A Little Spice & Everything Nice

It was earlier this year that I found myself considering a particular meal. Things I could think of which would be filling included a big pile of this with a diced up apple (sometimes more than one apple), which seems to automatically mean this should be sprinkled on top, & it was! 😋 I'd cook the pile of apple pieces in the microwave for two or three minutes where the juices that formed from the cooking created a great "sauce".

Then, for protein "power", I'd cook two, sometimes three eggs over easy, where the runny portion of the eggs added to the juice from the already-cooked-&-super-soft apple pieces moisturizing this pile well. Since I typically don't eat my eggs "plain", I'd sprinkle this & this over the eggs before taking a fork to the pile "casserole style".

As mid-year rolled on through & Summer officially declared itself here, this "concoction" was a near daily staple of mine. And I happened to be spending quite a bit of time with a newer friend, a friend who also happened to be pretty excited about this. She spoke volumes about it & mentioned including it with this as the two work in tandem.

It's a big, melting-pot of intense protein as well as fiber. And very well seasoned too. 😋

So this "accidental" dish that began as a nearly typical American "morning meal" back before Daylight Savings Time began this calendar year, became redefined within the kitchen - into something I'm highly doubtful most "typical American's" might like to bother & try.

When I do have it, it's super filling & can hold me well throughout the day, oftentimes without bothering to add an evening meal. Thus leaving ample hours for fun things like running, biking, & hiking!

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Running to New Experiences

At this time, one week from right now, I'll be doing my very best to unwind from one 26.2 mile course & completely focus my mental energies on another 26.2 mile course after I sleep a night's rest. I'm likely going to find this very easy to do - at that point...I'll have also just driven three and a half hours. 😏😂 I'm guessing that, between having just run 26.2 miles, and knowing that there's another 26.2 miles coming up in just a few short sleeping hours, and after having just driven the three and a half or so hours to get from one state to the next, that sleeping and being asleep will basically be just what my body is begging for (don't want to end sentence on preposition).

This past week has been awkward & odd in training. I've to admit, I know I began over-thinking the proper, or best way to taper for the past week or so. From the little bit I permitted myself to read online in encouragement & clarification (since, when I typically have prepared myself for a marathon, I've done it hastily enough that I'd have to "let go" of having a "proper" taper period), my tapering might've begun too soon. A week too soon to be exact. The good part is knowing that it's all a fluid, throwing-hands-up-in-the-air sort of way to go at this point.

It's strange because I actually miss running many, many miles (like double what I'm running now) every-other-day. Though something happened to me in the past ten days, &, when I meant to run X amount of miles, I ran a few less. I accepted it. I knew it was fine & that all would be well. And it has been well. Then, for the first time since I began the actual "process" of running (that is, once I got ahold of this stuff! 😁), I've not gone more one day without running at least five to seven miles. Then that happened...& I had to simply remind myself that it was okay. It was better than okay. In fact, it probably became a positive thing to my body healing. I know that. And that's why I'm more accepting of the graying within the black & white of the situation than I am bummed out. Also this week, my strength training has been a little bit less than it's been since, well, even before I bought this & began my running streak. At least I've kept it going to at least every-other-day still, which is something that at least leaves me feeling strong & successful. It's important for me to maintain it, even despite advice suggesting to pull back during a final taper week, as I feel it's something that's become an actual warm-up for me & that it provides an empowerment, a true feeling of success & completion where it's completely beneficial for me. (I can feel the muscles that are strengthening, coming to my assistance, really pulling their weight - yes, a pun right there 😏😉 - which is sometimes just what's keeping me going all the stronger.)


Also this week, in non-running news, I made a real, true, meal (crockpot-style!). I had pork ribs available to me, &, along with a garlic clove, half a sweet onion, a small bag of bite size medley red & white potatoes, & a jar of this, I finished a slow-cooking day with a large, juicy meal. I'm a little bit late [in life] to the whole cooking-actual-meals & not just throwing some food groups together & calling it a day - type of thing...Oh well, better late than never! 😏😁😂

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Sounds Like Runner's Grub

Saving Grace, Salvaging Eggs, High Protein, [reasonably] High Carb...

It was a week ago today when this post was inspired. Yep. Once again, in a striving attempt to make a molehill out of another [somewhat] mountain.

