November gray

When the north wind blows
'Tis time to seek
warm, soft, long undies
to hug the length of you
and comfort.

Like an old friend.

Respite

The night after
the sprawling bounty
of Thanksgiving,

We walked into our quiet
lakeside restaurant

to dip porcelain spoons
into the steaming fragrance
of pho.

Renewal

Early Sunday morning
Brahms violin concerto
saws softly through the week's clamor,
felling me with its
soaring
solitary
splendor.

Early Christmas shopping at World Market

Woman putting down
little chinese decorated box:
"I don't think I'll get this afterall,
because she has enough stuff,
you know what I mean?"

Companion:
"I hear you,
 I hear you."

Listen up,
Christmas-shopping
middle-class,
well-off people -

we
ALL
have
enough
stuff!

Talking Turkey

Don't you love that there is one holiday dedicated to the salivary glands?

Say the word Thanksgiving and I immediately taste/smell browning turkey skin, herbal bread mixtures, cranberries popping with orange, rutabaga's melting butter, mashed potatoes pooled with gravy, pumpkin pie - and infinite  pairings of lesser culinary cousins. One of my family's extras is dried soybeans, simmered for hours with butter, called "keckling" from our Pa Dutch heritage; another relative always had sauerkraut as an add-on. But whatever you add on, aromas rule! 

Whenever I go somewhere for Thanksgiving where I am not an intimate part of the cooking, I feel cheated because I can live for a long time on the sumptuous odors of roasting turkey and all the fixings - plus, Thanksgiving away means no leftovers to plunder for days.

 I guess my expectations for the food of other holidays vary all over the ballpark. But Thanksgiving is rock-solid unchanging goodness.

Like a mother at the end of the line.

Those Falling Leaves

Leaves.

First there are just a few red-gold ones lining the path I walk each morning.

Then more.

And more.

Then comes the really worthwhile pile to shuffle through. And wafting up from the disturbance is that wonderfully acrid smell of decaying foliage. Surely that sends many of us back to the first ten years of our lives when autumn meant rolling, hiding, frolicking through piles and piles of leaves. In my own neighborhood we played hunter, my brother being said predator and we girls the deer. He sought, we hid. For hours. Pulling more leaves over our heads, digging deeper to disappear.

At some point an adult pulled the plug on our games and the leaves were raked and carted off by wheelbarrow - even by pickup truck to the field behind our house There the enormous pile was set ablaze. With never a fear of spreading fire, we played at the edges of the smoldering leaves, pretending we were peasants and had to gather sticks to keep the fire going for the night.

Now with our increasingly fragile planet, those fires are long gone. As are many of the open fields and children playing such simple, imaginative games? In the place of that wonderfully aromatic scent of burning leaves, is the smell of gasoline from the increasingly large leaf blowers in our neighborhood as "lawn systems" sweep away summer.

Still I remember the watching the darkening skies over our leaf fires as the day slipped away and hearing the punctuation of geese flying south.

Winter approached for us - and the peasants.

Make a Note

The original nursery rhyme reads:

"Little Miss Muffet
Sat on her tuffet
Eating her curds and whey."

In 1976 our two-year-old son's version was:

"Little Miss Muffet
Sitted on she's tuffet
Eating her turds and way."  

We have laughed over that so many times and each time I once again marvel that for some whimsical reason, I kept a cheap little beige cardboard notebook in my kitchen drawer as the boys were growing up and recorded the cock-eyed sayings that tumbled out of  their mouths. Had I not done so, Miss Muffet's turds would be lost to the world! The perspective on life was dazzling then and even more so now. Fresh eyes.

Now, as the years pile up, I find I need to buy another such notebook to record my own thoughts, dazzling or not - or surely they will be gone by sundown.

And the winner is....

Around the turn of this century, my husband began a delightful tradition - taking me to some mystery location for my birthday. Not exotic, faraway places, but places nearby. And just for an afternoon, dinner, overnight and home. Each is etched clearly on my heart.

In the last several years, the tradition gave way to other events around my day and we sorta forgot. This year he suggested its revival. The result was a 24-hour period that sparkled with delight!

At 11:00 a.m. Saturday we left Reston. At 11:00 a.m. Sunday we pulled into our home parking spaces. Between.....ah. We headed toward Leesburg for lunch at a funky little place called The Wine Kitchen and were greeted at the door by one of his college colleagues who helps run the place. Lunch amid an ecclectic group of Leesburg residents included a fabulous glass of Domaine de l'Hermoniere sauvignon blanc paired with a savory citrus red beet/goat cheese/arugula salad. Heavenly pot de creme and espresso for dessert. Then a bit of antiquing and early Christmas stocking stuffer shopping and back in car.

With much circuitous driving around, pulling into various hotels, turning around, etc. etc., we finally pulled up to our Marriott destination in Herndon. A rosemary lamb dinner at my favorite Italian restaurant and the coup de grace, after-dinner drinks across the street at Russia House, a charming old-world restaurant that we had never visited before. The cinnamon liquer was the perfect.

Next morning, breakfast and 10 minutes to home. As we drove into our street Frank Sinatra crooned "Love Me Tender" - talk about finishing touches! It was all perfect down to the salmon rose and box of Chesapeake chocolates on my pillow.

Cheers to birthdays and husbands who know a thing or two about the way to a person's heart.