Many Guests, Many Veges

The tomatoes lasted until the end of January, and even tonight there are probably a few wizened ones left. It has been an amazing winter, warm beyond what anyone has ever seen.

Our New England family is hunkered down watching the snow fall, thinking about tomorrow when all that snow will have to be removed.

  And, here in paradise, I spent the day setting out seedlings, weeding, mulching, planting the new crops to join the broccoli, collards, carrots, and potatoes we are already enjoying. The porch is full of dozens of heirloom tomato and pepper starts I planted just after Christmas that will go into the garden in a couple of weeks. Many of them will go to the school/community garden and to friends.

 It is a new thing to have had vegetables from the garden non-stop for the entire year. Yeah, sometimes there are a lot of repeats. Collards and broccoli several times a week, salad every night.

Yesterday, when we made a last breakfast for our departing guests, we had those exquisite tiny new red potatoes with the eggs from a neighbor and the last of the tomatoes.

My brother and his wife had been visiting for two and a half weeks. They stayed in our lovely guest house that perches on a ridge overlooking the pond. My husband  and I and my brother and his wife have spent two or three weeks together every year for the past twelve years. We have been in Italy and France several times, to Alaska, to New Zealand and places closer to home. Sometimes our sisters were a part of these trips, but always it has been the four of us.

This time they came to visit us here and it was the best visit ever. I could be working in the garden and listen to my brother playing his violin from the porch on the guest house. We read and talked our heads off about books and politics and family. They loved the outdoor shower and the walks through the woods and the panorama of Florida spring with the wild yellow jasmine vines in the trees. We ate marvelous dinners and took day trips all around the vicinity and we had friends over and we sat on the bench by the pond and watched the birds.

It was a perfect visit from this big brother of mine. How I enjoyed the several hours when he prepared a bed for the strawberries and tenderly inserted the plants into the compost amended bed. When it's a long visit, everything doesn't have to be addressed immediately; important issues come in bits, more to come later.

Everyone Wants Money

Most of the calls I receive these days are from people wanting money:  requests from paramedics and police in our community, the democrats, the environment, my college, breast cancer, all kinds of other worthy causes.

 But I have donor fatigue. If I give money to a particular cause all I get in response is a request for more and more. So, sometimes I listen to the pitch, and feel guilty as I say no to right now. Sometimes the folks who are earnestly making the pitch engage me. "So, can I put you down for a thousand bucks?" I think of these young people who are manning the phone banks who have been schooled to make the "Ask". Sometimes, I quietly hang up. I cannot deal with this. Sometimes I tell them that, quite frankly, I do not have the money, but thanks for asking.

When I attend community meetings, most of what we discuss is fundraising. These groups need money! Funds enable kids to make a trip to Washington, D.C., and play football.  Funds enable the community to furnish a community center or provide meals for needy kids, or make it possible for children to get dental care.

Everyone needs money! And I know money is out there. There are many small grants in reach. There are many prosperous people who would willingly give to a cause. There are many people who can buy expensive cars or boats or whatever, but never really think about how far a hundred bucks could go to fund a kid for a soccer club or three hundred meals on wheels. 

We need to have a redistribution of money in this society. Lots of people- the haves- just don't think about it. Our American society is very generous. We just need to be constantly reminded. When the media highlights a story about a kid needing a lung transplant, money pours in . When the media has a story about a miserable dog that was shot with an arrow, or was spurned by our governor, money pours in.

We all do what we can, generous Americans that we are.

But I am not picking up the phone for Telefund - ever!

Everyone Wants Money

Most of the calls I receive these days are from people wanting money:  requests from paramedics and police in our community, the democrats, the environment, my college, breast cancer, all kinds of other worthy causes.

 But I have donor fatigue. If I give money to a particular cause all I get in response is a request for more and more. So, sometimes I listen to the pitch, and feel guilty as I say no to right now. Sometimes the folks who are earnestly making the pitch engage me. "So, can I put you down for a thousand bucks?" I think of these young people who are manning the phone banks who have been schooled to make the "Ask". Sometimes, I quietly hang up. I cannot deal with this. Sometimes I tell them that, quite frankly, I do not have the money, but thanks for asking.

When I attend community meetings, most of what we discuss is fundraising. These groups need money! Funds enable kids to make a trip to Washington, D.C., and play football.  Funds enable the community to furnish a community center or provide meals for needy kids, or make it possible for children to get dental care.

Everyone needs money! And I know money is out there. There are many small grants in reach. There are many prosperous people who would willingly give to a cause. There are many people who can buy expensive cars or boats or whatever, but never really think about how far a hundred bucks could go to fund a kid for a soccer club or three hundred meals on wheels. 

