December ice

Did you know that plants talk? They emit sounds of distress when cut or starved for water. You can't hear them, but that's on you, because mice can and moths can, and they choose their plants carefully, going for the healthier, quieter ones. (You can read about it in many places, like for example here-- where you can also listen to the amplified distress calls plants make.)

Ed and I talked about this over breakfast (which was deliciously decadent, as I had done substantial grocery shopping very early this morning, including at Madison Sourdough).

 

I noted that if we stop eating plants to save them from distress, and if we continue to avoid animals in our diet, we will be left with just water and a very short lifespan. 

Such scientific findings are common topics of discussion for us. For example, I told him today about that article in Nature that describes how much your gut microbiome shares stuff with people not only in your family but in your circle of friends. We marveled how little we understand all this today and how complex these issues are. Ed was quick to point out that we also share a significant biome with our cats. Lovely thought, isn't it?  Next thing, he'll tell me that the chickens and I also exchange microbes. I mean, I know it's true, but still, maybe we should have picked more selectively who should be in our tight inner circle of microbes? You really want to align yourself with chickens??

 

It's cold outside, but just a little less so than this whole past week. The subfreezing temperatures have created an early freeze out on the lake waters. For instance, when I drove out to shop this morning, I passed the lesser lake. It's already filling with ice fisher people. Can you see them? I myself would not venture out yet, but I'm sure they know what they're doing.

It was to be a quiet day for me. Sort of catch my breath before the onslaught of craziness, but in fact things did get a little more complicated. For one thing, Ed coaxed me into a bike ride.

Nippy! But good for us. We did our usual 45 minute loop despite the wind! 

(A pause by Lake Waubesa: looking pretty ice covered and slippery out there.)

Then, in the early evening, I join the young family and visiting other grandparents for a pizza dinner. They're here for Snowdrop's performance in Great Catherine today. There'll be a lot of mixing and mingling with various sets of grandparents this weekend and next weekend (other shows, birthdays, celebrations) and I have no idea which (if any) can be included (photographically or otherwise) on Ocean. You hate to ask. Or at least I hate to ask. So you have, instead, the usual suspects once again, ready for anything.  Ocean photo? Okay!

And now I am home with my own lovely set of microbes sharing Ed's biome in our warm, comfortable home. A winter evening at its best.

December play

It used to be that I could pack ten big ticket items into a day and not think twice about it. Put in a day of work, tend to kids' issues, take them to activities, cook their meals, plan their vacations, put up the tree, warp a few gifts, attend a kid performance -- you get the picture. These days, if I have one event that is out of the ordinary, I consider myself mightily booked and busy. True, I don't have many free hours. I joked to my daughter recently that the mornings are for doctors' appointments and the afternoons are for the kids, and though that may be a bit of an exaggeration, it really is true that mornings are for chores and the occasional walk with Ed (and for doctors appointments!), and afternoons are indeed for the kids. My downtime typically is limited to the hour or two after I put away the last dinner dish.

Occasionally though, something unusual crops up and any such event becomes central to the rest of the day just because it takes me out of the repetitious routines (chores and docs plus kids) and puts me in the thick of something else. Today, that event is Snowdrop's play.

The girl first signed up with the Young Shakespeare Players (a local theater group for young people) this summer, and like her mom and her aunt before her, she was smitten with the whole experience. Yes, there's a play that they put on -- typically an unedited, unabridged Shakespeare play -- but, too, the whole set up is very agreeable to a preteen kid who craves independence. They have a lot of it during rehearsals (meaning there's a lot of hanging out with other like-minded kids, without an adult always telling them what to do).

This fall, the group is putting on a non-Shakespeare play. It's G.B. Shaw's Great Catherine, Whom Glory Still Adores and if you have never heard of it, well neither had I before she signed up for it. The story is set in 18th century Russia during the reign of Catherine the Great. Snowdrop plays Claire, the fiancee of the visiting Captain Edstaston from England. Uninhibited Catherine, with her drunk former lover, Potiemkin and prim Edstaston with his equally English-prim Claire. You see the potential for comedy. Romance, intrigue, mockery -- it's all there.

The performance is tonight (the first of four for Snowdrop) and I am the only family member attending, so it's a big deal. (The others will see her tomorrow.) And as I wrote above, that one event sets the tone for the day for me. 

Of course, the day begins with the routines that are just fine and lovely (and cold once again!), but they are predictable. You know them well:

(granola today...)

The rest of the morning? Productive! Holiday stuff, for sure, by the Christmas tree...

