Keep the Coffee Comimg

Again? She’s doing it again? Yup, I am taking another day off but not to loll. I have several errands: Agway, because the dogs demand food every day, the dump as the number of trash bags is beginning to set a new record, the gas station as my car is running on fumes and Ring as my larder needs a few essentials like bread and cream. There also are some household chores: vacuuming as the tumbleweeds fly in front of me when I walk to the kitchen and dusting but only in those spots where I can write my name in the dust.

The temperature is already 84°. My air conditioner is blasting. The dogs are sleeping. Nala is even snoring. A dog’s life looks good from here.

Talk to you tomorrow.

The first thing I did when I woke up this morning was turn on the air conditioner. The house was already hot. The high today will be in the mid 80’s, but the humidity will make it feel hotter. The sky is cloudy, but none are rain clouds. There is a breeze which stirs the hot air and sometimes rings the chimes. All of that makes today a stay home day to luxuriate in the coolness of the house.

When I was a kid, I never minded the heat. It stopped nothing. Sometimes I even walked to and from the pool, from one end of town to the other. Back then it was only a dime to enter, and I had to wear a bathing cap. I was gone most of the day.

No one’s house had air conditioning when I growing up. A fan was the only inside relief. “Hot enough for you?” was rhetorical.

Where I lived in Ghana got the highest temperatures. During the dry season, over 100° was common. I hadn’t ever lived before then where it got so hot. That it was dry mitigated the heat but not enough, but I didn’t complain too much. It was just happenstance. I did take longer showers in the cold water. I went to bed still wet so the air cooled me enough so I could fall asleep.

My summer outfit when I was young was shorts, a blouse, sometimes sleeveless, and sneakers, originally white sneakers, and socks. The only deviation from that was my Sunday, go to church, dress. I wore shorty pajamas to bed, a night time replica of my daytime ensemble. My mother kept a pitcher of Zarex in the fridge. She did make dinner as my father liked his meat and potatoes. The table in the kitchen was against the wall on one side and the stove on the other. It only had 4 chairs around it as that was all it could fit though another chair could be added at the end. My mother always stood and ate at the counter. She did that even later when in our house the table had plenty of room for all of us.

I have things to do and places to go, but they can wait until I want to do them or dare to leave the house.

Jack, the dogs and I are behind closed doors. They are both sleeping on the couch after their strenuous morning of going out twice, having their biscuits and a bit of coffee. The air conditioner is blasting away. The weather for the week will be in the low to mid 80s. It is 83° right now.

My dance card is uke heavy. Last night we had a concert, practice tonight and both a lesson and a concert tomorrow. Also on my dance card is a trip to the dump, always a highlight.

Today’s Coffee is a stream of consciousness.

I notice that women on TV cover their mouths when they eat and sometimes even when they smile. I don’t. I guess I didn’t get the memo.

Late night commercials are geared to older people. I guess maybe the powers that be figure we’re a captive audience at single digit times of the morning. According to the commercials, pills are available to cure most common ailments. I should keep a list just in case.

Most nights I watch the Red Sox and a movie or two. I read before I go to sleep, sometimes for as long as an hour. I generally turn off the light around 2:30.

I have been eating out of my freezer. Some stuff has to have been in there for centuries (tongue in cheek here). A eureka moment was when I found hot dogs, two packs.

Quick is my best choice for dinner; hence, hot dogs. I also keep tortillas, cheese, jalapeños and guac for another quick dinner. I am in a catch as catch can mode for dining.

The best days are when I can stay in my cozies, loll around and do nothing. I become the quintessential sloth. I’m thinking I should be on a poster advocating the easy life, maybe one highlighting my napping skills.

I have more pairs of shoes than I have ever had, not to match any particular outfit as matching shoes with my outfits is out of my realm of experience. In Ghana, I was friendly with and enjoyed the Popps, Suzanne and Ken. She had matching dresses, bags and shoes. One time they were chosen by Gibley’s Gin as models for a full page ad. They were sitting at a table clinking glasses. It was a great ad. They were both wonderful volunteers with decidedly different experiences.

Today I will wear my khaki pants and my pink shirt with sandals.

