Presents on River Road

“The birthday of my life has come, my love has come to me.” - Christina Rossetti

January 10th, Mark celebrated his first married birthday. Since it fell on a Sunday, I had all intentions of devising a unique and mildly eventful weekend full of leisurely, comforting things to do. “I’ll make a reservation,” I thought to myself, “for Saturday morning at Mother’s downtown. He’ll have the eggs benedict and I the crepes, and we’ll lean over the table beside the window and watch the people go by." Then, perhaps we’d stroll a bit about Portland, dodging raindrops and window shopping our way through the afternoon. I’d looked into taking a tour and tasting of the Clear Creek Distillery, but found that I should have looked weeks ago. I am ever amazed at how far in advanced the rest of the world seems to plan. I had hoped that we might find ourselves that evening by the fireplace at the Stillhouse, or at home over a lavish dinner I’d been preparing all week. We’d conclude our birthday celebration, then, with the little something that had been waiting on the shelf in the closet for Mark. It would be “just what he wanted!” And thrilled would I be that all had gone so swimmingly.

But his birthday weekend was nothing like this. No, in fact, I believe it was a great deal more satisfying and enjoyable than anything I could have designed on my own. We woke early Saturday morning and, stirring our minds with conversation, lay warm in bed discussing what we knew had to be done that day. The CV joints. They must be taken care of. The day was dry and vacant. We readied ourselves together (which is a most delightful way to begin any day) and said goodbye. We don’t usually have to say goodbye on Saturday mornings, but the CV joints beckoned Mark as my ample wealth of homework beckoned me. It would be all day before my husband returned, only to bear news that there were complications in the installation of the CV joints, his car was rendered undrivable, and we would need to purchase a new part and complete the project the next day - his birthday.

Sunday morning, I must confess, we did not attend church. Sympathize, for this was not out of idleness or remiss. It was the CV joints. We enjoyed breakfast together (at Shari’s, not Mother’s), then made our way over to acquire a replacement part for the car. The drive out my grandparents’ farm (where the doctoring of Mark’s car was occurring) was most delightful. The sky was brilliantly clouded, looming over the ribbon of river we followed. I was eventually grateful for the slow-moving vehicle ahead of us, obviously timid on the winding country road, and for the way time passed so slowly. I made that drive as a child innumerable times - know every bend, every curve, every waterspout jutting from the land slopes above. I know that my dad used to jump off the Carver Bridge as a kid into the Clackamas, and can almost hear the slap of his tennis shoes hitting the water. I know which farm our Christmas trees came from, know the house that used to be a school, know when the road of trees bursts out into the open road of flat, quiet farmland. But we were driving so slowly this time that I could not help but notice things I never noticed before - not the least of which was making a childhood drive now with my husband beside me in the car. You see, I cannot explain it, but there was something spectacular about this.

This birthday weekend was most grand for that reason. Mark and I are both admittedly rather nostalgic people. I suppose I had never felt so young and so grown at once. I think this must be why he likes to watch old movies with me - ones he grew up with, and why he wants to take me to Disney Land, and why he brought me out to Dexter the night he asked me to marry him. To know every part of another person is not merely to engage with them in present experiences, but to also invite them, urge them, into your past. We didn’t get to grow up together as children, but oh, the ways in which we fuse our pasts with this glorious present! That was evermore better than any jaunt downtown. And he did, I might add, fix his car.

Happy birthday, my love. I hope this weekend was as much a gift to you as it was to me.

When Potatoes Attack

Dear Reader, I began my new year with a most unexpected encounter with the unearthly. Though admittedly I am a stranger in my own kitchen, and often do I consider the place to be otherworldly, nothing could prepare me for the visitation I would receive the evening of January 1st. I’ve seen things in there before that are better left untold, most undesirable, and far-too-long-neglected. I’ve witnessed the total destruction of leftover-leftovers, what becomes of a bag of forgotten lettuce, mold of every type, the unexplainable thing that happens to blackberry jam when the lid has not been properly sealed ... but I shall keep this post PG-rated. Our refrigerator, indeed, could often be mistaken for some kind of 5th grade science experiment. But nothing has ever disturbed me so greatly as the monster of a vegetable I found doing things behind my back in the kitchen. Mark and I were there together that night pondering what to have for dinner, when I recalled the bag of untouched potatoes that had been hibernating in the cupboard. Thinking they could use the light of day, I flung open the door to a most horrifying sight. Now, trust that I have since educated myself on the nature of potatoes and their customs, but you can imagine my terror when I saw this:

Fortunately I had my husband there to protect me.

Life has resumed as normal, I do believe. We have come to accept the peculiar foreigners living in our cupboard, and I’m not so afraid to be there alone with them. So long as I don’t imagine them conspiring or discovering ways to use their new little appendages, all is well.