(hello, little ones...)

(don't you just love a morning sunshine on the Christmas tree?)

 (Friendly, surveys Sparrow's construction project critically..)

... but also I snuck in some weight lifting. Such variety in my attempt to keep active in the winter season (and I don't care what the calendar says -- it's winter!): last year it was ballet. This year? I'm going for weights. An article in the NYTimes today reminded me of this chilling statistic: average keel over age (in the US right now) is 76. That's not the chilling part. We all die. One or two years this way or that way -- eh, small potatoes. The more chilling part was that most people develop serious age related health conditions soon after reaching 65 and it's downhill all the way after that. Some of this is luck, some of it is genes, much of it is also lifestyle. Up the grains, cut the booze, sleep well, move more.  It's a familiar tune. I just need to turn up the volume a little come winter. So, weights, here we come. They've been collecting dust in the basement for too long.

And here's something else I got from the NYTimes -- I'll share this story here. It's not one I would normally regard as a good read: all about a rich couple, with a stunningly beautiful house in the Hamptons. And yet, as I read along and admired their home, I was completely enchanted by all of it. They're artists and they built a successful jewelry business -- I dont really know how or why they got lucky with it. They started off as California Beatniks, she a drop out from high school, he enchanted with her, she with him. Plenty of love. Shared interests. (His name, David Yurman, appears to be totally recognizable among jewelry wearing people, but of course, here at the farmette, I never heard of him or his famous bracelets that lifted him to great fame.) When you read the story, you feel happy for their success. And of course, the notable fact is that they are both 82. And happy. A double yay for them!

In the afternoon I pick up the kids, bring them to the farmhouse...

(wild but sweet!)

 

 (ditto)

 

... and basically stuff food into them, especially the girl, who, to my knowledge, will not be eating dinner tonight as they make her show up early and the play ends late.

I then drop her off at the theater, him off with his dad, and I have this hour to kill. No point in going home. How about a relaxing moment or two at Barriques? It's been a while since I sat quietly, alone, in a cafe-bar in the evening. Sort of like an Edward Hopper painting, only I can't help but have a smile on my face as I look around me. I imagine most people at the tables around me are content. They look content. It's warm, cozy, a few are talking, some are with their laptops, I'm with my book. 

And then it's time to see the show. She is fabulous, of course. Great expression, perfect delivery.

Am I biased? Oh, I don't know... 

 

 

Snowdrop seems to take to the stage. For a girl with a normally subdued voice, she projects well, stays in character, and you can tell she enjoys the nuance of her lines. And the play is funny! A wonderful evening. 

It's late before I get home, reheat my supper. No matter! We have another episode of Clarkson to watch. Feet up, big cup of soup before me, with freshly grated cheese on top, of course. Exhale, with Ed, in total contentedness.

December nostalgia

I spent a good chunk of time looking at Etsy holiday place mats this morning. I know, I know -- what a time suck! Don't I have have better things to do in this extremely busy month? But the fact is, I loved it. I didn't buy anything yet -- they're all too expensive for my Christmas crowd of people at the table, and they have such a limited use: one, maybe two, at most three days and poof! Put away for another year. Besides, there was no perfect one: simple, not cluttered, not tacky, a feast for the eyes, but emphasizing something other than gift giving. Maybe nature, with a holiday twist? A gingerbread house? At least that's what made it into my "heart" pile. To be reviewed and reconsidered later.

What stood out for me is how much of what's there in the Etsy holiday stash bears the label "vintage," and how much of that stuff actually belongs to an era that matches up with my childhood. As I said in previous posts, my family didn't give Christmas much attention, but I showed my rebellion! I was completely enthralled by it -- wide-eyed and mesmerized with all the Christmas stuff in my local five-and-ten store (the equivalent of Target on a tiny scale), and in the magazines, in comic books (the Dennis the Menace Christmas Special was my hands-down favorite), and on television. I loved all the Christmas shows (Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol, the Christmas episodes of all sit-coms), the Christmas commercials ("rolling heads, rolling heads, rolling all the way, Norelco is the Christmas gift to give on Christmas Day!" "Have a nice holiday, with C-A-N-A-D-A D-R-Y, Canada Dry, the best you can buy is Canada Dry!"), the store displays, the shops with scraggly Christmas trees for sale out front. And many of those images are now sold to you, babes, with the label "vintage." 

It hit me how much "of another era" I really am! 

In other news -- it is a very cold day! You'd think sunshine would help, and it does. 

 

 

 

Theoretically at least. But the walk to the barn this morning is nonetheless brisk. For me and for them.

