Measuring our feet

We finally got around to seeing Al Gore’s opus, An Inconvenient Truth. The reason for the delay is simple: we use the library reserve system, which means we put our name on a waiting list for the next available copy. In this case, it took nearly a year to work our way to the top of the list. I wasn’t worried about the time lapse, and in truth, it made it all the more significant, since this two-year old information is even more valid today.

We figured there would be a fair amount of preaching to the choir, and we were right. We went through the exercise of visiting Al’s carbon calculator, and came up with a short list of things to do:

1. Finally swap out the remaining incandescent light bulbs with CF or LED bulbs (LED bulb arrays can replace those ubiquitous hot halogen energy hogs).
2. Re-evaluate our cars. This week, filling my car’s tank finally passed the $40 mark, and I’ve been living in a state of denial about driving so much in a big car when it’s more and more just me by myself. Hybrids have been around long enough that I can find a used one, and if I can find one that fits a cello in it’s cargo space, I’m good to go.
3. Purchase green energy. The PSE flyer has been on my desk for ages, and will only cost us about $10 a month. This seems a no-brainer, so it goes on my to-do list now.
4. Consider carbon offsets. I’ve never much liked the idea of purchasing the right to pollute, but my recent election to the ATA Board of Directors means that I am expected to attend four meetings a year, which will mean flying, often cross-country. The first meeting is booked, and an offset from Native Energy would be only $24. Since the money would go directly to funding alternative energy sources, I’m almost ready to take the plunge, but I hesitate.

As does my Darling Husband, who still scoffs at the whole offset business. Selling something that doesn’t exist really rubs him the wrong way, and I completely see his point. And then he goes on: this carbon calculator looks at big things like transportation and home energy use, but what about the small, frugal choices we make every day?

I had to search, but I did find another carbon footprint calculator, which answers some of my concerns: firstly, it’s international. Imagine thinking of global climate change as a problem not limited to the borders of the only country to not sign Kyoto. It’s very interesting to see how much your footprint shrinks just by moving your habits to Europe, for example. I also like the section that lets you see just how tiny the impact your miles have when taken in public transport, as opposed to a car.

But the part I like best is the tab labeled “Secondary.” It treats things like how you eat-vegetarians trod much more lightly on the Earth than folks who scarf a Big Mac daily. Buying local, organic produce in season—eating real food—makes a difference. But we also make a difference in our consumer habits. Do you always buy new clothing and furniture, do you always take up the latest fad or sport (and purchase all the accoutrements), do you recycle or just can’t be bothered to think about these things? The difference between the thinking and non-thoughtful choices here is the difference between 1 tonne and 10 tonnes of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere. The choice of what we put on the table and around us does make an impact.

Which takes me back to Darling Husband. Whenever there’s a new hire in the office, he has to “re-educate them”(his words, not mine): if you want a drink, you should not only choose water over canned soda, but you should put it in a cup or bottle that you have carried to the kitchen for that purpose. Same for a cup of coffee: bring your mug, use a spoon to stir it. A warning to anyone in his office: If you think you can get away with plucking a Styrofoam cup from the dispenser, filling it with coffee, popping the lid off a plastic non-dairy creamer and giving it a few stirs with a plastic stir stick (and then chucking it in the garbage), you will be hearing from Mr. In-Your-Face. He will press one of the spare used mugs from his office into your hand, and show you how to rinse off a spoon so you can re-use it. And you will use it.

Which takes me back to offsetting the carbon for my fight to Washington D.C. The calculator reckons it will release about .8 tonnes of carbon dioxide. It also tells me that eating less meat and eschewing overly packaged goods will more than offset that. I’m hoping those LED bulbs will help too.

Too much to drink

The rain finally let up a bit yesterday, and the water in our neighbor’s driveway subsided. I can’t say the same for some of the freeways and arterials around town, and certainly down south. They finally have a picture in today’s paper of I-5 through Centralia, the halfway mark between here and Portland, and home to outlet stores and other diversions for drivers passing through.

The last time we were in Centralia, though, we eschewed the big boxes and strip malls and headed to the old part of town. The train station had looked interesting from the tracks when I went down in September, and sure enough, we found a lovely, restored train depot, still functioning as a stop for Amtrak twice a day. Nirvana for Little One, and we came home with a pocket of smashed pennies. Soaked from the rain, we headed to the old downtown right across the street, and found a dark, warm pub (The Olympic Club) for a bite to eat and some hard cider.

