Archive for the ‘Musings’ category
October 15, 2017
I’m wondering where the sun is hiding. The day is damp and cloudy. It’s a quiet day, no breeze rustles the leaves and no voices are loud enough to be heard. I have to go out and do a couple of errands later and tonight is game night. That’s like a full day for me.
When I was a kid, the expectations for Sunday were pretty much nonexistent. It was a nothing day much the same week after week. It started with church. The only unknown was which mass I’d attend. Would I go early with my dad, the usher, or later by myself or with my brother? Sunday dinner was the biggest meal of the week. It was always a roast, sometimes a roast beef and other times a whole chicken. It was the one meal all week where we all sat down to eat together though my mother sometimes stood by the counter to eat. On weekdays my dad was late getting home from work so he was never there for dinner. We were usually watching TV when he got home.
Once in a while, on a Sunday afternoon, we visited my grandparents in the city. I was amazed by the city. Houses were close together. The Italian bakeries sold pizza. A house down the street sold Italian ice through an open window. On the corner of my grandparents’ street was a private club. My uncle was a member. I remember going there once for a family party.
If we didn’t go out to visit, we’d sit around watching TV until my dad took over and turned to a football game. That sent us to the kitchen to play a board game or down the cellar to play. If I had a book, I’d go read it in my room away from the noise. My mother cooked in the kitchen. She peeled potatoes and opened cans of vegetables. We usually ate around two. Most times there was no special dessert. We’d grab cookies.
Sunday night we’d watch a bit of TV then it was early to bed because of school the next day. We always grumbled. That never got us anywhere except upstairs to bed at our regular time.
Categories: Musings
Tags: beef, canned vegetables, Chicken, cloudy, damp, dinner, early to bed, football, games, Italian ice, Mass, Pizza, potatoes, quiet, roast, Sunday, Sunday dinner, sunless, the city, We always grumbled.
Comments: 12 Comments
October 14, 2017
It was a late night so it is a late morning, actually an early afternoon. I was still awake at four when Gracie finally settled, Maddie got comfortable on my sweatshirt, and I was snuggled under the afghan to stave off the chill.
This morning when I took Gracie out I was surprised to see everything was wet, and the air was a bit chilly from the dampness. I came back inside and put on my sweatshirt which Maddie had been kind enough to leave for me. It’s raining again. I opened the window behind me to hear the drops on the leaves in the side yard. It started as a gentle rain but is now heavier, a steady storm.
I have no lists today. I could do a couple of errands but I’ll wait until tomorrow. Today I have designated a do nothing day.
My friend Bill keeps track of the weather in Bolga where we lived. I checked today, and it is currently 94˚, a cool day. Tomorrow will be 99˚ and every day for the rest of the week will be over 100˚ but will drop to the low 70’s at night. I used a woven wool blanket this time of year as the 30˚ drop was chilling. It was an unexpected but wonderful feeling being cold. I still have that wool blanket.
My house is dark except for a lit nightlight and a small driftwood tree lit with white lights in the bathroom and a strand of scallop shells and a cluster of red peppers lit in the kitchen. They give the house a cozy feel.
I’m watching a really bad movie called Deep Space. You’re probably thinking of course you are. The creature sort of looks like giant bug with lots of legs and sharp teeth. I had to laugh when it traveled on a sidewalk as it looked like a wind-up. None of its legs moved. It attacks by jumping at the necks of its victims. A few babies just as lethal as their mama have been born. The death count of their victims is rising.
It feels strange to have a Saturday with no baseball.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 100˚, a do nothing day, Bolgatanga Ghana, chill, cozy, dampness, dark house, Deep Space, driftwood tree lights, errands, feeling cold, late morning, rain, red pepper lights, wool blanket, woven blanket
Comments: 10 Comments
October 13, 2017
The house was cold when I woke up. I stayed under the afghan not wanting to leave the warmth. Gracie was sleeping at the end of the couch, and she didn’t want to get up either. Finally the need for coffee got me up, and I got Gracie up. We went outside and got the papers and Gracie went into the backyard. I waited while she finished then followed her back into the house. She got treats, and I got my coffee.
