Lest I Forget

I woke up one morning and realized that I had let too many things go. The things that matter to me, that make up the rhythm of our days. It is easy in life to get overwhelmed and revert to what I call "survival mode". You take care of the basics of life until life calms down. Then you can take a deep breath, hike up your britches and add those things back to your day. I am starting small. Bread, to be exact.  I had stopped making bread in Germany because, well, let's face it, German bread was better, not to mention fresh baked and cheap, and could be obtained by a quick stroll to the village bakery. Now? I have no excuse for eating bread that doesn't taste good. My mother had a bread machine taking up space in her pantry. So, I brought her machine to my little condo, and started experimenting. I now have a nice white loaf that is delicious. Next up is a honey whole wheat loaf that is not too dry. My goal is to add back one thing at a time, until it is a full lif...

Picture if you will, a college campus, a boy, a girl.  He, a meat  and potatoes kind of guy. She, a vegetarian. Both studying  music, yet an unlikely match. Nevertheless, they meet, fall in  love, and get married. A quarter of a century passes, seven kids are born, and the next  thing you know, he is stationed in South Korea. One night he is looking for something to watch on Netflix and decides to watch  a documentary, and becomes a vegan. His wife, meanwhile, is now  raising a pack of carnivores back in Tennessee. What will become of these two? Will she learn to how to prepare  vegan meals? Will the kids protest? Only time will tell, though  the protesting children are pretty much a sure bet, based on  tonight's foray into vegan cooking. Stay tuned as the story  unfolds.

The days have been flying by, barely allowing me to appreciate them at all! In one sense, that is a good thing, because it makes this year's separation from Tony go faster. I can't believe we are almost at the halfway mark. On the other hand, after the kids are finally in bed and I can breathe a sigh of exhaustion, I wonder how many times I really, truly looked at them that day.     The kids and I have been looking out the windows of the van all through October and into November at the brilliant fall foliage surrounding us. The mountains almost looked ablaze for a while there with all the reds and oranges of the trees. Then, almost overnight, after one of those windy, rainy kind of nights, the colors were gone. Fall was gone. The dreariness of a long winter stared back at us.     Same trees, one week later As the idea of a long, cold winter sunk in, I happened to notice this pair of deer frequenting our backyard in the mornings. The ba...