Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Roots’ Category

June 2025 TBR

Posted in Books, Fun, Home, Mental Health, Reading Challenges, Resolutions, Roots, Wonder, tagged , , on June 2, 2025| 2 Comments »

Hello, June. I’m trying hard to get into the spirit of you. It may be easier this year, since I’m spending more time at the farm. I loved June in the Panhandle, growing up. It was almost as good as October. We’ll see if the magic still persists.

Speaking of magic, I have not been great at pursuing my exploration of wonder this year. There are reasons, but I’d still like to do better. After all, the whole point of cultivating a practice of wonder is to have it in place for when things are *gestures broadly* I think I’m going to start Awestruck: 52 Experiments To Find Wonder, Joy, and Meaning in Everyday Life by Alexandra Franzen [inspire/self-help/community care] this month. And continue on with Year of Wonder: Classical Music To Enjoy Day by Day by Clemency Burton-Hill [essays? Daily prompts?], which has been excellent. I also want to read On Thriving by Brandi Sellerz-Jackson [inspire/self-help/community care] early in the month so I can get it back to the library for the people waiting on it. Hopefully, these will inspire me to embrace the wonder in everyday life a little better.

What I have been great at is carving out time every day to read. Here’s hoping June brings even more of that. 

Library

In addition to On Thriving, there are several other books I need to return to the library this month.

Book Clubs

  • Tom Lake by Ann Patchett [general fiction]
  • The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon [mystery/suspense]
  • The Author’s Guide to Murder by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, and Karen White [mystery/suspense] – Rise & Shine is a mystery theme this month!
  • Under the Whispering Door by T.J. Klune [fantasy/nonrealism] – Follow the Reader’s choose your own adventure with a queer theme for Pride Month
  • Nevada by Imogen Binnie [queer lit] – also an FTR pick

Reading Challenges

Some of my favorite things about summer are the extra reading challenges and an abundance of readathons. Apparently, to many people, summer means more time to read, and that is delightful. Our public library has a challenge that lets you earn free books. As I also make space for Modern Mrs. Darcy’s Summer Reading Guide (the Minimalist List can be found here) by putting as many as my library has ordered on my hold list and eagerly await the possibility of a 52 Book Club summer challenge, I don’t want to neglect the yearly challenges I’m trying to finish. I know I have at least one official readathon coming up in July, but I know I will add more just for kicks, including a mini-retreat this Saturday. There are just too many good books I want to read! And by too many, I do mean never enough and please keep writing more great books, dear authors.

For this month…

52 Book Club:

  • Hurricane Summer by Asha Bromfield – Genre two: set in summer [general YA]
  • The Bodyguard by Katherine Center – A crossover (set in a shared universe) [favorite authors]
  • The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center – Shares universe with previous prompt [favorite authors]
  • Kill Joy by Holly Jackson – A prequel [mystery/suspense]

Libro.fm:

  • Under the Whispering Door by T.J. Klune – Listen to an audiobook by an LGBTQIA+ author [fantasy/nonrealism]
  • Kingmaker by Sonia Purnell – Read an audiobook about a historical figure and/or event [general nonfiction]
  • Nevada by Imogen Binnie – Listen to an audiobook by a transgender author [queer lit]
  • Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado – Listen to an anthology or short story collection [essays/short stories]

Bad Bitch Book Club:

  • Dumplin’ by Julie Murphy – A book set in the state/region where you live [general YA]
  • The Full Moon Coffee Shop by Mai Mochizuki – A book with astrology as a main plot point [fantasy/magical realism]
  • A bit of catch-up with the books I’ve planned for previous months

Nowhere Book Bingo:

  • All Fours by Miranda July – Book rec from a friend (thanks, Sarah!) [general fiction]
  • The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton – your favorite author’s favorite book – as choosing a favorite author is like asking someone to choose a favorite book (i.e., impossible), this is one of the favorite books of one of my favorite authors (Roxane Gay) [general fiction]

I’ve already plotted out all my intended reads for the Overeducated Women With Cats challenge in previous months. So all that is left to do for that challenge is to finish reading them. Maybe I will have them finished by the end of summer.

Looking forward to my mini-retreat this Saturday. I already had my snacks planned (because priorities), and now I have my TBR ready to go!

Do your reading habits change with the seasons? If so, how?

Read Full Post »

Summer To-Not-Do List

Posted in Alive, Beauty, Fun, Getting It Together, Home, Joy, Mental Health, Roots, Work, tagged , , , on May 21, 2025| 2 Comments »

I’ve had the draft document for this post open with nothing but a title for three days. That seems ominous.

