Bright Copper Kettles

I hope I am not an overly greedy person. It is always a joy to happen upon something you find perfect, appropriate, so well done. Following is a personal list of such treasure:

Book Title: The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, Carson McCullers
Comforter: Fraulein Maria's dark gold satin in her bedroom most noticeably showcased in My Favorite Things. Had she used this for the children's play clothes, they would have plumped up.
Albacore Salad: Waters Fine Foods
Black Pants: Worn by Kenneth Branaugh in Hamlet
Floor: White marble worn smooth as water
Color: Ocean
Pre-dinner Tasting: Olives
Idea: the library
Art Form: the book cover

Midsummer Meal

Yesterday I finished all 853 pages of Five Smooth Stones which took twenty moons to complete. It is the current read of the Reading Society and we look forward to discussing in September after our summer hiatus. We try to resemble Congress in our vacation schedule. I was surprised to pick up Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Birthmark soon after putting down the tome.

To celebrate any small victory, it is nice to plan a dinner party. I have not entertained in twenty moons either. So tonight was it. Here is the menu.

Wild Smoked Salmon

Mint, Feta, and Watermelon Salad (recipe on an earlier post)
Pasta with Sun-Dried Tomatoes

Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Cookies

Peach Infused Water

My guests were kind and appreciative. We discussed everything: counseling, Sunday School rooms, kids, relationships, counseling, bosses, GPS, trapeze class, taxi drivers, counseling, bitterness, first grade, summer vacation, and counseling. It was well rounded. One of my happier moments of the day was finding a bottle of red wine vinegar in the cupboard which I started yesterday to worry over (thinking I had none). I was going to barter with my neighbors for 2 tablespoons of the stuff for a Zip-loc of chocolate chip peanut butter cookies. I am not the type to not know my neighbors. I borrow too many eggs.

The Woman in Sunshine

I have done some interesting things this week. Here are a few of them. I made chicken and hominy soup. It is corny and hot-ish and liquid. Perfect for summer you say, shaking your head. I have eaten it every day with these chocolately cherry cookies. I explained to someone who Almanzo James Wilder is. Tonight I toppled a full bowl on warm soup on my person. The carpet will not recover. The clothes were removed and replaced. Drip dry. Reviewed the film Becoming Jane with the expected apprehension which was grounded (not being rooted in fact, concern for the actors, etc). Blindly, I enjoy all period pieces. Called a woman Grace whose name was indeed Frances. I blame the era these names were à la mode. I wore goggles for the second time this summer in the attempt to become a champion swimmer. I happened upon this fitting poem and knew it should be passed on.

The Woman in Sunshine
Wallace Stevens

It is only that this warmth and movement are like
The warmth and movement of a woman.

It is not that there is any image in the air
Nor the beginning nor end of a form:

It is empty. But a woman in threadless gold
Burns us with brushings of her dress

And a dissociated abundance of being,
More definite for what she is—

Because she is disembodied,
Bearing the odors of the summer fields,

Confessing the taciturn and yet indifferent,
Invisibly clear, the only love.

Outfoxing the Hounds

Last night I returned from puppy sitting for ten days. The home was not far from me but you know a change of environment is always a destination. There were eight pooches plus their mother (who I will expose was no help at all). Three brown, three yellow, and two black laboradors. I know next to nothing about this breed, least of all how to spell it. I found the brown ones visually appealing. One of the browns had an asthmatic rumble that I took to. The mother was a loon who lived for ball playing and games of this sort. I welcome lightheartedness in spurts but found the incessant demands obtrusive and wearing. When one is coralling, sweeping, hosing, resisting mutinous escapes by the deckhands, or in other ways doing one's duty, the last thing said person wishes for is to be barked at. The puppies were a pack of swarming bees when I entered their part of the house/yard. We got along though they progressed to eating my shoes, toes, and clothing within reach. With the young, all is forgiven.



While ignoring the barking requests for another round of Take Me Out to the Ballgame, I picked white nectarines, tomatoes, eggplant, basil, and smelled mint. The figs and red grapes did not ripen in time for me to enjoy them.

I performed hundreds of back and front dives and even used goggles one day to look under the surface. It was a pastoral region and peaceful.