things I didn't know

The weekend before Thanksgiving is always one of making lists, sorting through recipes, taking the time to muse about past holidays, thinking ahead to how this one might play out.

I'm in a food-ish mood this year. Ina Garten may be posting up and down that this is the year for "easy," but that's not my thinking. I don't want hard, but I want intensely fresh and honest. So I read a lot on what to add, what to repeat. I have a really ancient book on Thanksgiving from Williams Sonoma and it is stuffed with papers and clippings from recipes that I have deemed worthy over the decades. 

All this is rather nostalgic. Lovely, really. Favorites will be repeated. Traditions preserved. 

One more glance at a Thanksgiving Q and A in the Washington Post. Ha! Here's the question that stumped me for many years: when to defrost a frozen bird. Of course I started in too late my first years of turkey roasting. Of course! I was one of those that called the turkey hotline. Help me out here, guys! My bird is hard as a rock! And I would run water baths and do all the tricks and I panicked that in the end, the turkey only appeared unfrozen -- that bits of ice still nestled inside, only to be discovered by a Thanksgiving guest who would then get sick from eating undercooked meat. All that worry for nothing! Today I read that you can actually roast a frozen bird and it will come out just fine: you only need to double the roasting time. Who knew!!!!

My bird this year will be plenty unfrozen though. 

What is frozen right now is the land all around us. And the chickens are miffed: no-one likes a cold stomping space. Too, the Bresse hens are incredible foragers. This is a difficult task when nothing looks tasty out there.

Over breakfast, Ed and I talk about roosters. Should we buy one?

My guy has this (crazy) idea that we should get a Bresse rooster and hatch our own Bresse chickens and yes, maybe try to eat the meat that is purported to be so delicious. I think he's been watching too many Just a Few Acres videos. I do not see us smacking our lips over our own hens. Hypocritical? Sure, but also realistic. I know us too well.

And lo, there is a Bresse rooster for sale. But the owner will only part with him if we take the two Bresse girls along with the cockerel. That would give us a total of ten chickens.

Ten chickens? Do we really want to have ten chickens roaming the farmette lands, crowding the coop, digging up my spring flowers?

We spend a good while on this and we come to no resolution.

Meanwhile, I pick up my veggie bag from the Farmers Unite drop off point. We alternate between partly cloudy skies and snow squalls all day long. I'm in the thick of a cloudburst now and it is beautiful! (I pull up the car by the lake, just to soak in the prettiness of it all...)

Less "beautiful" is the biting wind that's also with us this weekend. Ed and I volley the ball of going for a walk: we should go, he'll say. He hasn't been out walking since he fell ill last weekend. Okay, a little later, I'll respond. And then -- we should go soon, this time from me. Back and forth like this, all the way until the sun is about to set.

And we do go out and it is cold but it is also invigorating and very lovely, in the way that only a winter walk at sunset can be.

I do mumble something about the unfairness of this Arctic air, coming as it does a full month before the official beginning of winter, but, on the other hand, it does get us in the mindset of a cold season. You remember to pack good mittens and a warm cap into your jacket pocket. And to wear warm shoes. And you so appreciate returning home to a warm farmhouse. 

Bresse eggs for supper. The new girls are laying regularly, despite the cold. Big girls, big eggs. We are grateful.

Patagonia Super Berry

You get jittery after a chicken coop raid. You count the chickens repeatedly and when one is missing, you're sure another predator was in on the attack, lurking now, waiting for a moment to strike again. "I shouldn't have let them out this morning!" -- is the recurrent theme of the day.

It's time to take a step back and make yourself a cup of (Rishi's) Patagonia Super Berry tea. It's not an everyday tea -- just for when you need to sit back and take a deep breath to recharge your happy cells. [It's a combination of blueberries, maui berries, raspberries, red wine grape skins and hawthorn leaves. You'd think that it would be excessively fruity. It's not. Mellow, gentle, calming. I sip it slowly. With a candle at the side.]