The day is already hot at 82°. I’ve turned on the air conditioner. Both dogs are now stretched out and sleeping. Neither one was out for too long earlier. Poor Nala doesn’t do well in the heat. She pants a lot.

When I was a kid, our house, a duplex, was close to the top of a huge hill and was on the corner of the street. It had a big, grassy lawn in front. There was a set of stairs from the street up to the pathway to the front door. I never rode my bike down that lawn but, instead, rode it down the smaller grassy hill next to the stairs then I’d glide to the big hill. Down that hill was the fastest ride. Up that hill was the slowest. About halfway up, I’d have to stop riding and start walking my bike. The hill was just a mite too steep.

In the winter, that hill was perfect for sledding. We’d walk to the top of the hill, run and then hit the sleds on our stomachs with our legs bent at the knee and the bottom of our legs in the air. Only little kids sat up on their sleds. We flew down that hill. At the bottom, we’d grab the rope at the front of the sled and trudge up the hill for another run. When our lips turned blue, it was time to go inside.

My mother aways made breakfast so we’d be fortified for school. She made oatmeal in winter, the sort you had to boil. It always had a few lumps, but if you added milk and tons of sugar, the lumps didn’t matter. She’d cook soft-boiled eggs. She’d make toast and cut the pieces into strips which fit through the tops of the eggs, perfect pieces for dipping. Sometimes we’d have cereal. We always added sugar to the cereal. I drank cocoa and my brother drank tea. My mother served the tea from a ceramic teapot. It always seemed a bit fancy. The cocoa was made in my cup with half boiling water and half milk. It had bubbles around the inside rim.

When I watch old TV shows like Leave It to Beaver or The Donna Reed Show, there is always a stack of white bread on the dinner table. I always wondered about that. Why squishy white bread? I’d understand rolls or slices of Italian bread but I just don’t get the white bread.

The sky is light blue and cloudless. The sun is eye squinting bright. A slight breeze stirs the air. Everything is quiet. Today is a lovely day.

When I was a kid, Sunday was sacrosanct. The churches were filled. Everyone was dressed in church clothes. Women wore skirts or dresses and hats. Men wore suits, white shirts and ties. The stores were all closed except for small, corner stores which sold essentials like milk and bread and the Sunday paper. Sunday was family day. It was Sunday dinner day, the most formal meal of the week.

My grandmother, my father’s mother, was a terrible cook. She cooked bland food. Spaghetti sauce was a can of stewed tomatoes poured right out of the can on to the pasta. My father’s bland palate reflected his mother’s lack of cooking expertise. To him, garlic belonged only on garlic bread and shrimp scampi, nothing else. Asparagus came from a can and bent at the middle. Hummus was wallpaper paste, a review gleaned from looking at it, not tasting it, as he judged food by looks. For him, the simpler the food the better. Give him roast beef, mashed potatoes and maybe corn, niblet not creamed, and he’d be in food heaven.

In Ghana, on Sunday, my students attended a service on school grounds, in the cafeteria. For it, they wore their Sunday school cloths: three piece dresses, a top, bottom to the ankles and a wraparound the waist piece. Each of the four classes had its own cloth pattern. Sunday was also visitors’ day. Students would wear their own dresses. Photographers came and took pictures. It was also the day Bill, Peg and I bought dinner from a chop bar by the lorry park. Translation: a small shed like spot with maybe a table or two and a few chairs which was at the parking lot where all the busses waited for riders before they left for other places. The food was cooked out back. Mostly we bought fufu and soup. Translation: the slightly sour, spongy dough made from boiled and pounded starchy food crops like plantains, cassava and yams — or a combination of two or more — in a very large mortar with a pestle. The soup was whatever was on the stove: light soup (nkrakra), groundnut soup (nkate nkwan), palm nut soup (abenkwan), green vegetable soup (abun abun), egusi soup and more. I was an okra stew fan. Fufu was eaten with your right hand. Your hand got a bit messy.

Today, I’ll probably have hot dogs. I took a pack out of the freezer. I figure I’m not violating New England cultural norms by eating hot dogs on a Sunday. I didn’t have any last night.

At 74° the morning was a bit cooler than lately. The sun comes and goes. The day is still, quiet. Nala is out. Henry is sleeping upstairs on my bed, his favorite napping spot. It is a lazy day all around.

