"Like the study of science and art, accounts of historical events can be intrinsically fascinating. But they have a wider significance. I believe that people are better able to chart their life course and make life decisions when they know how others have dealt with pressures and dilemmas---historically, contemporaneously, and in works of art. And only equipped with such understanding can we participate knowledgeably in contemporary discussions (and decisions) about the culpability of various individuals and countries in the Second World War. Only with such understanding can we ponder the responsibilty of human beings everywhere to counter current efforts at genocide in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia to bring the perpetrators to justice." "...we humans are the kinds of animals who learn chiefly by observing others---what they value, what they spurn, how they conduct themselves from day to day, and especially, what they do when they believe that no one is looking." ----Howard Gardner, from The Disciplined Mind, published in 1999
----excerpted lyrics from "Digging in the Dirt" by Peter Gabriel.
Tonight my county is beginning the observation of Domestic Violence Awareness Month a day early. The community event is called A Show of Hands.
For myself, the irony of naming the event after the easiest, and therefore, one of the most common weapons of choice in domestic violence situations is somewhat uncomfortable.I don't much care for the term domestic violence. It sanitizes it: pretties it up somehow.
For instance, in spoken language and in what is written on the package, an enema is just that: an enema; even the graphics on the box are generic, straightforward.
Yet a douche? It's feminine cleanser. The graphics on the box are most often limpid, flowery. Most importantly, those things aren't really of any use: a woman can actually do more harm to her body than good in using such a product.
Just tell it like it is: get rid of the crap; then leave well enough alone.
But I'm uncertain as to what to call it, this very specialized form of violence: a product of any silence that has ever met any violence against those perceived as weak---be it stranger-to-stranger; familiar-to-familiar. Putting words to things has never been my strongest suit.
But A Show of Hands?
Maybe my visual way of thinking is too informed by images of experience. I'll take good intentions wherever they may be found, dear reader; and really, we all help each other that way, don't we?
A Show of Hands
Hospital photo circa 1992
Nurses holding back hospital gown to show bruising---some of it taking the shape of the hand of the abuser.
October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month here in the U.S. Here at neroli.108 we will not only observe this, but look at the topic of violence against women in total. I'm going to be digging in the dirt. I invite you to stay with me, dear reader: most likely I will need your support.
Pop culture has been a consistent source of amusement for me, particularly when it behaves as its name suggests: when it "pops" out of nowhere. You know me, dear reader---cognitive dissonance is one of my favorite jokes. Madder was having one of his verbal episodes yesterday, on the way to the bathroom:
Today Cobalt's mother hurried up to me as she was dropping Cobalt off for school. She was flushed, excited. I don't often see her with this kind of smile, dear reader. She began to tell me how she had been doing a lot of reading. And that she had a plan for Cobalt. She wishes to cure Cobalt of autism.
Autism can be reversed, she said. I've seen it. Cobalt is doing very well here at school, I say. But Cobalt could be doing so much better, she says. She pats Cobalt on the head as she says this, in front of all our students who I've brought on this sunny day to greet their friend. Jenny McCarthy and Oprah have unwittingly caused more people to feel---well, a strange happiness that comes from promises of changing unhappiness: the kind one feels when it is felt that what you have just isn't good at all.
I think about Cerulean, who is, at last account, on the fifth classroom placement in four years. I wonder if Cerulean yet receives plankton, hyberbaric oxygen, crystal therapy, and the like. I think of Cerulean's family. Of how they would be over-the-moon happy---if Cerulean was at the same place that Cobalt is.
I thought yesterday about beginning a different meditation practice into my routine: the making of enso. One every day. After my encounter with Cobalt's mother, I think tomorrow is a good place to start. Namaste, dear reader. Namaste: Cobalt Naples Vermillion Thalo Blue Rosegold Madder Camouflage and Cerulean
I love videos, as they are a way of showing motion as a visual. It's a favored form for me. Often, when I hear sounds, they process for me in a very visual way; just as when you twirl a sparkler in the air, it leaves a light trail behind, ever so briefly, ever so brightly: topography of motion, fading to a still as it dims on the retinas, slowing to silence. It looks something like this: though I see motion, not specific images that speak to a referent. It's something that makes me happy. How's your week been, dear reader? I'm always glad to see you.