It'd been suggested to unload the vehicle where it was, on the quiet street, rather than the busy street on the other side of the corner location. I obliged & continued with the unpacking as I'd be staying at this location for just a few days. As previously mentioned I've technically two wardrobe styles: athletic/running gear & professional, ready-to-be-at-work. I'd been wearing the latter all day, which included a thrift store find - a unique sweater knit, nearly bright yellow skirt which would wear well with all things navy as well as gray & many pinks too.

In earnest of completing the task as timely as possible, I carefully & considerably loaded many bags (although, in my cautionary sense, I could've loaded even more) onto my forearms & fingers each time, leaving behind a item or two when necessary to balance for these wet weather conditions.

Then it happened anyway. Boom! I went down. I was on the ground knowing I was wearing said skirt & that one of those bags on my forearm contained two relatively well-packed dozen eggs. I'd have to investigate their cartons.

I spent, probably an hour, more likely closer to two hours in total, cleaning up the cartons & considering the salvage-ability versus the loss of what remained. The biggest positive was that these egg cartons were plastic & not instead a Styrofoam. This made it easier to retrieve all that could've been lost.

I learned how difficult it is to retrieve already-been-cracked eggs from their carton slots. 😂 I ultimately managed.

I realized I technically had nine eggs which really needed to be used right away. Bingo! I'd grab this from the small box (I think the exact one in which Amazon sent it to me 😁) & began working in the mixing bowl.

This "great positive" that came out of the situation: A super high in protein snack/meal add-on. I mixed four eggs with this coconut oil, water, this flour, this salt, pepper, could be also random preferred spices such as parsley, turmeric, basil, dill weed. Dried tomato pieces. Almost like an omelette, yet one with flour instead of cheese or meat.

It becomes dough-like & you've got something solid & good to work with. Drop this, somewhat pancake-style, into a low, yet wide pan, or a large skillet. Press down on it. Wait until it browns. Keep pressing on it in so that all of the raw batter touches the skillet & cooks & browns. Flip it. I used an average-sized spatula (like the one pictured in the middle here) for the entire "project"; it worked out well for me.

I made two of these. The high protein content, along with the flour's carb content, made for a spectacularly filling snackish meal. I made sure to eat them the evening before what was my 23 mile long run. Typically I end up enjoying the filling benefits of one banana before a run longer than 10 or so plus miles. In this case, I definitely didn't need anymore fuel. I lasted well into the run & got to enjoy the fruits of the labor of a "practice run" alongside a scheduled event. My mile times proved positive.

I'm also considering this same egg/flour recipe design with cinnamon, apples, cocao, etc. for a more "dessert-like" approach.

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Breaking The Fast

There were also times during these early mornings, when I’d rise early to shovel the snow for Dad before he left for his workday, where I’d also be that ambitious to also make him breakfast. I’m talking about a hot breakfast. One where I used mixing bowls (like these & especially this).

Typically, I’d do something with this & maybe also make up some eggs. At the time I really only had familiarity with making scrambled eggs, except for these. Dad was flexible with his eggs &, while he’s always had his preferences, he’s also always been fine with eating whatever variety he’s served. Actually, that’s about how that goes for most any food with him; he’s generally flexible & grateful for whatever’s available.

I remember one particular morning where I decided to make Dad breakfast. It went just fine like all the others normally did. Sometime afterward, probably just after Mom finished seeing Dad off to work, I happened to hear my brother saying to Mom about how he’d really been hoping for this hot breakfast to be the next morning.

I suppose he’d planned to probably suggest in the awkward, you’re-my-kid-sister-&-you’ll-probably-be-fine-with-it,-but-I’ve-still-got-to-ask,-&-maybe-you’ve-got-some-sort-of-current-adolescent-resentment-upset-right-now-where-you’d-rather-stick-it-to-me,-but-maybe-not,-I-don’t-know sort of way he normally would talk to me when the family sat around the dinner table together, that I might be willing to do this.

I also think that, as he realized I’d just done it that morning, there’d be such little likelihood that I’d do it again the following morning. Thus his quick discussion with Mom.

Mom quietly & calmly suggested that he ask me if I’d do it. He must’ve shrugged his shoulders & realized there still was that option.

