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Days Three and Four (Ahem) – Roots

October 4, 2013 by Suzanne

Today, I’m on a bit of a high, because a couple of lines from my post for the “I am from…” synchroblog were chosen to be part of SheLoves Magazine’s September zine.  Also, my parents are coming into town this weekend, and I haven’t seen them since July, so I’m looking forward to that.  I’m thinking a lot about heritage today.

Food is in my roots.

Growing up, we didn’t eat at restaurants very often.  We were the sit-down-at-the-supper-table family.  We were the five-kinds-of-pie-at-Christmas family.  We were Baptist potlucks.  We were homemade candy at Christmas and homemade jam in the summer.

In many ways, we still are all those things.

We grow food.  Apple pies and canned peaches come from fruit on the trees out back.  Pecans are picked and shelled, not bought.  And some glorious day, I’m going to find a farm near me that grows Cream Crowder peas, which, until about two years ago, I knew only as MeMaw Peas.

Yesterday, I didn’t have a lot of time.  I had a sandwich for lunch, and a frozen dinner at Kim’s that I ate while watching Parenthood.

But tonight, Mom and Dad are bringing tomatoes and peppers from the garden.  They’re bringing Mom’s apple cake (dairy-free, so I can eat it without taking a pill).  Tonight, we feast on foods that are homegrown and homemade.

That’s where I come from.  That’s the place I’m rooted.

That’s what I miss every time I eat food out of a bag or carton.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– The food I choose affects my sense of place in the world.

– In a pinch, frozen tikka masala is still pretty tasty.

– Even when I just have peanut butter and jam, at least the bread is good, and the jam is made from Mom’s blackberries.

I’m going 31 days without eating fast food.

Posted in 31 Days, Food, Roots | Leave a Comment »

Five Minute Friday – Write

October 4, 2013 by Suzanne

It’s what I do.  It’s who I am.  It’s the thing that jolts me awake, when a story doesn’t know what time it is – it just knows that it needs to get out there.

It’s what I want to do.  It’s who I want to be.  It’s the thing that I’d like to do in the real time of the day, not just in little pockets of time that I scatter around like chicken feed.

It’s something I’d like to get paid for doing.  That way, when people say, “What do you do for a living?” I could respond, “I’m a writer,” without feeling the urge to attach a disclaimer.

But it is what I do for a living, at least for the part of living that matters.  The part that doesn’t have a price tag attached to it.

I write to vent.  I write to create.  I write to love.  I write to mend.  I write to connect.

I write because I want to write.  I write, because I want to live in a world where we get to do the thing that we love the most, because a world full of people doing what they love has got to be a better world than the one we have.  It’s the world we could have.

I’m linking up with Lisa-Jo Baker – what does your five-minute Friday look like?

Posted in Five Minute Friday | Tagged , | 4 Comments »

Day Two – National Kale Day!

October 3, 2013 by Suzanne

Yesterday was the first annual National Kale Day.  It was also National Taco Day.  Obviously, I needed kale tacos.

I have made kale tacos in the past.  Roast some butternut squash or sweet potatoes, caramelize some onions, toss it together with steamed kale and goat cheese, wrap it in a corn tortilla, and you have a delicious treat.  This was the plan.

This is a great plan when you have any of those things in your house.

Alas, when grocery shopping on Tuesday, I did not anticipate this meal, so I did not buy for it.

I had leftover pasta with a butternut squash sauce and a sprinkle of parmesan.  That was acceptable.  In fact, it was good.  It was warm, homey, comfort food.

But it was not kale tacos.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– I am even more emotionally attached to food than I suspected.  If it weren’t for my decision to forego fast food altogether, I know that I would have hit up Taco Casa for tacos, and the pasta would have likely gone to waste, just so I could satisfy a whim.

– I need kale in my house, because as cravings go, this is a pretty healthy one.  ‘Tis the season.

I’m doing 31 days without fast food.

Posted in 31 Days, Food | Leave a Comment »

Day One – Welcome to the Club

October 2, 2013 by Suzanne

Yesterday was a weird day to begin this challenge.  I had my hair appointment, a million errands, and attended my first meeting at a new-to-me book club (where we were instructed to bring a snack to share).  My habit on such days is to take the afternoon off work so that I get to go to bed before 2:00 a.m., which I did.  I arranged coverage for my shift, however, long before I decided to challenge myself not to eat fast food for a month.