One of the cartoons in the paper mentioned today is Friday the 13th. I had no idea. Unless I have an appointment I lose track of the date, and it is only when I tear off yesterday that I see where I have to go today.
The day is lovely, a sunny day with a blue sky and a bit of a breeze. It is in the 60’s, average for this time of year, but it feels colder after the warm days.
The buses are here. I saw one at Chatham light. The passengers, all older people, were wandering on the beach and near the light. I saw another bus pulling into a seafood restaurant, the sort which has buoys, nets and plastic lobsters on the outside walls. I don’t need to see the menu to know it is mostly seafood but, it always includes hamburgers and for a bit more money, cheeseburgers. Both come with fries.
I’m not a big fan of cakes with one exception, Boston cream pie which doesn’t sound like a cake but don’t be deceived. I do like cupcakes as they are just the right amount of cake. I used to love Hostess chocolate cupcakes, and my local bakery has cupcakes like them including the white loopy line across the top of the chocolate icing. I buy one every now and then. Ice cream never belongs on or beside a cake.
My favorite fruit is a banana. It is easy to eat, can be eaten alone, or in cereal or with ice cream in a banana split. In Africa the peel made them safe to eat without washing them first. They were perfect food to buy when traveling as they were sold along the road and at every stop. I order them every time I do Peapod grocery shopping.
Eggs are great for any meal. Many times I make bacon and eggs for dinner. I like the yoke soft so I can slop it up with the toast. My egg salad must have celery and lettuce as it is a bit bland without them. Besides, I like the crunch.
I am not a picky eater. I eat with discretion.
Categories: Musings
Tags: afghan, appointment, bananas, blue sky, buses, Cake, calendar, coffee, cold morning, cupcakes, Friday the 13th, Peapod, sunny day
Comments: 4 Comments
October 12, 2017
My friends have left, and my house is ever so quiet. As always we had the best time together. On Tuesday we had a ride along the ocean, and I took them to my favorite spots. The sun was glinting off the water. It was so warm people sat on beach chairs in the sand sunning themselves. It was a summer day in fall.
We ate appetizers on the deck. The birds had found the filled feeders, and they flew back and forth from feeders to branches. Most of them were chickadees.
Peg had brought dinner, shrimp pesto. She had also brought vegetables, a cheese log dip, crackers, some fruit and dessert. The brownies had chocolate chips, and there was a thick fudge sauce to put on them adding to the chocolate overload though I would contend there is really no such thing as a chocolate overload. I am just using the term to give a vivid picture of how wonderful dessert was. Gracie was restless that night. At 1:30 she wanted food so I fed her and I had a brownie. Afterwards, we were both quite content.
Bill is a talented furniture maker and handyman. He did some repairs in the house, a few of which have been driving me crazy. Some of the fixes include the toilet upstairs which now flushes, the toilet holder downstairs again secure on the wall, my old curio cabinet repaired and my front storm shutting automatically.
Bill and Peg brought gifts. One was a wooden Red Sox peg board. Another was a framed silhouette of a boxer. There was homemade grape jelly and African coffee. The dip was in a pottery bowl and the bowl was also a gift. I can’t think there are better guests than Bill and Peg.
Last night we had dinner at Karoo’s, a South African restaurant. It is one of my favorite places. Bill and Peg had been there before and requested it for this trip. I had monkey ribs and beef samosas for appetizers. The drink I ordered, the speciality of the night, was amazingly refreshing with vodka, grapefruit juice and a simple syrup. My dinner was bobotie beef, a curried meatloaf served with turmeric rice and chutney. Bill and Peg both had West African peanut soup with pumpkin added though in Ghana it would have been groundnut soup. Peg had a falafel sandwich. All of us had come to love Lebanese food in Ghana, and we ate many felafel sandwiches, all wrapped in foil.
This morning was leisurely. Sadly, at close to eleven, Peg and Bill started loading up to go home. Gracie and I went outside to say goodbye. My house feels empty without them.
