Talk about turkey

     Just finished talking to my great layout editor, Anne Melnyk who lives in Pittsburgh, as we finished up on all the little niggley changes, like comma here, comma there?

Anne & Margie at Bonnie Leifer's in Pittsburgh

      All done and the Winter Issue of Notes From Toad Hall is ready to go to the printer. We started chatting about Thanksgiving and I learned she’s having sixteen people for dinner including three of her son’s college roommates. I exclaimed that she’d need a really big turkey if she wanted leftovers, like at least 18 pounds. Better at 20. Those are big beasts to roast and I’ve had too many close calls and glitches despite years of experience. It seems I unintentionally attract disaster and feel this is very unfair of life.

     So despite my own lack of perfection, I’m sharing some of my fail-safe tips. In the manner of Hints from Heloise who often leaves me snickering and thinking, these people need to get a life.

These are my best suggestions for roasting a turkey:

Get a digital meat thermometer. Seriously. Maybe everyone else knows this. It’s taken me YEARS to figure out you NEED one. (I should be slapped for sniggering at Heloise.) There’ve been countless times when I thought I understood how long to roast a 21 pound turkey only to learn I’d done the math wrong and had to keep taking the thing out of the oven cutting into it, finding bloody flux, putting it back in, waiting, waiting, and then finally risking salmonella because everyone was either getting crabby and hungry or filling up on antipasto and egg nog and coming to the weighted table full. So get a digital meat thermometer with a probe and a wire that can string to the outside so you don’t even have to open the oven door if you don’t want to.

Get it done early. Err on the side of having it done an hour or even hour and a half before dinner time. (A thermometer will help you know when to take it out, and you can always keep it warm.) You will be so much more relaxed. Done early also gives the turkey time to relax which makes it easier to carve. This rarely happens at my house because I push the timing way too close and there we are carving a steaming hot turkey that shreds and splits rather than slicing up nice and clean. I am confident you can read cookbook tables with minutes per pound far better than me.

No special turkey roaster. Put it in a large pan, or whatever it fits in – it’s okay if the legs hang over a bit. Stuff it, if you’re into that. Jab the thermometer into the fleshiest part of the thigh. Be sure to oil the outside with butter or olive oil – this helps keep the aluminum foil from sticking to the skin. Cover it loosely with foil tucking it in around the edges. About an hour before it’s done remove the foil and baste if you like to have the skin all browned and crisp. Prick a fork into the leg joints and a lot of juice should run out.

Turkey baster. I’m really not one for gadgets. I don’t like gadgets like little dealies that help you separate egg whites from yolks. No. No. No. But a turkey baster has some uses that are deal breakers. Sucking up the juices in the bottom of the pan and squirting them over the beast really helps it stay moist and browns it up beautifully. The baster comes in handy for other things, like drawing the fat off a broth before you make gravy, and other things I mostly forget now.

Frozen Turkeys. If you have a frozen turkey, you have to remember to thaw it way in advance. If you need to put it in the oven early on Thanksgiving morning, you can’t just take it out the night before and let it thaw overnight. It will still be cement in the center. I know this from sad experience and hours spent running hot water into its cavity trying to pry out the plastic bag with the neck and giblets. You should take it out at least the morning before.

Living in the north. Has its advantages this time of year. If you make your stuffing earlier in the day before Thanksgiving: chill it. That way you can stuff your prepared turkey that night. Stick it on your porch or patio safe from predators (I set up steel traps and grenades) and where the temperature is close to freezing, because you know very well it will never fit back into your full refrigerator. Even a balcony will do. This way you get to sleep about an hour longer or until you hear guests muttering about breakfast.

There. Those are my best tips. Good luck. I will not be available for triage on Thanksgiving Day. But I will be glad to post any of your questions or disasters the day following.

Happy Thanksgiving way in advance. And I’m sorry I haven’t been posting more lately. Thank you for stopping by. I really appreciate it.

