The Christmas Letter

As long as I have a hand to write with and a tongue to moisten the seal, I will try my darndest to send out real Christmas cards — the old-fashioned, tree-killing, carbon-producing kind.  I just like the feel of a card in your hands: it’s a physical connection between you and someone you haven’t seen in a long time.  I’d much rather meet you for lunch, of course, but we can’t always do that.  Hence the cards.  This year’s came from England. See how much I love you?

On to the wrap-up.  2011 began with snow on snow on snow: quite a lot, though not nearly as much as last year.  Snow is usually accompanied by snow days.  Cinnamon rolls optional. 

When things had thawed out a bit, we headed north for a brewery pilgrimage with some friends and family.  Here’s us with my parents on the beautiful, chilly Delaware beach:

However, I happen to prefer this photo as representative of my nearest and dearest:

Spring brought a new friend and beautiful colors to compliment the Little Red House:

We enjoyed a brief jaunt to Boston, where our dear friend Stephen was elevated to the priesthood and Rob made a new friend (no, I don’t mean the duck!)

And scarcely had we returned than we flew south for a whirlwind week in New Orleans, where we were treated to uncharacteristically fine weather and characteristically fine food and drink.  Matthew was definitely the star of this trip — he wheeled and dealed at the antiques market, doubled back in an ingenious move for a second batch of beignets at Cafe du Monde, and almost left his wife for a 50-year-old bartender.  

But in the end he stayed.  Why wouldn’t he?!

We enjoyed a quick weekend in the Carolinas, where Rob’s beautiful cousin was married: 

What’s that?  You don’t believe I was really in the American South?

Ham, peanuts and BB guns.  Yes, sir.  And the views across the fields were spectacular. 

As the summer began in earnest, I enjoyed writing weekly about the food from our CSA.  You can read these columns, as well as quite a few others, at Catonsville Patch.  

We also welcomed our brother Zach for an extended visit.  Zach presided over a series of dinners that started big (The Goat Meal) and ended bigger (a Georgian-style supra for 13 guests that lasted about six hours, with almost that many courses.)  In between, we steamed live crabs for the first time: 

Six hours is also the amount of time we waited in line for front-row spots when U2 played in Baltimore.  Totally worth it.

Once I had recovered from my swoon, we had a long visit with the West Coast, seeing the sights, visiting family and playing with friends.

And by “playing with friends” I mean we sat in our hotel room in beautiful Sonoma for embarrassingly long lengths of time, playing simultaneous games of “Words with Friends” on our iPhones.  Hey, it’s Apple Country. 

Somehow, we managed to harvest a few things from our sadly-neglected garden: I blame the beautiful raised beds my dad built for us, without which I think we would have only had weeds. 

More guests — human and feline — followed by a quick trip to Atlanta to claim our inheritance and gallavant with cousins. Cat games, long dinners and the best Elton John impersonator I’ve ever seen. 

Labor Day brought one last chance to enjoy the sun — this time at beautiful Lake Eufala in Oklahoma.  Our BFF’s hosted, assisted by a pack of semi-wild dogs that often outnumbered us. 

School began again, and we buckled down: business as usual for Rob, who’s working on some landscape projects as well as teaching architectural design, and one last semester of grad school plus high school for Emily, who is almost finished with her MAT and continues to teach English at a private Catholic school. We took a break in October to accompany the same wonderful family (and the same semi-wild dogs)  to Lewes in celebration of Jamie’s 30th birthday.  Long walks on the beach, light sightseeing and an incredible late-night bonfire: 

The fall wound down with a few great concerts and a day trip to Bear Run, Pennsylvania, where Rob took his students to see some architecture and Emily tagged along for the scenery.

And we saved the last month of the year to tackle two daunting projects: a new kitchen and a new member of the family.  This is Mishka, the stray who whined and chewed her way into our hearts.

 

Kitchen photos will have to follow in a week or so.  And now, back to Christmas preparations: wrapping, decorating and practicing music.  For the first time I can remember, we’re celebrating Christmas on Christmas this year: church in the morning before returning home for breakfast, presents and a day of family traditions.

How we wish you could be here with us — and you are, in our thoughts and prayers.

Love, Rob and Emily

Changes are Coming

Give a husband and wife five days off in a row, and there’s no telling what might happen.

They might, for instance, serve Thanksgiving dinner to eleven, and in the process decide they’ve had enough of making do in their hodgepodge kitchen, and two days later order brand new cabinets and appliances and start gathering volunteers to tear the place up.

Or they might hear a sob story about a friend of a friend of a friend who found a sweet shepherd-mix puppy in the city and is looking to give her away.  They might visit, swoon and make plans to bring her home, right about the same time they’re planning to lose their kitchen and most of their dining room.

And it’s always possible that the English teacher who hasn’t had time to read anything but papers like this will pick up a book that will change her life.  And if that were true (hypothetically) it wouldn’t matter a bit that the book was a gift from the author, her cousin — if anything, it would make the experience that more meaningful, a little like a letter from an older and more experienced friend who knows the way.

