Oddities, Audacity--and Appreciation

 

by Pat Laster

 

                “I’ve never seen one,” I said. “Wanna see mine?” he asked, unbuttoning ………….. the top two buttons of his shirt. I even reached in to touch––with his leave––the place that held his pacemaker. It was as round as a pocket watch, protruding just slightly with a still-angry-red scar above.

Dr. N. was an administrator at the school from which we both retired. He is a poet with two self-published books, a former president of both the state poets’ society and the local branch. This look into his shirt happened during the refreshment break of an afternoon meeting of the local poets. Nothing clandestine.

Was I audacious to ask to take such a peek? Maybe, but appreciative. Now, I know what a pacemaker (pocket) looks like and where it is located. And when I hear others talk of theirs or that someone they know has one or is about to get one, I’ll be able to visualize it. Thanks, Doc.

             Oddity:  At the same meeting, a newish poet who says she has written over a thousand “haikus” in the past few months asked me a question I couldn’t grasp at first. “Do you like to go down to the boats?” I couldn’t make out any meaning so I asked her to repeat it. “Do you ever go down and play the boats?”

             Oh, she meant the casinos. “No, why?”

              “Something I read in your earlier haiku collection, about your sisters…”

              Then I knew why she would think that. One of the poems said something about my coming home with only fifteen cents.

             No, the sisters never go to the boats. We go to flea market areas or unusual places like Hilton Head, Savannah and Charleston. And to visit our uncle in Oak Ridge.

             Odd: Twice in three days, I’ve read allusions to the hedgehog and the fox. Researching, I found that it is the name of an essay by Isaiah Berlin in which he takes the hedgehog as the type of person who knows “one big thing” as opposed to the fox who knows many things. The next time, I’ll know its meaning.

             Audacious: I have no caller ID. So when I answer a call and no one speaks immediately, I hang up, knowing it’s a robo-call/telemarketer/political ad. But this is what happened last week:

             Phone rings. I answer on the first ring since it is right in front of me. “Hello?”

             Nothing. I hang up.

             Phone rings. I answer. This woman whose voice sounds like I think Ms. Shoffner’s voice would sound, according to the picture in both the daily and last week’s STANDARD, says “Why did you hang up on me?”

             Me: “Because you didn’t answer right away, and because I don’t talk to telemarketers.”

            “You DO realize it was an insult to hang u––”

             Click.

             Phone rings again. I didn’t answer; she didn’t leave a message.

             Can you imagine the audacity? Has that ever happened to you?

 

c 2012 by Pat Laster dba lovepat press

Pear harvesting time again

by Pat Laster

 

                This year’s loaded pear tree has done itself proud again.  The fruit, though smallish (due to no selective thinning), continues to fall from the tree. [This picture is from Google Images.]

 I’ve taken a different tack this year when (ahem) attacking the pears. I only cut out the rot and the core and leave the peelings. I don’t even cut them into smaller pieces, but plop them in a pan of ascorbic water until it is full. Then I place the entire pan into the fridge.

After all, the time it takes to cut a pan full of pears is all the time I want to spend on that job. I probably need to check my email. Or take a nap. Or work on a column. Or a story. Or a poem.

The next step to preserving the free pear crop is to cook them. Four years ago, I wrote about a different method of preparing—peeling, cutting into bite-sized pieces, and using the microwave.

This year, I hauled out my Dutch oven and set it on the large front burner of the range. Using a colander, I poured off the water from the pan of cooled pears and placed the pieces in said pot. I added enough tea kettle water to assure some liquid, shook two dashes of salt over, poured white sugar to cover the top and some brown sugar and cinnamon to give it a homey aroma while cooking and a sweet and spicy taste.

With the heat set at 6 (out of 10), I covered the pot and set the range timer for 10-12 minutes. Being cold to start, the pears would take a while to heat. Since it was dangerous to leave the kitchen—the portable timer had a hitch in its gitalong; it wasn’t dependable--I set the oven timer. After the fruit began boiling, I turned the heat lower--to 5--and stirred them every ten minutes or so.