Dear reader, yesterday wasn't a Perfect Day. But I managed to be able to approach the challenges that presented themselves as a more refreshed and reinforced person: in no small part due to the community that you bring with you and that you share on your visits with me. I do so love a reality check. Blue skies, dear reader: they are always there, though often obscured. It's the knowing that they are there that matters. Enjoy the day, knowing that blue skies are only a matter of time, dear reader. Thank you for visiting. I look forward to seeing you again soon.
Dear reader, today was Not A Very Good Day, for all manner of reasons I won't go into here.
I worked very late and arrived home long after everyone was finished with dinner. Being the sole vegetarian in the household, it is not unusual for the rest of the family to start to eat without me. They know I'll pull up a chair with a salad bowl in hand if I'm particularly rushed for time. Tonight, out of sorts and out of time, I didn't want my usual quick salad; I didn't want to eat the same food that I'd been eating all week---food that I had cooked for myself on Sunday to warm up at work: in truth, feeling my not very good day still weighing on my shoulders, I really wished someone to make something for me. The closest I come to this is the local Taco Bell and its bean burritos, dear reader. And so I went. It was just one of Those Days: even my mail was not delivered properly; I know this only because a strange car pulled into our driveway in the late evening bearing a package for me---delivered by mistake to the wrong household. Inside: the starter from Bee and Jai, complete with instructions folded into a lovely card---and a container of fudge brownies. Opening this package, and seeing this kindness, my wise friends arrived in spirit with their gifts of bread and chocolate. On a day I most needed it, it was good to have someone fix something to eat for me.
See, I hear them say, it's just as it should be. Thank you, my friends: it's just what was needed. Namaste. Tomorrow is another day. Rest assured there will be a brownie in my lunch tomorrow.
Tonight I was driving home from university. I passed a commercial bakery, and smelled a yeasty, dense, slightly chemical smell, as if I were the proverbial Princess of the Pea , sitting on a pile of mattresses---if the mattresses were all plastic sacks filled with spongy white-bread hot dog buns. It made me laugh.
I laughed imagining myself as such a princess; I laughed imagining that the bread starter making its way in the mail from Bee and Jai must smell so differently, so elemental and alive in its fermentation. It's funny to me how things dance together, as if they are so much dough and freshly ground spices, dry fruits soaked to swollen, rising up in the heat of the oven: absolutely delicious, absolutely worth passing around to share. Don't you think?
One of the things I enjoy about my friendship with the blogger Artist Formerly Known as Purple Worms is our ongoing dialogue about the nature of art, and the relationship of art to artist. We've been engaged in this topic, off-and-on, for several years now. It never gets old. So when I wrote an earlier post about kitsch in response to reading Howard Gardner's take on the matter, I was fairly confident that AFKAPW would definitely be game to engage in the matter. And so she did!
AFKAPW wrote about kitsch yesterday in response to my earlier post. She informs us as to the origins of the word, and all the cultural attachments that are both origins and results of the word's usage. Please follow the link to read; she is ever more erudite than I, and I therefore won't attempt to paraphrase her words. In her conclusion, she ekes out the relationship, if any, of art to kitsch: Is kitsch art? So that gets me back to one of my all time favorite paradoxes - trying to define Art. (Capital A art.) When push comes to shove, I guess I resolve the issue by narrowly defining what I believe to be art. FOR ME (please note that narrowing there), Art must
1. Communicate some kind of message or meaning (The meaning may simply be that art in the past has been ovely wrought and fraught with meaning and I am protesting against this past idea or that art has ignored the craft of working carefully with its materials.)
2. It must have access to and address society and issues important ot more than one person (thus be seen or heard - if it stays in the bottom drawer - for me it is not art - it is creative expression.)
3. (And here is the one that upsets lots of my colleagues in the Art department) It must have ideals, and have more than a superficial level - it must communicate about something metaphysically important (yes the nature of art itself fits in this category) In short for me art must speak to truth, justice, beauty or some such form.For me this solves the problem of kitsch. If the object is superficial with no depth, then it is kitsch. Now we have the question of audience - for me - if there is a group that finds depth in the object (it has a social/societal component) it is art. Of course that doesn't make it good art, but it is Art.
As is our custom, her words are most thought-provoking for me.