The Urban Farm Handbook is a witty, practical guide to your personal paradigm shift from big-box grocery to local living.  Organized into seasons (beginning with winter — how timely and / or perfect for Christmas!) that are further subdivided into subject chapters, it gives just enough detail to instruct but not overwhelm.

I’ve read a lot about the locavore movement.  The vast majority has been in the form of personal narratives, moving and off-putting by turns.  The author (and, usually, spouse) is drawn to traditional methods of farming, producing, cooking and living; s/he spends a set length of time, almost always a year, practicing these methods, and in doing so reaches some degree of enlightenment.  Even when they’re beautifully written, as most are, these books don’t do more than vaguely inspire you in some ways and nauseate you in others. Titles in this category include:

• Animal, Vegetable, Miracle 
• Farm City
• Plenty
• See You in a Hundred Years
• The Omnivore’s Dilemma

On the other side of the spectrum are books that are so professional, they’re largely over your head.  They’re also fun to read; they’re great daydream material and would be perfect resources if you decided to move out to the country, but you can’t find much use for their advice where you live.  Examples:

• ABC of Poultry Raising
• Country Wisdom & Know-How
• Gaia’s Garden
• Nourishing Traditions
• The Four-Season Harvest

The Urban Farm Handbook has found the Goldilocks sweet spot: just right for people like me, who are frustrated when their increased knowledge doesn’t lead to life changes.  It’s for environmentalists who want to produce less waste, parents who want their children to grow up in a real community, and cooks who are obsessed with freshness.  It gives loads of advice to all kinds of readers.

I’m scheming to make this a monthly feature in my Patch column next year, supplementing the authors’ advice with my own research about the Mid-Atlantic region (they live in the Pacific Northwest.)  But I’ll write here about the behind-the-scenes activity, which you might find just as interesting.  In fact, I’m already hard at work on the first chapter.  Stay tuned!

First Harvest

Once I was lucky enough to interview Eliot Coleman, an incredibly erudite and witty subject in addition to one of my biggest gardening heroes.  “Weeding is like voting in Chicago,” I remember him saying. “Do it early and often.”

How right he was.  And how discouraged I was when, after two weeks of fun in the mountains and at the beach, my yard and garden looked miserably unkempt.

But there’s nothing to do but tackle the project.  In stages, of course — one bed at a time, preceded by a soaking bath with the sprinkler, and the lamb’s quarters and morning glories shrug and slip out of the soil.  (Not the crab grass, though.  I think Eve would have thought twice about eating that fruit, had she known what she was paying forward to generations of gardeners.)

The one place I don’t have weeds, however, is in the beautiful square-foot beds my father built for me. Everything is going gangbusters there, from melons to okra and tomatoes and even little thyme starts grown from seed.  In the midst of washing the first batch of radishes and pinched-off basil, I was struck by the beauty that exists in the silliest places in nature — spicy, knobby roots and wrinkly, lush leaves.  They later became pickles and pesto, but even in their rawest form they were delicious.

Crabby Father's Day

How is it that it took thirty years of living in Maryland for me to bring live crabs into my kitchen?  Not just the best crabs I’ve ever had (freshly caught and steamed in Baltimore’s cheapest) but also well worth the price of admission in entertainment value.

Also on the menu: fried oysters, hush puppies, corn on the cob, and not-quite-pickled cucumber salad.  Dessert was this cake; it really should have been Smith Island, to go with the Maryland theme, but chocolate and raspberries are Dad’s favorite combination.

*Crabs were harmed in the making of this film. They were also delicious.

Down in the Dumps, and Climbing Out

Pascha is always the high point; after it, everything seems to tumble.  End-of-year deadlines approach with alarming speed.  Carefully-made professional plans unravel left and right.  Weekends pass in a frenzy of social events and dump me abruptly back at Monday morning, where class after class seems to have lost all interest in learning:

• Yesterday one (out of fourteen) students got one (out of eight) geometry problems right.  In case math isn't your thing either, that means there were 111 wrong answers and just one correct one.


• Other classes struggle with Fitzgerald (Did he have to spend a whole paragraph describing a drunk, weeping singer?) and Eliot (Would Prufrock please stop mooning over mermaids and just make a decision for once?)


• This evening I asked a piano student, who wore a slightly-sullen expression, whether she was all right. "Yes," she replied.  Then, thoughtfully: "Well, my nose itches."

Somehow it's still only Tuesday, though this week is a short one (we leave Thursday for five glorious days of travel in the South.)  So in case your week is going anything like mine, I wanted to share my best advice for climbing out of the deepest of fogs: friendship.

• Have pulled pork at Little Havana with people who love you too much to care (or even notice) that your eyes are swollen and red from the atmospheric pollen.  Laugh a lot.  Optional upgrades: coconut custard, Flying Fish Summer Ale and half-price entree night.


• Watch an episode of Anne of Green Gables.  Preferably one of the first ones, in which her rare and precious friendship with Diana saves her from a life of loneliness and despair.


• Read this heartwarming portrait of two teachers who stuck by each other through personal and professional difficulties and remain the closest of friends.  In New York, of all places.

Don't get me wrong.  True love is grand.  But friendship is what makes this all worth it.