Lukewarm life

I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.

–Revelations 3:15-16

Does anyone else ever feel like they are living their entire lives in a lukewarm state? Not necessarily regarding God (although, obviously, that can be a big part of it), but in general. Not committed to one life path or another. Not pursuing anything in particular. Not excited about anything or distraught by anything or worked up about much at all.

That’s how I feel just now.

Here I sit. Wife of one. Mom of two. Co-owner of fairly successful business. Unable to decide whether to go back to seminary, pursue law school, apply for a full-time job or just part-time. Etcetera.

Bleah.

I can’t even get my act together enough to unpack my cookbooks, and cooking is one of the few things I know I love.

(Yet I know I don’t want to be a full-time cook.)

I can’t seem to fully focus on my business, because it isn’t what I most wish I were doing…but what do I most wish for? I don’t know. Clarity? A goal?

I thought writing out my thoughts would help, and this post is just as muddled as I am.

Photo of the day

Because I’m so freaking busy trying to finish moving and make Halloween fun and file taxes and do those other things I’ve already forgotten…

A photo. From last spring’s trip to Spain.

Is it possible to be more crabby and still be photogenic?

Unobtainium

Unobtainium is the non-word of the day.

Definition (inferred): an unobtainable substance.

Thanks to Erin at www.dressaday.com for the reference (see the October 19 post). I laughed for 20 minutes.

Good hair

Chris Rock has a new documentary that just came out entitled Good Hair. It’s about the black hair industry, how black hair (in its natural state) is perceived, self-image…and so on. It looks really interesting and, because it is Chris Rock, really funny.

My hair is not a huge part of my self-image, I must admit. I have been known to hack off a foot of hair without blinking an eye. But there are things I’ve always wanted to try with my hair, and Good Hair reminded me of that, because they are traditionally black hairstyles.

When I was in high school, a teen style magazine–either Sassy or Jane–ran a feature on African braids. There were thin ones and thick ones, ones that required additional (synthetic) hair and ones that could be done with what nature gave you. I fell in love with some gorgeous fat spirals. Unfortunately, I can’t remember the name of the braid style. Even more unfortunately, my thick-ish white-girl hair is not enough to sustain these braids.

In college, I tried to acquire dreadlocks  following the steps Alice Walker gives in Anything We Love Can Be Saved. I didn’t brush my hair. I washed it regularly. I twisted handsful of it to help the hair knit together. But at the end of six or seven months, all I had was unbrushed hair. Of course, I may be missing the key ingredient she mentioned: at least one drop of African blood.

I don’t want these hairstyles because I’m trying to become black. That would be silly and pointless besides. I just think they look beautiful on women and men I have seen, and I want to see if they would be beautiful on me, too.

Stupidest crime

As the Bean would say, it isn’t nice to call someone stupid. But you be the judge.

When the Bean was still in diapers, we lived 45 minutes north of Omaha. Michael worked in Omaha; I worked in Winnebago. We wanted the Bean to wear cloth diapers without us having to wash the dang things, so we signed up with American Diaper Service, which is located in the Big O.

The delivery driver, understandably, did not want to drive 45 minutes north to drop off 60 diapers each week. So we worked out a somewhat awkward plan. Michael would haul the dirty diapers to work once a week, pop his trunk and leave the lid ever-so-slightly ajar. The driver would open the trunk, remove the bag o’ dirty diapers, replace them with clean stock and close the lid.

It worked like a charm until one week, when Michael received a call at work. It was the driver, calling from the parking lot. You forgot to pop your trunk, he said.

Now, Michael had only arrived at work 20 minutes before, and he was sure he had popped the trunk. But perhaps the wind had blown it shut. Who knows? So he made his way out to the parking lot and reopened the trunk to find…nothing.

In the short time he had been at work, someone had discovered the open trunk and stolen the first thing they could grab…which happened to be 30 pounds of urine- and feces-soaked diapers.

I wish I could have seen the thief’s face when he opened the bag.

You know everything will be crazy when…

Your debit card is declined for a $6 donut bill.

Your bank account shows two purchases made at gas stations you have never heard of, in states you have never visited, totalling more than $200.

It’s the day before moving day, and none of your kitchen is packed.

It’s the day before moving day, and none of your bedroom is packed.

It’s the day before moving day, and none of your you have successfully packed only books, kitsch and coffee mugs.

It’s the night before moving day, and your mildly annoying cough of three weeks suddenly escalates into searing chest pain and an inability to breathe. Which leads to a five-hour emergency room visit, an IV, X-rays, a CT scan “to make sure it isn’t a pulmonary embolism”, antibiotics, and a diagnosis of pneumonia. Oh, and an injection of something that makes you unable to nurse your four-month-old daughter for 24 hours.

Which further leads to a trip to the pharmacy for formula, a prescription, a bottle, rice cereal and Pedialyte in case the baby won’t drink formula…and a bedtime of 5:30 a.m.  And you’re due to pick up the moving van at 8:30 a.m.

Wait. Somewhere along there the line between “will be crazy” and “is crazy” blurred. And I didn’t even get to driving to the hospital to pump breastmilk, my father-in-law’s bleeding hands and arms, furniture that wouldn’t fit through doorways or up stairwells…

Thank God for my parents, my in-laws and my friends. We never would have made it into the new place without them.

