On Saying Goodbye

As humans we are a species organized to accept the cycle of life. We assign names to it, we refer to rituals to help us celebrate it. Customs and rituals, both religious and otherwise are practices designed to keep us together, hold families in sync with each other, and to make our worlds a little softer on the edges for all of us.

We cannot know when our last day is, our last hour, our last moment of life. We can only know it if we plan it and even then, it might not exactly happen as we have designed it. More often than not, we live our lives full in the knowledge of that moment, that time which we find ourselves breathing in, but unaware if it is our last moment of breathing out. We push the idea of our own demise right out of our consciousness and travel where we must each day and in each moment of our life, we continue to expand our experiences and if we are lucky, our understanding of them.

Age is not the defining factor, neither is illness, sometimes it just happens, the time when we just find the end of our rope is not long enough to hang onto. That can take place in an instant when something over which we might have no control over, suddenly changes the trajectory of our living into the death experience.

We can do this but once in the physical sense, but many times in a metaphorical sense. We can suddenly find ourselves in a different point of view, whilst looking forward, realize that we have been actually looking at what has been long past.

I don't know if it is actually a fact, that life speeds forward as one ages, I can only say I think it does. If there is a parallel universe to this one, and in it we are still in a part of the past, it might make sense that when the planes of existence sometimes cross that the one we are currently in might speed up to avoid crashing backwards. Maybe we are moving in such a break neck way to our own conclusions to our own story, we are like a writer who knows the begining of the story and the end, but must develop the middle.

We are trying to bring that novel to it's natural conclusion, the one which we find we understand and know and yet, we are not thinking of the end.

We are thinking of the part that we fill up, creating the action, the scenes, the developments, the fleshing out of our character.

Every Thanksgiving we pause and give some thanks, not for the end of the story, but for the action in the middle, the parts behind us and the parts yet to come. We stand either close to the end or in the middle, unknown mostly to us. We don't get to practice the hushed or vibratto good byes, we just live until we run it out, until we get the story done.

I have said good bye to so many people in my life. I have adjusted myself to their loss. I have said even more good byes to dreams, to different pieces of myself that broke off over time. I have evolved as a result of these good byes, all of them actually. I have followed the rituals required, I have mourned, I have buried, I have scattered the ash. 

Yet, I realize I am still here. I am still a part of the middle. I don't understand it, but I am and I will continue to flesh out this character as best I can. In the last years my hands have told the story. I have become someone completely different than I was. I have walked a long path, and reached a place that reminds me of someone I have lost. I examine my hands and think of how, a very short time ago they held so many things, including promise.

I think that they can still grasp a bit of that. I will tell myself to hang on, until there is no more rope. My father would say, "tie a knot (in it) and hang on." Perhaps that is the real trick, to know when to quit trying to climb and just tie a knot and hang on. It is unlikely the knot will undue, and perhaps you will mark time and freeze it for a long while.

I am still here. 

 From my cousin the other day, He had been in remission for just over a year and a half, this is now what he faces again.

...wanted to update everyone on what my cancer doctor told me this past Thursday.....

My numbers that they track my Multiple Myloma have been going up  and my maintenance drug was not working....I started taking my new chemo (12) and steroid(10) pills today - this will be once a week for I think for 12 weeks. ......set up for another stem cell transplant down at Karmanos Hospial in Detroit - maybe March. When they talk now I hear a lot of blah...blah...blah. Just what I wanted more doctor visits.........

Why am I telling you all.....I don't know...... thought this way you don't hear anything second hand.....maybe get an extra prayer or two. (edited)

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55 

A Muse

She is mostly beautiful, more mysterious,

her heart finds its happiness

in sitting on the shoulder

of an artist

in his dreams.

Unearthly as it seems,

she is 

crafted of silk and gossamer,

feathers coat her wings,

withered against her rosy arms

they are 

dove like white.

He works very silently,

yet he whispers to his muse;

holding her arm against his breast

his thoughts carving their way into words.

He writes.

She thinks of many things of pleasure,

of cool meadows,

green grass,

the freshness of being

the new ideas;

the inspirations of all the times

upon this shoulder she has pressed

her percious drops of limpid sweat.

