Happy times with mom

The first time I went to visit my mother in Mexico was the first time that I tasted squash blossoms. We had gone to the house of one of her friends for lunch and the woman sauteed the flowers before using them as filling for quesadillas. Delicious. She then explained to me that this had been an experiment as she had never bought the flowers before. But she had had them in soup.

I somehow tasted the soup before I left and fell in love. My mother brought me a can of the Campbell's version on her next trip back to the States. For years I was OK in not having a recipe for the soup. After all, where was I going to get the flowers? Duh. Berkeley Bowl. So for many months I have been on a mission to find a recipe. Most of the recipes I found are written in Spanish. That's OK but they often lacked measurements. I finally found one posted in English -- with measurements. But the directions were rather garbled. What I present to you is what I concocted based upon all of this.

Sopa de Flor de Calabaza

1 cup butter
1 cup fresh corn kernels
2 cups zucchini, diced
2 cups of squash flowers, stem and stamen removed and chopped (I used 12 and was a little short. I'd recommend about 18)
Epazote (Berkeley Bowl was out so I substituted a little oregano.)
1 onion, finely chopped
1 cup tomato puree
3 cups chicken broth
2 jalapenos, seeded and diced
Salt
Pepper
1/2 cup cream

Melt 1/2 cup butter in a pan. Add corn, zucchini and flowers to pan. Saute until vegetables begin to release juice. Add epazote. Simmer on very low heat.

In another pan melt 1/2 cup butter. Add onion and cook until onion is soft. Add tomato puree. Cook for about five minutes.

Stir tomato-onion mixture into other pan. Add chicken broth and jalapenos. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Let soup simmer about another 20 minutes or so.

Turn off heat and stir in cream.

Oh, and of course I'll be taking some of this over to my mom's house. Along with some other items. But you'll get to see those later in the week.

No comment

So why throw something out into the blogosphere and then not allow comments? I've thought about it off and on throughout the day. I also thought about whether I "owed" anyone an explanation. Yeah, I do. I owe myself. No one else.

The first part is easy. I often write posts for myself. I just don't post them. The thing is that eventually there is a point that I end up deleting the stuff that I don't post. I didn't want these words to disappear. I wanted needed a permanent record.

I guess the second part is easy as well. I wanted to say what I felt I had to say without interruption. That's what happens with my family. I go in thinking to myself, "Here are the things that I want to say." Sometimes I get to say them and then they are glossed over.

I understand this though. I am the caretaker, the one who tells everyone else that it's going to be OK. And some days I ask myself how I ended up here? How am I taking care of these people who are 20 to 30 years my senior? I mean, I knew it would happen one day. Thing is I've been doing it since my teens. What made me seem like the rational, take-charge person? Of course, this is what has usually allowed me to do well at work. Funny, huh?

I am also the keeper of secrets. But they're not really secrets. Each just thinks that it is. And since enough folks already know them, let me enumerate the ones I have heard over the last few weeks.

Before my stepmother got sick, she went around telling her friends that she was thinking of divorcing my dad. I know she thought that he was having an affair. He was -- with a bottle of vodka. Before my stepmother got sick, my dad went around telling his friends that maybe he wanted to divorce my stepmother. Her family was driving him nuts. Then my stepmother got sick and everything changed.

This past week my stepmother started hallucinating. She also did not want to try to walk anymore. The hospice folks told my dad's older sister -- she visits my stepmother every day -- that the hallucinations will get worse. They also think that the cancer is now everywhere including in her bones. That's why she doesn't want to walk; it's too painful. So the end is probably near. And I think of silly things like how I still haven't used that gift certificate for a pedicure that she gave me last Christmas. We were going to go together but then she got too sick to go. My aunt has a return ticket home for October 3. My dad's cousin thinks that my stepmother will be gone before then. We'll see.

Marin says that we're alike in that we're both stuffers. We take the emotions and stuff them away in some dark closet in our minds. One day the closet reaches capacity and it all comes spilling out. Monday through Friday I go to work and field calls from family members. On weekends my family allows me to fall off the face of the earth, so to speak. And that's when I usually let the closet door open.