It had been a good morning otherwise.

Breakfast: I bought a raspberry cream cheese coffee cake yesterday at Clasen's and it's fine, if a tad too sweet for us. Still, it's a throwback to an era when such pastries were breakfast staples.

And now the Bresse girls decide to venture out, all the way up to the farmhouse, and one gets stuck in the snow, so that I have to do a rescue (she would have eventually stepped out, but since it's their first winter, I give her a little boost and place her in a box with straw in the garage. There, she happily contemplates life without feeling the sting of a frozen, snow-covered surface).

Then I drag Ed out to search for that missing girl that I was sure was gone for good, but he found her, hiding in the barn behind the tank that holds the water for heating the shed's floor. I wouldn't say it's exactly a warm spot, but it's snug and at least not cold.

All girls accounted for.

Celebrate!

In the late afternoon Ed and I watch Just a Few Acres -- the YouTube posting of an architect-turned-farmer (Pete) and his wife (Hillarie) and their toils and tribulations as they raise cattle, pigs and chickens for the local farmers market. Pete is a good natured, calm guy and I don't think I've ever seen him approach a farming problem without a healthy dose of humor. Ed is addicted to these videos (Pete posts several times each week). I once asked what he likes best about them and he explained that he learns almost as much as if he had a farmer in his family. Since we don't raise animals for slaughter (note here our failure to ever do anything with the Bresse hens), you'd think that Pete's work would be irrelevant to our farmette enterprise. But I see his point: Ed grew up in New York City. Nothing about clearing land and growing cover crops let alone raising chickens feels intuitive to him. Pete's efforts are just a nudge to keep learning.

In the very late afternoon I meet up at a coffee (and other stuff) shop with my daughter for our almost but not quite weekly catchup time.

It's dark by the time I get back home. Ed reports that all the chickens are in, though he had to chase some to get them into the coop. We breathe a sigh of relief. The trap is out to make sure no other predator is lurking on the sidelines. I tell him it will be super cold tonight (significantly below freezing and very windy). He throws an old quilt over the roosting box where the cheepers typically huddle. 

We watch a couple of episodes of Seinfeld, just to make sure our laughter cells are still working properly. 

They are. 

Thank goodness.

With love...

happiest

In the wee hours of the morning, once we got over the usual "are you awake's" and "now I am's," Ed read to me an article from Madison.com in which they listed the twenty five lists on which the city of Madison showed up recently. Most were not surprises: we score high in being a place that's livable, bike friendly, nature focused, kind to seniors, good life-work balance, etc. But one was a tiny bit of a surprise (only because all places listed were a surprise): it was a ranking of cities in the US on some platform of happiness. Madison, it turns out, is number 2 in the country in terms of happiness. [I know that all you want now is to know the other happy places, to see if your own home town made the cut. I'm here to please my readers, so here it is, starting with the happiest of happy places: Lincoln NE, Madison WI, Raleigh NC, Portland ME, Billings MT, Sioux Falls SD, Burlington VT, Minneapolis MN, Anchorage AK, and Denver CO. Find the full list of top 100 here.]

It's true that this list was compiled over a year ago and by Men's Health, so perhaps there's a bias to it, but let's not get too caught up on technicalities. Their sources sounded quite legit. We're happy, okay?!?

Immediately I wanted to bring up the equally recent list (this one from 2022, found here) of happy countries. Perhaps you've seen this one?  It goes like this, again starting with the happiest: Finland, Denmark, Switzerland, Iceland, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Luxembourg, New Zealand, and Austria. [As you can see if you read the full report -- the US is number 19, so not too bad, but given its wealth -- well, not too good either.]

You can't take this stuff too seriously. Or... can you? What strikes you about these happy places? They are northern for the most part. They are not of one political yoke. Lincoln NE leans Republican (slightly), Madison WI leans Democrat (heavily). Finland is believed to be the most socially progressive country in the world  (here's one source for this claim) with a woman as Prime Minister, while in Switzerland the far right party still holds a considerable amount of political sway (though the Greens are closing in). Women gained the right to vote only in 1971. 