We need to have a redistribution of money in this society. Lots of people- the haves- just don't think about it. Our American society is very generous. We just need to be constantly reminded. When the media highlights a story about a kid needing a lung transplant, money pours in . When the media has a story about a miserable dog that was shot with an arrow, or was spurned by our governor, money pours in.

We all do what we can, generous Americans that we are.

But I am not picking up the phone for Telefund - ever!

Warm Weather!

 I am foolishly crazy about growing our vegetable garden. I love those collards, so huge and resplendent now. Today I discovered a whole bunch of cauliflowers, already heading nicely. You would think that I would label what I have planted. But I do not. I love the wild abandon and the surprises when I find a whole row of carrots ready to pick! I love finding some of the last of the season's peppers, and those tomatoes left from the summer still top our salads. My goal is to plant something every day. Today I buried a bunch of sprouting potatoes and in a few weeks they'll be sprouting.

I work in the garden and spend a few minutes admiring the beauty of a lettuce bed with all its textures and colors. Sometimes I look out over the wonderful pristine landscape beyond the garden, and I am entirely happy.

Growing vegetables (and anything else!) takes time and sweat. I love planting and watering stuff but I hate the weeding and removal of spent vegetation. But it's all part of the process. My mate actually turned over the compost pile a few days ago, so now we have a really good mixture to use on the vegetables.

Our community garden also is doing famously and feeding lots of folks. The school kids work diligently with the plants and are taking home broccoli, collards, beans and other vegetables.

This evening I went out to our garden and picked broccoli for my supper. The coyotes were beginning to howl in the distance and the bats were flying around. Today's high was close to ninety degrees, way warmer than usual for this time of the year. It scares me. I love having this extended growing season and all the tremendous greenness, but I know in my heart that in ten days we could have a freeze. I like things to be normal.

Tomorrow I shall pick huge quantities of vegetables and take them to friends. It's great to be the idiosyncratic old lady who grows things!

About Gifts

Here is one of the best gifts ever. It did not come at Christmas, but sometime, just because. My best friend, Marie, gave me this orchid several years ago because she knew I love orchids and care for them with love and attention. This magnificent one now blooms twice a year and delights me over and over. To me, this orchid is the perfect gift: it was given with love, not to mark any particular moment or holiday, and she knew I would love it. She was right.

We have come to the end of this American holiday season when we all go into paroxysms of guilt and longing for the perfect gift for everyone. We spend too much on crap. The wrappings have been torn off, and most of the stuff hidden under those amazing, colorful, carbon emitting, and costly wrappings have long been assigned to the back of the closet, or exchanged for something we really wanted, and in the right size.

I do this too. I make my to-give list for family and friends, and I send stuff off to them. I do not want them to think me churlish or ungiving. I want them to think well of me (maybe).

Some people are extraordinary gift givers, and they love the opportunity! I think of my sister, Maria, who listens in July when I say to her that what I really would like is a statue of St. Francis for my garden. So, at Hannukah, this perfect statue appears! I think of my sister-in-law, Nancy, who knows I love those certain pears, sends them at Christmas. I think of my daughter who makes home-made items I love - and give them to us at Christmas. Why Christmas?

What are REAL gifts?  We don't really know how to ask for what we want! When you'd really like some cash to pay a baby sitter, you get a hand cream dispenser. When you'd really like some cash to pay for car repairs you get a hood for your snow-blower. When you'd really like some some help with computer issues, you get hand-made soap.

Dear Abby is full of folks complaining about the lack of thanks for these things. I kind of know where they are coming from. Yeah, no one thanks anyone anymore, and momentarily I think that nevermore will I send this or that for the dutiful Christmas gift, since it seems they don't care. (neither do I!)

I have made donations to Heifer in the name of giving those folks a hive of bees or a goat to make a difference in the third world. But whatever it is - goats, bees, a new bike, big part of a tuition for college, checks, keyboard, it's all the same- just stuff. So, now I just send my donations to these organizations straight. You just do what you do because it is the right thing to do.

So, I come back to gift giving. Why are we so consumed with this during the holidays?

I have many friends with whom I do not exchange gifts, cards, or anything for the holidays. And yet, we would do anything for each other!

At Christmas, for the first time away from home in fifty years, we were with our son and young family in their home. The amount of gifts under the tree was prodigious! I was particularly amazed with the expensive gifts of clothing and small electric things the outlying family gave to each other. Lots of this was probably stuff they needed. But I could not help thinking about their credit card debt for all this loot! I was warmed by the total caring and attention these folks had for each other. I have a lot to learn!