So under these conditions, how do each of the works above measure up? One is Bernini, one is Schnabel; each labeled as Serious Art: yet the frequency of the transmission, the style of the communication is very similar.
Or is it?
AFKAPW speaks to the referent. Is the referent absolutely necessary?
If so, how can each of us agree to the referent? Perhaps one could agree with others that the best referents that Art may address are the examples that AFKAPW gives: truth, beauty, justice, or some such form. Yet if this is the case, does it not also seem appropriate that such referents, such ideals, by their very nature, need many ways to be spoken of, the proverbial elephant to the blind men?
She then writes that : I get tremendous joy in kitsch and alas I have to report it is in a different way than my tender and compassionate friend Neroli finds kitschy joy. I am at heart a nasty and critical individual. While my generous friend Neroli joys in the abundance of feelings and its excessive expression in kitsch, I have to admit to enjoying it as Schadenfreude 9another one of those untranslatable German terms). May the universe forgive me, but I get a certain vindictive glee out of laughing at the grotesquely exaggerated nature of kitsch and looking down my nose at. I just can't quite escape that one-up-man-ship inherent in being an insider looking at the ostracized outsider. In short I am the worst kind of snob. While Neroli laughs with, I alas laugh at. Now I will go to my zabuton and try to meditate on the nature and necessity of compassion and yes after all that I still love kitsch and find it stupidly reassuring.
And it is here that my experience with kids on the spectrum of autism and pervasive developmental disorders comes to bear: my feelings and thoughts about kitsch have everything to with my life experiences and nothing to do with any positive character attributes; all of us have generousity and compassion. Communication, in all its forms, has become more and more my focus of interest. When I first came out of the gates of early adulthood, I thought that art was my passion; since my experiences of living so long with violence and isolation, and the subsequent implications of their workings in living without them, I've come to understand that it is really communication(Perhaps that in and of itself could be a component of a working definition of art?), particulary outside of the verbal realms , that engages me. Working with autism has brought this fact into focus.
Often, our kids with autism will speak to the same kind of referent that our kids without autism do; yet will do it in such a manner that would appear, if I may, kitschy: they are often displaying behaviors that anyone would be able to produce, and would be considered socially exuberant, exaggerated, or without any congruency at all to situational context. Yet, these behaviors are communciation nonetheless. To extend the metaphor: often, these kids will produce opulent velvet paintings when their general-education-population peers are producing Zen brushwork: both are happy responses to the same experience. For example, I've known one little person that we'll call Naples Yellow. In response to a happy feeling, Naples would jump up and down, pigeon-toed, all the while with one arm half-extended to the front, elbow bent, as if drawing another person into a one-armed hug; the opposite arm extended out, its hand moving in rapid circles, hitting that one-armed-hug-hand on the downstroke to affect a rapid and rhythmic clap, all in time to the jumping. The other students? To continue the metaphor: once they understood that this was Naples' way of saying "I'm really happy about this," they made room to hang this baroque, kitschy work next to their own.
Generousity? Tenderness and compassion? Children making room for one another, often despite the models given to them by less enlightened adults. Arguably the best Art of all; art with a capital 'A.' There's the makings of that kind of Art within us all; there's the means of receiving that sort of communication within us all; and there's most definitely room to hang it all on the wall. You'll know it when you see it, dear reader.
It seems a long week to me this week, dear reader.
I'm looking forward to the weekend; I'm looking forward to visiting those of you who have your own blogs.
Keep the light on for me, okay?
Coming to the end of the first week of school and of the fall semester of grad school, I'm thinking so much of all the good stuff we managed to wring out of the last week of summer.
Come and remember with me.
LG and I went peach-picking with Vermillion and his parents.
Snowy and I enjoyed being outside in the backyard with our kiddos running about.
Dear reader, you know how you can view an old saying: as a glass half-full; as a glass half-empty. Just this weekend, as a matter of fact, I was listening to the Roykos, parents of a son with autism, describe their reaction to platitudes on the radio program This American Life---old sayings such as that well-worn war-horse of expression, the one that exhorts us that we will overcome hardships as we are never given more than we can bear as our lot in life. I believe the Roykos recommended the proffering of that platitude as an invitation from one who was just itching for a fight---as the saying goes.