Not too long later, I think before we even left for the school bus, he did ask me. He might’ve figured I’d not want to get up & get going quite so early again. He would’ve been thinking from a single-minded angle as he was the one that was difficult to get up & out of bed each morning, while I was the one oftentimes quite literally sitting around waiting for whichever late in the morning bus stop time I'd been assigned. In those days I'd not been good at ingenuity of these sorts & multi-tasking; I'd be too anxious. I'd not even think to be crocheting.

I remember same as I feel now about his request: Why not? No big deal to me. Might as well.

And so I did.

Two days in a row.

I got up much sooner than I needed to & mixed up everything for a nice hot breakfast.

I don’t think that these mornings amounted to more than a dozen of our childhood. With Dad typically being an in-the-moment casual, laid-back kinda guy, these random hot breakfast mornings were treated like just about any other.

Mom would do her best most mornings to sit with him. On her best days she’d get up before Dad headed downstairs to the kitchen & she’d begin preparing their respective hot beverages. This brand or this brand for Dad; this brand or this brand for Mom as manufacturer's coupons ran rampant for each of these. 😁 She’d get two microwavable mugs set-up with their contents & microwave them for a minute & a half; a 1, a 3, & a 0.

It wasn’t until years later, sometime during the college years, when, back in their kitchen, that she “proudly” showed how she’d begun pressing the 1, then the 3 – twice, for one minute & thirty-three seconds. She had true excitement (at least, generally speaking, it was a “chilled out” excitement) that she’d realized for a mere three more seconds, she’d not need to move her hand that far for the zero anymore; it was perfunctory. Yes, these were the days before the minute automatic button options were added as well as the “add thirty seconds” button option. 😍😂

Other mornings she struggled & didn’t share any of Dad’s “table time” with him. On at least one of these mornings when I bothered to pull this out from underneath the counter, or this out from the oven's drawer & get our hot breakfast going - probably that time my brother had asked for a hot breakfast the following school morning, that time, I do remember, despite Mom not being a morning person, she came downstairs to join us too.

Dad gave her a gentle razing exclaiming something like, “Well! Look who decided to come down & join us!” Which, with his “local” accent, sounded more like, “come dahn & join us!”

At some other point during that breakfast, as a compliment & thanks to me, while also still sort of razing Mom, Dad said to her, “Been trying to get these breakfasts for years. I didn’t think it would be our daughter beating her mother to the punch.” 😂

I don’t remember exactly who managed each of these days’ clean-up. I’m guessing Mom; she managed breakfast clean-up on ordinary school days. 😊

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Pots & Pans Perhaps

New Year's Eve wasn't standard for us through the years. Seeing a movie in a theater that encompassed the last minutes of New Year's Eve as well as a bit of the First Day of the Year is one way I've brought in the New Year. I've slept through it on occasion; I've spent time with people, not in a party-type of fashion, though we weren't paying attention to the clock, & at least an hour into the New Year, we realized it. These are more recent ways I've "celebrated" New Year's Eve. 

For the most part, back then, our family would gather at whichever local cousin's house chose to host whomever decided to come. This would be nice because it'd be our relatives, although we didn't live in the same neighborhood as any of them, requiring at least a twenty minute drive usually. We'd switch it up occasionally & join our neighbors instead. They'd have their relatives joining them as well, though they were relatives with which we'd become acquainted throughout the year, as well as the years 😄, so no one felt it strange that we'd, well, quite literally, walk across our lawn, through their driveway, & up their front walkway to their front door. We'd joke about how we didn't even need to use the street, let alone drive (& since no one was driving, Dad could drink as he wished without issue), in order to get to the neighbor's house.

The adults typically hung out on the main floor; there'd be something on the television for their entertainment while everyone caught up with one another. The kids resorted to the downstairs where there was a couch for us to goof off on & some other random things around. There'd be about eight to ten kids, nearly ten years apart from oldest to youngest, though we knew each other well enough & enough age difference & maturity range in between the nine to ten years that it never mattered.

Some of what was fun about hanging out next door was that this group of friends, for me, not the adult generation, is that the most of the rest of the year when I'd see this group of people [read: those who were my age] I'd be seeing them only during the "nice weather". This meant that we'd either be wearing play/sweat clothes or in our swimming suits since we'd be playing around in the pool our neighbors had in their backyard. When we'd all be together on New Year's Eve, we'd all be wearing the sort of clothes that we'd typically wear to school. The coolness of this seems a bit, well, uncool now as I'm writing it. I suppose it may be one of those things, which, at that age & time was something exciting, & now, as adulthood has set in deep, there's a great perspective shift.