So now that we have removed political leanings from the discussion, we can freely speculate where this pull toward a good life comes from. How is it that these places have fostered resilience (because during a long and dark Finnish winter, you have to be resilient, no?) and community and patient perseverance, at the same time that equality and access to nature and to good health care and education have remained priorities?

Of course, at the individual level, happiness is an entirely separate matter. A city or a nation can be ranked as happy, but are you yourself in that boat of happy sailing? Is yours a good life? Granted that during the pandemic we all slumped into a stressed, perhaps even panicked, worry-filled and isolated daily existence. But assuming that you and your loved ones survived, are you now recovering those precious days of joyful living? I hope that, like my good friend in Michigan who, despite huge obstacles, nonetheless finds moments of joy every single day of her life, you too are able to list many things that in the course of a day make you happy. Who knows, maybe your city can kick Madison off its pedestal someday. Or join us on the happiness platform. Well, on the second to highest platform, unless we topple that darn Lincoln NE and rise to the top! Or, better yet -- share space up there! There's room for very many in the happiness club of our beautiful planet.

I make my way to feed the animals. We wont get above freezing today and there's a good side to this: the ground is crunchy rather than muddy. The air is crisp, bracing and energizing. Us happy northerners know how to bundle up and head out!

Breakfast? Back to oatmeal. I mean, we can't abandon the healthy stuff completely in this fast approaching holiday season.

The morning hours are spent on trying out the new recovery plug for my weird camera card. And it works!  Accidentally erased photos -- recovered! (Here are two chucklers that you missed in Sunday's post: cheepers on the run and Ed, not quite up for breakfast.)

Eventually, I leave, heading first toward Clasen's Bakery. This place rolls in the Christmas season for us. The German Bakery has been a Madison staple for many decades. I took my kids there when they were little -- for the Christmas cookies and especially for the chocolate covered gingerbread hearts, moons, and stars.

It's too early to go there with the kids. But not too early for me to stock up on the cookies! That little gingerbread treat with a cup of milky coffee has to be the best afternoon snack on a cold winter's day. The cookies are only sold now, through mid December. No reason not to eat them even before Thanksgiving, right??

Oh, but at Clasen's, temptation strikes hard. How about the gingerbread with a dollop of raspberry jam? Or the printer - with honey, orange peel and hazelnuts, all covered with chocolate? Or the almond windmills? Or how about these spicy cookies?

My cart is filling up. And bread! Let's try their baguette! (Verdict later: it's very good! a little chubby, but the taste is very nice!)

And then I pick up Snowdrop at school and bring her to the farmette.

Play outside, fence with Ed (whose weapon is a baguette)...

... read and eat, play inside. That's a routine that is so engrained (well, maybe not the baguette duel), so loved by her, that we both fall into it without hesitation.

And then I drop her at an evening class, do some late errands and I smile as I turn toward the farmhouse road. I'm ready to go inside where all is blissfully warm and happy. 

My mind is on that word today and I think -- yeah, no matter what, despite it all, we are so very happy. And then that superstitious quiver sounds within me: if you admit to happiness, might you lose it?

I pull into the driveway. Ed is coming up the path. Help me out here -- I call, as I carry a carton of holiday bottles to the farmhouse. As he pulls open the door for me, he says: there's an opossum in the coop. The chickens are scattered up and down the barn wall. But he got Happy.

He got Happy. Our rooster that we bought a handful of years ago to protect the girls from predators. Did he fight the opossum while they fled? Or, was it that his old limp kept him from escaping in time? 