Do I even have plans this summer? Or is it just something I have to get through until the weather is nice enough to wear my boots again?

I know why I’m hesitant. It makes sense. Summer is the busiest time at my job, so while everyone else is making plans to go on vacation, have fun outings, embrace all the summer programs that their community has to offer, and just generally live their best lives, I’m going to be super busy most days and, subsequently, too worn out by the time evening comes around to want to do any of those things. 

I’m also checking in on my parents more, which means at least every other weekend will be spent working on things at the farm, hanging out with my new bird friends (see above), and helping Mom and Dad plan and navigate whatever the next phase will bring.

I’m not really looking for more plans. 

In fact, what would make my summer better is to find things to take off my plate. That seems unlikely, though.

I don’t want to suck at my job or abandon my family. I also don’t want to drop off the face of the earth with friends or miss out on the things that bring me the most joy.

But it’s just a lot, and I probably need to use some of that PTO I have stored up.

So my bucket list this summer is more of to-not-do list. And it’s just two things:

  1. Find 5-10 random days to take off. I’m leaning toward 5 right now, but if things start getting nuttier, it’s gonna need to be closer to 10.
  2. DON’T. TELL. ANYONE. As soon as I say, “I’m really looking forward to taking a couple of days off next week,” people like to respond with “Ooh, we could do something!”

    Which is great. Truly. I adore the place of love and excitement that comes from. I’m glad people still want to hang out with me even when I’m not my very best self, which seems to be all the time these days.

    But the moment I start making plans on my day off…I no longer have the day off. Sure, I may get to sleep in or have more leisure time, and I guess that’s better than nothing. But once I make a plan with someone else, that whole day is now centered around making sure I don’t get too involved in a project or task – or even a spontaneous outing, if that’s where the day’s whims take me – that I forget or show up late to the plans I made. And I’m very bad at turning down things that sound fun with people I love simply because I need to rest. While I strive to be better at this, I recognize that I’m not there yet, so I’m removing the temptation altogether by not letting anyone think I’m available when I’m not.

Whew.

Saying I’m not available when I have the day off is uncomfortable for me. I have struggled with being honest about what I need for most of my adult life. Peeling off the people-pleasing layers I clung to during childhood is hard, and this one is particularly thick. 

It’s work worth doing, though.

Read Full Post »

Friday Five – Happy Almost-Holiday!

Posted in Books, Food, Friday Five, Home, Roots, Work on December 22, 2023| Leave a Comment »

It’s the last workday of the year (well, at one job – probably going to do some writing for the other one next week. Probably. Maybe. We’ll see.). I am in the process of interviewing everyone who passed through the application portion of selection (for the department’s new live-in student staff next year) and indicated they were specifically interested in the Housing Ambassador side of things, but I am done with today’s round! I desperately need to organize my office, so that’s on the to-do list this afternoon.

Then tomorrow, it’s off to the family farm with my sister and brother-in-law! 

But first, I have some things to share with you today:

  • My favorite news this week – Martha Wells’s Murderbot is going to become a show! I love Murderbot. Very excited to see what they do with it.
  • I Am From Here by Vishwesh Bhatt – This cookbook is written like a love story to food and family and all the influences that brought Bhatt to where he is today. Beautiful pictures and a horde of new recipes to try.
  • In a Holidaze by Christina Lauren – I enjoyed this book, but I was stressed out for most of it because there was a going-back-in-time/Groundhog-Day-esque element, and I didn’t feel like the conclusion to that was thoroughly flushed out. Are they OK? Did everyone make it out alright? I needed answers sooner and also more completely.
  • Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt – I LOVED THIS BOOK. The characters are endearing and one of them is an octopus. It’s not as weird as it sounds. It’s charming and wonderful and if you liked A Man Called Ove or Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine or books like that, you will like this one, too.
  • And finally, while I’m definitely going to pick up dinner tonight on my way home, I am looking forward to my upcoming slower week. Gonna make some big-batch meals in the crock pot and roast a whole lot of vegetables for warm salads. Maybe make some soup. I’ve pretty much depleted my stash of frozen leftovers in the last couple of weeks, so I’m excited to replenish them.

I also look forward to posting some year-in-review thoughts as well as my theme and goals for next year in the upcoming week. I wish you contentment and love as you finish out the year!

