Complex...life.

This Christmas season has left me in a whirl - I have wanted to write and post and all around feel I was advancing the steady march towards....towards...towards...good will towards men? I seem to have lost the intent in the reality of seasonal chaos!

So funny - anyway, life is good and worthy of love and excitement! Merry Christmas!!

Daisies

from my garden

This World...and me.

I am a Christian; Jesus is beautiful. And although I have made many entries in this blog I have for the most part stayed away from religious entries. Too many people saying too many things. But this morning I have a thought that is important to me, something I think that I will be thinking about for awhile.

How is it that Christians (in USA) live as if we were part of the world? This world is not our home yet we strive for acceptance according to the standards of this world: material wealth power, prestige, physical beauty. Jesus clearly stated that he was not of this world. He explained to the disciples that the world did not esteem him and therefore the world would not esteem his followers. Jesus explained that he was from above, a difference, a different place altogether. Yet valuation is placed on churches, preachers, speakers and leaders by how wealthy, beautiful, powerful and clever they are, according to the standards set in this world. This valuation has to be fundamentally flawed.

There does not seem to be a great deal that Jesus is addressing with His disciples according to the 15th Chapter of John other than love and obedience; to obey his command - and that command is to love each other as he loved us, an all encompassing sacrificial love. I have not seen this in the religious institutions I have attempted to connect with, after all they cannot afford to be dictated by sacrificial love. I have grown bitter in the past then evolved to indifference - but indifference is a numbness to your soul, we were not created to be indifferent. So perhaps my answer is very simple, a singular solution...love as Jesus did.

you and YOU

I thought I had you
deep in MY mind
and
grasped in MY hand.
I thought I held
and
understood YOU,
as a book
yet
YOU can not be held,
or restrained by me, or any.
What i had was MY idea of you.
When my experience taught me
much more than i held,
I had to let you go -
you, with a lower case face,
not the YOU who IS
capitals and forever.

Sunset

Gulf Breeze, Florida

Cover Me Sky Blue

Cover me sky blue!
Fall red, summer green.
Wash over, come into
fill the empty corners,
tuck up tight!
Let the yellow drip dripping
and the grey blend blending
creep up like ivy patterned,
cover my soul.

I See You

Sitting on the curb looking,
I see you
caring for the human traffic
moving by.
You notice the homeless,
helpless,
mindless,
humans siphoned of life.
Caring for the human traffic
you cause a swell of giving
offered to the empty man...
moved by the people wandering
and I wonder why.

Seagulls and Diamonds - Happy Thanksgiving!

Jambalaya

My next door neighbors, from Abbeville, Louisiana, showed me something about cooking Cajun rice dishes like Jambalaya, something I never knew. They put in one onion, some garlic, one red bell pepper, one yellow bell pepper, and one green bell pepper and cook it down at the beginning until it is all mush and you can't identify any of it. Sounds unimportant - it is not! I have no idea why and I'm not posting a Jambalaya recipe here but if you are going to make it - any version of it - do this first. It will amaze you. Thanks Darlyne and Walyn! I'm making Jambalaya tonight.

Pork Loin

Pork loin, unseasoned and not injected with any solution can be a lean meat, if you have no objections to pork. I have never cooked a pork loin I really liked...before tonight. This is what I did...I had one half of a larger pork loin I bought - used one half and then froze the other - the frozen half made out much better than the first for sure because I think the first half was good enough for my husband to be very silent and then we disposed of it and acted like nothing ever happened...anyway - tonight.
I took the other half, covered it in a paste of prepared mustard, LOTS of minced garlic, salt, pepper and maybe 2 Tablespoons of dried sage , crushed - (the sage came from my plant and from leaves I dried - so much fun) - I rubbed the meat with this mixture, seared it - put it in a 500 degree oven for 10 minutes then a 250 degree oven for 3 hours - it was great. Something that I like about this is that I grew the sage and dried the sage. It really gives me a sense of satisfaction. Very fun, and tasty!

A Full Sentence

It seems that the older I get the more I appreciate things in smaller doses. Doesn't seem to apply to food...(-: ... what I am trying to say is that, for example this morning, in the 15th chapter of John, 1st sentence - I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. I was ready to stop there. How full is that? I am going to think about it for awhile. I love to garden, I think I understand that a bit...anyway, it is a very full sentence.

My Heart is an Albatross Flying

My heart is an albatross, flying
rarely setting on ground.
Free flying,
salty,
happy,
and me.
My heart is an albatross flying.