I also remember being concerned the first few times we'd go next door for New Year's Eve. Mom made a "big thing" out of, once the new year rang in, each person you saw, basically as you saw them, you were supposed to greet them accordingly & give them a kiss. This would've been drastically weird. There were roughly thirty adults there, some of whom I didn't even know their connection to the next door neighbors. It seriously freaked me out & made me uncomfortable, though I eventually got used to realizing when I'd look at these people after the clock struck midnight, they'd just smile & continue along, so - so did I. 😊

Nevertheless, also each year, our neighbor would go into her kitchen & the cabinet/cupboard, whatever it was where she kept these, & she'd dig out one for each of us kids, along with one of these for each of us. At least each of us who'd want to stand outside the front door for the first ten to fifteen seconds of the new year to announce it to the rest of the neighborhood, at least those within hearing distance. There's another thing for which I've gained a drastic perspective shift. Oh, the joys of childhood & adolescence - just to be able to "legitimately" make some noise at the stroke of midnight standing outside.

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Christmas & The Day After as a Child

And so here we’d be, on the day following Christmas, when as a young girl, I’d have just spent the previous day sitting in the family minivan in my unofficial official seat right behind the driver (which 99% of the time was Dad) being driven around to whichever family member or family friend was next on our list; we’d canvas the larger neighborhood & spend time with at least a half dozen family & family friends over the course of our Christmas afternoon, evening, & night.

Mom explained years after we’d stopped traveling out-of-state for Christmas Day that we’d always spent that day traveling from house to house because it was Grandma’s wish that we’d not remain at her house for the day, nor to have anyone stop by her house to visit on Christmas Day.

Once my brother & I had begun taking lessons we needed these. Mom & Dad had us bring them with us when we visited Grandma for Christmas. That’s how it began. Family & friends heard that we had them with us (Mom & Dad would have us bring them in the car, not leave them at Grandma’s house for the day), & they’d have us go get them so they could listen too. They were really kind & inviting; we really never did sound reasonable, let alone good.

At the end of the day, once we were all fully exhausted & basically falling asleep, we’d retreat back to Grandma’s house so that we could wake up, eat a quick breakfast of eggs, toast, & whatever else might be leftover, before heading back across the state border by around lunchtime at the latest.

This way we’d be back to our house long before dinnertime & be able to enjoy our household gifts at that time. If we were full of energy & the weather was kind, we’d head over to Dad’s mom’s house, maybe even for dinner, if not just for the evening & to exchange gifts with her too. Dad’s sister, who was living downstairs, would stop by with the few boxes she had for us as well. Otherwise, we’d wait & see Dad’s mom on December 27. During this visit is when this would’ve been.

It turned into a lot of traveling & a lot of seeing lots of people, & spending lots of time with everyone. At one family friend’s house a quick “deli buffet” would be set up on their dining table for us to stop & assemble a sandwich of our choosing. They had a few grown daughters who gathered with us & we’d team up to play this. I never cared to play this, especially not solo, as I had to be “hyper-aware” & super paying attention at all times; never letting my guard down. I didn’t care for this on any holiday, particularly not when celebrating Christmas, so I was grateful that these family friends joined & supported us; it served as a great “emotional hug”.

I most remember Christmas, & the following days, as a lot of moving about & being told, “Go here.” “Be there.” “It’s time to get going.” It was, oftentimes, hard to be “in the moment”, & seemed to be a lot of just sitting around waiting. Those were the years for that; that was the age of “the waiting game” & making the most of the conversations & experiences which played out before us. 

On the upside, during one of our “waiting around” visits, at the house where Mom’s best friend grew up, I remember admiring her sister’s handiwork. I’ve never really minded anyone watching me do this; maybe it’s in part due to the generosity this family friend showed me during that Christmastime visit.

Family friends joining in while playing this & making the most of “waiting around time” working up some of this. Lessons in kindness of Christ-like spirit of heart at Christmastime for a lifetime.

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Way Back When Christmas Eve Recently

From before I’d been born our family had headed on a few hours drive from our house to Grandma’s house; that is, Mom’s mother’s house. It was just Grandma living there by then, though many others had, at one time or another, living there too.