Driving through is a part of my afternoon-off routine. I drive through Sonic (chosen because I’ll want coffee, and they add a shot of espresso to the coffee, rendering it somewhat less terrible) and get some kind of sandwich to fuel my afternoon, which I eat on the way to Salon LaPage, where Meredith will work her magic.

But Sonic is a no-go this month.  Instead, I had to plan ahead.  I had to remember to bring my travel mug so that I could take coffee made from my stash at the office.  I brought a sandwich from home, which required getting up earlier to make it and pack it.

You know what?  I didn’t miss Sonic.  My sandwich was delicious and not greasy, and you know the coffee is better when I make it.

On the way home, though, I really wanted onion rings.  Again, it was my pattern.  I went grocery shopping, and on the way home from grocery shopping, I always drive through and get a snack.   I know, I know – it seems ridiculous, because I just bought all this food, and then I get fast food.  But that’s just what I do.

This time, I didn’t get a snack.  I let my reasonable side – the side that tells me that this habit is ridiculous – win.  This might have been my favorite moment of the day.  *pats self on back*

Third challenge – bring a snack to share.  Taco Cabana taquitos work beautifully in such situations, because the last thing I usually want to do when coming home for the day is find something to cook.  Instead of Taco Cabana, though, I decided to make beer bread, and people loved it.  It didn’t take a lot of my time (mix three cups of self-rising flour with a beer, put it in a loaf pan, pour butter over it, and bake for almost an hour at 350 degrees), and it made for a much prettier presentation than an oil-soaked box.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– Shirking convenience requires planning ahead.

– Fast food is intricately woven into most of my days.  I’ll have to watch out for unraveling.

– Real food (and coffee) is so much better.

– I need to learn how to make onion rings.

I’m doing 31 days without fast food.

Posted in 31 Days, Food | 2 Comments »

31 Days of No Fast Food

September 30, 2013 by Suzanne

31 Days - big

My eating habits are terrible.  TERRIBLE.

I could rattle off a lot of excuses.  I have two jobs.  It’s so much trouble just to cook for one person.  I don’t want to eat the same leftovers for a week.  The drive-through is so tempting and convenient – it’s on the way to everywhere I go.  And so on.

My excuses, however, are weighing me down.  More specifically, they are enabling me to continue with excessive behaviors that weigh me down.

I know how to eat well.  This month, I’m going to start making choices that reflect that knowledge. I know what my worst habits are, and this month, I’m going to break one of them.

For 31 Days, I am going to avoid fast food.  I’m going to avoid what’s convenient and replace it with something better.

I’m not going to count calories or obsess about the fat content of what I’m cooking.  Those steps can come later.

What I need to do first is to get back into the habit of planning meals and saving my out-on-the-town meals for special occasions.

I want to be healthier.  I want to have more energy, and I want to take care of myself better.

I also just want to be excited about food again.  I want to feast, and I want to feed people.

None of those scenarios has a Taco Bueno bag in it.

These posts will focus on what I’m making and the people with whom I’m sharing it.  I hope there will be lots of stories and pictures and minimal whining.

I’ll be linking up with The Nester and hundreds of other people posting what their next 31 days are going to be about.  Will you join us?

Day One – Welcome to the Club

Day Two – National Kale Day!

Days Three and Four – Roots

Day Five – Everything in Excess

Day Six – Breakfast Love

Day Seven – Jesus Feminist, Body Image, and Related Ramblings

Day Eight – Running out of Coffee

Day Nine – “Let me ‘splain…no, there is too much.  Let me sum up.”

Day Ten – Irritability

Days Eleven, Twelve, and Thirteen – The Myth of My Poverty

Day Fourteen – Pretty, Pretty Food

Day Fifteen – Olivia Pope is (not) always right.

