Thank You!

I'd like to express a big thank you to all of you who were kind enough to think about Bill and our family. Because you sent good juju, thoughts, and prayers, the surgeons were able to accomplish all of the tasks they intended without a glitch. Bill has passed the first big surgical hurdle and is recovering as expected in the ICU. He's been extubated, had several of his chest tubes removed, is able to sit in a chair for short periods, and has had a few sips of water. These may not sound like big accomplishments on a normal day, but after you've been in the operating room for more than eight hours and had your chest cracked open, they're big enough.  

Hopefully, Bill will be back home in the nearish future and feeding the birds, deer, turkeys, and occasional bear.  

 

Thanks again and I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. 

A Gathering of Poetry: January 2025

It's the third Thursday of the month so I'd like to welcome you to A Gathering of Poetry.

I finished reading this book once, but I've kept Ted Kooser's Winter Morning Walks nearby so I can choose a poem and read it whenever I feel like a bit of poetry. This one may be my favorite (and Kooser has dated it January 16th) so I'm sharing it with you today. 

 

The January Thaw

by Ted Kooser

A flock of several hundred small brown birds,

all of one mind, crazily chases its tail

across a muddy field and into a grove of trees.

They are full of joy, like a wheel that break loose

from a truck and bounds down the road

ahead of the driver, then eventually slows,

and falls behind, wobbling onto a spot

on the shoulder, rocking around on its rim,

then settling with a ringing cry.

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Kooser, Ted. "The January Thaw." Winter Morning Walks. 2000: Carnegie Mellon Press, pg. 66.

You can read more about Ted Kooser here.  

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Thank you for reading and joining us for our monthly Gathering of Poetry. You are more than welcome to add your link below if you would like to share one of your favorite poems. The more the merrier!

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Unraveled Wednesday: 1/15/25

I'm joining Kat and the Unravelers today, plugging away on the same cowl as before. 

I'll probably knit a couple more inches in pattern and then do some matching ribbing at the top. These cables have a kind of magical quality to them, making me slow down and feel a sense of calm. That's knitting I'll gladly do more of!

This week I read an ARC from Edelweiss entitled The Bright Years, by Sarah Damoff. It's a poignant debut novel that delves into the complexities of family dynamics, addiction, resilience, and possible recovery. Set in Texas from 1958 to 2019, the narrative spans four generations of the Bright family, offering an intimate portrayal of their struggles and triumphs.

The story is told from three perspectives: Lillian, her husband Ryan, and their daughter Georgette (Jet). Lillian and Ryan's relationship is marked by love and the scars of past traumas, including Lillian's experience with adoption and Ryan's battle with alcoholism. Their daughter, Jet, navigates the challenges of growing up in a family overshadowed by secrets and addiction, striving to find her own path amid the chaos.

Damoff's writing is both tender and unflinchingly honest, capturing the raw emotions associated with generational trauma and the enduring hope for redemption. Her background in social work is evident, as she approaches sensitive topics with compassion and depth. I think the author writes about alcoholism and addiction honestly - the anxiety, secretive behavior, impaired judgement, hope, mercy, and the never-ending fight.   

This is a story that I was initially leary of requesting as the blurb makes it sound like it could be a non-stop soap opera. But the novel is well written with well developed characters so it doesn't often feel like an overwrought drama. The author does have a habit of over-writing similes; I found that these were most evident in the first third of the book. There is nothing wrong with descriptive writing but I had trouble when reading "I peel back my eyelids as his slam open, his eyebrows like deep-diving caterpillars plunging into a frown." I am not familiar with deep-diving caterpillars and this simile made no sense to me. The overuse of similes gave me a glacial pang of pain like the stab of a dagger of ice frozen from a poisoned well (sorry!), but the story and the messages are still good ones. Overall, The Bright Years is a compelling exploration of love, loss, and the possibility of healing. Damoff's nuanced portrayal of a family in turmoil through generations offers readers a heartfelt and authentic narrative. Three and a half stars rounded up.

Thank you to Edelweiss and Simon & Schuster for providing me with a copy of this book. It will be published on April 22, 2025. There is currently a goodreads giveaway for it if you are interested. 

What are you making and reading this week?

 

A Request

I have a small request this morning. My brother-in-law, Bill, is having some fairly extensive open heart surgery tomorrow at Cleveland Clinic. He's having his mitral valve replaced, his tricuspid valve repaired, and two cardiac arteries are being bypassed. He has been there since Monday and will hopefully be in the hospital for about a week. 

That's Bill on the far left next to John's sister with John and I when we hiked at Watkin's Glen last summer. Bill is a smart, funny, well-read, interesting guy, so if you've got a few moments tomorrow, maybe you could send some good juju, a prayer, good wishes, healing thoughts, or whatever fits into your belief system. 

I've been thinking about Bill for much of the fall. He had first visited several cardiologists closer to home in PA, and later on ended up at Cleveland Clinic for three days of testing. Thankfully the cardiologists there felt that this was something they could do, and after some fraught waiting and rescheduling (his surgery was originally scheduled for December 16th), tomorrow is finally the day. I wish Bill only the best and it may help me to relax just a bit knowing that there are others out there wishing him well also. 