We both loved that chicken because he was so, well, happy! Unusual disposition for a rooster. Never a threat to the hens, to humans. Just, well, happy with his girls. He did have some kind of disability and try as we did to figure out where it came from and how to fix it, we got nowhere. He limped and stumbled and keeping up with the girls was getting to be hard for him. This morning I found him snuggled next to Peach in the barn -- she was his favorite old girl -- and I thought how sweet they looked. Two oldies, finding comfort in each others presence. 

Ed buried Happy and carried out the opossum and we managed to pick up all the seven girls and put them in the coop. At home, we talked about getting a new rooster. Maybe. Sigh...

With so much love...

so hygge or kurashi?

Some time in the predawn hours, Ed asks -- are you awake? You know how that goes: I am now! He's mesmerized by the overnight snow, the gentility of it. The stillness of the night scene. 

I do reach for my (lesser) camera, but I've been in this moment before, where the beauty of a scene is such that you have to witness it firsthand. A photo just wont do. But, I am awake, and without much thought or concern about the final product, which I know will be inadequate, I snap away. 

(from the kitchen, onto the snowed up screen porch..)

(from the art room)

(from the bedroom)

And now I may as well be up. A little early for me, but winter mornings are indeed beautiful. 

Hey animals, an early meal for you today!

And then I focus on our own breakfast, which, as yesterday, is in the warmth of our kitchen. I cannot tell you how much I love this kind of beginning to a day!

But here's a bother: I've stopped the daily hikes. I have to rethink my strategy going forward. Winter couch potato-hood is not a good idea.

For now though, I make myself a cup of Strawberry Shiso tea and luxuriate, chatting to friends (who live in warmer climes), reading, planning for the month before me. And in the realm of idle and inconsequential thoughts, I think how absolutely special these teas are -- this one, from Rishi, is a pure botanical (no caffeine) and it is not at all what you would imagine for a tea based in large part on strawberries. There's no sweetness to it at all, perhaps because of the Shiso, which is a Japanese plant that someone described as a bit spicy, a bit green and earthy. It's from the mint family, yet again -- you'd never guess that. Of course, all this conjures up a Japanese tea drinking image and this brings me back to the idea that maybe Kurashi is not such a bad idea after all (see yesterday's post)? Maybe curating special corners where you can have only that which brings you peace, joy, beauty, is worth aiming for? 

When you are retired, you can think about such stuff. 

Okay, can you see where my morning has landed? And stayed? (On the couch.)

In the afternoon, I pick up Snowdrop at school and we go back to my mom's place. She had a broken lamp, I took it home, Ed fixed it, so I'm bringing it back and giving Snowdrop a chance to connect to the older person's setting. (And yes, Snowdrop does have a bruise on her forehead, the result of being accidentally whacked by something a younger brother was swinging.) 

On the drive to the farmette, I get into one of those conversations with the little girl where I never win. Today, she got a candy bar from my mom. I tell her -- okay, you can have it, but it's super large, so just that for a sweet treat. She persevered with her position: mommy would let me have a candy bar PLUS a caramel!, adding -- I distinctly remember her letting me do that and I dont even know what distinctly means! I had to laugh. 

She got to eat her candy bar and the caramel.

At the farmette, somewhat defiantly, she climbs her tree (my mom had told her she thought it was dangerous).

Evening -- I am with Ed. He's still recovering and I am absolutely determined not to succumb to whatever dragged him down. Perhaps the Strawberry Shiso tea helped because I have shaken off all advancing germs and viruses thus far. 

Beautiful night. And guess what -- we're back to popcorn for our movie viewing! Total pleasure.

snow

One of winter's mysteries is how much snow a day will bring. Even if the forecast tells us there will be snow, you're never sure if you will need to shovel your way out or if it will all fizzle to a dusting of wet flakes, ones that will rapidly melt in the course of the day. Snow is like a cat on the prowl: it charts its own course and rarely lets you in on the secret of where it will choose to land and how much of its beauty will cover the landscape outside your window.

So yes, they said it would snow today. Ho hum. It's November. Snow is a rare event this early in the season. Besides, last week we were topping 70F (21C). We're not in the snowy frame of mind.