Read Full Post »

Leftover Soup

Posted in Food, Home, Roots on November 30, 2023| Leave a Comment »

(Not a pic of the most recent leftover soup described below, but definitely one of my happier accidents from the past)

One of the things I get most excited to make when the weather is even the slightest bit chilly is leftover soup. It’s especially useful at the end of a holiday or multiple days of gathering when you’ve cooked a lot and have multiple random bits of dishes too big to throw out but too small to serve everyone for another meal. It combines three of my favorite things:

  • Soup
  • Creativity
  • Minimizing food waste

I take a look in my fridge and pantry and identify the items that will definitely be beyond their useful date before I get around to eating them. Or items that I have a ridiculous amount of (like The Great Chickpea Debacle of yore pictured above). Or items that don’t go with anything else but the very specific recipe I bought them for. Or items that would just taste great in a soup.

I gather them, imagine what they would taste like together, and ponder a spice profile that most closely fits it (and also my existing spice collection). Then I warm some oil, chop up whatever soupy aromatics (onion, garlic, celery, peppers, carrots) I have on hand, add them to the oil, and get started crafting my soup.

This past Saturday, I got to teach my dad how to make leftover soup. This was thrilling in several ways. First, I hardly ever get to teach my dad cooking tips – it’s usually just following his instructions on whatever plan he already has in his mind. Second, I got to root around freely in their over-the-top herb/spice collection. Finally, I got to watch his amazement as he discovered the joys of combining coconut milk and lemon, one of my favorite culinary delights in life.

In addition to sauteed onion, garlic, and celery, we combined:

  • mashed sweet potatoes with rosemary and butter
  • boiled russet potatoes
  • green bean casserole (green beans, cream of mushroom soup, milk, and those weirdly addictive crunchy onion things)
  • cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, random garden herb blend, fresh cracked black pepper, salt
  • coconut milk
  • lemon juice

Other than adding enough water to make it the consistency we wanted, we didn’t fuss around with it too much. Just let it thicken and simmered it until we declared it done.

It was a hit! The end result was homey and warm and comforting and delicious. I was especially pleased with the salty-sweet theme. Mom, Dad, and I all enjoyed it, and I got to bring the small amount we had left over home to savor the next day.

If you’ve never made leftover soup, I highly recommend it. It’s a low-stakes experiment from which you may discover new favorite flavor profiles or combos.

Read Full Post »

Day 22 – Potlucks

Posted in 31 Days, Church, Food, Home, Joy, Roots on October 22, 2023| Leave a Comment »

I grew up Baptist, so I’ve definitely attended my share (and about 14 other people’s share) of potlucks. Any chance the church folk had to gather and share a meal, they jumped at it. They usually tried to fit it into some sort of holiday or celebration, but if the hostess committee (yes, that’s what it was called) felt we had gone too long without one, we’d see an announcement in the bulletin inviting everyone to bring their favorite dish to share in the next week or two.

I act like it wasn’t glorious, but it was. Casseroles as far as the eye could see, various things made in slow cookers, fried chicken, all manner of potatoes made every way you could imagine, things called “salad” that were definitely more dessert than the healthy side the term implies, and someone always made deviled eggs.

The church I attend now can also bring it with the potluck spread. Casseroles, charcuterie boards, and so many desserts. We have vegan and vegetarian options, and occasionally someone brings beer (because Lutherans). And because many of our congregants have lived in New Mexico at some point, there is usually at least one dish featuring the hatch green chile or some other pepper.

The most common potlucks I attend these days are our monthly cookbook club nights. We often have a theme (and, as one of the members pointed out, the theme is often “orange” because we really, really love cheese). Friday’s theme, for example, was spooky foods. We had:

  • Jack o’lantern sweet potato fries on the side of matching falafel burgers
  • Jack o’lantern pizza
  • Mummy hot dogs
  • Ghoul-ash (my contribution)
  • Pumpkin cake (and yes, the stem was a rice krispie treat)

I learned a lot from the way I grew up. Much of it, I’ve had to unlearn (and then relearn some things…). But one of the things I value the most is the importance of gathering around the table to share a meal and some conversation. Taking the time to eat some good food and have a good talk. Most of the people I know the best and love the most are those who have fed me or have allowed me to feed them. Linking food and friendship – I come by it honest.

I’m writing about how food has shaped my life, my relationships, and my sense of home this month.

Read Full Post »

Day 20 – Free Friday Five

Posted in 31 Days, Books, Food, Friday Five, Fun, Home, Joy, Mental Health, Roots, Work on October 21, 2023| 2 Comments »

I love having a free day. I was off work today, and my car is fixed, and I had cookbook club tonight, and it was just a great day.