Giving in the holiday season is an affirmation of being a consumer. My partner, in his quiet way, does not participate in Christmas. He knows that I will do the minimum to keep the troops quiet. Sometimes in the heeby-jeebies of the night I wish he would give me a gift of something he thought I would love, something inviting that I didn't have to tell him. But he gives me the gift of self. What more could anyone want?

Thinking about Gifts

New Kind of Christmas

They are wearing matching Christmas suits! Silvio, eleven, is so loving with his twin brother and sister.

It was a different kind of Christmas for us, not being at home.

We flew a thousand miles to be with our son's family. We had six of our eight grand kids there. The twins had a wonderful time eating the wrapping paper and tumbling around from arms to arms, crawling like mad from room to room and cruising along on the furniture. They are that delicious age of nine months, plump and cute, just starting to speak, so curious and accepting of everything.

The twins' three brothers were there, amazing young adults and Silvio the eleven year old. Their cousin Quincy, eight, rounded out the grandchild contingent.

What really delighted me was observing how my son and his wife took so naturally to the noisy hubub of managing this family of five kids ranging in age from nine months to nineteen years old, and a huge number of family and friends who came on Christmas.

Our son has the wonderful capacity of being able to work full bore in a very responsible position in state government, and then, when he is off, he's Dad. He makes his life for his family fun and warm. He cooked a huge Christmas dinner for thirty and seemed to love every minute of it. When the babies needed anything, he was there for changing or feeding or reading them a story.

I loved how he and his wife have such a natural rhythm for getting stuff done, paying attention to each other and to the kids. My daughter-in-law is just the best! I love how she is easy and accepting. And I love her style of making sure those twins eat only organic and home made food, no fake stuff in their environment. But she's not shrill about this. She just does it. She clearly loves this part of life when she's majorly on duty as the Mom. And anyone can clearly see that these twins, who were quite premature, are thriving like crazy.

Someday, probably soon, this woman will go back to working full time at an outside job, and I know she'll have a huge array of help to do it.

It was a wonderful Christmas, very interesting. And I am still enjoying the chocolates!

The House on the Side of the Road

Many years ago when we first lived here so far out in the boondocks we found a cross stitched sampler in an antique store that said " Let me live in a house by the side of the road and be a friend to man." We bought it and installed it in front of the toilet in the powder room, where it has been ever since throughout many new themes and coats of paint. I thought about this old beloved piece today. Out of the corner of my eye I saw from my studio window an unusual sight. Here came a young man on a loaded bicycle, pedaling like mad from the farm track to the north. He stopped at the cattle gap and went across it. I went out to greet him as he threw the bike down near our front door. Clearly, he was in trouble. Reminded me of the many lost hunting dogs that find their way here, knowing we will return them to where they are supposed to be. It turned out that this young man had been lost in the woods for four days, and somehow found his way to our doorstep. We stuck out our hands (Tracy and Molly). "Come in for breakfast" was the first thing I said. It never occurred to me then to be suspicious. Obviously, he was not packing an assault rifle. O.K. The bathroom is that way, and then come and sit down and I will feed you. I stirred up four eggs, ten sausages, four English muffins, strong hot coffee, orange juice, no questions asked. (Are you vegan,vegetarian, gluten free?) This guy would have eaten the wallpaper, and a traditional huge breakfast was just right. I asked him if he had celebrated Christmas and he was somewhat noncommittal. His mother had dropped him off with his canoe and bike at the state park up the road. As he ate everything on the plate he politely told us of his adventure on the river. There was some weird stuff, such as was why did he not have a better grip on the geography of where he was, how could he have gone out on a four day trip without any food? Or a compass? How could he have portaged his canoe and the bike? (This would have killed me!) But, still, here was this friend to man, needing sustenance, and here we were by the side of the road, extending friendship. We learned little about him as he ate steadily. I could see that his arms were very strong and he told us that he took no food on his trip because he expected to forage for food. He was not a hunter, but he wanted to fish for food. He did eat some fungus from trees but was sickened by it because he had not boiled it. The recent frost killed so many green plants he was unable to find much to eat. I wanted to ask him botany questions about food foraging, but he was clearly focusing on the breakfast. We did find out that he was unemployed, laid off as a tech trouble shooter, went to college, lives with his mom, has a girl friend,not a hunter, loves nature. He was very polite and I could see that he was exhausted from the four days he spent lost in the Green Swamp.I wondered what his back story is.. He only told us about adopting a baby fox and how great it was. I guess I should have been more cautious, more suspicious. I should have examined his voluminous bike packs for assault weapons or hand guns. But, trusting person as I am, I did not. I invited him in. (And I do this with the lost dogs, too!) After breakfast and many thanks, we hoisted his bike into the truck and dropped him off in town. We exchanged phone numbers and expect he'll be back to collect his canoe on the bank of the river. When he said, "How can I repay you?", we only told him to pay it forward to the next time. He got it. These funny and strange encounters with our fellow man give me hope to think that we all Americans, weird as we all are, can welcome each other and still trust. Tears still spring from my eyes when I think about the carnage in Newtown. Those survivor kids will have a long way to go before they trust again. But it can happen. We must make it happen. Wishing you all a New Year of peace and love.