Nonetheless, we woke up to this pretty farmscape:

The Bresse hens are having they first experience with snow. And I have to say, they are lucky to be tasting this white stuff, because the expectation had been that by winter they would be in our freezer. Ha ha. Not gonna happen.

One hike out and they retreat to join the others, who never even bother to leave the barn.

Breakfast, cosy, hygge, even as I know that this is last year's concept. I believe the new buzz word this year is "kurashi," which I understand to mean creating a tidy lifestyle for yourself. [You can read about it in the NYTimes today here. I did get a chuckle at the end, where a psychologist scoffed at the idea of aiming for such perfection in your everyday. People are complicated and they have complicated relationships and this, not clutter, is a source of anxiety for many. To quote this clinician: "If my clients all lived in houses filled with junk but cleared the toxic people out of their lives, I'd be fine," she said. "Keep the old suitcases: get rid of the grumpy uncle." So true.] 

Me, I'm still in love with hygge, so here's my winter breakfast. Ed's eating chicken soup, I'm still on croissants, but we're on winter placemats now. And the candle, a Portuguese Olive Blossom, reminds me of winter trips Ed and I took to places where olive trees released their fruits starting just about now.

This day is memorable not only for its first real snow this year (looking so fine on the firs across the road!)...

... but also for my mother's birthday. She is 99 today. She claims that she does not celebrate such stuff but honestly, I'm not sure I believe her. I pay her a visit and bring her the one thing she really does want -- authentically brined sauerkraut.  

She's doing ever so well, now chugging' along onto her hundredth year of life.

And from there, I go to pick up Snowdrop. It's a complicated day, but not so complicated that she wont take time out to enjoy a run in the snow.

After she's nourished, rested, dressed, I take her to dance. 

And there's more for her afterwards -- a scout meeting. I help her change and gather her stuff and off she goes!

And only then do I drive home. The snow is still with us, swirling as it does at night, right into the headlights of your car. 

All is calm. All is very beautiful.

Monday

One good way to start the week: have breakfast with a good friend, first thing! Well, after feeding the animals.

(No great pics today, but hey, I'm teaching myself not to erase. My new strategy: never press delete until you say the magic words. And never say the magic words until you have checked that everything is uploaded safely onto your computer.)

Not especially stunning, but very much Novemberish:

My friend Barbara is in town and we have a very long breakfast together at Madison Sourdough. The sun streams in, the pastries are perfect, the morning hours slip away in animated sharing...

Honestly, I can't imagine a finer set of early day hours. And mind you, we are in for an Arctic blast this week, so we need to tuck in all the warm glow we can get. Friends do that for you -- they wrap you in a blanket of sweetness. The almond croissants are just icing to an already delicious cake.

In the afternoon, Snowdrop is at the farmhouse. School is closed today (again!) and so she comes straight from home, not as tired, not as hungry as on school days, but equally eager to repeat favorite routines: outdoor run, indoor read, play.

And very quickly the day fades into dusk, then evening. I return the girl, and head back home to the cats, the chickens, Ed. With so much love...

Sunday

Oh how quickly they fall! One step out into the real world (airplanes, airports, dinners -- in other words, life in the more normal mode) and my never-wanting-to-travel or indeed, to-leave-the-farmhouse beloved is under the weather with who knows what virus. (Not Covid.)

Our day is structured carefully around this. I'm back to full time animal duty...

(so pretty outside, but yes, very cold)

[You could be looking at a lovely photo of farmette lands under a light dusting of snow]

And breakfast is together, in a way.

[Here, I'd put in a pic of breakfast in the living room: Ed is under a fluffy quilt.]

Then he sleeps and I continue with holiday shopping. All on line. Gone are the days of crazy malls and long lines at stores. I suppose there is a loss. The social aspect (is there a social aspect?) flew out the window. But for a person who never really liked shopping, it is indeed fabulous to search websites rather than real sites.