The multiple layers of grief? I'm lucky if I can remember what day it is. I wake up Monday morning counting the hours to Friday evening. And as I told my boss last month, I just take each day as it comes and do the best that I can. But mostly I keep telling myself that this -- and the world around me -- will get better. And it's kind of hard when something comes along that shakes your belief. But I'll get through this as well. I have to. Who will my family have if I don't?

One of those days

First of all, I must say that these days are becoming less frequent. But they're still here. What kind of days? The ones during which I miss my aunt. A lot.

I'm trying my best to put my thoughts into some sort of order in between the sobs. Because with order, maybe I can make the sobbing stop. And because I had plans for today that did not involve curling up in a ball in bed for the entire day.

It probably all started a few days ago when I was talking to my dad. He started talking about his parents and my aunt. His big thing these days is about how he's so happy that I got to spend as much time as I did with his parents. He's just finally realized what a big impact that my grandparents had on my life. I think it was my aunt's death that made him realize this.

My father was devastated when his mother died. My stepmother had no clue what to do, what to say. At least that's what she told me. Then again, this is a woman who didn't even bother to attend my grandmother's funeral. So I helped my father deal with his grief and I dealt with mine alone for the most part.

If things were different, I would try to talk to my dad about all of this. His wife is dying, though, and he's dealing with his crazy ass in-laws. He has more than enough on his plate. He doesn't need my crap as well. So I lie to him when he asks how I am. I tell he doesn't need to be concerned when he says that he's worried about me.

Friday afternoon my former supervisor stopped by my office. He asked how I was doing and quickly took the question back. He knows. He's lost a lot of family members to cancer. How do I answer that question when asked? "Fine." "Coping." "Taking each day as it comes." What else is there to say?

We then talked about movies. He said that a few months after one of his relatives died, he made the mistake of seeing My Life. He ended up having a complete meltdown in a movie theater. I told him that I've been trying to stick to comedies and action flicks lately. I then mentioned that perhaps I should try to avoid Stepmom and I felt a tear slide down my cheek. Wouldn't you know that the movie was on some cable channel yesterday. I didn't watch it though. I did try to watch Soul Food though. That lasted for about 15 minutes and then I had to find something else. It just hurt too much.

I've tried to fill my days with classes and volunteering. Oh, and cooking. But cooking is another trigger. I don't really know how to cook in small quantities. There's only so much my freezer can hold as well. I often delivered the surplus to my aunt.

I started this practice when she was first diagnosed with cancer. At that time I worked about a ten minute drive away from her house so I would stop by after work. When I started working farther away, Sundays became the day that I would most likely stop by. I would call to make sure she would be in. When I mentioned a delivery, she would ask, "What's on the menu at the restaurant today?" I would drop off the containers of food and pick up the empty containers from previous weeks. And then we would sip tea and talk. That's what I miss. Our talks. I still find myself picking up the phone to call her at times. And then I remember.

This week I've really wanted to talk to her -- especially today. She spent most of her career teaching people how to empower themselves. She wanted there to be an even playing field -- for everyone regardless of ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation or any of the myriad ways in which we try to classify one another. She didn't like to watch the evening news because she said it was so filled with negativity. It doesn't mean that she wasn't aware of what was going on in the world. She just wanted to believe that we -- society in general -- could be better than those images she saw on the news.

In the past week there has been a great deal of discussion about privilege on the internet. As I read the first piece, I wanted to call my aunt. We had had this discussion for too many years to count. And finally it looked like everyone else was talking about it as well. My hope in people was renewed.

Then the discussion continued and I became frustrated and saddened. Now I really wanted to talk to my aunt. I wanted her to remind me that this is part of the discussion. Yes, the discussion is often phrased in terms of black and white. That's because that has the longest history in our country. Even if it is only put in these terms does not mean that it doesn't include all of us though. People will feel that they're under attack and become defensive. Some people will never really get it no matter how many ways you try to explain it to them. That's OK though. Those people usually end up being the minority. As long as I can believe that most of us can reach that point of consensus, then I can still have hope. Because I got to thinking that if you can't believe in the possibility of something difference, then what's the point of it all? Why try? Why do anything?