All is very well. Mark and I traveled miles during Christmas - sharing our families, driving about, reveling in old friendships, expending more calories than were consumed, caught up in the warmth of our past homes, giving up some traditions and welcoming new ones. It was a rich and wonderful time. Now I sit in the cozy student lounge at Marylhurst and try not to prepare myself mentally for my first day back. I would say that life is back to normal, but there’s nothing normal (in its bland and ordinary sense) about today. We are still quite enamored with marriage, and quite eager for every new morning, every new thing :)

Happy New Year from the Maricles and their uninvited guests!

Post-Rant Recipe

So this is December. Finals have been finalized. Course evaluations have been completed. Frost was on the ground this morning, and I managed through one lonely night without my husband. We’ve found ourselves caught up in a whirlwind of Christmas music rehearsals, frequent excursions to Eugene, mismatched work schedules, LSAT testing, dinners out and dinners in, and often no dinner at all. And everything is perfectly wonderful. So wonderful in fact that I needed to use an adverb to describe the condition of the adjective. Though I’ve regretfully seen very little of my husband the past couple days, I rest in the glorious fact that we land in the same place tonight, will wake up early in the morning together, will carry on with what the day brings and will be ever aware of our rings wrapped about our fingers. This is most comforting.

Back to December. I’ll miss you, fall quarter. I find myself quite anxious for winter term to begin. I am looking forward to a plethora of excellent writing classes, and shall try earnestly not to pollute the poor blog with free writes and scratchy drafts - though I’ve already declared this space something of a venue. I, unlike many of my friends in this season of life, do not have senioritis. What I wouldn’t give to want to be done with school. I otherwise ignore my student loans that are increasing in number and spreading through my school and my presently untouched bank account like a parasite, waiting to rear its ugly head and sicken what I’ve saved. May the Lord deliver me from post-grad syndrome. I do love school, and love the things I’m learning. But as faith without action is dead, so learning without implementation is futile. I am a firm believer in the fact that an education can still be wasted even after it has been achieved. Mark, for example, graduated from the University of Oregon with a bachelor’s in music and jazz studies. He received a fine education, and is a highly accomplished jazz guitarist. He doesn’t necessarily (and thankfully) teach the theory in schools, nor does he tour the world in a bus with a band, or record 15-song albums that gather dust on the shelves at Borders. But he has taken his education and and let it permeate his very realistic, practical life. He teaches guitar lessons on Thursdays, remains faithful to his father’s Christmas program in Eugene, and allows me the sheer delight of listening to him pluck away on strings during quiet evenings at home. If he did nothing more than that, I am certain, it is an education well spent.

Anyway ... December. I was going to try to meal plan for the whole month, but seeing as that I am already a week behind, I really see no point. Mark always says he flies by the seat of his pants, so that is precisely the tact I am going to take with meal planning ;) But while on matters of food (and recalling the original purpose of this post), I was given a most delicious recipe for a chocolate chip pumpkin cookie I implemented today, and must share with you. The recipe follows, but do note: this cookie contains no nutritional value. Do not make yourself feel better by substituting raisins for chocolate chips. Do not try to use whole wheat flour. Do not adulterate the recipe in any way; you will compromise the profoundly delicious nature of the cookie.

P.S. If you need canned pumpkin, don’t go to Fred Meyer’s. They have a sign that reads: “Due to high demand for canned pumpkin, we are currently out of stock. Sorry for the inconvenience.” Yes, Fred Meyer, it was an inconvenience.

Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Cookies - I halved the recipe for you, otherwise you’d be making 60 cookies .... which isn’t such a bad thing

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup (yes, one ENTIRE stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1 large egg (eggs come in sizes?)
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup canned pumpkin puree (carrots, believe it or not, work just as well)
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves (yuck.)
• 1 cup milk chocolate chips, NOT semisweet

Directions

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray cookie sheets with nonstick spray or line them with parchment paper. If you really wanted to be as good as Martha Stewart, you’d line them with parchment paper.

Using a mixer, beat the butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg, then mix in the vanilla and pumpkin puree. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves. Slowly beat the flour mixture into the batter in thirds. Stir in the chips. Test the cookie dough several times to “make sure its not poison.” Scoop the cookie dough by heaping tablespoons onto the prepared cookie sheets and bake for 13-15 minutes, or until the cookies are browned around the edges. Remove from oven and let rest for 2 minutes. Take the cookies off with a spatula (or your bare hands) and cool them on wire racks. Makes 30 amazing, addictive, crowd-pleasing, gone-the-next-day cookies.