During the cooking, I usually stood at the sink and began working up another batch, either brought in that day or the day before. Reminding me of the sheep and the goats story from scripture, I separated the ones with obvious rot from those whose outsides looked unsullied. (Hmm, maybe that’s not a good allusion.) I laid out the good ones on a table in an adjoining room.

There was another step. After the fruit was cooked and cooled, I poured the contents into a glass salad bowl, covered it with a glass plate and stowed it on the bottom shelf of the fridge. Till tomorrow. Or whenever I got around to it.

After gathering those containers that had been emptied, washed and stored, and buying new ones, it was time to cut the pieces into bite sizes, cover them with juice, seal them and pop them into the freezer. They were already cold so there was no need to cool them first.  When they were frozen, I moved them to the chest freezer on the back porch.

Now, (after thawing) they will ready for compotes, cakes, cobblers, or to eat alone with whipped topping or ice cream. The skins are as soft as the meat, with a slightly different texture.

Here is a made-up recipe for a light dessert: one berry bowl of stewed pears, to which a dollop of whipped topping and a shake or two of sunflower seeds have been added and mixed in. Yummy!

c 2012 by Pat Laster dba lovepat press

My turn at the names game

This could be the Couch sisters, Patricia Ann, Mary Carolyn, Barbara Jean & Beverly Diane

 by Pat Laster

 

                Since the 1940 census data was published, various columnists have jumped on the bandwagon by comparing given names with then and now. So here I come at the tail end before the horses begin galloping to catch up with the last bandwagon I missed.

Camille Nessler and Lynda Hollenbeck, both of The Saline [County, Arkansas]Courier, and even the Amity Standard’s own Norma Blanton beat me to the wagon and got the best seats. Camille’s take was on crazily-spelled names. Those she listed are: Mykull, Twany, Whenndee, Suhmanntha, Apple, Coco, Banjo, Quillon, Prestalyn, Jerrison, and Mountain Tree. Thanks, Camille.

Still, since I’ve been collecting names for some time now, I gotta get my two-cents worth in. I looked through my last journal page by page, knowing that somewhere I listed the 1940s 10 most popular girls’ names, the 1940s 10 most popular boys’ names, then present-day’s 10 most popular sobriquets. Many of the earlier boys’ names were the same as today’s. 

                While searching, I ran across this list of interesting complete names of folks still living: Tad Hair, Mike Right, Jeff Rent, Bo Beck, Cherish Gray, Prairie Rice, Mark Mix, Redhawk, and Two Rivers. And then there’s the lately deceased astronaut, Sally Ride. Makes the name Pat Laster seem like … well plaster, doesn’t it?

Here is a Doris Elizabeth Jean (surname omitted). Two of my late Aunt Doris’s daughters were named Jean and Elizabeth. To Marilyn Collins, a teacher of memoir-writing, a prompt of this kind should be written on a 3 by 5 card and kept for the future time I might have—after finishing everything else I’ve started –to begin my own memoir. (Done, Marilyn.)

Aha! Here it is! Madison, originally a surname then a boy’s name through the 1950s is now the 8^th most popular girl’s name in the US. Mia is 9^th on the 2011 list.

In the 1940s, Betty was 5^th most popular, Carol, 6^th and Shirley, 9^th. None of those are in the top 1,000 today. Also falling out of favor were Judith, Barbara, Sandra, Linda, Nancy and Mary.

The 1940s top ten boys ‘names remained in the 376 most popular names in 2011. James (1/17), William (4/3) and David (7-18). Others in the earlier list were Donald, Ronald, Richard, Charles, Thomas, Robert and John. (Yawn.)

In my previous journal, the final list of names noted from my day’s readings included: Fanny Blanche, still living at 99, Astra, Buford and Jap (from the 1913-era), Lum, Delilahann, Sherece, Olyn, Coleton, Nali, Tyress (Why hasn’t someone thought of naming their girl child Tygress?) and Misael.

Also, Theresia, Laura Lee (96), Drucilla (98), Doanie, Armando, Corise, Adler, Johnma, Kierra, Traxel, LaDenna, Denyce, Delia, Zan, Lura Clyde, Symantha, Rabia and Gael.