I do go out, for my walk, but alone again. Ed sleeps. And sleeps. And sleeps.

(well, not entirely alone)

[A beautiful closeup of sandhill cranes]

(the air is crisp! on the shores of Lake Waubesa...)

[The lake is reflecting a dramatic sky of grays and blues. Stunning!]

And then I come home and do the stupid thing I do every several months, without fail: I accidentally erase my camera card, so that all the images of snow dusting, of our unusual breakfast together, of cranes and an absolutely gorgeous Lake Waubesa have disappeared in a puff of smoke. Yes, I know there are data recovery programs out there. My camera has an unusual card. It's unconventional formatting does me in. Future lesson, since I am never going to NOT make this goofball mistake -- go back to using standard photo cards which can be salvaged when someone idiotically presses delete before she has finished downloading the pics onto her computer.

In the evening, the young family is here for dinner. Great moods, lovely smiles. And I am not going to accidentally erase these photos! 

And later, much later, Ed and I are back on the couch for our evening together. I mean, there is no way that we can stay out of each others germ space. Might as well snuggle under the same couch quilt. Besides, there is a chocolate to share.

with love...

Saturday

Every day has its highlights. Unless you are in the thick of tragedy, even the most ordinary 24 hours will have you thinking more than once -- wow, this is nice! For me, it's routine to ask Snowdrop at pickup time -- what was the highlight of your day? Let's recall those before we turn to all that was imperfect.

Take a day like this one: seemingly plain. Ed and I saw no one of note, and we went nowhere special. And yet...

I was up my usual time. It had been a chilly night. The water bowl where the cheepers pause for their midday drink was frozen and that cold snap was not letting up. Still, I'm getting used to the shift toward winter. The walk to the barn is invigorating!

I have three errands to run and they are all sweetly delightful. The bakery (what could be better on a cold morning...)!

Then, my Saturday pickup of farm produce from our local farmers, and this includes today a Thanksgiving turkey. It's small this year (the choice was small or large: we don't need large!), but looking at it just makes  me smile. A family holiday, so soon!

Onto the post office. I had to wait there until it opened. A line formed. Behind me. It's funny how that works: if you have to wait 15 minutes for something to open, you are content to watch those minutes fly by. You take out your phone, read a newspaper article or two. Life is good. On the other hand, if you are in line behind a person who takes 15 minutes to take care of their shipping needs, you groan with impatient frustration. 

No frustration for me.

Breakfast, with bakery treats and with Ed. Late, but he doesn't care and I certainly don't mind. Hot milky coffee, a croissant, fruits. And the bearded guy. Perfection.

The afternoon had two stellar moments. First, I asked my daughters to Zoom with me about the forthcoming celebrations. We need to coordinate and it's easiest if we bounce around ideas together. They delighted me by bringing their kids to the call (except for one who was napping).

The level of joviality immediately rises when the wee ones are present!

A call about holiday get-togethers, with grandkids attending. What could be better!

In the later afternoon Ed takes the rein in pushing the two of us out the door. It was threatening to be a repeat of yesterday -- me pacing the house because I did not feel the motivation to do a walk outside. Yes, it's gray out there. Yes it's cold. But surely we can find some pleasure, even if only along the trails of our city park by Lake Monona.

We do! It's crispy fresh, with an occasional snow flurry. There are birds on the water: American Coot I think, though I'm not sure...

This is not our favorite park for walking because you can always hear the hum of traffic somewhere in the background. But because our expectations are never high, we walk away deeply satisfied and today is no different!

We drive home. There is a dusting of snow outside. You can't call it a snowfall really. More like confectioner's sugar on a freshly baked cake.

At home, I open the file where I have begun to dig into my Next Great Writing Project. 

Do you see why I would be so tickled with this day, even though really, nothing happened?

Oh, and supper was very insignificant. Eggs, veggies, salads. And chocolate!

With so much love on this beautiful November day...