It's been a challenging year this year, and continues to be so. Just when I have been feeling as if the wind is somewhat slack in my sails, so to speak, our new school year begins. Enter one particularly tiny, affectionate, happy little person: a brand-new kindergardener, cute as a button, who walked into his new classroom for the first time, face solemn with the magnitude of his excitement, and melted into an illuminating smile and into my arms, giving me a bear hug and several quite hearty thumps on the back in the process.
Can I tell you what a special thing that is? Can I tell you what makes it all the more special? When I was a little girl, my grandparents lived in one half of a house; the other half was occupied by another couple their age. These good people were as grandparents to me as well, after a fashion---or at least a flamboyant aunt and uncle. I played with their grandsons as a girl, even though they were a few years younger than myself. My new little friend, of the thumping bear hugs, is the great-grandson of my grandparents' neighbors, son to one of my childhood playmates in my grandparents' backyard. As always, in her fashion, my grandmother seems to support me in deep and quiet ways. This is the picture, this life says to me. See the pattern?
Life's full of the good stuff: the surprises and the guffaws, and a few thumps to the back from a tiny fellow with a huge heart can dislodge whatever may stick in your throat. Free from obstruction, you are free to say yes. Free to say yes to the good stuff; free to laugh at everything else: warp and weft, all part of the whole cloth. I wish the same for you, dear reader.
Dear reader, as you might imagine, our kiddos often require their teachers to bring as much energy to the day as they can muster. Sometimes music is just the thing to bolster one's energy levels. Here's the music that was running through the back of my head today, on the first day of school: it saw me through cartwheeling in the classroom to shoes removed and thrust in my face for smelling to insulin checks to the understandable impatience of a kindergardner who wants his pizza, please---all the while having to wait for a twenty-minute-long-wait in line in order to get it. Happy first day of school!
I'll talk with you soon, dear reader. Take good care.
Today we all went to see Mr. Bean's Holiday. Choosing to attend the early matinee, we had the entire movie theater to ourselves, something we enjoyed immensely. The movie is perfectly beautiful, and beautifully happy. The ending was perfectly wonderful, and in what is becoming more and more my usual fashion, I got a little teary-eyed with happiness.
What a wonderful thing to laugh out loud, dear reader. You know what I mean?
There is no place for humiliation in the course of managing individual behavior; behavior is a learned response, one that is predictable; behavior exhibited is the best effort available at the time for a successful outcome by the individual: these are the three assumptions from which our learning in class will proceed. ---Angela Kirby-Wehr, on the operating principles of functional behavioral analysis, and excerpted from my class notes.
Those assumptions are both ballast and Polaris: they are what help one keep an even keel and chart a steady course in sometimes uncertain waters. Be assured, when we go to Meet Children Where They Are, it is well worth it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FFE3zUKmyU
Dear reader, 1939 US filmThe Wizard of Oz has been referenced in yesterday's post as well as today's. I've included the hyperlink, in the event that you would like to read more about the film.
One of the things that I do not enjoy about working with the students and families that I do is that I sometimes experience dependent-arising thoughts in some of the remarks made to those of us in the field of work. I have been trying to grow an attitude of gratitude for the opportunity to break the cycle of dependent-arising when these instances do happen. I know they will always happen. So far, this attitude I wish to grow is a seed I hold in my hand; sometimes, I think that I've sown it: yet, with a fresh remark, I find that it's still nestled in my hand.
For instance, our classroom is in an entirely different building in the district. A support staff team member who had first expressed delight at our coming (I can't wait to get my hands on them. I love those autistic kids) entered the room yesterday and expressed the desire to come and visit from time to time as, even though our students will keep their former support member (as planned by design), she still wished to visit because, well, that's my little quirk. I love kids with autism.
Kids with autism? Children are, and will always continue to be, children. Plain and simple. Autism? A part of the whole child. Please make no mistake: these children are not broken. The quirk, if one could call it that, and I do so here only to parallel the semantics---the "quirk" should be that you love kids.
You might think that I am referencing our newest quirky friend when I referenced the Wicked Witch of the West in the title. Don't be too certain of that, dear reader. It may very well be me, dependent-arising.