My muse is on vacation. I have started and erased several different openings. None have caught fire. I stalled each time. Ghana is my back-up.

My house, one side of a duplex, was on school grounds, Women’s Training College, in Bolgatanga. It was brand new. It had four inside rooms: the living room, my bedroom, a spare room with my desk and an eating area with a table and a couple of chairs and the fridge. In the courtyard outside was the faucet, a shower, cold water only, a toilet room, the actual kitchen with a stove I never used, and a room for Thomas, who worked for me. I always felt lucky, maybe a little guilty. I had water and electricity.

I had no TV and no radio. I had a cassette player and a few cassettes: Peter, Paul and Mary, Joni Mitchell, CSN&Y and Simon and Garfunkel. I also had a mixed tape my sister made for me.

All my classes were in the morning. I taught the second years. In between classes I’d go home and sit outside and drink a cup of coffee. During my off time I’d sometimes go shopping in town, but mostly I read book after book.

Every night, the watchman made his rounds before he’d fall asleep by the fire. He’d stop at my house for ice water. He didn’t speak any English.

The nights were quiet and dark. I always slept soundly. I was up early as I usually went to bed early.

After I bought my moto, I traveled on the backroads with a can of gas bungeed on the back, just in case. The road weren’t paved. They were dusty in the dry season and tamped down in the rainy season. I loved exploring far afield, and I suspect the sight of a white lady on a motorcycle on a way back road stopped people in their tracks. The ones I saw walking on the road always waved.

I was never bored. Every day was exciting. Every day I woke up in Africa. Every day I was amazed.

Right now it is 78° and cloudy. Tonight the low could get down to 68°. I look forward to feeling cool though I wonder if it is a prescience of fall or Mother Nature pranking us. Possible showers are also part of the weather report, but I don’t care one way or the other. Rain never stops me.

When I was a kid, only the movie theater had air conditioning. In our house, we didn’t even have a fan. Both inside doors were open to the screens as were the windows. The dark living room, shades down, was the coolest room in the house. Our screen doors were wooden. I can still remember my mother yelling, “Don’t slam the door,” but if you ran out the door, it just slammed itself. She wanted and maybe even expected my younger sisters would gently close the door. The poor woman had no idea. What kid stops to close the door?

Popsicles were my favorite treat to beat the heat. When Johnny, the ice cream man, came, everyone ran home to get money. Popsicles were only a nickel. All the other treats were a dime. I loved the root beer and cherry popsicles. If I had a dime, I’d buy a Drumstick. I still buy Drumsticks. If Johnny had no drumsticks, I’d buy a Push-Up. That was sherbet in a cardboard tube about the size of a toilet paper tube. It had a wooden push up stick on the bottom; hence, its name. My favorite was orange.

When we visited my grandparents in East Boston, we’d sometimes buy Italian ice, similar to a snow cone but tastier. It came in either a cardboard cup or a cardboard cone. Lemon was my favorite. I remember at the bottom of the cone was liquid, cold, tart lemon.

As for ice cream, I went on a mint chocolate chip frenzy a while back. I did the same with coffee chip. Now it is coconut to which I sometimes add a bit of hot fudge. It is ice cream Nirvana.

This is quite the busy week for me. I even had to buy gas. In the next three days I have four uke concerts, a practice and a lesson. Last night’s concert went well. Across the green was a nice breeze so the sun wasn’t deadly. Tonight’s practice music is the Beatles.

When I was a kid, I didn’t know anyone who played a musical instrument. My grandparents had a piano, but it was more of a status symbol as no one in the family played. It stood in their living room with its pearly keys unplayed but dusted every day.

The same grandparents had a dining room. The furniture was bulky and dark. The table with eight chairs, a hutch on one wall and a side board on the other filled the room. I remember eating there when I was young but not when I was older. The kitchen had a hidden ironing board and a small table crammed into a space between cabinets. If you sat against the wall, you were sort of stuck at the table. I remember tall cabinets to the ceiling. The kitchen had a closet which is where my grandmother stashed the bottles of root beer.

We didn’t usually go to visit those grandparents, my father’s parents, even though they lived in the same town. My father by himself would visit. I didn’t mind as being there was always boring.