They are now his,

which he cannot easily wash away. 

Next he furiously works to keep his pace,

the ideas come

and he is satiated with her inspiration.

She finds herself no longer so needed

and focuses on the distant cries she hears.

Her use is only to those who pierce the night

with their laments

to come alive,

to create,

to really live again in their work.

Dedicated to Rosycheeks and Lea Lane 

May your muse visit.

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55 

The Birth of Venus

A very long time ago, when I was 20, I was wandering the halls of the Uffizi in Florence, Italy. When I came upon Botticelli's Birth of Venus, I was struck with the enormity of the painting and her presence. I had studied art for a couple of years already and loved her. She was just the most beautiful woman who came from a seashell, with red hair, that I had ever seen. I was always fond of water, shells and red hair. I even deepened the red in my own hair once in high school, a few years before we formally met. I think I felt some kind of affinity with her. I knew her spirit then too. 

When we met she was in a gallery lit only by sunlight, at least that is how I remember it. Her massive presence is now housed in her own gallery with other Botticelli  paintings.

Ten years after she and I met, she surfaced in a marble statue in Cancun. I took her home with me. She graced many places and now stands quietly beside the relics of an interest in silver. I don't think she minds. She still is a vision of loveliness.  While my beauty is on the wane, she is ever present in her youthful essence, a goddess.

In all this time, all these many years, she has never stepped out of her shell. I did. 

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55 

The Wind is Blowing

I cannot escape the wind howling outside the french doors of the room I am sitting in, trying to focus on these few moments in time to tell you where I am.

I have gone back. I am back in the time of being the wife, the mom and the hostess. I have put writer on hold temporarily, and activist too.  I have polished and cleaned and stopped just for a brief moment to appreciate that my sons are home for a break from college. I made the buckwheat pancakes, the eggs, the English muffins this morning, and cooked the sausage, laid it out as each in their own time left to go to the business to work. I had done the last big bit of holiday organizing last night and have today to think about the trays that still need polishing and the chairs upstairs that still need dusting. 

I tore bedding apart and washed it all, I rehung the winter drapes, missing the lovely lace that lets the light through, but knowing that the icy cold loves them too. So the velvet went up and I went down to answer the door as some new package of goodies arrived for the holiday. I am thankful.

The boy that spends so much of his time with us, and has, as a friend of my boys at college over that last four years, is back at his home in Minnesota. He headed out for break there with his family. He is celebrating too, he already has a job offer lined up for when he graduates in spring. He is thankful.

My husband asked if he should get a pizza last night or was I cooking. I let them know when they called hours later that it would be pizza, could they order and pick up. When my one son had come by earlier before heading to the shop, he asked if his girlfriend could have dinner with, so she arrived later with the pizza too. In my drive to do things, that was a detail overlooked, but quickly remembered and so we had a full table. I was grateful to see her.

When my other son came in he told me how excited all the German students were to come on Thanksgiving and told me he could have got the count up to 30 easily; I asked him why he had not invited the rest of them, instead of half. He said it might be too much to handle and he had made sure the students that came were the ones he truly knew and spent time with in Germany. He assured me the others would have fun doing whatever they had planned without him. I was thankful.

Mystified by the daily stresses of life without a holiday approaching, I was wondering why I had to stress myself out by going to an event downtown that would be covered with protesters and likely to aggrevate my blood pressure and agitate me into having a canniption fit. I was encouraged to attend as I had paid a hefty fundraising style ticket, was on the 'host' committee and it was a chance to be with my friends who I have worked with over the years on the issue. I thought of staying at the hotel, thought of an outfit, charged my camera and then said to myself, um, hey, duh, take it easy, you got a 22 pound turkey to defrost, a ham, bunch of stuff to do, they  should have had this in October, what the hell are you doing to yourself. I was the only one who noticed, that I perhaps needed not to go and do all that. I was grateful.

I woke up this morning, instead of feeling like I had been in a car wreck, rested, ready to see to my husband and sons, and have a few minutes carved out to write how grateful I am.

 I am thankful and when my daughter gets home she will be too, all the cleaning she thinks she has to do will have been done and she can have a nice, albeit quick, relaxing break from her studies.