Just last Sunday, I found Rolla and Mabel (1912-era), Ingalls, LaVerle, Uela, Iwana, Geneil, Cathaleene, Dia and Theba, Mekale, JaMichael, Defonta, Kimber, Fantasia and Bobak.

Also Ludmilla, Rocco, Salman, Kurtz, Halton, Jakolby, Pearl (a male, 100 years old at death), Inocencia, Kecia, Jelonda, Moronda, Cindra, ReZell, Lovana, Eramo, Emry, Ponce de Leon (!), Philander, Plato and Evangel.

I wonder how many of those names made the latest census. Or the 1940s one.

 

c 2012 by Pat Laster dba lovepat press

Oregon to Arkansas and back: parts of an e-conversation

by Pat Laster

 

          FROM A FRIEND who saw where Isaac’s tail-end hit near Little Rock and inquired as to my safety.

          “We've had a lot of smoke from two wildfires on the Warm Springs Indian Reservation and the air was pretty bad until yesterday, when the wind again shifted to the west (only twice now in two weeks). Still pretty warm, too, with mid-80's; usually by September 1, we're into the mid to low 70's. The summer came late and stayed late this year.

          “I enjoyed the August Haiku--especially the "signature poem"--power outage/enjoying the lighter side/of darkness. We were without power on August 5 or so for about 5 hours after lightning struck a transmission line; lights went out for over 9,500 people and we lost our reception of Oregon Public Broadcasting.

         “When I informed them of it three days later, the "customer care" (don't you just love that!) woman emailed me that the engineers were working on it.

          “Two weeks later and we still can't get the signal, so I emailed again and she seemed rather surprised that it wasn't fixed yet, then told me they were out there again at the antenna array trying to see what was wrong.

            “As of last night, still no OPB. I really miss the Masterpiece Mystery series and Sherlock Holmes, and Doc Martin (which at first I thought was stupid, until I saw a repeat of the first episode ever made, which explained a lot, and now I like it).
            “Well, enough of my babbling . . . .  S.”

          ON SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, I answered her:

 

“Thanks for checking/caring. Except for lashing wind and slashing rain--which I found myself in TWICE within an hour--it is now sunny and as calm as if Isaac never lived and breathed.

 

“I did drive 30 miles in it yesterday (from a writers' conference in Searcy)--very slowly on Highway 67/167, sometimes with hazards blinking.

 

“Back at Beebe, we changed to dry clothes, then I started home. Had to stop for gas and by the time I had drawn enough to get home, and the pump said "see the attendant," I was drenched yet again. The good part was that two or three miles south of Beebe, the four-lane highway was dry and the sun was shining. So, though wet, I drove with cruise control (a no-no in the rain) until I-30.

 

“Within a mile of home, a fireman stopped us. A power line lay across the road "just over this rise," he said. Not too much trouble to turn around and take a back way home.

 

          “On Couchwood Hill, two tree limbs were down--both smallish-- and other items--flower pots, buckets--were blown around.

 

         “Glad you liked the August booklet. The September Senryu one ready to mail out. I spent almost all of August entering state and regional contests and submitted a revised version of the Rakestraw Experience to an Ozark-related anthology. My muse may be spent, too.

 

           “I've already had a nap today since I arise early to get to church (choir) at 8:14!! This morning, the power was out at the beginning of the service. We sang the anthem by candle-and- window-light.

This is my 3rd Sunday running to sing in their choir, a neighboring church with a good (to me) new director and young-man organist who has gone back to college (where grandson Billy goes) to finish  his degree. Some of my oldest and dearest friends still sing in the group, too.

 

           “Life is good here. Take care of yourself. PL”

 

c 2012 by Pat Laster dba lovepat press

Check out my novel, A Journey of Choice, on Amazon or B&N. A sequel is in the works.

 

        The drought ruins a few plantings

                                                 —but not all                                                    

by Pat Laster                                                                               

           The first cooler days of August last week—and the rain, plus a dose of nutrients––prompted a rejuvenation in part of the flora that surrounds Couchwood Manor. Showing WHITE were abelia blooms, an airplane plant blossom and, against maroon foliage, shamrock flowers.

            Different shades and hues of PINK turned up in a few Encore azalea blossoms, the long-blooming crape myrtle, oxalis, and Mom’s old hanging begonia.
           