As I look at the aerial photo of Centralia splashed across the front page this morning, I note that the old part of town is perched just high enough that it remains above the floodwaters: the soulless boxes and even the interstate freeway, however, are still underwater, two days later. Almost as if the founding fathers had decided to work with nature instead of arrogantly trying to master it.

We are thankful to be largely unaffected (there was a small mishap with a puddle, but it only resulted in a bit of extra laundry). We are grateful to be free of the huge task of mucking out from the storm, able to indulge ourselves in small seasonal tasks: filling the bird feeder, making up a batch of potato leek soup, lighting the first candles of Hanukkah. And wrapping presents for my brother, who is hoping the waters recede and the road is repaired before he plans to trek up for Christmas.

The sound of light

There is a single candle in the center of the room, and a few notes floating from a harp in the corner. Before my eyes adjust to the gloom, I think it is the usual accompanist, and can only make out which chairs are empty or taken, but not the faces. When Number One walks past with a candle, I realize that it is Teacher Jenny, his old preschool teacher, come home to roost in a new guise. I wonder what she is thinking, for it is she who introduced us to this contemplative festival of light as we head into the darkest season of the year.

The first year was in a tiny, cramped living room in the house that doubled as our nascent school assembly room. The spiral of pine boughs couldn’t have been more than a few feet across, and the children walking it were small. I recall the collective gasp when Little Annie bent too close to the flame and singed her hair, and the fleet spring of her teacher, who extinguished both fears and fire with a tight hug. I remember the year when we spilled into a Sunday school next door, with no harp, for Jenny had left the nest: her replacement was perched on a box in the corner with her flute, an angel-like Pan in her impish stature.

I recall the first time I saw this hall, and how I envisaged the spiral in front of me even on that bright spring day. It was clear to me that the space longed for this warm path. There was the year we put down sheets underneath, afraid that we would have to shampoo out sap, since we did not yet own the place.

I watch them now, these children. I have watched these preschoolers turn into young children, then older ones, and now I see a group of willowy almost-women with real curves, not-quite-men becoming more gangly with every step of their oversized puppy feet. When it is my turn, I want to linger, for the path is littered with treasures at every turn: a wooly gnome, a fern frond, a polished stone, a knitted ginger cat.

When the last candle is lit, the harp fades away, and our collective light fills the void. No one makes as to leave, no children fidget or cough. The silence radiates around us as we breathe in the warm glow. We fill ourselves with this light, and head home in the biting cold, ready to face the dark.

Turkey soup

There is a reason that I’m chopping carrots in my nightgown.

The two turkeys provided by two incredible women and the myriad of side dishes and pies were reduced to very little in the way of leftovers, but we snagged two treasures: a tiny plastic container of stuffing (enough to fight over, and a reason to see Patti again, to return the Tupperware) and a turkey carcass.

As expected when I eat things I shouldn’t eat (stuffing and pumpkin pie spring readily to mind), I woke with a headache. I swallowed some herbs and hoped for the best. Our Plan of the Day was to hitch a bus into town and take the monorail to Seattle Center, where Nose in a Book was to be performing with the Junior Symphony, but her mom called to say she was sick, so we regrouped. Black Friday and downtown isn’t particularly interesting to those of us who eschew materialism, and the sun was shining, so we made some calls. Some fellow first-grade parents were game for a day in the park and a good long walk, so we met up in St. Edward’s State Park and let the kids play for a bit, then headed down to the water. The cool air and warm sun felt wonderful, and we capped it off by helping them work their way through their yummy and allergen-free leftovers.

We had one more social stop for the evening, dropping in on our British neighbors for drinks and little noshes. By this time, my head had not improved and I was feeling crushingly tired, clear harbingers of a cold. And sure enough, the next morning I woke groggy and congested.

Darling Husband put on his shining armor and took both boys away for the bulk of the day, indulging the boys in such Daddy adventures as a blueberry pancake breakfast and cool shoe shopping. I figured I needed soup, but with nothing in the larder (I’d used it for the stuffing), and no one to do my bidding (here at least), I threw a sweater on over my nightie and headed to the kitchen. Making stock takes very little energy (no need to chop anything), and putting it on a low flame meant that I could get a good snooze in before making soup, also a low-energy effort. Celery, carrots and a couple of handfuls of rice meant that supper was simmering by the time the boys made their way home.

