’s head, the landscape. The sheep’s head, complete with eyeball, is greasy and gross. They also have close up autopsies and dig up a 20 year-old grave.

    “Harem” a Turkish-Italian movie. Won some award at Cannes. Lots of beautiful women, of whom you see lots of. It tells the story of the women in the last harem of the last Sultan of the Ottoman Empire around 1900. An interesting story which encouraged me look up more information on the history of the times. Gorgeous sets and costumes, when they were wearing any.

    “A Somewhat Gentle Man” a Norwegian film staring one of my favorite actors, Stellan Skarsgard. Mostly you think of Ulrik as “that poor bastard.” He’s just been released from prison and is stumbling his way into several unsatisfactory relationships and quickie sex acts. He’s also eats many meals, all of which contain some kind of fish. But, the characters are quirky and fun and it does end fairly well.

    “Biutiful” a Spanish film which is not pretty or even attractive. It’s ugly, sweating, dirty, sad, depressing…need I go on? Sometimes these kind of films are called arty. I call this one awful and waaaay too long. Interesting mix of multiculturalism, though.

    Last one, “Vidocq” a French film, starring Gérard Depardieu. It’s a mix between a supernatural thriller and detective movie. Intriguing and interesting with great characters and interesting sets. Looks like France in the 1830‘s had plenty of decadence and opium smoking.

    You can find these films and more at Netflix or IMDB.

  • Real Homemade Ice Cream

    This afternoon, on the way home, I drove past a Marble Slab Creamery.  The neon sign was blinking “Homemade Ice Cream.”  And, I’m like, “I don’t bloody think so!”  Homemade ice cream is made like this…

    Mom lovingly stirs up the ingredients on the stove, scalding the milk just right.  Dad gets out the hand-crank ice cream maker.  The milky mix is poured all steamy into the canister, lowered into the wooden bucket full of ice with homemade ice creamrock salt on the top.  Old quilts are laid over the bucket so the kids can sit on the top and keep things steady while Dad cranks with a strong, firm pace.

    Thirty minutes later, the top of the canister is pried off and everyone takes turns spooning up the most delicious, creamy ice cream ever, bar none, no comparison.  Really.

    Here’s the recipe handed down from my grandmother.

    Three Quart Freezer Ice Cream–Hand Crank

    5 eggs beaten

    2 quarts milk-scalded

    Add 1 tablespoon flour to 1 3/4 Cup sugar and add to the milk

    Add the eggs.

    Cook 1 minute.

    Add 1 can Carnation evaporated milk and 1 tablespoon vanilla

    Feel free to add Texas peaches or other fruit.

    Hand-crank with love.

    That’s homemade ice cream.

  • Letter to Lifetime Fitness Marketing

    Dear Lifetime Fitness Gym,

    My household received your extravagantly over-sized marketing ad in the mail yesterday. You know, the one with the young, thin, slightly sweaty girl in skimpy work-out clothes on the front. Such a slick piece, I thought, warranted a look.

    I noticed several things that made me think you weren’t really interested in my actually joining Lifetime Fitness. There were no pictures of anyone over 35 or mentions of programs for senior citizens. None of the models looked anything like me or any of my friends. If you’re trying to infer using your facilities will transform older, droopy, overweight persons into trim, muscular, wall-climbing athletes, I am Woman at the Gymsmarter than that.

    Also wondering how high the dues must be for you to be sending out full color, magazine-sized ads that must have cost a bazillion bucks in a direct mailing.

    Where I go to the gym, there are people of all ages and body types, working to stay healthy. Maybe some real people stories might appeal on a broader basis. Or, maybe you just want the beautiful at your gym? Good luck with that.

  • My Dream House

    I have this house I dream about. It’s the house I lived in from 1969 to ’77 in Austin, Texas. Fresh out of college, two single, white females with hair down to our waists, my roommate and I found this house during an evening stroll. It was empty; but, we could hear it calling to us. We found the owners and asked if we could rent.  Amazingly, they said yes, rent is $90 a month. Even back then, it was a great deal.

    The house was built in 1926, a split level with a small downstairs apartment. It was (and is still) located right on the cusp of Clarksville near Mopac. The house had no air-conditioning and a old refrigerator with the motor on top. But, it was full of good vibes.  We moved in and proceeded to live the life we had been dreaming of those past four years in school.

    Without a doubt, those were the best days of my life. Oh, not that I don’t think all my days are the best, including tomorrow, next week, next year… In 1969, the neighborhood was in flux. With only a few actual homeowners left, the hippies had moved in. The neighborhood felt like a commune. We had our own gardens and vegetarian guru who supplied all our greens, if you know what I mean. I worked as a waitress in a popular restaurant and made plenty of tips. I think we saw every band that played the Armadillo. We came home in the early morning with our dancing shoes in one hand and a sweet boy in the other.  Later, our naked little babies played together in the back yard.

    After we both had moved out and moved on, I began frequently dreaming of the house. I’d walk through the rooms with feelings of deep emotion, like a longing to be back home. Over time, the dreams became less frequent and the house began to look kinda distorted with odd shaped rooms or a weird view from the windows. But, it still felt like it was a place I wanted to get back to.

    Our House is a very fine house.

    Several years ago, my husband and I bought our first home.  Some days I sit in my comfy chair, by a cabinet full of all my souvenirs, and look out the large front window. With the smell of jasmine and honeysuckle wafting in, I watch the sparrows flinging bird seed all over. I say “thanks” for this wonderful home.  And, I can’t remember the last time I dreamed of the Austin house.

  • I Want to Go Home to the Armadillo

    One of my favorite lines is “if you remember the 60’s (or 70’s) you weren’t really there.”  Well it seems plenty of us were really there and are remembering the Armadillo World Headquarters–that venerable music venue in Austin, Texas which was THE place to hear live music from 1970 through the early 1980’s.

    Having been pointed in the direction of the ‘I Remember the Armadillo’ Facebook page by my brother Jack, I became an immediate fan.  I proceeded to spend way too much time reading the posted memories, checking out the list of bands and dates they played, and creating my own nostalgic musing. Since my downstairs neighbors worked at the Armadillo, and would put me on the ‘list,” it seemed I was there every time the doors opened.

    Just about every band or musician you ever heard of and, some you hadn’t, played at the ‘Dillo.   Always the best audience, we gave a standing ovation for everyone—Ravi Shankar to Jerry Lee Lewis, Commander Cody to Frank Zappa, Freddy King to Boz Scaggs, and the list goes on.  The Armadillo embodied everything about that era in Austin, the music, the camaraderie, the wafts of smoke (you know what I mean).  But, it was definitely, first and foremost about the music for me.

    So this weekend, I grooved to some of my old LPs, did a little dance and felt the love.

    Listen to some good music this week.