So I'll think instead about the young, enthusiastic women who came into our classroom yesterday morning instead: our students leave the room for specials, such as music and art, and these ladies are the general education teachers with whom our students will work for these things. They wanted to know what they could do to help our students; they wanted to know things such as their birthdays and the spellings of their names, so that our students would be included in their rooms in tangible ways: names on the birthday charts, name tags on desks. A gentle reminder to their classmates in that room: I'm coming, I'll see you soon. And for that, I am grateful.
Gratitude? I'm finding, dear reader, that it can be found---even though we may have to shift our focus elsewhere---or perhaps, not even focus elsewhere; but rather, relinquish that focus to a gaze: allowing us to take in more than we had previously, allowing ourselves to be surprised at the goodness that we may find. I love a good surprise, don't you?
Look, dear reader! It's our K-1 Learning Support Room, straight ahead. We've been working very, very hard to make a wonderful, beautiful, exciting place for the new group of munchkins coming through; and we want our second-year munchkins to be even more excited for first grade than they were for kindergarden! It's hard to believe that there were stacks of boxes, no clear table surfaces, and a supply closet flood that made the carpeting very wet, isn't it? http://www.wizardrealm.com/wizards/fantasy.htm http://www.allposters.com/-sp/Glinda-Posters_i1636223_.html
Look, here's Neroli! She's very, very, tired.
Why is she smiling, you ask? She's all dressed up. She's getting ready to meet her new students for the year. She's very excited about that. She's excited to meet their parents. She hopes they will like the room and their teachers very much. She's getting ready to see three of her kindergardeners from last year walk through the door as first graders. Sometimes she feels that spending her days working with these wonderful kiddos is Too Good to Be True. So she'll do this:
Nothing happened. No wonder she's so happy. It already is just like home.
Tomorrow is open house/meet your teacher day. Can you tell I can't wait? All eight of you---I'll see you soon!
Just checking! I'm glad to be here. I'll talk with you soon.
Dear reader, I am unexpectedly called back to work today; grad school resumes tonight. You know what they say about the best-laid plans. Enjoy the day.
Figure 4. Nodule in isthmus of the thyroid which is "hot" on the sodium pertechnetate Tc 99m scan (left) and "cold" on the I131 scan (right).
After a pleasant morning with Big and Little Guys before their first day of school (side note: BG took my breath away when he came downstairs this morning. He made some extremely tasteful selections at TJMaxx---and looked quite handsome in dark Perry Ellis jeans, new black Chuck Taylors, light blue tee with a sky-blue-and-white-checked button-down shirt over---hair done just so. He's growing up so well, to take such pride in himself, that smile when he knows he looks great in clothes he not only chose, but bought with his own paycheck: it's a lovely thing to behold, and I'm happy for him), I went down to the coffee shop to see the old gang. When I came home, I sat down at the computer to finish reading a review of the new Mr. Bean movie on the NYTimes website that I had begun before leaving to see Little Guy off at the bus stop (side note: LG took my breath away with the clarity and magnitude of his smile as he sat perched by the window, waving: I know he is always homesick the first few days of school, and that one of his strategies this year is to smile an extra-big smile when he feels this way; he's learning to figure out this thing called life on his own, and his brave little heart shown in his smile is a lovely thing to behold, and I'm happy for him). After finishing the review, I scrolled down the page, and saw a review for a film I'd not heard of: Descent, with Rosario Dawson, an actress I've always liked very much. The reviewer tells us that the movie is difficult to watch in its cruelty and violence, and that Ms. Dawson gives a magnificent performance, likening it to DeNiro's in Taxi Driver. The reviewer also wrote that, and I paraphrase here, Descent makes Irreversible seem not so terribly violent or cruel after all.
Dear reader, my relationship with violence has been an intricate one, and one that is difficult to articulate. Although violence has long been part of my past, it somehow still informs me; as if violence were a radioactive contrast, shot into my veins: but the half-life is an exceedingly long one. Or, alternately, it seems as if it is the stuff in me at a cellular level, those very atoms that wake up and spin to the larger magnet's tune in the MRI tube. When I read about the story of Descent, it is as if I am in the MRI, and I can feel the violence rise and move: excited, resonating.
Hidden is not the same as nonexistent; it's one of the first cognitive benchmarks we achieve as we grow.