Families Happen

 Like everyone else, mostly, I have this vast family connected to me by DNA. Of course, I love and treasure them, and connect with them over thousands of miles whenever we can. We visit back and forth and it is so important to me to be in contact with all my eight grandchildren.

Because we live so far from most of our family we have our "family" here as well. Here is Maria, the sister I adopted many years ago in Italy. She is wearing the robe I gave her for her trip up north where it will be cold.

 We both needed a sister (I already had one, she had none). You can't have too many sisters! In case you're thinking this beautiful woman is some kind of desperate orphan - NOT! She's a famous and published anthropologist, and we happened to do the adoption in Italy because we were both there having an amazing holiday and it seemed the right thing to do.

In this photo she's wearing the new robe I gave her for the family Hannuka celebration last week. In our mutual adoption, I got a new brother-in-law, my grandson got a wonderful uncle, all of us got new family we treasure.

This weekend another part of our "family" is here. This is a family of four- Peter, Anne. Stephan and Phil. This family has been visiting our ranch for years and we have watched their two boys grow up. Together we have explored the woods and swamps and fields. We have shared so many meals, talks and walks and heavy work cutting downed trees and mowing the fields. More than any 'real' relation, this family truly gets it why we love this place.

We are hoping that they will be able to buy some of the acreage next to ours.. So much to think about that.

Their boys do not have any living grandparents, and I think they may regard us as some kind of surrogate. This family is our family forever.

And, so important under my heart as an outlier part of my family is Warren, the cowboy we inherited when we bought this land more than twenty years ago. Warren owns and takes care of the cattle on our place. He is a suspicious guy who takes his time figuring out anyone. But, now, he and I are thick as thieves, we hug a lot, have conversations about cows and vegetables and the weather. He is so different from me politically, but I know he is not ever mean spirited (the deer he kills is butchered and sent to the local food banks) Warren would do anything for me and I would do the same for him. He's family to me.

Last Friday as the massacre was happening in Newtown, I was in a public school first grade making latkes with the kids.

Terrible week, thinking about this. What I do know is that the IRA is totally on the wrong track!

Families happen in the most serendipitous ways. My little family of those first graders grating the potatoes and onions, asking questions, trusting.

Family happens!

Festival of Lights

 Here is my grandson Quincy last night lighting the last candle for Hannukah. There is my brother-in-law supervising.

I love this part of our family tradition when we all sit down to the usual knishes and latkes and everything else and we exchange all those wonderful and wacky gifts. My sister Maria listened when many months ago I said I really wanted a statue of St. Francis for my garden. So there it was- tasteful and the perfect size to guard my water garden.

We are certainly diverse; our family includes all colors, ethnicities and religions. And we celebrate like mad! This night we were especially tender as we thought about the tragedy in Connecticut but never spoke about it in front of Quincy. None of us could bear what those parents who lost their children have to do. So we hold him tighter and laugh as he releases the big slinky down the back stairs and we hear the clanks going down. We laugh as he manoeuvers his new robotic spider under the table and over our feet, and we scream.

Next week we'll be going to visit five of our other grandchildren in Connecticut. We'll celebrate Christmas with all the decorations and twin babies crawling around eating the wrapping paper and bigger ones eager to tell us what they have been doing since we last saw them. We won't be eating latkes. We'll be feasting on traditional Puertorican food, and probably a dab of some traditional English fare.

We'll rush in on Christmas Eve morning on a blast of cold air, so eager to see everyone and hugs and kisses and how you've grown and is there any time left to run out to the CVS for more stocking stuffers.

I do love the holidays! I am glad we do not have to have our own Christmas tree here, but I am looking forward to the one I'll see soon. (And I am looking forward to chocolates!)