(the birds, on the other hand, seem just fine!)

Breakfast -- still with oatmeal. Ed douses it with maple syrup, I prefer fruits and yogurt and honey. 

And yes, my December lunch hits another level of decadence.

I pick up the kids as usual. They're in great moods. he was a classroom helper today, she hung out with her pals at recess. It takes that little to make them happy (imagine being thrilled to be appointed a "helper," who is then tasked with doing more rather than less in the course of the day!).

(why they always leave their winter jackets in the car is beyond me...)

In the evening, I reheat the soup of course. The beauty of veggie soup is that it lasts. And lasts. Ed turns on Season 2 of Clarkson's Farm. Somehow we watched Season 1 and Season 3 but never tuned into this in between one. More than once I found myself laughing out loud. When you listen to the news of the day -- national and international -- you honestly think that laughter belongs to some bygone era. And yet, tonight I laughed. Perhaps it's because tending to animals, to flowers, fruits and veggies is so hard. You need skill, experience and luck to have a really successful year. Clarkson knows how to turn this all into a good show. Watching him stumble along is good comedy, but it also makes you feel better about all the hits and misses you've had in your own growing fields, with your own farm animals. So you laugh at the show, and too, at yourself.

Laughter and reheated soup. A perfect winter evening.

December trees and a very gusty wind

The trees outside are still there come winter, for you and me, for the beasts and birds that pass under and around the bare branches. 

 

The Christmas tree inside? Beauty, unleashed. I could look at it all day. I hear that Snowdrop begged to sleep on the floor next to it. Her mom relented. The girl was enthralled. Ed often dozes off next to our tree, though I'm not sure he's feeling the same kind of thrill! Still, he tells me it smells nice.

By the time I reached my thirteenth birthday, such things as Christmas trees (indeed, Christmas itself, and, too, birthdays, or any celebrations) became too much of a bother to my parents and so there was a period where I had no tree inside. As soon as I left home to live in my own little studio, I brought back that tree. Small at first, but like the farmhouse tree, over the years it grew. Because, well, you just can't get enough of that twinkle, sparkle and shimmer, made all the more lovely now that you don't have to turn off the lights -- the bulbs aren't hot, the branches wont dry out.

December surely gets the prize for jazzing up your world significantly. Despite all odds. Despite the tough weather days, the lack of color outside, despite everything -- inside, there is something akin to magic.

Okay, but let's get back to the prosaic day-to-day concerns of a December day. For example, breakfast. You know that this meal counts for a lot in my book. My only regret is that it doesn't last nearly long enough and that I really have to work hard to resist having a second very large cup of milky coffee.

Today's breakfast was a bit of a mess, because Ed absolutely had to get through to someone or other for his machining project and so he came to the table with phone in hand. Never a good idea in my book. I sulked. "But I wanted to be there with you!" -- he tells me later. Well sure, his presence is important to me, but I'd rather sit alone with Christmas music than with a guy who is trying to explain to DHL that they mis-delivered something important. Too, that phone call lasted forever. I was done before he got it all straightened out. Nonetheless, it was a good, warming meal. Yes, it's back to oatmeal. The cold windy gray morning deserves it. And here's my bargain with myself: if I eat boring oatmeal for breakfast, I surely can spice up lunch with a plateful of holiday cookies -- all combinations of gingerbread and chocolate, which for me is a true taste of Christmas. 

There is a threat of snow in the air. Just a threat. States to the east of us will get a wallop of the white stuff. We remain naked and brittle and brown. Winter, without the crunch and the beauty of snow. I stay inside. Ed works on fixing the ancient dryer. He comes up at noon: I fixed the dryer, but knocked the pipe out in the hot water heater. So, yes, you can dry clothes, but no, you cant use hot water. At all. He goes back down to the basement.

 

I head out to get the kids early today. With stops to take care of the most boring, the most trivial of chores. And yet, I like the drive. With music playing, brain on idle, eyes focused on the road (and on the speedometer!) -- December driving puts me in a trance. Is this what meditation feels like?

 

 

Kids... I get the question from one: can we stop for ice cream today?

Not today. Tomorrow. Can't have treats every day, you know that.

Then from the other -- But Gaga, if you go to the poor house (my oft used excuse for not going out for treats daily) then you'll become rich! I dont follow this logic, so I stand firm.

Please?

Tomorrow.

We will be so disappointed... Siblings united now. One front. 

It's good to occasionally feel disappointment.  

One: Please, please, with all my heart! With all my body! With the universe!

