Needing Water

The earth is dry, cracked and hot with the heat of the sun baking soil to brick. Almost September the nights are colder now, but still the days burn and we haven't mowed the lawn in weeks. There is, really, no lawn left to mow. It has withered, scorched away, evaporated, and only hardy native weeds remain.
Chickory stems which marred the perfection of grassy expanses now give the only signs of life in this dry place. It has not rained, not a proper rain, in too long. I miss those rolling afternoon thundershowers that used to spell August afternoons across a booming sky.
But everywhere are signs that this will change soon. The hot months are shifting from springs moist greens to brown burnished leaves, from green unripe apples to blushing red ones, harvests soon to be ripe with the fullness of Autumn. And then the rains will come.

Silver tarnished clouds will fill the blueness and burst out to wash the fruit of the land. Then we will stand, you and I, in the midst of lush golds and reds, a touch of evergreen, and we will joyfully weep with the sky. We will pray that we might never be dry again, and we will praise God for Living Water.

Fireworks

Last night we celebrated the independence of our nation with fireworks. Several of my sisters have small children, and although the fireworks are not quite so spectacular when set off at 6:30 on a summer’s evening, most of us were watching the delighted faces of the little ones anyway and thoroughly enjoyed the show.

Our State Laws do not allow any explosive types, or areal varieties of fireworks, and for the sake of our eardrums and the timid three year old who was badly frightened by “loud fires” last Fourth of July, we remained whistle and bang free. So we had gentle Snowflakes, a marvelously silent blue and white fountain called Blue Ice, and some colorful Geyser Fountains the heights of which solicited squeals of delight better than any eardrum piercing manufactured shriek. This year we also tried out something called a Tomahawk Rocket Fountain, which is not a rocket and sits on a stick which we put into the ground rather than holding as the package suggested – I should have gotten more of those, they were not noisy or scary. A new favorite is born.

We did not hold the sparklers this year either. I remember when I was young the sparklers were taller, longer lasting – I could write my whole name in the sparks of just one sparkler. I couldn’t get half way through with the sad little sparklers they sell these days. Sparklers used to have lengthy metal “handles” too. Something long enough that your hand never got near the hot part and there was no real risk of injury as long as you held the right end. (You know, instead of getting out the “L”, and watching its dying sputters drop a spark on my disappointed hand.)

I’m not surprised we hear about states wanting to ban hand held sparklers now. I want to ban these skimpy sparklers too. Who do we write to about making the good old-fashioned kind again? The kind that used to cost just 99 cents and were three times the length of the current 2 dollar kind? I long for a lengthy sparkler with which to sign my name in the night sky. My nieces and nephews should be able to have that experience too – it feels like a part of childhood that they might miss.

There are all sorts of summer things designed especially for making childhood memories, fireflies are another. The evening willows filled with the glimmering bugs as we wrapped up our pyrotechnics. At least some things don’t change. Their silent flickers reminded us of special evenings being allowed to stay up late, with tinfoil lids on Mason Jars. We fed our fireflies, my sisters and I. Certain they would need to eat as they glowed in our rooms for a night, we would fill their jars so full of leaves that they would often hide in the center and be only a soft green flicker through foliage.

“Look at all the fireworks.” The child said to me last night, pointing at those very well designed sparklers of the summer night. They filled the twilight with a twinkle of wonder I had almost forgotten to see. Thank You God, for not re-designing the firefly.

Salad Days

There is something about hot weather that makes a hot meal seem like blasphemy. These are Salad Days. The don't turn on the stove and eat something cool and refreshingly cool days. Don't even think about the fact that it's healthy. (Do think about where it comes from and try to buy local -- support your community farmers whenever possible!)

Veggie Salad: Fresh lettuce, choped tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, broccoli, whatever's ripe in the garden, and Pepper Lime Dressing. Yum.

Pepper Lime Dressing

4 tablespoons sugar
5 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 lime’s juice (or about 1/4 to 1/2 cup from the "Real Lime" bottle)
4 teaspoons fresh grated ginger (or powdered dry if you must)
5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon sea salt
2-3 teaspoon crushed red pepper
Combine everything in a bottle (You have a bottle or at least a jar you can use. Look in that recycling bin, pull something out, sterilize it in the dishwasher, and reuse it now.) Refridgerate overnight, or at least a couple hours, to let the flavors meld. Shake thoroughly before serving.

What I did this morning... Patriotic Photos

Hooray for the Red, White, and Blue!