 

It's my hope that Bill will feel well enough by the spring to return to one of his pet projects. He and John have been working on getting Bill's father's 1964 TR4 running again. We are all anxious to take a ride with Bill behind the wheel.

Thank you for your good wishes!

The Best Lunch Ever

Even though it's winter and the garden at Ryan's is dormant until spring, we still go up to visit him once every week or two. We used to go out to a diner for breakfast or lunch, but Ryan likes to cook, and he often says that he knows he could make something better at home. He was not wrong, and has perfected omelets, grilled cheese, tuna melts, sausage corn chowder, and supper on a bread slice. He has started watching American Masters: At Home With Jacques Pepin on youtube. This a series that PBS ran during the pandemic where the renowned chef cooked many of his favorite dishes at home in his kitchen. Despite being a famous French chef, Pepin makes some simple dishes and prepares omelets, scrambled eggs along with other variations, pancakes, and crepes. 

Ryan watched Onion Soup Gratinée and decided that since onion soup is one of his favorite things, this was something that he should make. He made it once for himself, decided it was delicious, and he would make it for us when we visited on Friday. His house smelled wonderful when we get there because he was caramelizing the onions. He added them to stock and toasted bread to add to the soup crocks. Following Jacques' recommendations, Ryan added toasted bread to the bottom of the crock, placed some grated cheese on top of the bread, ladled the soup in, added another piece of toasted bread and cheese to the top of the crock, and then baked it for 30 minutes or so. 

It was truly the best lunch I've had in a long, long time. Ryan has six crocks and said we could each have two. I couldn't imagine eating more than one, but the first one was so good that I was glad for a second serving. I've made run-of-the-mill onion soup with bread and grated cheese on top, but this versions has deeply caramelized and flavorful onions and the two slices of bread both rehydrate in the soup and mix with the melted cheese to become a delicious, thick soup that has bread, cheese, and onions in every spoonful. Ryan used cheddar, gouda, and gruyere cheeses but you could use almost any cheese you prefer. I love how Jacques Pepin makes cooking approachable and I love how Ryan used that to make us the best lunch ever!

The Weekly Loaf

Earlier this week I posted about the pullman pan I had redicovered in my kitchen cupboard, and wondered how cinnamon swirl bread would work. This is how:

Paul Hollywood might have some less than flattering things to say about this loaf, but I don't think he's stopping by. I rolled the dough tightly and got a good swirl, but there are still a few gaps between the cinnamon-sugar and the dough. But you know what might help fill those gaps nicely? Raisins! I didn't have any when I baked this bread, but I'll make sure there are some in the pantry before I bake next week. 

 

 

In the meantime I'm starting my morning wonderfully with a couple of pieces of toasted cinnamon swirl bread and a steaming mug of chai. Life is pretty good when you've baked bread!

Unraveled Wednesday: 1/8/25

I'm joining Kat and the Unravelers today with an FO and a UFO. I did finish John's Westerly Hat and he wore it so I can probably call that a knitting success. I could have saved myself some knitting and done at least two fewer pattern repeats before the crown decreases, but I'm not taking it apart to unravel some of the extra length and reknit the crown. There were no complaints from the recipient, so it must be okay.

I cast on for a cowl with the same cable pattern as the hat, but it took me four times before I was happy with it. I wanted to start with 2x2 ribbing, so I mistakenly thought that just meant my number of stitches needed to be divisible by two. There are 13 stitches in the cable pattern, so I cast on 130 and started knitting, but discovered my mistake when I ended up with two extra stitches. I ripped it out and started again, but made several different mistakes and I wasn't happy with the transition between the ribbing and the beginning of the cable pattern. I did some simple math and finally cast on 144 stitches, doing 10 rows of ribbing, then an increase row to 156 stitches, followed by the start of the cable pattern. That's working and I have incentive to keep knitting. Our overnight lows are in the teens and it's cold. We had to take Justin and Jess to the airport this morning at 4:00 am and I was wishing I had a nice warm cowl around my neck. But I'm kitty-sitting Nugget for the week and picking Jess and Justin up after midnight next week, so there will be plenty of opportunities to work on and hopefully wear this cowl in the near future. 

We have a couple of inches of snow on the ground and I thought it might make a nice background for a picture of the cowl. But the temperature was 23 degrees and the winds were howling at 30-40 mph when I took the picture Tuesday afternoon, so the background is the fleece afghan I snuggled under while knitting some more on the cowl. Outdoor photos will resume when it's not so darn cold outdoors!

 

I finished Ted Kooser's Winter Morning Walks this week. It is is a near-perfect collection of poems that Ted Kooser wrote on postcards and sent to his friend and fellow poet, the late Jim Harrison. Because he was undergoing treatment for cancer in 1998 and needed to avoid sunlight due to skin sensitivity, Kooser took walks in the early morning and composed these observational, reflective, and meditative poems. They have made wonderfully calm reading during this winter season, and it's a book I'll keep nearby to reread. These are poems full of gratitude, humility and hope. This year I also hope to read Braided Creek: A Conversation in Poetry: Expanded Anniversary Edition, Kooser's and Harrison's conversations in haiku. 

What are you making and reading this week?