My heart is an albatross, running.
Struggling for flight,
looking for updraft,
determined,
to be.
My heart is an albatross running.



(the photo is a Frigate Bird, no albatross in the Image Library!)

Diamonds on the Water

Herons in the Morning

Prepared Minced Garlic

I blogged earlier last month - when I had just started my blog - about prepared minced garlic - you know, the issue that keeps you awake at night. I have used it ALOT for the last few years. My husband has high blood pressure and I though that globs of this garlic was great in just about anything ....but...guess what? My garlic I use - from Great Value - (I know, I'm sorry!) - has Phosphoric Acid in it. Our not so good of a friend - phosphoric acid...I loved that I could open the jar and just throw my globs of garlic in my food - but I have discovered that...even with what we consider "natural", minced garlic in a jar - this garlic has phosphoric acid all in it - I have to research but from what I can see phosphoric acid in soft drinks has been linked to a problem with dissolving skeletal tissue - Let us just mince the garlic cloves, don't you agree?

Blemished Heart

This morning while reading Malachi 1 - I suddenly understood something - not exactly the text of the reading but you know how you can be looking at one thing, or reading something - even hearing the drone of others talking - and something else is happening in your head? Well - it happens to me a lot - might be a learning disability - haha - but back to what happened this morning - I have been bringing a blemished heart to prayer time - blemished by fear, blemished by trying to protect myself, just simply blemished by less than the truth. I appreciate that insight and I will attempt at better communication for now on!
Isn't life painfully wonderful!

Contrasts

Waiting at at the corner of our property for the sun...the emerging light, water, clouds, birds, slight wind... something about it all went together in such peace of perfection and I started to muse...and contrast...and want something else besides challenges and weight. I contemplated that desire to exist in a much more peaceful life style and then I remembered Him...His life, His purpose and I contrasted again... no excuse to recluse.

Clouds or Smoke?

Affordable Funerals But I'd Rather Live

It's Saturday morning and I fixed breakfast - not a usual thing. Now I'm surfing the web for information on a new business venture that I want to do - stopped by my blog to see if there were new comments - and saw that Google had added a new advertisement on my site about "Affordable Funerals"...I am not very excited to be associated with funerals but it did give me a new title - I love titles!
To proceed in my attempt to actually write something that goes with this title...I'd rather have an expensive life, slightly out of reach but something to work at and for, than any affordable funeral. Now on to my day...

Bayou Battleships

One of my favorite scriptures is in Habakkuk 2:14 - "For the time will come when all the earth will be filled, as the waters fill the sea, with and awareness of the glory of the Lord". How powerful is that! I have it written at the top of a map of Haiti - I pray for Haiti and I speak those words over that map when I do. Does that phrase describe the present day reality of Haiti - I think not - but the promise is there never the less - for the whole earth, Haiti included.
Today I feel so conflicted for myself - a promise inside myself of my destiny, that destiny unfulfilled, at least in my estimation. After having raised children and been a relatively good wife - (I don't think I get an award for either but I think I did my best) - I sense a truth similar to the promise of that scripture within me, true, but unfulfilled. I bet there are scores of women, and men for that matter, my age, that feel the same. A mid life crisis (or 3/4 life crisis...) - I don't think so - I think a desire for a shift, a change - something else...I have told my sister that sometimes change can be like turning a battleship around in a bayou...
The challenge is this...love your life, appreciate your life and your loved ones...understand change can be incremental - but make the changes in patience and love. Have faith and peace in a guiding hand much larger than your own. Pursue the truth and don't settle for less...for the time WILL COME!

Colors at Night

The Moon in the Morning

Full Moon, Gulf Breeze, Florida

The Dryer is Broken and the Dragonfly is Dead

My dryer broke the other day and I had to go to the laundromat to dry a blanket. I was the only one in the place. While waiting for the load to dry, I kept hearing a strange, faint, buzz. Surfing the web on my phone, standing up, sitting down, walking around...still that strange, faint, buzz. I looked down. There at my feet - so glad I didn't step on him/her, was a dragonfly, a very sick bug indeed. Buzz, nothing. Buzz, nothing, nothing. Faint buzz, nothing, nothing, nothing. Being the photographer I am, I scooped him/her up and put him/her in the car with thoughts of a wondrous photo shoot when I got home.
Got home. Went to find some fabric I bought in Japan, visions of a beautiful dragonfly lying gently on exotic fabric. Not so. Ok, went to the granddaughters room, raided the doll house of a few pieces of furniture - a dragonfly in an arm chair, a dragonfly taking a bath! You know, a dead dragonfly is a dead dragonfly and next time I think I'll leave him/her to die in peace.