Here are some foodie things I enjoyed reading this week.

  • And we’re right out of the gate with some controversy, but I really need to get something off my chest. Sweet potato pie is superior to pumpkin pie. Discuss if you must, but I said what I said.
  • We had a whole discussion about favorite holiday foods and favorite sides at staff. There were divisions, alliances were formed, shots almost fired. It was glorious. Best staff meeting ever. In related news, I need cranberry salsa in my life. 
  • When I find a foodie book I really love, I often re-read it. In fact, of all the genres, foodie memoir or fiction is what I’m most likely to re-read. We are discussing Lessons in Chemistry in a book club at work on Monday, so I’m listening to it again this weekend. It may be my favorite book I’ve read this year. It’s so good. I’m also re-reading Love, Loss, and What We Ate by Padma Lakshmi, and I love it just as much as I did the first time. The stories people tell about food, its place in their lives, and its impact on culture are meaningful to me. It’s one of my favorite ways to get to know someone.
  • The Modern Proper: Simple Dinners for Every Day by Holly Erickson and Natalie Mortimer – I adored this cookbook from the beginning when one of the authors was talking about her grandma teaching her the “proper” way to dice. What little culinary education I gleaned during childhood was learning the proper way (i.e., Mom’s way) to do something. My mom and I once had an argument because I was adding water to the pie crust recipe wrong (my point was that I had seen several bakers doing it a different way and their pies turned out ok…to which she responded “But they weren’t baking in my kitchen.” Welp, they sure weren’t. She had me there.). Conversations like this one were why, while most of my formative memories of food stem from the place I grew up, most of my actual cooking skills were developed when I had a kitchen of my own. Like the authors of this cookbook, I have great memories of observing Mom, Aunt Gale, MeMaw, and (later in adulthood) Dad in the kitchen, but my workable knowledge is the result of experimenting and creating my own sense of the proper ways to do things. It’s how I learned that the way I add water to a pie crust is just fine and also that if you replace half the water with vodka (or gin), you get a flakier crust (the dough puffs as the alcohol evaporates). Sometimes learning new ways to do things is good.
  • And this has absolutely nothing to do with food, but it has everything to do with home, and also I love Jenny Lawson, and maybe someone here might benefit from reading it, and plus…I do what I want. Actually, looking at the drawing, I can picture myself curled up in a blanket, drinking something warm and eating something comforting in that little house. So it IS sort of food-related after all (if you really want it to be). Read all the way to my favorite line at the end – “Sometimes the mistakes are beautiful. Just like you.”

I hope you have a wonderful weekend, and I hope you’re enjoying this series on the food that reminds me of home this month!

Read Full Post »

Day 19 – Salads

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Home, Nostalgia, Roots on October 20, 2023| Leave a Comment »

As integral to our family life as food was, I didn’t really learn to cook a lot of things growing up. Mom had a system, and it seemed to stress her out to have us in there when she was cooking.

But it’s hard to mess up a salad. We didn’t need a lot of direction (other than the main one of chopping everything into small bits so that a long-ass piece of lettuce doesn’t get dressing all over your face when you’re trying to eat it), so once my sister and I got old enough to wield a knife with minimal risk of peril, making a salad was our job.

I don’t remember a time growing up when there wasn’t a salad in the fridge, and that faithful constant remains true today at the farm. We made one every night at supper with enough left over for lunch or for a snack the next day. To this day, I count salad among my snack food options.

To this day, I also feel compelled to visit the salad bar if it’s available wherever I eat. I don’t always give in, but I feel the tug.

I do not often make a salad at home, though. I have done that enough to last a lifetime. I will buy the bagged salads with the ingredients already chopped and the toppings already prepared (Taylor Farms kits are my faves, particularly the Everything, Asiago Kale, Sweet Kale, and Thai Chili Mango kits) and make a whole meal out of them, but I rarely buy the ingredients alone.

But occasionally, I get a nostalgic urge for a basic green salad and the compulsion to chop it up myself. When that happens, here are my favorite ingredients:

  • Leafy greens of some sort (usually some type of lettuce, but I also love arugula and kale)
  • Radishes
  • Snap peas
  • Carrots
  • Whole cherry or grape tomatoes (I do not like tomato juice dripping freely throughout my salad)
  • Black or Kalamata olives
  • Dried cranberries or apricots
  • Some kind of cheese (my typical preferences are a sharp, hard variety such as cheddar, feta, or goat cheese)
  • A little bit of dressing (specifically French, Russian, Catalina, honey mustard, or Caesar)

What’s in your favorite salad?