I don’t remember all of the details anymore…Anymore than I remember the car rides, which I’d sleep through (click here). We’d get there in enough time to unload what we’d brought for the next two nights (or as they say in these modern days “sleeps”).

Grandma, in her teeny-tiny eat in kitchen would have everything set up in, what became, for this “event”, her very overcrowded teeny-tiny eat in kitchen. Her kitchen could barely hold a table, & yet one for all of us to gather around sufficiently as well as simultaneously. Fortunately, the table was oval in shape, so its circular-ness provided assistance in lessening our bumping into one another. 

The table would hold a ceramic dish which had two sides. One side was for whole kernel corn; the other side was for peas. A very dear family friend made, in super large batch annually, bobalki, which Grandma would receive a certain portion of that would be cooked up & served at this Christmas Eve meal; its presence would be in another nearby bowl. There’d be a dish of unshelled nuts as well as sweets (typically these) as well as about a dozen homemade Christmas cookies. 

The “main dish” would be salmon patties. That’s because we’d not be eating meat on Christmas Eve. The tradition remained long after my uncle’s days of gathering around this table, though salmon patties were the only type of fish that Mom’s brother was willing to eat, therefore it’s the type that Grandma came to prepare for this meal; it’d become habitual.

There’d be a candle, the family Christmas candle, which would be pulled out from a safe space since its last use & be lit from our saying grace (a special, Christmas Eve version where additional thanks for the special highlights of the year would be mentioned, as well as a quick, piercing reminder of anyone we’d lost in the family, simply by mentioning their names).

Everyone, while wearing these, (& not these, nor these 😂), would remain at the table together until the last person had finished their last bite. The symbolism was in that we were showing gratitude (First World Country type of thing, perhaps?) that we had these which we could be wearing. (I managed to always be finishing my plate last since I ate super slowly, though not on purpose.) At that time the candle would be blown out.

*****

In later years, after Dad’s sister died & we began spending our entire Christmas break in the region where we lived, & sleeping in our own beds each night, this Christmas Eve dinner continued on with Mom overseeing its many detailed traditions beyond that which is written here. At this point, as Dad & I have favored eating seafood through the years, we'd enjoy salmon fillets; ordinary frozen fish sticks were available for everyone else.

As we kids were a bit older at this time, gifts would be waiting for us underneath the Christmas tree already & I’d get so excited & anticipatory that, as I’d learn years later, Mom almost folded & asked Dad a few separate years if he’d be fine with my opening just one of my gifts on Christmas Eve. It was always a “no go” from Dad. Big bummer.

One thing we could count on was knowing that we could turn on the television & from 8 p.m. until 11 p.m. (if we’d not yet fallen asleep 😏) this movie would be airing on a major network.

It became my favorite movie. One that, since it’d never been gifted to me as a DVD, I recently finally treated myself to…Another movie which has its themes set in these days of the year, would be this one…It’s another which I’ve watched more times than is healthy 😄, & its commentary too, I’ve seen/listened to many a time more than I’m probably meant to.

I particularly slowed down this movie & paused it on the commentary a time or two because, toward the beginning, in - maybe the second or third scene - the commentators pointed out a “nod to NPR” which I never noticed on my own;. Once I paused & paid that much more attention, I agree, it’s there.

What I did notice on my own is that this movie’s title speaks four-fold in the storyline. The commentators do not discuss this, leading my curiosity to consider that they may’ve never picked up on this genius within the writing details of this movie on which they worked. This sort of thing leaves me feeling particularly clever.

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Late December Birthdays & Duplicate Gifts

When Dad's talked about it, he's explained that Grandma didn't care for her birthday any longer, not because, it being one week before Christmas Day, it'd get lost in the Advent season & Christmas preparation - rather, because, on separate years, both her mother & one of her brothers died on her birthday.

Apparently having me as her only granddaughter didn't win over & heal her heart. 😂 It's not a laughing matter; it really isn't. I can say that, even at her birthday & when we'd visit for Christmas (where we spent our youngest years with our other Grandma on Christmas Day), she'd be quite happy, content, & pleased to see us & be with us.

Since Dad entered her world as menopause knocked on her door, & Dad didn't marry & have a family of his own until he entered his 30s, Grandma waited around quite a few decades to be able to say she had a granddaughter.