Quilts and Tea

Perhaps this has only been my experience, or perhaps it is true for others as well. Quilters drink tea. In Jeff Brumbeau and Gail de Marcken’s marvelous book The Quiltmaker’s Gift the quiltmaker who lives an idyllic live on the top of the mountains drinks blackberry teas and settles in to quilt. She pours tea for a bear and her teapot billows with her skirts from a rope tied round her waist when she is stranded on the tiny island. (That is one of my favorite of all the beautiful pictures in the book.)

Basically, she drinks tea. I drink tea too. I never acquired a taste for coffee, that bitter drug, but tea…

Green teas, black teas, oolongs, “sky between branches,” “cup of poetry,” “dragon’s well.” Who can resist the alluring scents of “blackberry sage” and “Moroccan mint;” who doesn’t love the image conjured by “monkey-picked oolong,” it’s irresistible. Okay, I’m not a fan of the smoky Lapsang Souchong, but it’s so fun to say I wish I did like it.

Sure, I’ve met quilters who also drink coffee, but tea always seems the beverage of choice. Am I wrong? Have I misunderstood; are they merely playing along with a woman obviously obsessed over tea? I don’t know, but I don’t think so. There’s teapot and teacup fabric on the shelves of the local stores, bolts of it. I’ve never notices any coffee mug prints. There’s even a quilt block called tea leaf and…. well, no, I suppose the Temperance T quilt block isn’t really T for Tea, so much as it is T for Temperance. But it could be, don’t you think?

Better than Ethanol

Have you had sweet summer corn yet? It's July already you know, and the old farmers in their almanacs tell us to expect corn "knee high by the fourth of July." I expect corn to be at roadside stands, in tail-gate-down pick-up trucks when you pull into parking lots, and freshly husked still on the cob in a pot of boiling water on the stove.

The corn in the garden is tasseling, as you can see, not grandly like a field acres thick but sparsely singular against the dark shapes of the Leland Cypress, and in scraggly rows like a back yard with frequent groundhog visitors. Give it time, we may get a few ears yet.

Speaking of corn… For the fourth of July I plan to make a red “Cheating Chillie” and some Blue Corn Bread. Would you like to make some too?

Blue Corn Bread
2 cups blue cornmeal (try your local organic foods store)
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
½ cup sugar (or ¼ cup honey)
2 Tablespoons baking powder
2 teaspoons kosher salt
½ cup (8 Tablespoons) hormone free butter
2 cups organic skim milk
2 beaten free-range extra large brown eggs

Combine the “wet” ingredients then add the “dry” stirring together. Lumpy is okay. Actually lumpy is better than perfectly blended because over-stirring will make the bread rubbery. Pour into a greased pan – I use a lasagna pan – and bake in a 425 degree oven for 25 minutes.

While that’s baking get your biggest pot, the one that’s as tall as a spaghetti noodle. Mine’s a silver shade of stainless-steel or aluminum, my mom has one exactly like it, the given name for these is “the big silver pot.” In your big sliver pot dump two cans of kidney beans (or one of the bulk size cans) one of those giantly huge jars of salsa (I think it’s ChiChi’s brand?) and two cans of Tutterossa tomato puree. Plus some ground chili powder to taste. Isn’t that easy? If you’ve remembered to turn the burner on to medium-high under your pot, by the time the cornbread is out of the oven your chillie will be burbling away and ready enough to serve. It’s actually better the second day but don’t worry, there’ll be plenty to find that out for yourself. I usually have leftovers for a week, and you know, I don’t mind that at all.

Weigh Stations

Let me be weighed in a just balance, and let God know my integrity ~ Job 31:6

I know almost nothing about trucking. Eighteen-wheels, CB radios, and "Weigh Station Ahead -- All trucks exit here when flashing." That's about it. I have no idea why some trucks do not "exit when flashing" or why they speed ahead down the highway without stopping to weigh the consequences or weigh the load they are hauling.

It makes me wonder though; how heavy is the load I carry? How many times have I been asked to slow down, pull over and weigh my load, and how many times have I sped past too intent on my destination, in too much of a hurry to obey? And when the time comes that I sit on those final scales how many burdens will still weigh me down? Proverbs 21:2 says "Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the LORD weighs the heart."

Let's pull over, off the highway of our lives, and look at our hearts. What weights does God see there? What heavy sins do we bear that He would ask us to surrender to Him? Take time with me today, the weigh station is open -- it's always open -- the lights are flashing asking us to exit and be weighed.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. ~ Hebrews 12:1-2