Sunrise Through the Curtain

Ok - all the obvious metaphors... I posted this photo a few days ago thinking of personal experiences of recent. I love photography in that way - to say without saying.

You Only See That Hair in a Certain Light

52 Years old. Where did the time go? You hear it all the time and certainly I feel this way... I feel much younger inside. Even my thoughts are much younger than they should be for a mature woman my age, I frequently think. I still can turn that volume way up on a favorite song, and I did recently see Bob Dylan in concert...and I did not stay seated! But when I look in the mirror I think I'm always a bit shocked. Especially in the full length one. I look like a 52 year old woman who needs to get on with the exercising and I don't like it. I am not unhappy with the inner me, it's the MB people see that needs some work! (Actually, the MB that people don't see is getting a work out all the time from the ultimate Make Over authority). Anyway, getting ready for the day today and looking in the bathroom sink mirror, the full length mirror and that special lighted close up mirror, I had these thoughts and decided to write them down - aren't you so glad? :-) No solution, no conclusion, just another post!

The Challenge of Change

My garden on the east side of my house has brought me a lot of joy. There is a walkway between two patches of dirt and I can walk it's 40 ft. to check out the changes - what's bloomed, what has grown, what even might be in a stage of decay, what is dying. There are many different types of plants along the walkway - some in the ground, some in pots. Some tall, some small. Some that bloom, some that do not. As I walk and observe I then have to address each issue as I need to, as I am able, or want to, because I am the caregiver/gardener.

Life is sort of like that - as we walk life's path there are many changes we will see - some to enjoy, some to lend a hand to, and some to just watch die. I think that the wisdom to know our place as caregivers over the garden we have been assigned is crucial, to have the knowledge of the plants - divine.

Reflections

Santa Rosa Sound, Gulf Breeze, Florida

My Chives Need a Haircut and the Cilantro Has Gone Wild

Another Sunday afternoon although this one is a bit different because Dan is convalescing from knee surgery and I know for a certainty that I was not created to be a nurse...

Since I am a constant companion in the living room/kitchen area with him, I am staying busy. I was also that companion yesterday and I was not as busy but a bit lazy, watching Netflick's on the lap top. Not a typical Saturday and my choice of movies were a bit on the dark side...I want today to be more uplifting and productive so I have repotted my chives and gave them a military style hair cut and my Cilantro has surprised me today by suddenly having a growth spurt and I am in the hunt for recipes that use it. I love the taste of Cilantro.

Today was Tomato Gravy for breakfast - Dan loves it, it must be a Southern thing, I do not love it but I do like that I can use the sweet marjoram I have growing to put in the sauce. Now I am cooking blackberry cobbler - blackberries I picked earlier this year - they freeze well. I put the blackberries in the food processor and grind them up then dump them in a wire mesh strainer to get all the juice out and leave the seeds behind. My granite pestel works really well for pressing the seeds and running it around in the strainer to drain the juice.

Waiting for Day

Gulf Breeze, Florida

St. Francis and the Pony Palm

St. Francis stands in my living room. I see him everyday, gazing lovingly down at the bird on his shoulder, the one who never moves. For that matter, neither does St. Francis, unless I choose to move him.

St. Francis was found very few days after Hurricane Dennis hit my hometown in 2005. He was almost buried completely under mounds of seaweed and other assorted refuse that had washed up on our property - fishing poles, lumber - lots of lumber, trash, signs, dead fish. My husband and I with some friends, after spending days washing muck out of the house, decided to walk a bit along the shoreline - a sort of treasure hunt - and there he was - laying as still as a saint under duress - and we rescued him.

Since that day St. Francis has lived silently in my living room, his only companions his birds and the assorted houseplants I decide look good standing with him. These changed from time to time, mood to mood - until one day he stood by the pony palm , the one we brought home from my mother-in-law's funeral in 2007 - the one that grows and grows. They became permanent companions that day.

St. Francis came to our house after adversity, the pony palm after a death. Visitors to my house may very well have wondered why I have a garden statue in my living room. It is because St. Francis and his friend the pony palm remind me daily that death and adversity are a part of life, sometimes companions - but life continues after death and sainthood comes from coping with adversity for God's sake.