Happy Holidays, friends. Hold tight to your family, hug your kids. Pray for peace and love.

Food, Glorious Food!

The New York Times says that dinner parties are dead. The Tampa Bay Times says, not really. From my perspective, I'd say that dinner parties are alive and thriving. We have always given dinner parties, but not the Manhattan kind where everything is exquisite. What we do is invite folks, mostly close to the last minute. "Hey, we have some great fish, come on over!" Or, more formally, a week or two in advance. At the ranch where we mostly live, we often invite local people to round out the weekend guests we frequently have. Our local friends usually bring eggs from their own chickens, or whatever interesting produce they have. We send them home with our garden produce, maybe some good books or puzzles. More often than not we have many dogs flopping around in the dining room and kids taking their places at the table. My husband who does all the cooking takes into consideration all the dietary needs (gluten free, vegan, vegetarian etc.) and comes up with wonderful menus everyone likes. The vegetables and salad come from our garden out back. I set the farm style table with colorful and casual stuff (Martha Stewart would be proud), and my eight year old grandson places and lights the candles. I am not concerned with how people dress! Just be clean, no bare torsos, no ball caps inside. The conversation will be great. And the food, the glorious food is stellar! Some of our friends are truly great cooks, and I think that it invigorates my husband to do the little extra when they come. Of course, in these dinner parties, we all eat the same things. Sometimes people who are staying in the guest house contribute dessert or something else. What truly interests me is that we all have to eat and we must eat the stuff we grow and cook from scratch. We must realize that eating is a social thing that is fun to do together. In doing this we'll all be slim and fit (even after scraping the last bits out of the lemon souffle pan!) Dinner parties give me courage to set forth again and again in this community where I labor so hard at growing a garden for all and find it uphill work where I daily encounter people who never cook from scratch, never have the wonderful experience of eating good food together and consume calories mostly from fast food and the Dollar General.

Grandma's Favorites

Dispirited with the Public Schools

I have stopped comparing the public schools where I volunteer to the one private school I once ran. Now, five years into my volunteer experiences, I am still appalled. There is a reason why Obama sends his kids to Sidwell Friends School. There is a reason why I send my grandson to private school. If a family can afford it you opt for a school that isn't the deadening and lackluster place where FCAT is paramount. The bottom line is that every child is worthy, some are very bright, most are average, and a few need more help. Here is my view of a public elementary school. In this particular one, a "D" school for the last couple of years, the sense of fear is palpable. Most of the teachers this year are new. They take seriously all the meetings and visits from THE STATE. If the rating cannot go up to at least a C, they will be toast. And so, this involves lots of nonsense about reading 100 minutes a day, no recess, no fun, no reading out loud. I have never gotten as much as a sniff to indicate that any of the teachers or administrators actually read anything! What about the kids? These high poverty kids need experiences! They need to do hands on stuff, play, talk, go outside to run and tumble. They need to have the experiences of growing things, cooking, sewing, measuring, building, playing games, talking! They need mulch for their minds! Teachers do not have any autonomy. I stroll through the classrooms and see in these bleak windowless rooms only neat canned and commercial things and directives on the walls. No art, no science nooks full of interesting things, no creative toys,no live pets to care for, no inviting reading spaces. It shrivels my heart. No joy. Several of us from our local town garden club got a grant to install a school/community vegetable garden. And now, this garden is incredibly bountiful, bursting with all kinds of vegetables. We are eager to cook with the kids who have grown this. When the classes come to the garden,water and weed, pick the produce, and prepare and eat it, it's wonderful! But, so often, we find that most of the teachers really have no idea that there is this great garden out back. They are so hunkered down doing their so many minutes of FCAT prep, there is no time to look up. To say the least, it is uphill work introducing these kids and families and teachers who live in a food desert, to good eating and nutrition. We certainly do not feel valued at all. Except by the kids! One of the faceless and gray people from "THE STATE" accidentally crashed our worm farm to the floor the other day. No apology, just a terse directive to get the custodian to clean up the dirt. I wonder how this school could be if it had a real sense of community? I wonder how it would be if those humorless and gray folks from "THE STATE" would just go away and the teachers could really talk about how education in their school could be, take on the challenge together? I wonder how it would be if everyone was not fearful? I wonder how it would feel to a first year teacher to be able to actually run their ideas by their peers,and be challenged by the best profession, teaching? Who cares what grade this school gets? The point is to educate kids. I notice as I roam around that these kids are sorely lacking in writing skills, math, and of course, no one actually reads for pleasure, and NO ONE READS ALOUD ON A REGULAR BASIS to kids! This total devotion to upping the school grade is devastating to any real meaning of education. Kids do not work this way. To have kids really be good readers they have to have a lot of experiences to hang up there in their minds. If you are reading about geese, for example, you need to have your kids actually see a goose! You can't make sense of sea life if you don't have those kids go to the seashore with a seine net. You can't make sense of history unless you take the kids to the local history museum and let them touch old stuff. It is nothing useful for reading and anything else to just make kids hunker down with commercial materials that are foreign to them. The commercial education companies, which are the drivers of all this,are in it for the money. They have made us all afraid. I believe that every kid is pretty much above average, every kid is valuable, and we owe it to them to make their childhood joyful,interesting, safe, and provide them with the skills they need for life. I want our principals, superintendent, lead teachers to lead the way and not be afraid to really really TEACH our kids.