             BLUE wandering jew, PURPLE monkey-grass blooms and beautyberries, FUCHIA dianthus, YELLOW lantana and lance-leaf coreopsis completed the rainbow of colors.

            Wait! I forgot the various colors of the rose moss/moss rose/portulaca. [See picture: disclaimer: not mine, but similar.]

             Also a community of white tent-capped toadstools sprang up in the lower south yard.
           
               Not everything in this hilltop acre survived the drought. It was easy to water the front and porch plants, but not so much the back where cannas are still green but have not bloomed. Oxalis and monkey grass planted around the yellow ash stump pretty well went dormant/brown or the foliage disappeared, leaving bulbs stacked like miniature minarets.

             For the second year running, two property-edged plants on the west died of thirst. Only one branch of a variegated privet survived. The neatnik neighbors will like that: they can encroach farther into my yard with their mower. Suits me: less for me to mow.

              Grandmother’s rock garden/our pet cemetery under a three-tree sassafras grove, is way out of reach of a hose. Earlier, optimistically, I planted lamb’s ear, a coreopsis, oxalis and tansy to the already- growing, single stalk of pink chrysanthemum and an ancient stand of day lilies.

              I carried water from the rain barrel (a number ten washtub) at the northwest corner of the house. Eventually, with no rain, I also let that bed go. Only the lilies and the mum stalk still show green. And a community of wild asters. All the leaves of the volunteer dogwood sapling are half ECRU. (Ecru—now there’s another color to add to the ones above!)

           The pear tree is so loaded that on one branch each pear touches another all the way down (or up; I took a picture for proof [for later]. This tree does its thing without benefit of pruning—except what nature does––or spraying. One fellow stopped by earlier in the month to see if I were going to “do anything” with the pears. If not, could he have them for preserves. I assured him I was.

          “You can have what’s already fallen,” I said, but he didn’t take me up on that. My disabled-vet cousin will likely be by again (I don’t see him until pear season) to get “a few for his wife.” He fills a five-gallon bucket!

         I’ve sometimes thought of adding a faucet on the north side, but since I can’t keep the ‘mum bed on the south alive and blooming, why add to my responsibilities?  P. Allen Smith I’m not!!

         Speaking of the south mum-and-lily bed, it is the worst-kept rectangle of them all. Located under the breakfast room windows, and close to the only outside faucet, it is built up a foot high with rock-and-mortar—Dad’s doing, I suppose. What it needs is a complete dig-out. Which may happen after I finish the kitchen painting project.

           Always plant for color, Janet Carson says, but isn’t GREEN a color?

c 2012 by Pat Laster dba lovepat press

 

Times spent in the kitchen: variation and near fiasco

by Pat Laster

 

                In a recent post, I said I didn’t spend much time in the kitchen. Meaning, I don’t ordinarily cook. But one day, I did, and it turned out swell [Slang: excellent]. 

          I needed a dessert for a family dinner I was hosting in a week or so. Frozen pear sauce (with peelings) from last year’s early crop lay in the chest freezer. [Advice to self: if you do this again, put the hard little knobs through the sausage grinder.] I thought: look for a recipe for applesauce cake; it should be the same thing, right?

                From a Piggott United Methodist Church cookbook, I found one. Since I already had ingredients similar to those in the recipe, I thought again: what about substituting what’s already in my pantry/fridge. I set all the needed supplies except eggs out on the countertop thinking I would cook either early morning or late night. I did neither. For a week or so, those things took up habitation.

                But on a day when the temps were supposed to be MUCH cooler, the spirit finally moved and I got busy.

                I turned the oven to 350 degrees, then greased and floured a glass 9 x 13 inch glass dish instead of a bundt pan, per the recipe. I had one, but I didn’t want to use it.

                In place of “one box French vanilla cake mix,” I used what I had: a Betty Crocker white cake mix, expiration date, August 2012.

                In lieu of “one package French vanilla pudding mix,” I used a plain old vanilla, store brand box.

                The four eggs were a no-brainer. Nor the one-third cup vegetable oil.

                Instead of “one cup raisins” I used one cup of mixed dried fruits—cranberries, yellow and dark raisins.