Today's Roast

I am so very hesitant to reveal the locale from which I write lest I only add to the artist’s starved and yet ever so dapper stereotype. Yes, I sadly admit, I am sitting in a Starbucks, writing. How very artsy-studious of me. How very chic. All the good writers seem to be inspired by their piping hot double-grande-mocha-vanilla-reduced-fat-lattes, Ella Fitzgerald lamenting cooly in the background, and the whole-bean-Sumatra-blend-disciples with wide framed glasses and Macbooks tilted casually in front of them. I think they must like the steam screeching through the espresso machines, like The New York Times in wrinkled piles near the door, like the milky circles on tables where the last meetings took place. Local artwork adorns the walls, lamps that look like spaghetti sauce suspended from the ceilings, and exercise groups and mom’s clubs and dental assistants gather in corners and talk over each other, over the espresso racket.

I am seated quite uncomfortably in my angular chair at my angular table, writing in an angular fashion on a place heavily frequented by people like myself ... yet not at all like myself. If I use sentences like, “... and the aroma of pumpkin spice and autumn rain outside the window makes me long for holiday festivities to begin” then, you see, I’ve succumbed to the conventional image of the “writer” found in a Starbucks cafe. But if instead I use sentences like, “... I chose this morning to be economic and bring my own beverage to Starbucks, withstand for a while the nauseating smell of breakfast sandwiches, try desperately to ignore the toddler staring blankly at me as he clearly crashes from a caffeine high, and offer my chair to the first person who appears to be wanting to stay”, then I’ve carefully set myself apart.

The goal here is not to write poorly of Starbucks, or to associate or disassociate myself from any particular writing “group”, or to suggest that I don’t enjoy a good cappuccino from this place every so often. I find the environment disturbingly a muse, my coffee gone cold, $1.59 left on my gift card...

Shower Cookies

I’m so proud of the dexterous man I married, I have to share this. My mom and I hosted Elizabeth Hanson’s church bridal shower on Tuesday evening. Trying my hardest to facilitate what little creative abilities I have, I sought the inventive flair of Ms. Martha Stewart, and borrowed her idea of the umbrella sugar cookie. It was, after all, a shower. When it occurred to me that it was going to be a challenge locating an umbrella shaped cookie cutter (its unlikelihood seemed impossible to me when I incidentally found a cookie cutter online in the shape of a fetus ... but we’ll save that for her baby shower), my husband proposed making one for me. A rainy trip to Home Depot for a scrap of sheet metal resulted in a fine piece of art. Well done, Mark, well done.

Days

My skis and I both know it’s snowing on the mountain. They can feel it on their waxed-up undersides, and I can feel it icy on my skin while the rain surges through the gutter outside our kitchen window. We could make rivers out of their muddy gush. There is pumpkin bread in the oven. My husband got his Italian shoes repaired today, and Elizabeth is getting married in six weeks. There has never been another November day like this one. Tomorrow the sky will be gray folding over layers of gray, used rain clouds and bursts of cold sun. I love that there will be different things about then, that won't be true of now. Happy seventh day of November.

Delight

As promised, I decided that today would be a good day to share some wedding pictures. (Facebook) We were blessed with a fantastic photographer who gave infinitely more than his artistic abilities that day - he gave a great deal of his time and energy, his patience and tremendous skill. Though he makes it appear so simple, I can only presume photography is a great deal more involved than he lets on.

These snapshots are, even now, far more valuable to me than I could have imagined. Nick captured moments of our wedding that I missed, that tradition didn’t permit me to see, and that years and years from now I can think fondly upon with images to accompany my memories. That is absolutely priceless.

The day was, as my dear married friends assured me it would be, the briefest and fullest whirlwind of hours that ever we would be swept into. Our anxious readying, our trembling hands, our giggles, our unsteady knees, our short bursts of squeals and momentary panic, our emotions and excitement and thousands of butterflies beating about in our stomaches all seemed to force the hands on the clocks to spin and make the sun set hastily on our wedding day.

Prior to, I was given a wealth of happy hints and gleeful counsel from people excited for Mark and I - things like “remember to eat something at the reception!” (not unless we wanted to feed the butterflies), and “don’t lock your knees!” (how could I? They were weak at the sight of my new husband), and “plan to feed more people than RSVP’d!” (Italian meatballs made: 800. Italian meatballs left over: 0).

But by far the best advice - the rawest, truest, most exhilarating statement made to me was just shortly after Mark and I became engaged. Our good friend Megan said to us once quite plainly but with a ripened wisdom, “at the end of the day, you’re married, and that’s all that really matters.”

I’m delighted Nick captured the details so that I didn’t have to, so that I could think about those words and purely enjoy the wed-ing of our wedding day.