What was I Thinking? Twenty for Thanksgiving!

Feels like I have just finished a cruise! We are just putting away the last of the laundry and six dishwasher loads of stuff from this feast.

On the day, we began by amassing all the stuff- the turkey, the salmon, all the vegetables from the garden,the cranberries, the potatoes, the ingredients for the gluten free, the vegetarians,and all the rest. We have our plan of attack affixed to the fridge. Our daughter has set up the tables for twenty in the hall, corralled enough chairs, made the table look beautiful and bountiful, set up the table for the wonderful hors d'oeuvres my sister will bring. Grandson Quincy is on board to light the many candles (and he looks splendid in fresh clothes and very large black shoes!) As sou chef I spend the morning washing and chopping vegetables, cleaning as we go, and the chef works on preparing the stuffing, marinating the turkey, knowing all. At some point it seems that everything is ready to go. Broccoli, beans and collards are washed, chopped, ready in their steamers. Potatoes are peeled and ready to be mashed and the butter and garlic is at the ready. The stuffing is in the oven with the turkey. An amazing green and red salad from the garden is washed and spun and ready to be dressed. My sister comes and lays out her appetizers on the porch table (and immediately we all dig in! She makes an incredible spinach pesto loaf, olives, tapenade..) Now folks are arriving, the table is set, drinks are set out. We have been on our feet since dawn (and we are not Martha Stewart!). The best part of the day is when people begin to gather - friends and family we have not seen in a long time, and others we have not yet met. There are hugs and inquiries, people bringing pies and orchids and bottles of wine. In this last part of a Florida afternoon the light is lovely and warm so our guests wander about and enjoy the place. Of course, there is always way too much food! We toast our happiness and good fortune, and dig in to the bounty of food. After the pies and the coffee we repair to the fireplace room (and several of us take turns loading the dishwasher over and over!) No one here turns on the T.V. to watch football. What we did was to do some stargazing with the help of my brother-in-law's i-pad. And, of course, there was the usual clot of folks who talked politics. So, it was a wonderful traditional American Thanksgiving. We gave thanks for the outcome of the election, for not having any Hurricanes here,for our health and happiness, for friends and family, for frogs. Lots of folks spent the night so there were the arrangements of sheets, blankets, where to brush your teeth, do they have enough covers, etc. Brother-in-law Jay prepared breakfast the next morning for everyone: local eggs, bagels, lox, tomatoes and the works. Grandma Molly was k.p. and laundry queen, then captain of the walk through the fields and woods - and then, after all guests left, one could see her lying on the floor of her studio, maybe meditating, maybe thinking that... I love doing this! It does take a toll on us, but it's worth it! We are eternally thankful for all our blessings, our friends and family, our energy to be helpful in our community.

Football frenzies

O.K., people, you know who I am. Watching 60 minutes tonight about the huge driving force that football is in our universities, I was sickened. Here is this huge amount of money spent on the football programs, five million paid to the coach of Michigan (or was it Alabama?).

I know that many folks love their teams. My co in-laws go to every alumni game and bleat their brains out supporting it. I wonder how they would feel if our grandson was beating his head and body on the field as a regular practice?

Here's a proposal: Separate the football from the academic! Those football players should just play football with all the violence and danger and money. Make it a sort of sub professional league. Those young folks who wish to participate in this blood sport could do it without also having to do the charade of also being students. Perhaps they could also have some support about how to make it into professional teams and get on with a meaningful life.

What has football got to do with acquiring an education? Think of it- that brilliant girl or boy, starting out to save the world by studying environmental science has no interest in damaging his/her brain with the violence of football.

Let's put football in the same realm as casino gambling. Just go for it as the violent sport it is (kind of like dog fighting, maybe). Let it be totally profit driven, a business people can support or not.