                Rather than “one cup chopped pecans,” I used one cup sunflower kernels. Cinnamon and nutmeg amounts remained the same.

                Instead of “one cup applesauce,” a cup of pear sauce.

                I beat the eggs together first with a whisk, then added and “blend[ed] all the ingredients.” With the same whisk—no getting out the hand beater and counting three minutes as some recipes say to do.

                Voila! A perfect cake using similar ingredients. Now, if I can keep from eating it before company comes.

             Do you suppose I could copyright the recipe?

                Oh, and now, the new crop of pears is coming on, er, down. Just today, I gathered a bailed bucket of windfall or weightfall or too-crowded-I’m-getting-outta-the-way-fall. This is the second batch I’ve brought in.

                The first batch of small green pears, I cored and gouged out the rot, dropped them into water sprinkled with Fruit Fresh. I would cook them with the peelings, and then rice them into smooth pear sauce. In my aluminum kettle, I dumped the fruit, added sugars, both brown and white, a dash or two of salt, and a dash or three of cinnamon. Put the heat at 5/10 [medium?] and went off to the computer.

                Soon, I smelled something. I ran into the kitchen and turned the fire off before grabbing a hot pad to the metal handle of the lid. The fruit was prettily glazed and sitting in a little floor of honey-textured syrup. Well, a little thicker than honey, to be truthful. No need to rice these skins. They are as tender as the pears.

                Maybe I’d better stay out of the kitchen after all.

c 2012 by Pat Laster dba lovepat press

GUEST COLUMN on folklore adages

Will Rogers inspires recollections of    
                                   childhood sayings
                                             by Lew Taylor

         Will Rogers is famous for a number of his activities, not the least of which is his origin of quotable sound bites of encapsulated wisdom. One of the most quoted, “I never met a man I didn’t like,” can be a source of wonder and dispute. Another one of my favorites: “The trouble is, we know so many things that ain’t so.”

         History has proved him right on that one, but it set me to wondering about the things we knew in my youth that seem to have no basis in fact. We knew those things with a certainty, and since there was no one to dispute them around in our mountain home at the head of the creek, they must have been true; at least in those days as far as we were concerned.

         Take, for instance, “If a turtle bites you, he won’t let go until it thunders.” Now, on our trips we often caught turtles of various types and sizes. Since getting the hook out of the mouth of a turtle could be risky, we frequently cut the hook off the line before we dispatched him with a rock.
         Thus, we never knew anyone who tested the premise; that is, no one we knew was ever bitten by a turtle—which was good, because it could be a long time between thunderstorms.

          Another, while we’re on the creek bank. “Snakes won’t or can’t, bite under water.” Thus we confidently waded the streams known to harbor water snakes of two or three kinds, knowing we could see them swimming toward us on the surface and beat them off. And, of course, they did not pose a danger under water.
         Never mind that the Dawkins boy was bitten on one toe wading Big Cedar Creek. He must have stepped on its head, because snakes don’t bite under water. No one thought to ask how they caught the fish and frogs on which they thrived. It was just reassuring to know they don’t bite under water.

          Another well-known fact in our mountain home was that eating fish and drinking milk at the same meal would make us sick. How we came to know that I cannot surmise, but no one at our house ever ate fish and drank milk at the same meal. None of us got sick afterward. That was all the proof one should need for that wisdom.

         Of course, a lot of our quotes to live by from my childhood proved themselves valuable. One of those wise pieces of advice, “Let sleeping dogs lie,” proved its worth in some way almost every day.

        Some sayings have passed into cliché, or common folk lore. “Don’t take any wooden nickels.” I had no problem with that one, as I do not recall seeing any wooden nickels, although there must be some historical event that gave rise to it.

        “Not enough room to swing a cat by the tail without getting fur in your mouth” always sounded like good advice, too, but I never saw anyone try to swing a cat by the tail in a larger space to check the need for the adage.

        The real gems from childhood, though, were all the things we knew that weren’t so.   

        Will Rogers was more than a pretty trick roper.

 Lew Taylor is retired from the Foreign Service and is a poet living in Stillwater, Oklahoma.

c 2012 by  Lew Taylor and Pat Laster dba lovepat press