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55 

Stollen, A German Christmas Tradition

 About a dozen years ago I started to make Stollen at home for Christmas.  I had bought my last imported one and decided that I could try this recipe. I had a couple of years of making bread under my belt, so this did not seem impossible.  This particular version is from an Encyclopedia of Creative Cooking edited by Charlotte Turgeon. 

Back in the 1980's I was working for Merrill Lynch and a young office boy was selling these books floor by floor in our building. Imagine someone doing that now; well, they used to do stuff like that back then. I never cooked much as a child or young woman and most things like that were a complete mystery to me.

Stollen was something I had eaten in Austria so I always associated it with a magical time in my life. 

This is the same recipe from long ago, however ,I do make some adjustments as noted.

Stollen

2 packages active dry yeast

1/4 cup warm water

1 cup scalded milk

1/2 cup butter

1/4 cup sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom

4 1/2 cups sifted all purpose flour

1 egg slightly beaten

1 cup seedless raisins

1/4 cup currants

1/4 cup shopped mixed candied fruits ( I use dried fruits in any combination finely chopped, never the candied fruits.)

2 tablespoons grated orange rind ( I sometimes use dried orange peel)

1 tablespoon grated lemon rind (I sometimes use dried lemon peel)

1/4 cup chopped blanched almonds ( I often leave the nuts out as someone in our family has nut allergies and might like to try some.)

2 tablespoons melted butter *(Okay, I use a whole stick, slathering it over the hot from the oven loaf, the stick gets deformed, but it really works well for coverage. The kids thought it was funny when I started doing that.)

Confectioner's sugar **(This is fun, I take a couple of cups of this and dump it on the loaf. Then I attempt to glue that stuff to it with the butter already drenching it, done while still very warm, it actually works!!!)

Dissolve the yeast in the warm water.

Combine milk, 1/2 cup butter, sugar, salt and cardomon in large mixing bowl; cool to luke warm. Sitr in 2 cups flour; mix well. Add yeast and egg; mix until blended. Stir in fruits, grated rinds and almonds. Stir in enough remaining flour to make soft dough.

Turn out onto lightly floured surface. Knead 10 minutes or until smooth and elastic; add more flour as needed. Place in greased bowl; turn to grease surface. Cover; let rise in warm place 1 hour 45 minutes or until double in bulk.

Bake in preheated 375 degrees F oven 20 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees F about 40 minutes, until lightly browned. Brush with melted butter; place on rack to cool.

Sprinkle with confectioners' sugar*, then with additional candied fruits.** Yield about 15 servings. 

Fresh out of the oven! Naked Stollen! 

 

Here is the Stollen with the powdered sugar on it. Some years there is not a stitch of brown showing when I am done! 

 

Here is a piece cut, note the thickness of the powered sugar on the top.

Enjoy your holiday season with the goodness of fresh baked memories. The sights and smells, the fun of doing all this with your kids is what they will remember.

 Most people customarily bake their Stollen well in advance of the holiday and store it, to eat it then. That is the way many Germans do it. We eat ours immediately. It is a festive ceremony, preparing it with the sugar while it is still hot from the oven, then slicing it while it is still warm. There is usually only a bit left the next day. That small remnant  is very good with coffee and if you are so inclined, you can put a bit of butter on it. 

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55 

 Here is an interesting pictorial of the ingredients and stages of Stollen:

Dresdener Stollen Process  image courtesy of Ulrich van Stipriaan on Wiki

 Stollen has very old origins.

 "The early Stollen was a different pastry, the ingredients were very different - flour, oats and water.^[6]

As a Christmas pastry, Stollen was baked for the first time at the Saxon Royal Court in 1427,^[7] and was made with flour, yeast, oil and water.

The Advent season was a time of fasting, and bakers were not allowed to use butter, only oil, and the cake was tasteless and hard.^[4]

In the 15th century, in medieval Saxony (in central Germany, north of Bavaria and south of Brandenburg), the Prince Elector Ernst (1441 - 1486) and his brother Duke Albrecht (1443–1500) decided to remedy this by writing to the Pope in Rome. The Saxon bakers needed to use butter, as oil in Saxony was expensive, hard to come by, and had to be made from turnips, although we now know this was a healthy option^[8].