When I was growing up, my family played games together: board games and card games. I learned to play whist when I was probably ten or eleven. My parents had built-in partners, my brother and me. It was always girls against the boys, and the girls usually won. I remember playing Po-Ke-No for pennies. My mother kept a penny jar in the kitchen just for that game. We always put the pennies back when the game was over.

I am lazy when it comes to meals. Mostly I look for easy. I hard-boil a few eggs for snacking. I fry a couple of hot dogs for dinner. A banana is usually breakfast though once in a while I have toast. I always have cheese. Bread is supposed to be the staff of life, but I’m thinking it needs cheese to be complete.

We are still stuck in the heat. It is already in the mid 80’s. My AC is cranking. The sky is cloudy and sunny and cloudy. It rained last night, a heavy rain for a while. Today will be dry.

This is a busy uke week for me. Last week I had none. This week I have a lesson, a practice and a concert every day starting tonight in Hyannis. My fingers will be tired.

I remember odd events.

I was on a bus one time, and there were three women sitting on the front seat which faced the other front seat. They never stopped talking. One woman lit a cigarette and somehow kept talking. She wasn’t paying attention and put the lit end of the cigarette in her mouth. She sputtered and spit.

I used to take the bus from Boston to Hyannis when I was in college. It left from the old Trailways terminal in Park Square. That terminal had a small luncheonette and a kiosk selling newspapers, magazines and candy. The chairs were along the wall. I was sitting and reading and smoking when my bus was called. I put out the cigarette in the metal ashtray and went to stand in line. Right behind me a guy walked over, picked my cigarette butt out of the ashtray, lit it and started smoking. The Trailways terminal didn’t always attract the best clientele.

I remember my confirmation when I was in the sixth grade. I had to wear a robe with a white collar topped by a red beanie. The bishop came to perform the ceremony. The nuns had prepared us. They told us the bishop would slap us on the cheek as a reminder that we might have to suffer for our faith, that we were becoming soldiers for Christ. I got slapped, but it didn’t really hurt though I had braced myself.

I remember the flight to Ghana. My seatbelt got stuck between the wall and the seat so I couldn’t use it. I hoped no stewardess would notice. They showed one movie, The Love Bug.

I remember learning to tie a bow. My mother sat on the chair in the living room, and I knelt beside her. She had yarn, and she’d show me how to tie a bow then would have me try. It took a few times, but I succeeded in tying a bow. A triumph!

My memory drawers are filled with all these odd little memories, most of little consequence in the scheme of things.

The morning is hot, humid and windy. It is also cloudy again. I have a couple of errands. Jack, the cat, needs more food. Nala, the thief, got in and stole all the envelopes of Jack’s new food. I have cans of food, but Jack doesn’t like the food in the cans, the same food he ate last week. Cats are peculiar.

When I was a little kid, I believed in Santa, the Easter Bunny, the tooth fairy and all magical beings. I thought fireflies were fairies, relatives of Tinker Bell. The nights, though, were for vigilance when witches, trolls and goblins wandered. I always figured that was why I had to be home when the streetlights came on, to keep me safe from the dark creatures. I loved stories like Hansel and Gretel, The Brave Little Tailor and Jack and the Beanstalk. They were the good guys. They beat the bad guys.

In Ghana, my language instructor told us folk tales. Mosquito buzzes ear because mosquito is in love with ear who rejected him. The buzzing reminds ear that mosquito is still around. Adze, in a Ewe folktale, is a vampire who turns into a firefly and even a human. It possesses people and turns them into witches. People still believe in witches in Ghana, and there are witch camps where women accused of witchcraft, who have had to flee their villages, live in safety.

I love the classic horror stories rather than the ones with blood and gore and victims a plenty. I’ll always watch Dracula, my favorite. His eyes are mesmerizing, and his cape work captivating especially when he hides his victims and bites behind it. I’d like to be invisible though not mad, crazy, like The Invisible Man. I’d sneak on planes and travel. I’d spook people on Halloween. I’d never want to be The Wolfman, the poor, old sad Wolfman. Frankenstein is my least favorite.

When I was a kid, I knew the difference between what is real and what isn’t, but I remember hearing noises and, instead of hiding, I’d yell out and warn whatever was out there I was armed. It was a lie. It was bravado, but it seemed to work. I never did get attacked