  

Bagged and blown away

Winds and floods pound and rise far to the east of us. But across our street this scene. A beagle and a retriever rolling in the leaves, their owners raking tawny-melon colored leaves into giant piles, pressing them into bags. The scene is so idyllic I want fall to stay for weeks and weeks so we can bag the warm golden light this old maple channels into our living room. Yesterday, lawns were mowed a final time. Hostas, the last to fade, were cut back, even gutters were cleaned.

Today, all the leaves are gone. Bagged or blown away. The maples and lindens are dark and bare.

I could have imagined all the world is all right for a day or two.

For this is what the Lord says – he who created the heavens, he is God; he who fashioned and made the earth, he founded it; he did not create it to be empty, but formed it to be inhabited- he says: I am the Lord, and there is no other,  …those who hope in me will not be disappointed.” Isaiah 45:18, 49:23

I was happy

... the weekend we invited people to lift a glass of champagne and hear a reading from The Exact Place. It was beautiful but surreal. Around 50 people came to Toad Hall. Anita did all the planning. There were candles inside and out, flowers, sparkling glasses in a row and my grandmother’s lemon angel pie (one of the recipes from the book) ready to share. Me: useless, standing in front of closet wondering what to wear, or does it really matter? It doesn't, silly woman.

...I sensed people walk in, take a deep breath, exhale and settle into a chair for the evening. Then I relaxed, too. That people would actually come. That friends, and Anita, and Denis would take charge and make folks feel welcomed. That there was a real book to hold after so many years of claiming “I’m writing a memoir.” All I had to do was remember how to spell my name. It actually happened.

The dining room table made a good spot to sign.

Night falling by arrival time.

Looking from the kitchen out to the front door.

John Eddy & Denis arranged chairs to seat around 24.

Leslie Van Orsdel and Anita with last minute details.

Sunday afternoon reading. Randy & Barb Kinnick in foreground.

Big hug from my littlest sister, Roxanne.

Signing. Karen Vinson, Shelly Bergen, Melissa Hake. (Front to back.)

Thanks, Anita, for making beautiful details!

Two special surprises: John and Leslie Eddy came from New York for the weekend. The other: my youngest sister, Roxanne, arrived for the Sunday afternoon reading. She is nine and a half years younger than I am so by the time I left home for college, she was only seven years old. For most of the story – the part of my life I write most about – she was the little girl sleeping in the crib or my shadow following me around the farm and my best-est sleeping buddy. She still has enough sassiness to keep my writing honest. We don’t often see each other often enough.

Golden Fall

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Looking down the front sidewalk

I walked through the front yard this morning to stand among the leaves. If it’s quiet you can hear them faintly whispering as they drift to the ground. I wanted to capture them spinning, slowly falling, but couldn’t. By the end of today there will be a completed golden carpet on the lawn and sidewalk. They will be gone in a few days. Mulched by the mower or blown to the neighbor’s. I love fall. I wish these days lasted longer. My great treat early in the morning, before anyone else in our house rises, is to wrap up, pretend I don’t have my pajamas on under my coat and sneak down to Caribou, lining up with all the medical folks getting ready for early rounds, and I order a soy latte. Back home, I sit by a window and read and watch the day begin.

CSA members picked up on our front porch.

 CSA is over for the season. The sign down. The boxes going into storage. I already miss the weekly box of vegetables from HeartBeet Farm. Each time the box comes, we open it like it is Christmas. Golden squash, huge, sweet red radishes, bright carrots, red potatoes, ripened red peppers, kale and more kale. It didn’t get old. Nor does it get old supporting these young friends who work hard to bring people the produce of their gardens. It was a pleasure to be their drop-off point for 26 members, who stopped by every Wednesday afternoon to pick up their boxes. We’ll be doing it again next year.

CSA Box

You can see the sprinkler going, one last good drink before winter.

Mornings are especially cold this week. But I like that. Denis is waiting until Thursday to turn on the furnace, since the high that day is only supposed to be 48 degrees. This morning the moon was almost full and still up in the western sky when the sun rose. There will be bleak days ahead, but for now I’m enjoying the glory of fall, and I hope you can, too.

Dylan on work and calling

     In the last issue of Rolling Stone there was a lengthy interview with Bob Dylan. In the midst of it,  I was fascinated to hear him talk about about work and calling. It seemed very insightful which really shouldn't be surprising.