Memories of Grandma include things that are her favorite color: pink, & finding these & these stored in these & kept in the bottom of one of these, which Grandma had in the corner of her eat-in kitchen, which had previously been a bedroom; Dad's - to be exact.

Before the era of Grandma having grandchildren, the house she lived in had been built as a single-family house. In the general idea of these things, it had remained a single-family house - with one front door which opened to a living room with a staircase just a few feet ahead leading to the second floor & to the finished attic, which was also a bedroom.

The difference was, at a certain point in the cycle of life, this house, that our ancestors had built by hand for themselves, changed from simply having a basic setup for one family, to having a setup for two families, rather two generations, which could amicably & trustingly, live together, yet separately, under the same lock & key.

And so the change remained into the decades of my youth where the room Dad had spent his childhood growing up in, studying in, etc., had now become a room with a kitchen sink, a standard-sized kitchen counter, kitchen cabinets, a stove, & a full-sized refrigerator/freezer - with a table large enough for six people to comfortable dine sitting in the middle & just enough space for everyone to also back up their chairs when they needed to sit down & stand back up. It was in the corner of this room, opposite the refrigerator, that this sat. It was the corner nearest the doorway from where we'd enter, so we'd be able to reach inside on our way into the room, formerly Grandma & Grandpa's bedroom (& the exact spot of where Dad was born 😮), now Grandma's living room, where we'd gather with her before we'd eat.

There had been a section nearby where the television stand sat that I'd often scooch in the corner of with these. Grandma never complained that I'd keep to myself on the side of the room, she'd simply look at my layout from time to time before checking on things in the kitchen. This little section off in the corner also happened to be where I was sitting as I unwrapped my gifts from Grandma one particular Christmas.

I'd say I was in about my mid-elementary years, & Mom, not wanting to ruin either her mother-in-law's Christmas with her grandkids, nor her own daughter's Christmas with her paternal grandmother, briefly mentioned on the car ride back after Christmas Day (when I'd opened a gift from an aunt, who is also my Godmother) that, should we kids happen to open any gifts which appeared to be, or definitely were, the same as one which we'd recently received, we should receive the gift just as we would had we not just received said gift. Mom would work with us to fix what we saw as an "extra of the same gift" later. And honestly, Mom's wording & explanation were such that, the way this is written here, isn't giving her talent-in-the-moment due justice; she spoke much more eloquently (or, I was just that young, innocent, & naïve - or both 😉😂).

See, we lived locally to Dad's mom; Mom's mother lived a few hours away, across a state border. Dad's mom never learned to drive. What Mom began doing, once we kids were born, would be to purchase a selection of items, drive over to where Grandma lived a few neighborhoods away from us, & set up on her bed, which was just next to her living room, the items Mom had found that she knew would both fit us kids (in the case of clothing) & that we'd like & would actually play with (in the case of toys, etc.). Grandma would basically "shop" atop her bed as if it were a store counter; this system worked for years.

It is also because of this system that Mom knew in advance that one of us would soon be opening a gift that we'd just opened as gifted to us by someone else; it was me. It was one of these.

So there I was sitting in that corner of Grandma's old bedroom-turned-living-room, opening up the gifts she'd picked out that year, (we kids hadn't yet learned about Mom & Grandma's "'atop-the-bed' shopping arrangement") & there it was. I remember opening it. I remember looking at it, thinking to myself, "Hey, Mom was sayin'..." And I looked up, sort of toward Grandma, yet truly toward Mom (though, fortunately, Mom was sitting just past Grandma, so it was basically a 'wash') & I was wearing a smile that said, "Hey, check it out..." while my head was sort of spinning in a child-like haze.

I'm sure I definitely appeared to be more satisfied than not-so-much, so Grandma's heart still swelled with contentment & satisfaction. And later on, maybe days later, maybe weeks later, as Mom worked to correct the duplication, she explained to me about what had happened.

Those days of childhood, those days of running around, being told where to be, where to go, what to do, & how to be, they seem to us as children to be such a burden, to be so "fixed", unnatural, busy, & unrelaxed. In many ways they are, yet they can be so fulfilling too. They are the days of gifts; of giving & receiving, of cherishing moments, memories, & special occasions. They are the days when "duplicate gifts" are made possible.

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