Categories: Musings
Tags: appetizers, Beach, bird feeders, bobotie, chickadees, Chocolate, deck, dessert, gifts, handyman, Karoo's, ocean, pesto, ride, sand, seeds, shrimp, South Africa, summer day, sunning
Comments: 14 Comments
October 10, 2017
Today is another beautiful, warm day with a bright sun and a blue sky with just a few fluffy clouds. It is already in the 70’s. Tonight, though, will go down to the 50’s and will usher in daytime highs in the 60’s, far more fall-like weather than we’ve had. The doors and windows are open, but with cooler days coming, I guess I’ll have to start thinking about putting in the storm doors, the beginning of the cold weather rituals.
When I was a kid, my father would spend one whole Saturday putting in the storm windows. They were kept in the cellar during the summer. He’d have to take down the screens first, haul the storm windows outside, wash them and then attach them to the house window frames. There were hooks on top of the frames to hold the storm windows. My father would tilt the storm window at the top until it could be hooked. Sometimes it took a few, okay maybe several, tries before he’d get the upstairs windows attached. He was never happy about that. One thing my father lacked was patience. We’d watch the window exchange the whole time. My father used to lean out of the upstairs windows and attach them from there. He used a step ladder for the lower windows. Those Saturdays were the times when my vocabulary of four letter words was expanded the most. It was always a most entertaining day.
My guests are due between one and two. I’m just about ready. All I need is the wash to finish drying. I think I need guests every week as this is the fastest I’ve even gotten the was done. Usually it sits by the cellar door until I run out of underwear. This load never even sat by the door, a miracle of sorts.
My usually quiet day has been interrupted by the sounds of motors. The first sound may have been someone shutting down an irrigation system and the next was like the sound trimmers make. I saw the kids waiting for the bus this morning. They were riding scooters until it was time. I’m not usually up and about that early, but I had a meeting this morning.
I haven’t planned anything for today. I figure we can sit and enjoy each other’s company for a while. Later, we’ll take a ride, maybe stop at the beach and a shop or two. I get to play tourist.
Categories: Musings
Tags: beautiful day, hooks, impatience, screens, storm windows, swearing, warm, wash
Comments: 8 Comments
October 9, 2017
The rain started last and has continued intermittently all morning; of course, it started raining when I brought Gracie outside. Isn’t that always the way? The drops were big, and they made a thud sound when they fell on leaves. We both got a little wet.
Last night the arms of Morpheus eluded me. I was awake until almost four. I alternated between reading my new book and watching Netflix where I binged on a documentary about emergency rooms. Each episode highlighted three or four patients. The one that grossed me out was about the guy whose foot had gangrene. It had to be amputated. I watched every episode.
Watching emergency had me thinking about my own medical history. When I was four, I broke my wrist. I was so proud of my cast I showed it off for the camera in a couple of pictures. I have also broken my cheekbone and my shoulder, and I chipped and broke teeth and lost a bit of my lip on one memorable fall down the stairs, which I don’t even remember. My ankle was severely sprained when I fell off the front step after I stepped on an out of place welcome mat, one of the great ironies. That is the entire litany of my injuries which really isn’t too long a list considering how many times I have fallen. I guess I’ve become an expert at mitigating the damage. I’m so proud!
Today I have a list of stuff to do before my guests come tomorrow, but I have to work around the Sox game which may be at one if it isn’t raining in Boston at game time. I figure between innings I can get hurry and some stuff done.
I love rainy days. The darkness in the house is warming in a strange way. I leave candle lights on in the windows and a night light in the bathroom. In this room, the computer is the only light. Gracie is sleeping beside me. She’s snoring. It sounds loud in the quiet house. Yesterday the doors and a couple of windows were open, but today the house is tightly shut to keep the moisture and the cool air at bay. I have to go out later to get a few groceries, and I think it might just be sweatshirt weather.