Rolling Stone: So live performance is a purpose you find fulfilling?

Dylan: If you’re not fulfilled in other ways, performing can never make you happy. Performing is something you have to learn how to do it. You do it, you get better at it, you keep going. And if you don’t get better at it, you have to give it up. Is it a fulfilling way of life? What kind of way of life is fulfilling? No kind of life is fulfilling if your soul hasn’t been redeemed.

You’ve described what you do not as a career but as a calling.

Everybody has a calling, don’t they? Some have a high calling, some have a low calling. Everybody is called but few are chosen. There is a lot of distraction for people, so you might not never find the real you. A lot of people don’t.

How would you describe your calling?

Mine? Not any different than anybody else’s. Some people are called to be a good sailor. Some people have a calling to be a good tiller of the land. Some people are called to be a good friend. You have to be the best at whatever you’re called at. Whatever you do. You ought to be the best at it – highly skilled. It’s about confidence – not arrogance.

Rolling Stone,September 27, 2012, Interview with Bob Dylan by Mikal Gilmore.

Bob Dylan

     Way back when, when Denis and I began thinking about what in the world “Jesus is Lord over all of life” meant, we wondered how that could be as we cleaned dental offices for a few years while finishing up school. How could God be just as pleased with us doing that as when we were practicing a spiritual discipline like prayer or Bible reading. We had enormous barriers that kept us thinking that a call to “The Ministry” was a higher calling than the poor sot who goes to a JOB every day. It took time, reading, and lots of discussion to move us to a place in life where we could say, yes, this menial labor, this repetition of vacuuming and emptying, day after day, returning exam rooms and lobbies to clean orderliness – this is what God has called us to do for now. And it is good. As good as being a missionary to the homeless. We learned to honor God with our brooms and dust cloths, like Dylan does with words and guitar.

Longing for wholeness

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Bumble bee visiting a giant zinnia

     Today while I was in the backyard admiring the zinnias once again, I caught this bumble bee visiting one of the blossoms. I’m certain their season is nearly over, as fall is here. We almost turned on the furnace this morning. I know these gentle, bumbling pollinators are becoming less common as their environments become increasingly toxic. It was odd to come across a woman from the tenth century who teaches us more about caring for God's creation.

     Hildegard of Bingen’s (1098-1179) term for the grace of God inherent in all living things was viriditas, or greenness … Hildegard’s holistic approach to God and humanity is relevant today, particularly to those longing for wholeness and healing for all of creation.

She wrote, “we shall awaken from our dullness and rise vigorously toward justice. If we fall in love with creation deeper and deeper, we will respond to its endangerment with passion.”

Resource: Common Prayer by Claiborne, Wilson-Hartgrove, & Okoro.

Writing that soars

Gabby Douglas Women's Gymnastics Olympic Gold Medalist

This summer, we were entranced by the U.S. women’s gymnastics team as they competed at the Olympics. Yes. When aren’t we entranced?  Watching Gabby Douglas soar through the air was rapturous. She made impossible moves look so easy, for a fraction of a second I imagined I might be able to do that, too.

Of course, that’s ridiculous and not only because of my age … we know it takes years and years of practice and pain for a gymnast to make something so difficult and precise look so grace-filled and effortless.

I’m not saying writing is exactly the same, but it’s similar. A good piece of writing, a good story makes you forget the work it took to write it. It carries you away. For example, Cormac McCarthy’s work does that to me – some of his dialogues are so finely crafted they take my breath away. You don’t think about the author sitting hour after hour, drafting, deleting, staring out the window, percolating words and phrases as she chews eraser heads.

I strive for this sense of ease and flow in writing, but it is not automatic. If my work merely approaches this standard, barely touches it, like I’ve maybe placed in a local gymnastics meet, then I am pleased. The endorsements from folks who’ve read The Exact Place humble me. I rejoice in them, and yet I’m afraid. I wonder if it’s okay to fall off the balance beam once in awhile.

(This was first posted to Kalos Press Blog.)