Well-meaning folk told me I would regret the potluck aspect of this Thanksgiving, that there would be no leftovers. They are right, but they were wrong. We haven’t had extra meat for sandwiches, but we enjoyed friends’ leftovers, and a bubbling pot of turkey soup honors the effort of the turkey growers, reminds me of the warmth of the gathering, and heals my sniffles.

Which is why I was chopping carrots in my nightgown.

Careful!

When I was a sophomore in high school, I enrolled in the first of many Shakespeare classes of my academic career. In addition to trying to teach us a bit about the literature, Mrs. Brandon, an enthusiastic and passionate teacher, tried to give us a little perspective on things, no small task for an audience of teenagers. I could almost grasp that the Elizabethans had a different world view, but scoffed when she admonished us, “If you’re careful enough, nothing good or bad will ever happen to you!”

But in the past few years, as the culture of fear has grown tentacles that reach into seemingly all corners of our lives, I find myself repeating Mrs. Brandon often. I shake my head when I pick up Mothering Magazine and read how C-sections are on the rise again, as each woman is convinced that it’s the safest thing to do. I groan at the admonition in the Hanna Andersson catalog that I must make sure my children’s organic cotton long johns are tight-fitting, since loose clothing is more likely to catch on fire, and I have (apparently unwisely) chosen untreated pajamas.

When we went to adopt Hannah, we quickly learned that no animal adoption agency will allow a cat to go home with a family that intends to let it outside. Interview forms contain a trick question about the indoor/outdoor intentions of the family; flyers posted prominently shout that the lifespan of an outdoor cat is considerably shorter than that of an indoor cat. I think back on all the cats I have had: only one died “young,” a runty kitten rescued from being drowned for her birth defect. Her palsy certainly contributed to her demise far more than her outside habits. Indeed, she was never happier than when romping outdoors.

Wednesday evening, as I cut real butter into flour for pastry and my Darling Husband put together spaghetti for supper, I reached for the bottle of red and grabbed a wine glass to share from the drain board. It was one of the oversized balloon stems that I purchased for the auction rather than our everyday stemware. My Darling sighed and said we shouldn’t use them; they might break, especially because they were hand-wash only. I assumed the hands-on-hip stance I learned from Mrs. Brandon, and reminded him that there was a reason for the shape of the glass. It was designed not to fit into a dishwasher, but rather, to allow your nose to fit into it, doubling the sensory input when sipping wine. I handed him the glass, and he tried it. And smiled. It does taste better this way, notes he.

I print out a recipe for stuffing for some guidance on proportions, and happen to glance down at the instructions for cooking it. There it is, in black and white: we do not recommend cooking stuffing in the bird. Apparently, it is safer to cook the stuffing in a casserole dish, and moisten it with stock. We shall not do this, however, because the payoff of stuffing a heritage turkey with local artisan bread is far too tempting to pass up. Yes, I shall risk it, as so many things in my life, for if I am not careful, I shall find joy.

Local magic

The setup happened a few weeks ago, but the magic began last night.

A random email from by my friend Patti inviting us to Thanksgiving piqued my interest. We never really celebrate this all-American festival, because, well, we’re not all American. Sure, Darling Husband loves stuffing like nobody’s business, but he didn’t grow up surrounded by the holiday and all the trimmings: maiden aunts pinching your cheek, Mom melting down over misbehaving pie crust dough, arguments over giblets in the gravy, and sitting at the card table until your knees were up to your ears. My tiny family is nowhere in evidence this year, so we immediately said yes.

The setup is a potluck among friends who’ve never met, but who agreed that it was to be a local feast, in celebration of the turkeys Patti was growing. If all went according to plan, they were slaughtered this Monday, along with a few chickens for her freezer. Someone else will bring the pumpkin pie, so we will provide the stuffing and alternate pie. Sourcing is easy: My family loves bread, but the rotation means that we don’t always eat the whole loaf before it turns to stone. The odd ends get pushed to the back of the bread box all year, and we haul them out at Thanksgiving. By this time each year, it’s hard to fit even a single loaf in the breadbox, but this year, there’s room for two, so I bought an extra loaf to dry out.