The other:  Please go straight, to the ice cream shop. Please!

Guess who won that battle?

 

 

When I drop them off in the evening, I weave my way through a residential neighborhood to see what people have done to their yards in preparation for the holidays. It's lovely now in these early days of December. (By January I will have had enough!)

I pick up my bi-weekly CSA winter spinach, carrots and collards and come back to the farmhouse. It's so windy outside! It'll go down to 9F (-13C) tonight. I feed the farmhouse cats and the porch interloper. What's that I see? Snow flurries! Just enough to make the animals hide. We set up a hut with a heated blanket for Pancake, our interloper and the most feral of the ferals. The other two -- Dance and Friendly, are sprawled on the floor vents. (The three remaining cats stay in the sheep shed.) Like me, they like to keep warm. And what better way to do this but to cook soup for supper tonight. Ed pulls out the quilt for the couch. We settle in, grateful for the working furnace, the restored hot water, grateful too for the winter quiet.

with love...

December days

It's hard to feel kindness toward an animal that destroys your newly established peach orchard and decimates your spring tulip collection. An animal who has no shame in eating new plantings in your carefully tended veggie patch and who loves to top it off with a dessert of newly ripened tomatoes. 

And yet...

We have had a steady trickle of visitors today. Deer. In the morning, just as I set out to feed the animals...'

Then again before lunch, this time two of them, completely at home here, even though it is midday -- not the typical hour of their hunt for food.

And they're thrilling to see, despite my antipathy toward their farmette raids.

It's a funny thing about emotion. You may not love an action, and yet you have love for the person or animal committing that act. So much am I in awe of the deer (their movements!), that I despise the hunting season, which, in Wisconsin is complicated: the regular old hunt ended on December 1st, but you can still go after deer with a muzzleloader (Ed explained that one to me... what a sport!) for a few more days, and you have even more time to take down deer with antlers (the proper nomenclature is "harvest" but I find that to be a horrible misappropriation). And you get an additional set of days for the antler hunt later on --  it's called the "holiday hunt" -- from Christmas Eve until January 1st. Such a weird thing: we tell our kids about the magic of Santa's sleigh, pulled by reindeer, and we go out and shoot the deer down for amusement's sake. Antlers and all. [And yes, I do understand that a deer hunt may actually be a good thing in terms of maintaining a healthy deer population. The fact that we so far have removed 189 000 deer from Wisconsin this year, makes for healthier stock in the remaining 1.6 million that inhabit our state, they say. I just do not get the fun of doing it.]

Breakfast, with Ed and somewhere in there we have a cat who enjoys torturing me with her request for a solid petting session just when I'm about to bite into a flaky (reheated) croissant.

The rest of the morning is rather sedentary. This is not a good thing, but countering the urge to stay put is hard when it's cold outside and so lovely in the living room, right before the Christmas tree.

At noon, I propose we walk, despite our lovely and very peaceful moments at home. We go to our local park. Yes, it's cold. The pond is frozen now.

 

But there is sunshine. This should be a lovely little hike. It's even climbing to almost freezing! A positively toasty noon hour. But somehow two topics swirl around us like hornets determined to unravel your inner peace: nuclear weapons and their current levels of sophistication (Ed's been reading up on this for who knows what reason and so he brings it up) and Hunter Biden (I'm responsible for that one, though I didn't quite realize it would spin in the direction that it did -- family relations in general. A positively heated conversation ensued!).

It's not that we disagree on either of those topics. But Ed and I do differ in the way we examine such issues. He does not tip toe around difficult ideas and conclusions. We end the walk less at peace than when we began, which is not the way it's supposed to work. As we drive home, Ed grows sweetly mellow. I take a little longer to get back on track. Maybe it's because my free hours are more precious and I hate for them to be anything less than sublime. Especially on a forest walk.

Grandkid pick up time. I feed them. We read, they play.

Just as the sun sets, I drop Snowdrop at her play rehearsal and return Sparrow to his dad. 

Home now. Beautiful, warm, sparkling with lights home. 

(Cats, knock it off! The tree is not a toy!)

Contentious walk long forgotten. I make a mushroom omelette, put together a salad. Ed asks -- what do you want to watch, gorgeous? 

We're set for an evening of pure contentment.

with love...

 

December

The funny thing is we've grown used to not getting a white Christmas. Or even a very cold Christmas. So this burst of Arctic air is a shock to our sensibilities. Oh, I know it's just a small dose of what is, after all, typical Wisconsin winter weather and it's likely that by Christmas it will all mellow out, but still, everything seemed to come quickly this year, including winter.