I’m talking about home and how it has influenced my food choices this month.

Read Full Post »

Day 9 – Holiday Candies

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Home, Nostalgia, Roots on October 10, 2023| 3 Comments »

Besides pie, another treat that reminds me of holidays at home is homemade candy. My mom’s side of the family made candy from scratch every year. Aunt Gale liked making chocolate-covered cherries (meh – maybe another reason I thought I didn’t like cherries) and divinity (also meh and so, so sweet). As I grew up, I discovered that these candies weren’t gross, but they did require a slightly more sophisticated palate than I had as a child.

What did not require a mature palate? Chocolate.

The day after our big family gathering on Thanksgiving, everyone went home and we continued to graze on leftovers because there was no room for cooking in the kitchen. It was candy day. Well, for us it was putting-the-Christmas-decorations-up day. Mom ran the show in the kitchen. I always listened for the exasperated sighs that told me her hands were getting tired, though, because they also meant she was open to my help. So I helped make at least one of the candies each year.

We made (among the occasional others):

My favorite candy was (and still is) the Martha Washington. I do love coconut. And while we dipped all the ones that were coated in chocolate with milk chocolate, I prefer dark. Very dark. The darker, the better. Which is how I make them today if I’m making them at my house.

The millionaires are Mom’s favorite. Many recipes that you find will have you melt down caramel candies to make the nougat, and that’s fine. You can’t really mess it up. But if you want something truly delectable, make your own caramel as directed in the recipe I linked above. You won’t be sorry.

Well, you might be. Because you will probably burn your hand at least once, especially the first time you make caramel (or toffee flakes, which is what you get when you accidentally cook it a little past the soft ball stage. Sorry, not sorry). In fact, if you don’t burn your hand, drop the wooden spoon into the hot, boiling caramel (risking burning yourself again), and yell, “Shit!” at least twice during this process, are you even doing it right?

But if you make it past this stage with minimal injury, you will have the satisfaction of enjoying homemade caramel, one of the most delicious pleasures that exist in this life. And while many recipes, including my family’s, will advise you to simply add a bit of food-grade paraffin (canning aisle) to whatever meltable chocolate you have to make it smooth and shiny, you really should try tempering some good chocolate for the coating at least once.

[Aside: Expect cursing during this step, too, especially if even one molecule of water gets near the melting chocolate.]

We haven’t made candy in the last few years. It makes a lot, and it ties up the kitchen for a long time. As we’ve all gotten older, it just seems to add unnecessary angst to our time together.

I miss it, though. Even the stressful parts. It was one of my favorite holiday rituals.

I’m talking about food, family, nostalgia, and all sorts of related things this month.

Read Full Post »

Day 5 – Dad and His Grill

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Nostalgia, Roots on October 5, 2023| Leave a Comment »

I realize the picture above may not automatically match the post’s title in everyone’s mind.

But in our family, you can use the grill for just about anything. Never one to waste an opportunity to plan ahead or cook in bulk, Dad cooks a lot when he goes to the trouble of firing up the grill. He will grill lots of meat that we will eat at the upcoming meal, and that will be the priority, of course. He may also grill some vegetables for the meal or make veggie packets to place on it that will steam perfectly in the residual heat.

He also cooks the bacon and sausage that he uses for breakfast almost every day in bulk. Taking the pre-cooked bacon out of the freezer and just warming up what the two of them need gets the everyday breakfast he makes for himself and Mom on the table without a lot of fuss. He “accidentally” (thinly veiled fib) makes extra when he knows I’m coming for a visit so that he can sneak a bucket of bacon or sausage in the to-go cooler when I leave.

I use these particular reserves in different ways, though.

For supper at the farm, meat is the star of the show. It’s the main course. There are usually 2-3 veggies or other sides, plus a salad, to go with it. This is what constitutes a proper meal there.

When I’m at home, however, most of the meals I cook don’t have meat at all. And when a meal does contain meat, it may be part of the main dish, but it’s rarely the centerpiece. Sometimes, it’s little more than seasoning.

When I returned from my visit to the farm on Labor Day weekend, I brought about as much meat back with me as Mom and Dad eat in a week. I, on the other hand, spent the next couple of days using it to cook big-batch meals so that I could freeze portions of them to eat throughout the month. A month later, I still have a couple of portions left in my freezer.