Day Sixteen – Southern

Day Seventeen – Small Talk about Big Food

Day Eighteen – The Fridge of Shame

Day Nineteen – The Visiting Cottrells

Day Twenty – Supper Club, Phase One

Day Twenty-one – Not Eating is Not an Option

Day Twenty-two – Taco Tuesday

Day Twenty-three – NaNoPrep, Meal-Planning To-Do List

Day Twenty-four – NaNoPrep Meal-Planning, Steps 1 & 2

Day Twenty-five – Waste

Day Twenty-six – Grocery Shopping (aka, I can never spend money again)

Day Twenty-seven – Easy Like Sunday

Day Twenty-eight – Supper Club

Day Twenty-nine – Well-Stocked Pantry

Day Thirty – Sugar High

Day Thirty-one – Grace

Posted in 31 Days, Food | 4 Comments »

What I’m Into – September edition

September 30, 2013 by Suzanne

September is the month when two of my favorite kids in the world were born.  In fact, I remember the call I received ten years ago today.  I had just walked out of the building, relieved and also sad to be leaving my last class of my first semester at El Centro (I started working there as a substitute for the department chair while she was on maternity leave).  Then my phone rang. On a windy day in downtown Dallas, I learned that my best friend had just given birth to her son Micah and that mom and baby were doing just fine.  He’s so smart and so bold.  He’s a lot taller now, but here’s the first picture I have of him:

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Has any other face in the history of the world ever been that sweet?  I just don’t see how that’s possible.

A few years later, his sister Raven was born in September, too.  She is funny and creative and has an intense moral compass, overflowing with compassion, that I pray she never loses.

Happy birth month, beloved ones.

Here’s what else I’m into:

To taste –

Apparently, the sound of football makes me want bar food.  That seems to be the major theme of my meals this month.   I also blame National Cheeseburger Day (September 18), but, really, that only covers the one day.

My favorite things that I ate/served people this month:

– Vegetarian Beanie Weenie – just sauté some onions, cut up some veggie dogs, add some beans (I used a mix of cannellini, pinto, and black beans), spice it according to taste (I recommend chili powder, cumin, and a sprinkle of brown sugar), and you have one delicious treat.

– Sausage and sauerkraut on Bavarian Rye with horseradish mustard

– Frito pie (both veggie and traditional)

– Goat cheese quesadillas with roasted red peppers and olives

Honorable mention goes to Whataburger’s Avocado Bacon Burger.  This burger gives me so many happy feelings and only a little bit of indigestion (worth it).

And no bar food meal would be complete without a cold beer.  Beer goes well with all of these things.

 To read –

 The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman – I read this book in one sitting.  Granted, it’s pretty short, but I just couldn’t put it down.  Gaiman is such a captivating storyteller.

 Lie Still by Julia Heaberlin – This was our book club read for this month, and I liked it a lot.  I read it over the course of a weekend.  I like the way she created suspense and didn’t give too much away too quickly.  Some of her “Texas women” characters were a little caricature-y and over the top, but she pretty much admitted that in the Acknowledgements section, so I can’t be too upset about it.

The Tucci Cookbook by Stanley Tucci – I want to marry this book and have its babies.  Delicious, starchy babies.  I haven’t technically finished it yet, but that’s because I keep putting it down and going to the store, because I have to make the food in the picture IMMEDIATELY.  I might be talking about this one for a while.

 To watch –

Because of my voracious love affair with his cookbook, I had to watch Stanley Tucci’s The Big Night.  I have three thoughts:  1) I want all those foods on that screen, 2) I need to have more parties with dinner and music and dancing, and 3) like a good wine, Stanley Tucci only gets better with age.

I tried to get into Rescue Me.  I almost made it through the first season.  Nope.  Not going to happen.

TV is back!  My current favorites (changes weekly):

– Revolution.   I watched the entire first season in one day.  And now I’m all caught up and need to see the premiere.

– Parenthood.  I missed this family so much!  And you can’t prove this, and I’ll deny it if you try, but it’s possible that I might (or might not) have let class out early so that I could watch the premiere.

 To hear –

 My friend Karyna played at a wine bar, so I went to see her, which I hadn’t done in a while. Windchimes and Honeybees is my favorite song of hers.

I have been on a weird hair band kick (specifically, Poison and Whitesnake).  I’m not sure what that’s about.  I’m also not sure that I want to analyze it further.  It is what it is.

 To write –

For those of you who have followed since the livejournal days, I am back to working on the Fishbowl story.  I really love my main character Bob.  He might be my favorite character I’ve ever written.