Categories: Musings
Tags: arms of Morpheus, broken cheek bone, broken shoulder, broken wrist, cast, darkness, drops, emergency, gangrene, injuries, Netflix, rain, rainy days, Red Sox, sweatshirt weather, welcome mat
Comments: 9 Comments
October 8, 2017
The day is cloudy dark. Rain is predicted. It is also windy which makes it feel colder than it is. I had to shut the back door. Last night was Gracie busy. She had me up every couple of hours, and we went out at 3:30. I went back to sleep but woke up when I heard her moving around at 8:00, but she readily jumped on the couch with me, and we both slept until 10.
I did all my errands yesterday. I had a route in mind, but the cars in long lines at the lights had me reconsider how to get there from here. I should have realized they’d be lines as this is, after all, a three day weekend, sort of summer’s last hurrah. Today is a stay off the roads day as the weekenders will be driving around looking for something to do.
I can smell wood burning again. The smell has again triggered memories. I remember overnights at Camp Aleska, the Girl Scout camp in the town where I grew up. The camp was up a dirt road across from the zoo and was surrounded by tall pine trees. Paths were behind the camp and led all through the woods. There was one big room in the camp with a huge fireplace. My favorite part of the overnight was falling asleep as the fire waned and the embers glowed in the dark. I have mentioned mornings in Ghana several times. The air smelled of wood fires as breakfast was cooked over wood charcoal. In the market, huge bags of charcoal were for sale. In some villages tree trunks were slowly burned into charcoal and bags of it were for sale on the sides of the road. Even the irons were filled with wood charcoal.
At night, aunties, older women, sitting along the sides of the main road in Bolga cooked food over wood charcoal and sold it. I remember the smell in the air was a combination of the wood charcoal burning and food cooking at my nighttime snack stops. That was the first time I ever tasted grilled corn and deep fried plantain and yam chips. Guinea fowl was rare, but I always bought it if I found it. I remember the spots of light from the lit lanterns up and down the street and the blazing embers under metal bowls filled with groundnut oil where the food cooked.
I am ever so thankful for having served in Ghana and for the memories still strong and vibrant.
Categories: Musings
Tags: burning, cloudy, cool, errands, Ghana, girl scout, grilled corn, long weekend, night, one trees, peanut oil, rain, tourists, windy, wood burning, wood charcoal, woods
Comments: 4 Comments
October 7, 2017
The sun predicted for today has yet to appear. It is cloudy and damp. I could feel the moisture in the air when Gracie and I went out to get the papers. It made me feel a bit chilly and I wished I had put on a sweatshirt. The house, though, with all the doors and windows closed is warm.
We’re going out today, Gracie and I, to the dump, the market and Agway. My trunk is filled with trash from Thursday’s great cabinet clean-out. Gracie needs canned food and a treat or two, and I need the essentials for life: bread, coffee and cream.
My friends are coming on Tuesday for a couple of days. These are the friends I traveled with to Ghana last year. We first met in 1969 at Peace Corps staging in Philadelphia at the Hotel Sylvania. Staging is the first time the whole group of trainees get together before leaving for in-country training, and it is where we got shots, had interviews and were introduced to PC staff from Ghana. Right away we became friends and co-conspirators. The three of us skipped some of the orientation to tour Philadelphia. It didn’t take a whole lot of convincing. They were supposed to be posted in Tamale, a city 100 miles from Bolga. That would have made us neighbors. Instead, after Peace Corps found out Peg was pregnant, they were posted to New Tafo, in the south. I visited them every time I went south, and we traveled together. Just before our second year, there was an open post at my school. They were willing to join me in Bolga, and the principal agreed to make the request to Peace Corps so we became neighbors living in a duplex on the school compound. Bill had a red motorcycle. I had a grey one. We used to take day trips around Bolga. He’d take Kevin, their son, and I’d take Peg. We had adventures. I remember a couple of picnics during school holidays, one by a watering hole and another in the hills of Tongo where school boys stood and watched us the whole time. It was there an old man threatened us with the gods because he claimed we had desecrated a sacred rock by putting our small charcoal burned on it. The schoolboys said he just wanted money. We decided to take our chances. As we were leaving, Bill’s motorcycle stopped dead. It just quit running. We sort of chuckle and hoped the old man didn’t see us. The motorcycle did start right away, but it gave us pause.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Bolgatanga, chilly, Clouds, damp, errands, Ghana, motorcycles, New Tafo, Peace Corps staging, Peace Corps training, Philadelphia, Tamale, Tongo
Comments: 6 Comments
October 6, 2017
When I went out with the dog, the air smelled of wood burning. It was morning in Ghana. All that was missing was the rooster crowing.