It is because of this that I still will often feel strangely compelled to learn more about violence, and more specifically, how have other people dealt with violence in their lives, and what can I learn from it? For sometimes, to continue the medical metaphor, one just wishes for the one pill to swallow that will Make It All Go Away; or at the very least, manage the symptoms. And so sometimes, when confronted with things such as the movie Descent, I think that I should avail myself of the opportunity to learn something: to see that mythic story in another incarnation, to get a different picture, to affect a more fine resolution to the picture that already exists for me. But what it comes down to, dear reader, is this: a film is a film, a story nonetheless. I've come to believe that it is not so much a learning experience for me to access such stories as it is a diversion, a distraction, from the telling of my part of the story: one of an infinite number of stories that make up this life, this world. So I won't seek out this film. I can only voice my experience to you that violence is a potent substance, more problematic than one knows at a cursory glance, or even after much study.
It's a relatively new thing, in the scheme of things, to be thinking about my own story, this sequel, a follow-up to violence. Rather than listen to the recommendation of one who won't reveal an ending, only telling you that it is grim and shocking, it's a relatively new thing in the scheme of things to look ahead for the good stuff.
Our blogging friend Captain Corky recently posted about his and Corky Jr.'s goals for the immediate future. As always, I learn best in a collaborative setting, so I've decided to take the Captain's lead. There's little time for posting some things ripe for posting, so the list of coming events here is most functional. Little and Big Guys return to school tomorrow; the school district that employs me resumes after Labor Day. This means I have some open all-by-myself-time: a commodity that normally only avails itself to me in times of insomnia or commuting on the interstate to the university. What this means, dear reader, is that in addition to having as many lunches out as possible, I may have more time to write that post that's been swirling in my head about theories of motion, equilibrium, behavior analysis, and a famous quote from the Gospels; or perhaps the post wherein I am attempting to reason how motion as symbolized by the visual may be used as a vehicle for the exploration of language acquisition at the preoperational stage, and perhaps sooner: ideally for children with autism, but certainly for any students who may find that such a thing speaks to them. Or perhaps the post in which I attempt to describe the origins and patterns of my continually growing obsession with spoken and written language: the whys and hows of its efficiencies in communication, and how those with intelligences much stronger in areas other than the linguistic can feel facile in this environment of language. Can you hear that calliope playing circus music?
Once my school district begins, my fall semester of graduate school will have already begun. You might, dear reader, see posts only on a weekly basis; you might see short daily posts. I've commited to this practice of language; you've reinforced my efforts with your presence and your kindness. We'll figure it out together.
Our blogging friend Pelicano asked in an earlier post comment about my avatar here on Blogger. It is a still from what is most likely my favorite film from the master, Hayao Miyazaki: Spirited Away. The image that I've chosen is one of Sen/Chihiro, the protagonist, and a character named No Face seated together. For me, they are two sides of the same coin, one that spins close to my heart. So, dear Pel, dear readers: if you've not seen the film, I would highly recommend it. Here's the trailer as it appeared in Japan, followed by the scene in which my avatar image appears. If you've seen the film, then you know exactly what a potent image it is. Miyazaki is the master indeed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QORyMLG9CyA http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bOJE_F9yL0
Last Thursday evening, Little Guy and Snowy watched the SciFi Channel's Who Wants to Be a Superhero? in one room; Big Guy and I watched NBC's The Office in another. At one point, during a commercial break from their show, S and LG came into the hallway, stood unseen by BG and myself. S announced, in a booming voice: The world was searching for a hero. They foundtwoin Mega Cheeks and Micro Cheeks! At this point, S and LG jump out into the room, clad only in their underwear, and this underwear is pulled fairly high up, exposing their rumps---much like an impromptu sumo look, or a wedgie, dependent upon one's viewpoint. Don't look, BG, I said through my laughter. It's not pretty. BG replies, matter-of-factly, I closed my eyes at 'the world was searching for a hero.'
Wish us luck for tonight, dear reader. More loud and mysterious things may be ahead.
Despite humble and perhaps literally small beginnings, you inspire faith in almost everyone you know. You are an agent of higher powers, and you manifest this fact in mysterious and loud ways. A sense of destiny pervades your every waking moment, and you prepare with great detail for destiny fulfilled. When you speak, IT SOUNDS LIKE THIS!