Mas hideousness

No, no..not “mass hideousness”. “Mas”. As in “more”. This is your Spanish word of the day.

And now for something completely different…

Mm…just look at those ’70s colors. Don’t you just miss burnt umber?

End of the season

The weather predicted for Saturday, October 10: hard freeze in the early morning hours.

The weather received: 3+ inches of snow.

Hello, winter.

Because I hate to see good food go to waste (especially if I’ve grown it), I made a special trip to our garden at sundown Friday night. I picked a plastic grocery bag full of these:

Can you guess what they are?

I filled a second bag with green and red tomatoes, and a third with various herbs to dry or use. I drove home after dark, wishing I had made it to the garden earlier, because I KNEW there was more that I had missed.

Saturday was the last day of the farmers’ market. Sigh. I wasn’t sure if anyone would show up, since it was still snowing lightly at 10. But I couldn’t just ignore the last week, not when I had made up a whole list of what I wanted to buy. So I showed up with my $40 in hand (double what I usually spend), and gave my custom to the growers who had braved the cold.

I made three trips to the car.

It’s an affliction.

I bought:

• parsnips
• carrots
• turnips
• onions
• hubbard squash
• acorn squash
• pumpkins
• lettuce
• spinach
• apples
• green onions
• red kale
• beets

And I was given a sourdough baguette from a vendor anxious to get in out of the cold.

With my car full of produce, I headed home. Unfortunately, my kitchen was already full of Friday night’s haul, Thursday’s coop order, Wednesday’s visit to my parents’ garden, and leftovers from last week’s market.

I pulled on my gloriously stained apron and set to work. As of now (2 AM on Sunday), I accomplished:

• one green tomato pie
• ~2 pounds of okra, trimmed and cleaned for gumbo
• 5 cups of zucchini, grated for bread (half in the freezer, half for now)
• ~1/2 pound of blanched spinach in the freezer
• 4 cups of rhubarb, chopped and frozen
• 1 1/2 cups of rhubarb, chopped for use this week
• a pot of soup composed of the last of my red potatoes, an aging leek, bacon trimmings from Wohlner’s, and a bit of cream
• 2 heads of lettuce cleaned and ready for use
• 2 trays of herbs drying

Oh, and remember that mystery photo? Those are unripe currant tomatoes. I plucked a quart of them off the vine. They are now residing in the freezer with everything else.

Did I mention that I made nutty sweet potato waffles for breakfast, sorted my baby’s clothes, closed all of the storm windows and did two loads of dishes? And I took my older daughter outside for a snowball fight. This is the most energetic day I’ve had in…uh…my life?

Hideous cookbook series, part 4

I wandered away from this topic for awhile, but stumbled across a recipe this week that simply screamed for inclusion:

Corned Beef Salad

1 3-ounce pakage orange or lemon gelatin

1 3/4 c. hot water

1 c. Miracle Whip

1 c. chopped celery

1/4 c. chopped green pepper

1/4 c. finely chopped onion

3 hard-boiled eggs, chopped

1 can corned beef, broken up

Add hot water to gelatin to dissolve. When cool, add other ingredients. Chill until set in a 9″ x 9″ pan. Serve with crackers.

–from A Taste of Heaven, compiled by Hazel Dell United Methodist Church

Okay, first off, what about this says “salad”? Is it the gelatin? Is everything that contains gelatin either a salad or a dessert?

Second, just the phrase “can corned beef, broken up” makes me gag. Ew.

And, finally, the woman who submitted this recipe is known for being a fantastic cook. I won’t publish her name, because I don’t want to embarrass her, but…wow. The Hazel Dell compilers evidently did not suffer from the same compunctions.

More hideousness to come!

Yes Man theology, part 2

I started on this topic yesterday (drawing parallels between the movie Yes Man and living as a Christian), but my post grew long before I finished what I wanted to say. So here is part two.

In Yes Man, Carl’s yeses invariably result in good things happening to him. Even when “bad” things happen first, eventually it works out.

Events happen like this in Christian life, too. Except, to quote Dr. Seuss, “when they don’t. ‘Cause sometimes they won’t.”

God’s choices are not always easy to understand. Sometimes bad things happen to us or our loved ones, and we can’t help but ask God why. If you can’t think of an example, I’ve got a whole long list I’m saving up to ask God about, including:

1. child molestation
2. war
3. nuclear holocaust
4. non-nuclear holocaust
5. rape
6. physical abuse
7. verbal abuse
8. murder

…and so on. I have specific people in mind when I list many of these topics, but their stories aren’t relevant here. My point is, being a Christian does not exempt you from suffering.

It would be great if it did, right? We would be living the sweet life. We would be rewarded right away for making good choices…which would lead to even more virtuous actions. Unbelievers would see a clear correlation between Christianity and rewards, so they’d be beating down the doors of every church! No more empty pews! Yes!

Well, it doesn’t work that way. Christianity does have its rewards, but they are complex and difficult to see from the outside. Why? Ask Paul Stanley.

“You really like my limousine;
You like the way the wheels roll.
You like my seven inch leather heels
And goin to all of the shows, but
Do you love me, do you love me?
Do you love me, really love me ?

–from “Do You Love Me?” by Kiss

God wants us to choose his way because we love HIM,  not because we love what he can give us. There may be more to it, but for now, that’s answer enough for me.