But, this violent sport of football has no place in academia that I can see. Young people who are about getting an education need to do just that. If all college football programs went into another league, not connected to their college or  university we would actually see how much alumni support there is. Maybe not pretty, but realistic.

Sports have an important place in any academic program, but to have football with all its violence and entitlement be the driver of money acquisition seems to me to be callous and unethical. I am proud to be an Ivy League alumna with a crappy football team. I only wish they would dispense with it entirely!

The Problems of Powerful Men

During the Viet Nam war, my husband was drafted. Basically a pacifist, he could not see any alternative to going. Many of our friends got psychological and other waivers, but he believed in doing this thing that all American young men did. As a Harvard graduate, he had the chance to go to Officer Training School, and the perks and pay would be better. But he chose to be a PFC and see where that led.

He was not about to do any possible thing that led to killing people. He stayed stateside in boring jobs, dispensing dental floss and teaching English to new recruits. At one period he was fingered to be some kind of bomb demolition expert, but he did not pass security clearance (Our parents were Lefties). And this guy who could have been an amazing four star general, except for that inconvenient fact of his pacifism, went on to be a powerful person in journalism.

I remember dreaming about what would happen if he decided to be a military man, and thinking that that fact would lose him from me entirely.

Then our lives tumbled into great careers, the raising of a family, and by increments our financial position improved from the relative poverty when we were students. There were times, later on when we dined at the White House, danced at soirees given by the President of Argentina and Chili, toured Russia, ate incredible buffets put on by the King of Norway. But at home we painted our own house, went to soccer games, and our entertainments were largely just friends we cooked for.

We were beguiled by the opulence of many of the entertainments we attended, but, no way was this something we wanted to do. We were much more interested in the common folks we met, and any excess money was given away to causes we believe in.

I think that this Petraeus thing is having power gone wrong. I kind of have the French take on this: public is public, and don't lift up that private page. But I do wonder about this Jill Kelly person. She and her husband and sister seem to embody the worst sort of greed. She ensnares.

My husband would never be ensnared by the baubles of surface beauty and the entree to opulent living. Neither would our current president.

But still, we have lost an excellent public servant and it makes me sad.

Houseboat Trip/ Climate Change

We and four friends made our annual pilgrimage up the Suwanee River this week. We rented a houseboat and slowly wended our way up river, stopping at some of the springs that feed this magnificent waterway, a jewel of America.

Here you see the dawn just coming to the cypress trees, and as soon as the sun reaches the shoreline many turtles come out to bask on any available log.

All of us have slept on our cramped bunks, easily wakened to see the full moon on the water and hear the slapping of the tide on the bottom of the boat.

We rejoice in knowing that we are privileged to be a part of seeing this last pristine part of rural America. Three of us are scientists who work daily trying to understand how climate change will decimate this amazing place. We scan the banks with our binoculars and see such huge variety of critters as the tide rises and falls. We speak endlessly about what this place will be in twenty-five years, a century, more..

How could anyone just say they do not 'believe' in climate change? We know that the hurricane Sandy is going to hit the Northeast. And we are here on the vast river, no contact with the big world. (I am itchy to hear about how my northeast family is faring!)

The amazing panorama of river banks goes by, bird by bird, turtle by turtle, so many clots of flowers, and we revel in all of this. For four days we slowly travel up the river, stopping at some of the springs that feed it. We swim and hike.

And we have such a good time cooking for each other every night and talking our heads off (not about our kids: we have many.) We touch each other and cuddle like puppies. This time, the weather was cold and gusty and it was hard to make that houseboat behave in the wind and current, so it was kind of adventurous. Our captain was stellar! Everyone did anchors and lines
and it worked out.

In the cold windy weather we hunkered down inside and did a couple of jigsaw puzzles with the sun on our backs, lizards in the sun. And thought about the next meal! Every minute or two someone would alert us to something interesting out there on the river.

This annual expedition is a time out of time. Very little connectivity to the larger world. A cocoon of great friends you feel comfortable with (even with that horrid bathroom, and no privacy.) is the best.

I have a great need for physical activity, and on a houseboat, how to do it? Well, I went on up top of the boat at night when everyone else was settled down under the covers, took my i phone and ear buds, and danced at night by the light of the moon for the length of an album. No one below complained.

It was a wonderful trip, and as usual, I couldn't believe that five days had passed- and I never looked at my watch!

What would this amazing place be when the sea rises? We think of our children and grandchildren and beyond..

Blue Curls!