Pope Nicholas V (1397–1455), in 1450 denied the first appeal. Five popes died until finally, Pope Innocent VIII, (1432–1492)^[7] in 1490 sent a letter to the Prince, known as the "Butter-Letter" which granted the use of butter (without having to pay a fine) - but only for the Prince-Elector and his family and household.

Others were also permitted to use butter, but with the condition of having to pay annually 1/20th of a gold Gulden to support the building of the Freiburg Minster. The ban on butter was removed when Saxony became Protestant.

Over the centuries, the cake changed from being a simple, fairly tasteless "bread" to a sweeter cake with richer ingredients, such as marzipan, although the traditional Stollen is not as sweet, light and airy as the copies made around the world." Wikipedia

The Inevitable Sunrise

Like the boiling pot on the stove, life has a way of sometimes escaping the boundaries we create for it. 

I have been reading a number of pieces written by some very fine authors found on Open Salon and also on Viewshound. What I have found is that many people have remarkable ideas and lives, interesting advice and epiphanies. I could spend hours reading and learning. Somethings I throw out of my head, somethings I treasure and keep, to continue to mull over.

When I was thinking of this month and Thanksgiving, I thought I would write something for every day and have interesting things to share. Turns out I have missed a few days, actually because I was living. I have been cleaning and fixing things long neglected so that I will have a holiday that shines brightly.

During all of this, I have had luncheons and seen movies, grocery shopped, holiday shopped and still read a great deal. That is the hardest thing, the hours that seem to go by when I am reading. My mind is not content to take it all in, it must be analyzed and framed in a context and further measured according to my own thoughts and experiences. There is so much happening in the world these days. My practice is to read several articles on progressive news outlets as well as some mainstream conservative ones. I do not read one source, nor do I watch one source. I am a news junkie to a point.

It seems that my routine has catapulted itself into over drive as the world has whirred the fastest it has in a while and blurred so much that I must painstakingly examine it, or I, the me you know, will be lost.

I also found a very good silver polish so that has been my downfall too. Everything it seems has not been polished in some time, so I must do it now. Why? I don't know, this polish is really great and some of these things might actually get used this year on the holidays.

My husband calls it nesting. He has told the children, tucked away at school, that. He even smilingly and jokingly, asked me if I was pregnant. Ha. At this age and in this condition, no, not a chance. However to him, this is what it feels like.

Even if I had not found that silver polish, I would have found something to do to prepare for the holidays, it is my nature. So, even if I don't get to some of this, tomorrow will be another day, and I can fill up my extra time with reading. I don't have to write so much right now, I need to read, absorb and apparently polish. 

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55 

The Majestic Ornament

 This is our tree this year! Full of old ornaments and special meaning, with this tree we are celebrating being all together again at Christmas.

 

These paintings were done years ago. They tell a story of a time when I was thinking of children's books. I painted several and saved these three for my own children. They were painted in 1993. I actually gifted them to each child when they were old enough to tell me which one they liked. Once in a while I take them out at holiday time and hang them up.

 

 

This is the little tree. This year the little tree is mostly blue and white. We put some fairies and dancers on it and also some sea ornaments, shells and sailboats, also some snowflakes.

This year we are only using about one fourth of all the ornaments we have stored. A few summers ago, a young woman was my summer helper. She needed money, so I thought of a few jobs to give her. One of our projects was organizing some of the boxes of Christmas stuff. Together we put all the important ornaments for each child in a special box with their names on it. It was the first attempt at wrangling some sense out of all these precious pieces.

 The Majestic Ornaments

I think, maybe next year,

I will go through them all again

and put some more aside in special boxes.

Some so old,

and not in the prettiest shape,

represent things to me that no one else can really see.

They are a part of a past life,

a young girl full of hope and starlight.

If I let them go, no one else will see their glow.  

They kept me focused and warm, in the hope that someday a

Christmas

would come, filled with children, a loving husband

a warm feeling, a fire in the hearth.

All their promise rang true,

with each passing year, the Christmas grows more

beautiful,

with real love, real devotion,

and faith.

There is no shortage of these here. 

We are blessed. 

Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55