I had to remind myself that this is what living is though. Being a part of it all. Sounding like a broken record because maybe someday someone will finally pay attention. I thought about how it's just so overwhelming to try to change society as a whole. I can handle it one person at a time though.

Now I'm OK with the frustration. These problems didn't happen overnight. Nor will the solution.

And the sobbing has been replaced with the occasional quiet tear so maybe this has done it's job. Right now I don't miss my aunt as much. I just needed to remind myself that she's not really gone since she's so much of who I am.

Probably for the second time ever, I am turning off comments. Today I'm not much in the mood for dialogue, but tomorrow I probably will be. This was a hard decision because I figure that if I throw something out into the universe, then I should be willing to discuss it. This just isn't one of those days though.

With that, I'm off to do laundry and more cooking. The surplus? I'll probably take some to my mom. And maybe I'll bring some into work tomorrow.

Hot fun in the summertime

Summer's almost over and it's only right that it should end with a bang. Today I went to Chilebrown's for a pepper tasting. Because I'm crazy like that. The first bite was sweet. And then then heat started. I initially thought that it was not much worse than eating habanero. Now that I think about it? I've put a substantially larger piece of habanero in my mouth previously to produce the same level of burn that the cute little peppers produced.

Pictured above is the stuff I brought home from the garden -- minus the Bhut Jolokias. Can you believe that Chilebrown wanted me to sign a waiver before leaving with two of those babies? Don't worry though. They'll probably be heading to my dad. He was indeed jealous when I told him about my pepper bounty. Now what to do with all the others...

Fuck vanity

I have so many topics swimming around in my head right now. I just got off the phone with my dad and we talked about family, music, and the election. But I don't think I'm going to go there tonight. Instead it's going to be completely about me.

This week was "fat" week for me. Even worse? I need to do laundry. This means that the stuff that I could comfortably wear during "fat" week is dirty. This is how I found myself in the "wrong" skirt on Wednesday.

Up until about 20 years ago, I wore a size six. Then one day I walked into a store and tried on a size six. I was swimming in it. The saleswoman said, right before she brought me a size four, "Our sizes run large."

I thought that this was an isolated incident. But no. Suddenly instead of a size six, I was a size four. And as the years progressed, I became a size two.

I sew. OK. I used to sew. But the thing is that my size never changed as far as commercial patterns are concerned. I was a size six. And in recent years, I became a size six with size eight hips.

I am vain though. I loved saying that I wear a size two or four. Three years ago my former neighbor and I made a pledge. Each would kill the other if she ever had to go higher than a size four.

So this week due to bloating, I suffered through clothing that was beyond uncomfortable. Wednesday I had mistakenly chosen a skirt that I am still sure to this day, the cleaners shrank. Really. I sucked it in until my ribs were quite prominent and the skirt was still too tight. This was not the case in the past. And Wednesday night was tutoring. After spending eight-plus hours in this skirt, I just could not imagine spending an additional hour and a half. Oh, and the driving time home. And did I mention the lower back pain?

Fortunately I had a break between work and tutoring. That's when I headed to the mall. The store had loads of denim on sale. At this point I only owned one pair of jeans without holes. So I thought that denim was a good idea. I grabbed loads of pairs in size four. And at the last minute added one pair in size six.

I tried on a couple of pairs of the size four. In both cases I thought to myself that they would be completely comfortable in a week or so. They just weren't now. The whole point of the shopping expedition was to find something that was comfortable now -- besides the sweats that I wear at home in the evenings. And so I stepped into the size six jeans. They not only felt great but they looked great. And they were on sale.


Pretty cute. Right?

So now that I've crossed that threshold, I have decided that going up a size after 20 years isn't that bad. But it does stop here.