Quick Spaghetti For a Tired Cook

Farberware Classic 8 Quart Covered Straining Stockpot

The end of the day. I must have spaghetti for Dan - Went to Wal Mart to shop with the scooter gang. Remembered the reusable shocking blue Wal Mart grocery bags. YEA! A quick nod of the head to the greeter...bought Italian Sausage (just about the only meat I'll buy at Wal Mart), 29 oz. can tomato sauce, 29 0z can diced tomatoes, 8 oz. package of fresh portabella mushrooms, sweet onions - beat the scooter gang to check out, and came home. Making the sauce - put a glug of olive oil in pot - add one diced onion and one or two tablespoons of minced garlic. Dump in the entire pack of mushrooms and a cup of fresh basil - let cook until the onions are very soft and when they are, add the can of tomato sauce and the can of diced tomatos and another cup of fresh basil, salt and pepper to taste. Let it simmer at least 15 minutes, 30 is better. I have window boxes of basil - (they love the sun and to be in a bottom watering container).Cook the Italian Sausage to the side - I just cook it in a fry pan with a lid - then you can add them to the sauce for about 5 minutes, or not if you have vegetarians in your house.

Sumatra in the morning - should it be tea?

Monday morning - a strong cup of Sumatra coffee, Starbucks of course and Good Morning! It's still dark at 6:15 am and a bit cool here in lower LA - (Lower Alabama) but it's Monday and thinking about getting back into the hamster wheel of trying to get Contractors to actually pay us makes for a challenge in the optimism department, but no matter - optimism is a must. On that note, with a probable challenge ahead, should it be tea instead of coffee? The coffee gets me going but since I love it and drink it until the pot is gone, would it be better to make myself get in the habit of tea? I think some of the issue is that we get into a ritual habit, making the coffee, smelling the coffee, that first taste in the morning...maybe if I have a tea maker...I made a tea with lemon balm, lemon catnip, rose hips, lavender - but that was for my sister who has had trouble sleeping for years. I think I'll put this on my list to do - find a mixture of herbs that would be good for a morning tea, with a kick! Ginseng comes to mind.

The sunrise today is so beautiful. Deep orange fading to yellow and moving on up to blue. Glorious!

Easy Beef Stew

OK - the stew. I had sirloin steak in freezer, I did NOT want to go to the store to buy stew meat so I used it. It was two average size steaks. Cut them up then dusted them with unbleached flour and about 2-3 tsp. of crushed basil I had just dried last night in the dehydrator. Some salt and pepper. Brown this in olive oil. Added a can of tomato soup (I need to replace this with chemical free soup - I used a popular brand and forgot to read the label but I am sure it has additives) then I cut in quarters 4 yellow onions. I use yellow onions with stew. Then I cut up about 1/8 cup of flat leaf parsley from herb garden, threw in a approx. 7" stem of rosemary from garden, about a tsp. of sweet marjoram, some water and about a tablespoon of minced garlic. The garlic, it is in the jar in refrigerator - fast - but I need to research the additive added in that - I'll do that later. Cook for one hour. Then added organic baby carrots - just dump them in without cutting them up - and 2 red potatoes I had and three russet - two yellow squash and let that cook until we leave for church. Turn off stove before leaving and stick pot in frig. I have sage and rosemary in dehydrator right now - must remember to turn that off too! Will sample after church...(bread is in bread machine...).

Just got back and ate the stew - great! I think next time a bit more salt but the rosemary gave it a sweet flavor and the basil also. Hurray! Oh yea - don't forget to pull the rosemary stem out. All the leaves should be cooked off.

Easy Sunday Morning

Well, this morning is great - clear, crisp and I feel energized - all 52 years of me. I've been wanting to start a blog for some time because...I really don't why but I have so here I am.

I have been trying to get us (Dan the hubby and myself) off of as many chemical additives in food as I can, factoring in that I don't have time to devote my life to it like a religion, but I am making the changes I can as they come to me as opportunities. For example - bread. Look at the ingredients in a loaf of whole wheat or whole grain bread - maybe you have the whole grains but you have a whole lot of other things also. So I started to make bread in my bread machine - yes, my bread machine because if I want to be a purist and make it by hand, it will never happen - whole wheat bread with flax and sunflower seeds. For my husband and I a loaf a week is enough - keep in the refrigerator - ingredients - unbleached bread flour, whole wheat flour (I am looking hard to find whole wheat bread flour (might have to grind my own) - salt, yeast, honey, butter, flax seed, raw sunflower seeds. Great! This morning I am making stew and I have decided to eliminate and replace the stew seasoning mix I have used for years with my herbs I grow. Herbs - that's for another post. I have learned so much about them and enjoy them and love the smell of them when cut and when drying. Too much to write now. But I'll post later what I did with the stew if it tastes good - or even not so good. Gotta learn by trying...