Finally, there is the merest vapor of a new season about to happen. I have opened the studio door and I feel the breeze, so welcome after the heat of the day.
This morning when the dew was still upon the land I walked up the lane behind the barn and saw the blue curls that I have been looking for all summer. These flowers are small, about the size of a fingernail, blazing blue, curled over. I had thought that they were to bloom in summer - but here they are, a presage of autumn.

The chimney swifts have flown away and we no longer hear their loud chatter. We swapped out the hummingbird feeders for songbird feeders. The last of the hummingbird feeders are full of butterflies, mostly zebra long wings. There are so many tree frogs one cannot open a door without being covered with them.

I am resting for the weekend after an obsessive week of starting the Lacoochee school community garden. Most of the planting is done and it was like herding cats to get the teachers on board and get the watering system up and running and get the kids to plant their beds. But I still have this vision of an overflowing garden of vegetables and flowers, many parents and kids and teachers owning it. I think we are on the way!

Many volunteers have stepped up to help! Those lovely shy Mexican parents come by (Ms. Molly, Ms.Molly!) and take home pots of extra collard and broccoli plants. Others from the summer camp I run come by to be supportive. Officer Friendly waves, Mr. Lopey, the janitor, is the main man who will monitor the watering.

In the mornings when I walk from the office to the garden and see lines of beautiful kids going to their classes I am surrounded by hugs (Ms Molly!) I have known so many of them since kindergarten!

The core volunteer group is equally beguiled.
It has been a wonderful and hard week but well worth it.

And I have discovered this season's blue curls!

September Promise

On Labor Day we begin to sniff the air for any possible hint of cooler weather or even the idea of drier air. And we are always disappointed. So we entertain ourselves with watching the river rise, bringing with it lots of small fish and frogs that attract jubilees of ibis in the growing swamp. The deer and other critters have been leaping out of their flooded habitats and come closer than usual to our house. Even the wild pigs spent a night of it, rooting up the dirt just outside the fence.

The hummingbirds have left right on schedule. One day they were there in force at our five feeders, and the next day they were gone to Mexico. The dregs of the nectar now attracts zebra long wing butterflies and ants.

Days are getting shorter and soon we'll not have to mow the lawn. The beds for the fall garden are ready and just today Quincy, the seven year old grandson who lives here part time, planted a row of sugar snap peas in the planter next to where I have already put in broccoli seedlings. I know it's early, but so far, in many years, I know that judicious planting after Labor Day pays off (despite what the books and the Master Gardeners say).

Months ago, several of us from our local garden club applied for a grant from Whole Foods to make a school garden. We got the grant and began to plan for this garden next to probably the poorest elementary school in the state of Florida. (96% of the kids are on reduced or free school lunches) This area is definitely a 'Food Desert'. The school administration was enthusiastic.

We bought planter beds and garden soil and spent several sweaty days constructing everything and heaving the dirt. We bought the hoses and timers and tools and seeds.

The staff at school seemed positive about the idea of having this garden.

Yesterday, earlier than we had thought, the seedlings of broccoli and collards came on the market. So tomorrow is planting day! I have one second grade on board. And then I think that teacher by teacher, we'll have every child participating in this interesting hands-on project. I imagine huge collards, tons of broccoli, peppers, tomatoes, beans, carrots! I imagine evenings with families when we cook those veggies. I imagine parents taking home pots of vegetable seedlings they can care for at home.

I am not long on lecturing and talking about nutrition and good eating. Little kids just need to do it! We have every hope that parents will help out and make this their hang-out place after school. A good friend has volunteered to do all the translating so that the bulletin board and all the signs will be both in Spanish and English.

This project is about making a whole curriculum and dragging people into it. I believe so ardently that growing good food to eat is the key to health, that all the work is worth it.

Tomorrow I will go early to the school garden to set up the hoses and watering system. We have the hoses and timers and garbage cans of weak fertilizer solution, tools, gloves, signs, watering cans. When you work with a group of kids you need to have everything ready to go, no fumbling and waiting.

This period of planting the garden and educating the teachers and arranging everything is the hardest. Many folks have said they would help, and I am sure they will. (If only I would call or email each of them individually multiple times.)

But this grandma doesn't have all the energy I used to have. I worry about this first month when we have to get every class on board.

I think of this month when I must fly to various places to visit two sets of twins - family business! Will I have those someones who can coordinate this school garden?

The vision of many children growing food, having fun digging in the dirt and finding who knows what, and learning much more than is in the FCAT curriculum keeps me going and loading the truck with garden supplies for tomorrow.