When Big Guy began work, Little Guy and I missed seeing him during the day, and BG missed his old carefree habits. To help make sense of our new routines, I decided that we should share a special lunch together on Mondays, one of the two days of the week that BG doesn't work.
This past Monday was the last such lunch of the summer, as the boys return to school in the coming week. We cooked a pot of chili (with soy burger, thank you very much :), LG standing by the stove, spoon in hand, as if he were the captain of a ship with a constant hand on the tiller, stirring and adding pinches of salt and coriander; BG making guacamole, using the dasher from the chocolate pot to mash the avocado into the lime juice and salt; and I, of course, had to bake cornbread to complete this cooking, taking care to preheat the skillet so the golden batter hissed and purred when it hit the sheen of black iron. It was fitting, too; for this was the menu of our first celebratory BG's Day Off Lunch. As we sat and ate, showering fistfuls of Frito corn chips over bowls of chilie and guacamole, we again declared contest rules: he (or she!) who first finds one of the three cardamom pods in the chili will be declared The Winner---of what, it's never been specified: somehow, knowledge that one has indeed been acknowledged The Winner seems in and of itself to be most satisfactory. Not a one of us found a single pod, but we were too satiated to much care. Yesterday, I warmed up a bowl of chili. I found all three pods. I'm the winner!
Finding those three pods is the least of the reasons that I consider myself to be occasioned by good fortune. It has been a challenging year this year past, with more challenges to come. This life, full of family and beauty and challenge, this coming here, and having the occasion to meet you as you come by---all have been as serendipitous as finding that first cardamom pod. So many are having such dreary weather as of late, ourselves included. Especially in those conditions, it's fun to find that one thing that makes you The Winner, isn't it? Go ahead: declare yourself The Winner for today. If anyone asks you to present proof positive, you may say I'm holding that cardamom pod, just like a crackerjack toy, for you. Have a great day, dear reader.
When our friend Swampy wrote in her post about the warmth, color, and light of the kitchen in all its manifestations, and the green glass that transmitted that light, that love, I was delighted, and for more than one reason. In the midst of Anita's party, I was already thinking and feeling about what we all can bring to the table, to this life, and was all the more happy for it. I was delighted in reading Swampy's words because I was reminded that sometimes those everyday articles from the kitchen, and those we oftimes use to bring our offerings to the table, are as full of meaning to us as the gifts and the gatherings about the table themselves: metta you can hold in your hand. I was delighted because my special kitchen feelings are evoked by green glass as well: Fire King Jadeite, the tableware used day in and day out by my grandmother, and therefore, such a powerful touchstone for all those feelings and thoughts that are so difficult to put words to---thoughts and feelings so much more easy to speak of by the dance in the kitchen, the putting on the plate, the enjoying with others---be it in the present, or be it in our memories.
Dear reader, at one point in my life, I was a single parent without a home; having only my toddler (now Big Guy), the clothes on our backs, and a garbage bag hastily crammed with favored toys; although this stage of our life lasted for a relatively short time, I still struggled as a single parent, as so many of us do.
Yet I valued so highly what the Fire King Jadeite embodied that I once bought 12 plates I found at a flea market for 5 dollars each---and believe me, at that time, 60 dollars for plates that I did not need, but merely wanted, was a frivolous amount, ridiculously so. You see, I felt so torn from so much of the goodness I had previously known, dear reader, and flung so far away from it: I felt as if those plates were a means, a map, to help me return to what I knew once before, long ago. If I held one, if I ate from one, and served my son what I cooked on one, I could almost barely feel my heart soften and turn---some embryonic feeling that I hoped would grow, and live, and breathe. Of those original 12, I have but 6 that remain. Looking back, I'm glad for my frivolity, that leap of faith: I bought the insurance, hope-against-hope that remains with me today, despite the bumps and bad breaks along the way. They are ever present at our table.
Do you have a favorite touchstone from the kitchen? I'd love to hear about it, dear reader.
I'm glad to know that at the flea market, some wisdom older than myself knew better: yes, I wanted the plates; yet, I needed them just as much---perhaps even more so. Dear reader, may you always have what you need, in the same magic and beautiful ways that a stack of glass has worked for me. Thank you so much for joining me at the table.
Make puri, she exhorted; just enjoy the making and the eating, and then tell us all about it. Of course, I was delighted by Anita's invitation, and resolved to make the puri within the time frame that Anita had proscribed.