The meals I cooked included:

  • Spaghetti with spicy marinara and bacon
  • Steak, sweet potato, and kale stir fry
  • Orecchiette with bacon alfredo
  • Ginger fried rice with steak, bacon, scallions, and carrots
  • Warm corn, green bean, carrot salad with steak
  • Sausage and broccoli stir fry

Most stir-fry meals are pretty straightforward – you can tell most of the ingredients by just looking at them. And almost all of mine start with a saute of garlic, onion, and ginger. Here’s how I made the sausage and broccoli stir-fry pictured above (6 servings).

Ingredients:

  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
  • Several cloves of garlic, minced
  • Sesame oil
  • Olive oil
  • Red pepper flakes (to taste and optional…ish)
  • Soy sauce (optional but recommended)
  • Salt (especially if you don’t use soy sauce) and pepper
  • Large bag of frozen, chopped broccoli (of course, you can also use fresh, and admittedly the texture is better, but frozen is sooo easy)
  • 1 quart (or about 1 1/2 pound) ground sausage, browned
  • 2 cups rice
  1. Steam rice according to package directions or according to how Woks of Life does it. Or if you want leftover rice you can freeze for up to 3 months so that it’s ready next time you want to make fried rice, bake a big batch of it (a winter freezer staple of mine, because I do not turn on the oven in the summer).
  2. If using frozen broccoli, microwave in a bowl for 4 minutes (or steam in the bag according to package directions, if that’s what you bought) and pour off the excess water.
  3. Generously coat the bottom of a large skillet or wok with equal parts sesame oil and olive oil. Warm oil on medium-high heat and add onion, garlic, and ginger. Cook until soft. Add red pepper flakes and stir to mix.
  4. Add sausage to skillet to brown (or if pre-browned and frozen, to thaw and warm throughout).
  5. Add broccoli and stir together with sausage, allowing everything to finish heating evenly (shouldn’t take more than 2-3 minutes).
  6. Remove from heat. Add pepper and either soy sauce or salt to taste.
  7. Serve sausage/broccoli on top of rice.

Do you like to grill? If so, what do you make?

I’m writing about the food I grew up with this month. Click to see the whole list!

Read Full Post »

Day 4 – The Family Coolers

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Fun, Home, Nostalgia, Roots on October 4, 2023| Leave a Comment »

This cooler is currently sitting in my apartment. Actually, there are two of them. They’re identical – right down to the Terry name written on them in permanent marker right under the handle – and neither of them is technically mine. I’m usually pretty good about taking the one I have with me to the farm every time I go, but I guess I missed one of them at some point. No worries. Dad knows they’ll eventually show back up. They always do.

They’re the family coolers.

These coolers have gotten a lot of use over the years. When Tammy and I were growing up, they were mostly used for transporting food that needed to stay cool from the house to a potluck through the Texas summer heat. They were also useful when we had to drive anywhere and wanted to have sandwiches or snacks along the way.

My first memory of using the coolers was on our trip to Colorado to see my Aunt Vicki. The cooler sat in the middle of the backseat, and I was tasked with keeping it from falling to the floor or shifting around too much (why this was important is less clear to me – I suspect it may have just been something to occupy my attention during the long drive). It was probably filled with a mix of our go-to favorite sandwiches and snacks:

  • Bologna and cheese on Mrs. Baird’s white bread (with Miracle Whip)
  • Tuna or chicken salad sandwiches (also with Miracle Whip…usually on white bread but sometimes on wheat for the grownups)
  • Carrot sticks
  • Celery sticks
  • Cucumber slices
  • Cherry tomatoes
  • Vienna sausages (still in the can but also in the cooler because they’re “better cold”)

Eating the same type of food anywhere except our kitchen table always elevated it to something special. It made it seem like a treat to us but also must have saved our parents a lot of money on food while we were away from home. Double win.

Now the main thing we use these coolers for is transferring food from the farm to our own homes. Every time I visit, for example, Dad takes the opportunity to make steak, and he always grills more than we can possibly eat while I’m there. We also make extravagantly larger portions of sides, even though there are really just 1-3 more people for each meal.

When we were growing up, this simply would have meant we had lots of leftovers for later in the week. What it means now that there are just two of them there most of the time is that the leftovers come home with us.

I mean, I will take leftover steak (or potatoes…or green beans…or bacon…) that I neither had to cook nor buy. I will take that every single time.

Thus, there is usually one of our coolers in my apartment, a constant reminder of one of the specific ways our parents show us that we are loved.

I’m writing about food and home and how those two concepts intertwine this month.

Read Full Post »

Older Posts »