It’s clear that my traditional water chestnuts stuffing isn’t sourced locally, so I asked around: truly Northwest stuffing, it seems, contains oysters, of both the shellfish and mushroom variety. I hunted on the Epicurious, that wonderful site that saves me digging through piles of magazines, and if gave me quite a few ideas (and a chuckle from the one cook who said “this stuffing was too much work; next year, we’ll go back to Stovetop.”).

Our first Thanksgiving as a couple, I made a pumpkin pie (that’s a story in its own right), and my Darling then-Boyfriend gobbled most of it up. And was sick, no surprise. Now I make sure there’s a second pie just for him, usually pecan, usually (gasp!) purchased. The rest of us enjoy my homemade pumpkin pie, sweetened with molasses and spiced with ginger. But pecans are not local, and filberts don’t cut it. So I thunk and I thunk until I got it. Those peaches from last August will be the alternate pie. A sprinkle of cardamom and cinnamon (we agreed spices were a worthwhile exception to the local rule). With flour from Stone Buhr, butter from Wilcox, we’re bringing peach pie and ice cream (vanilla bean, from Alden’s).

Before I went to bed last night, I dug in the freezer: out came the bag of peaches (weren’t we smart to slice them up!), a pound of sausage for tonight’s sgabhetti, and a small package of smoked chum salmon from Fishing Sensei, which will pair with a local goat cheese as a small appetizer offering both tomorrow and Friday evening, when we’re invited to British Neighbor’s for drinks. I also tucked a few bottles of Columbia Valley Semillon (Fidélitas, 2006) in the fridge to honor the birds.

This morning, when I got up, I climbed in with Little One, who rolled over, and said in a voice unfuzzed by morning sleepiness, “When we die, we go up and become part of God. And then we fly around and we’re fairies.” Indeed, the Tooth Fairy also paid a visit last night, to an increasingly skeptical but nonetheless affectionate Number One. The air is positively thick with magic, which bodes well for making pie crust.

Bus karma

I’d love to write about our chock-filled Saturday, but a wave of exhaustion overwhelms me when I even look at the calendar. Suffice it to say we were all so tired that the single event we had planned for Sunday would have been easy to blow off.

Number One Son and I had tickets to the Youth Symphony concert downtown. I love Benaroya Hall; its open spaces, cushy seats and soaring glass art help heal my weary soul. But spending time idling in a line of cars to get in and out of the parking garage undoes much of the good, so we’ve taken to riding the bus. In the past, it has been less than soothing, trying to comprehend the Byzantine routes and fare schedules, but yesterday we hit pay dirt.

The bus was, amazingly, on time, but waited for the fellow who had to dash from the transit center across the freeway. Our driver was far from the public transit stereotype: positively cordial, welcoming each person, helpful and knowledgeable. The bus moved smoothly, not lurching and throwing standing passengers. I found myself relaxing.

Unsure of which cross street we needed, Number One took it upon himself to ask: Superdriver informed us to get off a block later, so the two blocks to Benaroya would be downhill—that’s what he did, he said. We arrived in good spirits and early, so we treated ourselves to a couple of toasty peppermint hot chocolates before the downbeat.

The concert itself was wonderful: I continue to be impressed and inspired by the kids and the organization. The new Musical Director, Stephen Rogers Radcliffe, first caught my attention not for his pro-wrestler shoulders, but his musing to parents. Here was a seemingly mainstream voice telling people to buy their kids a violin instead of a computer—it’s better for their brains and social development. Clearly, he takes his own advice: I noted that there was no podium between him and the musicians, as he conducted Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique from memory. I also noted that he assigned the program notes to various musicians. Bravo.

As the finale “ends with a moan” (Schoenberg), he let the sound go, never actually cutting off his musicians. We all breathe a collective sigh and head out into the chill evening, our souls cleansed by Tchaikovsky’s catharsis. As we arrive at the bus stop to catch the 5:01, a clock chimes the hour. After twenty minutes of watching each others’ breath, a bus finally arrives. We merge onto a clogged freeway, and the driver comes on over the loudspeaker: sorry for being so late, and that the bus is so full and traffic is so bad. When we arrive at your stop, please feel free to disembark using both the back and front doors. And don’t worry about the fare this evening, folks.