The day is again remarkable. The doors and a few windows are open. The sunlight made me squint. I felt like a mole emerging from my underground burrow. It is a day in October wearing the best of a summer’s day.
I slept in this morning, waking up at 10:30. It was close to one when I went to sleep so I was surprised by how long I’d slept. My mother would have said I must have needed it.
Yesterday, Leandro, one half of my cleaning couple, went into two lower cabinets to clean them. I suggested he might want a mask as those cabinets are where the mice used to live. He actually had one with him as well as gloves. He started pulling out everything: the pots and pans, paper goods, Tupperware, baking supplies and dishes. He vacuumed the bottom of the cabinet as he uncovered it. He mentioned my mice must have been diabetic given the number of empty Equal packets he found, each chewed at the top. He checked the expiration date of the food he found: all had expired years ago. I didn’t even remember food was there protected by Tupperware. I was hoping he would find two of my favorite missing kitchen tools: my apple peeler corer and my old double loaf pan, the one I always used for my date nut bread. He didn’t find the pan. I was disappointed and perplexed. I can’t imagine where else I could have put it. Lee found a good size mouse nest made of paper towels, dust and pieces of cardboard. It might have been the home of the three dead mice he found, all mummified. One clogged his vacuumed. That was the only one I saw. I had him throw away some worse for wear pots and pans I never use, didn’t even remember they were there far back in the cabinet. They are as old as the house and were gifts from my aunt when I moved in. I filled the dishwasher twice.
It rained last night just after I’d turned out the lights. The window beside me was open, and I could hear drops hitting the leaves though it took me a minute or two to figure what I was hearing. That was the sound which lulled me to sleep.
This will be a quiet weekend.
Categories: Musings
Tags: cleaning cabinets, Equal, Ghana, kitchen tools, mice, rooster, Tupperware, wonderful day, wood burning
Comments: 18 Comments
October 5, 2017
The sun is bright, the sky is an amazing blue, and the breeze is ever so slight, all combining to make for a perfectly lovely day, summer’s return engagement for this week anyway.
When I was a kid, this was the golden season when all the leaves turned yellow. I know there must have been other colors, but it is the yellow I remember the most, the yellow I can still see in my mind’s eye. Fallen leaves covered the sidewalks, and most times I’d kick them into the air as I walked to school. As the leaves dried, they made a crunching sound and broke apart when we walked on them. The wind took the pieces. I remember October as a warm month when a sweater or a light jacket was enough.
My only bad memory of October was having to go inside earlier and earlier as the days got shorter and shorter. I sort of felt cheater.
I have been lazy. I read most of yesterday and finished the book I got on Tuesday from the library. My to do list didn’t shrink. My halloween decorations are still in the cellar. The bird feeders are now really low on seed. I just have to get motivated.
I’m get to binge on sports today. The Sox open their series with the Astros at 4 and the Pats play against the Buccaneers at 8:20.
My dad would have loved to have seen the success of the Patriots. His allegiance switched from the Giants when the Pats came into being. He was always a home team fan. He loved football and hockey the most. He was only a so so fan of baseball and didn’t enjoy basketball at all. He and I had opposite favorites, but I do watch the Pats but never the Bruins.
Time is passing so very quickly. September was gone in heartbeat. If I were still a kid, I’d love such a quick passage, but now I want time to go slowly so I can savor every minute.
Categories: Musings
Tags: blue sky, breeze, bright sun, Buccaneers, crumbled leaves, fallen leaves, lazy, Patriots, Red Sox, short days, summer, warm October, yellow
Comments: 10 Comments
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