I am also starting to gear up for NaNoWriMo.  I am thinking about trying my hand at Young Adult.  I can do that for a month.  It’s also going to be set in a different era, so I might be biting off more than I can chew.  It will be interesting to find out.

I’m linking up over at Leigh Kramer’s blog – won’t you join us?

Posted in Food, TV, What I'm Into, Writing | Tagged | 4 Comments »

I Am From

September 25, 2013 by Suzanne

Linking up with She Loves Magazine

I am from Bunn coffeemakers,

From hair gel and stacks of well-loved books that tell stories and have stories of their own.

I am from a small reflection of the farm where I grew up, from the aroma of newly picked onions and fresh-shelled peas,

From dusty air and the big, big sky.

big sky

I am from cotton and wheat, from lavender and basil,

From the mesquites of homestead giving way to the redbuds of home .

I’m from homemade Christmas candy and stubbornness,

From MeMaws and Aunts pronounced like ants.

I’m from disagreeing (but not in front of company) and sharing recipes and really loud silent treatments.

I’m from look at me when I’m talking to you and be good and Rocky Mountain Rain.

I’m from Texas pride and the stoicism of being English, Irish, Dutch, Creek, and Cherokee, all at the same time,

From Southern Baptist discretion and cavatini and steaks cooked over mesquite or charcoal and chocolate pie with perfect meringue that I still refuse to eat because it is the texture of calf slobber.

I’m from conspiring to move MeMaw Sharp’s garden inside, from learning the hard way that people can’t kiss their elbows, no matter how much I wanted a brother,

From silly songs and fighting over the sweet spot on the couch and tattling and learning to be friends.

I am from heirloom quilts and solid furniture,

From twenty-four place settings apiece bought with green stamps,

From tractors and dirt bikes and so  many cats,

From the remnants of family that follow me home and remind me that I am more than tolerated, that I am loved and kept.

Posted in Roots | Leave a Comment »

Guest Post at Andilit!

September 25, 2013 by Suzanne

I have the honor today of guest posting over at Andi Cumbo’s blog while she’s in the final countdown week before her wedding.

I write almost every day.  Writing is the only way that I’ve figured out how to get my charming friends who live in my head to come into the world and play without making me look like a crazy person.  I don’t always write well, but I write easily.

I also get distracted easily.

Grab a cup of coffee, and join me at Andi’s place to read how I manage the distractions.

Posted in Andilit, Writing | Tagged | Leave a Comment »

Five Minute Friday – She

September 20, 2013 by Suzanne

She loves the rain.  She loves the sound, the smell, the peace, the cleansing, the newness, and the hope of it.

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She does not like the complaining of the people who do not like it, but she understands.

She knows that life is inconvenient sometimes.

She knows that it is frustrating to plan for a day to go one way, only to have it go another way, without warning.

She understands, so she wants to listen, but their noise drowns out the rain.

So she nods, and she hopes that they will feel heard but also that they will go away and leave her to her bliss.

She is her mother’s daughter, as they share a low tolerance for whining, particularly regarding things that one can do nothing to change.

She is also her own person, though, so she understands.  And listens.  And looks forward to talking to the ones who will share her joy.

Maybe they will have a puddle party later.  Maybe they will invite everyone, even the naysayers, and help them turn their bleak day into dancing.

She hopes.

Linking up with Lisa-Jo Baker and other five-minute-Friday participants!

Posted in Five Minute Friday | Tagged | 8 Comments »

Happy Little Friend

September 19, 2013 by Suzanne

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We have a new friend at the desk.  Her name is Pamela.

The freshmen seem to like her.  I caught one saying good morning to her when I was getting my coffee.  It was pretty cute.

I think the school year is finally settling down.  It seemed like it took longer this year.  Maybe it was the upheaval from the Union being moved to different little pockets of space around campus so that the demolition could begin.  And now begins the long wait for the new Union that we will have in a few years.

My students seem to be settling in as well.  We started talking about topics for their speeches last night.  The speeches are far enough away that they aren’t so nervous about them yet, so they can focus on being excited about their topics.  I hope they hold on to some of that energy as the due dates get closer.

 

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