And yes, we woke up to a light coating of snow. Pretty, actually.We had a visitor, too.

The deer may be brave, but all the remaining farmette animals are hiding. Not a creature is stirring outside.

Well, maybe a bird or two.

Breakfast, as cozy as it gets! The fake candles are back. (You'll recall that Ed said no to the real ones. They irritate his breathing apparatus.)

We stay inside. Of course we do. I take advantage of online sales and I start in on card writing. In front of the tree, with a mug of tea at the side. It feels wonderful!

Eventually I head out to pick up the grandgirl at school. On the way, I make a quick stop at the post office. There is a line. Not so much for mailing reasons, but for submitting passport applications. Are people thinking of next summer's vacations? Or, is it typical to take care of such stuff in the busiest postal weeks before Christmas? Hmm....

Snowdrop is in high spirits. 

 

 

I press her a little for details, but she cant quite put her finger on the "why." Gym: she liked gym class. And she liked the Advent calendars at the farmhouse. And snacks -- I was agreeable to her favorites. But you cant probe too much. Kid sadness -- that's another story. You want to make sure they can wiggle out of whatever ails them. Kid happiness? It's theirs to hold dear to their growing hearts. 

Eventually I drop her off at her drama rehearsal and I continue on to do a weekly grocery catch up. It is, of course, late when I get home. We're still picking out chunks of leftover turkey for our supper salads. I tell Ed this is the last day where Thanksgiving turkey is deemed safe to eat. He listens. Smiles. Shrugs. Me, I'm officially turning the page on the last bits of Thanksgiving. It's December 2nd! Such a lovely time of the year...

holiday Sunday

It's always like this and it will remain thus until the day I keel over: they're all here, content, satiated, with food and family filling them up to the max, they talk a little, play with the kids a tiny bit (less and less each time, as the kids like to do their own stuff), do a puzzle, sit back, do nothing too, read maybe, talk some more... And then they get themselves up and one car load returns to their home nearby, and the other car load sets off for the return trip to Chicago, and their departure creates this huge void in me that feels at once empty and happy, because it was so good to have them all here (for brunch, which is our usual habit on the last day) and I know they're returning to happy homes, so that's all good, except that I miss them already so much... 

My Sunday in a nutshell.

I suppose the important background information is that it is bitter cold outside. When I go out to feed the animals (just at sunrise), it's 10F (-12C) outside. How did we get January weather so quickly this year?!

I have some prep work to do for the family brunch, but first, I do drive down to Madison Sourdough to get fresh bread and flaky croissants. They'll go well with the eggs (some of our own, but supplemented by store-bought, because our hens are molting, of all things, so their laying is a rare event this month).

I love putting together a brunch for these guys! You can get creative (I added a side of cold-smoked salmon and, too, garlicy mussels, as well as some turkey slices for the kids), but really, the scrambled eggs (with freshly grated Parmesan for those so inclined) are the base, so you dont need to fuss too much beyond that. Sure, I bake up some bacon (and veggie based bacon for the pescatarian among us), and I find myself having time enough to bake a batch of blueberry muffins as well. To add to the morning buns from Clasen's. And of course, there has to be a plate of veggies (tomatoes and avocado) and a huge platter of fruits. I put out a jar of our home made jam and we get a ridiculous amount of praise from kids and adults alike for our summer jamming efforts.

(one end of the long table, all leaves added to it -- just manages to seat 11!)

None of this takes time. It's simple, it's fun and they are an appreciative bunch!

 

 

I don't take too many photos today. But there are two that kind of speak to the moment: one of my two grandgirls from Chicago and me...

And another -- of the whole five of them. All grins and happy hugs.

They leave in the afternoon. Sigh...

After tidying up, I'm ready to sit down and put my feet up (with this coffee break...)

 

 

 

... but Ed coaxes me up and into a walk. Just in our local park. Yes, its bitter cold, but that's no excuse to sit it out. I acquiesce and as usual, I'm so glad that we do a loop through the forest. It really is wonderful to let go of everything and take deep breaths of woodsy wintry air.

At home again, I decorate our tree. It takes me half an hour to do the whole thing. I dont purchase any more ornaments, feeling now rather attached to what's there. A handful from my past, but most are from my years at the farmhouse. 

Lovely, all of it -- just lovely. (I like looking at it close up!)

 

Happy December, Ocean readers! Stay cheerful if you can. We've got each other. Good hearts, good, caring people. Reason enough to smile.

with so much love...