To make a long story short, I awoke this morning, the last day of the party, without having made the puris. I was feeling tired, a little deflated, a little out-of-sorts, and honestly didn't know if I would be able to make them.
I made a pot of rose tea, and added rosewater to my cup for that Extra Something. I sat in my grandmother's rocking chair, she who always was so much of the kitchen, offering the work of her hands from her kitchen at any occasion; for her, just being with you was as good as a party . As I drained my cup, the warm coral-pink cloud of rose from the last swallow of hot tea permeated my very skull, and infused into my very self, it seemed---warm, pink, vital: waking my senses and getting me out of the chair.
And so I began in the kitchen. I cleaned collards, and then put them in a crock to cook slowly in a pot liquor of smoked almond broth. As Little Guy sliced hot dogs with a Chinese cleaver, I made the puri dough following Anita's recipe, with only a small change: substituting some of the salty smoked almond broth for the salted water originally asked for.
LG went back to his playing as I added tomato paste to the sliced hot dogs in the pot, and cooked the mixture to a lovely reddish-brown. To this, two cans of bacon and brown sugar baked beans were added, and the pot left to simmer.
Though I had made pita breads countless times, and felt at ease with rolling out those breads while cooking them, I felt less at ease with cooking the puris as I rolled them. I decided to make all the rounds first, placing them on a big platter and covered with a towel, and then I would fry them.
As I rolled out the breads, I felt comforted by the crick-crick, crick-crick sound of my ring on the round pin. I felt happy as the dough stretched and turned, as the pin rolled around.
When the first circle of dough went into the hot oil, it bubbled happily and seemed to burst with joy, and I laughed out loud.
Come here, LG, I said, look at this!
Naah, well...okay, he said. Okay, all right, let me get my stool.
LG, perched on his stool, stood at the stove by my side as I splashed the top of that first puri with oil, and then flipped it. He watched with much exclamation as it continued to balloon and as I carefully brought it out from the oil to drain on kitchen paper. We both admired its beautiful, happy golden, glistening roundness. It was too lovely for words.
The next thing that I know, dear reader, LG has completely taken over the stove: he is using tongs to pick up a circle of dough to slip it into the oil; he is using a kitchen spoon to carefully splash oil on the top of the circle; he is checking the bottom, and flipping---his puris are puffing, and we are both wooping and clapping as if we were both tiny children.
I had no choice, dear reader, but to watch him and set the table in between puris.
So with vegetarian baked beans in hand, I joined my family at the table, to eat the collards that I had prepared, the beans and franks that LG and I had made together, and the puris that LG had cooked, for all intents and purposes, mostly by himself, with some salty gherkins on the side. This is the best dinner ever, LG said, happily and solemnly, all at once.
My grandfather had an expression whenever he was in the midst of eating something the he very much relished: there ain't going to be no rind.
So it was at our table today, as we toasted Anita and all those at the party.
From the moment that the rose cloud of tea awoke my senses to the moment the dinner was finished, I was so mindful of not only metta, embodied in the kindness of the kitchen, the kindness of the invitation and the gathering, but of ksanika, also known as point instant theory. This is a way of thinking about time, of the passing of time, and of the value of the moment: each moment is here and then never again; our lives' moments, the stories of these moments, are so very much as a movie, a flip-book---miss a frame, the story is changed, and perhaps even makes no sense at the time. What one needs to remember, though, is just to keep watching. The world is a beautiful place, a magical place, and in the kitchen today, I felt as if I were dancing with it.
I thought of the party, and imagined the individual frames, the moving pictures that were making up the story of a party, the story of a gracious hostess, and equally gracious guests.
I may not be able to see the rest of the pictures, but I felt so much the connection to the story.
Thank you, Anita. Thank you, dear guests and dear readers. Remember: the plot may twist and turn; but the story is about beauty. It's about magic. It's about the metta that fits it all together. Eat puris. Laugh together. Enjoy the moving pictures.
I've been working on a post since last week, and making slow progress for various reasons; hence, some visuals, as the second installment of "Crayfish Park" is also slow in coming. (Sorry! I want to know what happens as much as you!) Thank you for coming by, dear reader. It's always good to see you. I'll talk with you soon.
