Suzy Says

As is our post Thanksgiving tradition, Megan and I met Kalli and Jarrett at the annual craft fair in the Village.

The Village was packed, with sillier-than-usual visitors meandering all over the roads without looking for cars or even other pedestrians, and there was a theme of poorly trained kids and dogs with their utterly oblivious parents. Every time I encounter either of these breeds, my long-ago decision to keep them firmly out of my house is reaffirmed as being 100% correct, an unusual feeling for someone as decision-challenged as I am.

The crowds in the Arts Center were a little less madding. I loved the tomato sculpture:

And this little mushroom sculpture:

Note how the stem is patterned with little hands.

I loved how this was made simply, with sticks and pinecones, accented with a serendipitous Fall leaf:

It was fun to wander through the rooms of lovely things, admiring the skill of the artists. For a lightly populated area, we certainly have a lot of wonderful artists. I think the beauty of the area both draws them and inspires them.

We parted ways afterwards, with Jarrett and Kalli heading to meet their friends and Megan and I to run a couple of errands and stop by Rio’s place on the way home to repo some turkey. Megan had missed the memo that Jonathan was planning to make the carcass into soup on Saturday, and since she had paid for the turkzilla, she wanted some pre-soup leftovers. It seems that no matter how big a turkey she buys, she somehow never gets the leftovers. This year, she did, though.

Clayton, Rio, and Jonathan were hard at work painting the guest cottage at her estate. Clayton is a professional house painter, and it’s always a pleasure to watch an expert at work. They had a system going, with Clayton applying the paint with a very long handled roller and Rio and Jonathan applying the brushwork. Henry Ford would have been almost as proud of us as he would have been on cider making day, when our assembly line was a model of efficiency.

We headed home with Megan’s hard-won leftovers, Star wedged between our seats looking like a ship’s figurehead. It had been a good day.

A YEAR AGO: Lights in the darkness.

There ended up being a lot of people jammed into my bijou residence for dinner, but I’m pleased to report that the evening didn’t involve stitches, handcuffs, Narcan or the Fire Department. Surveying the wreckage this morning, though, I now understand why they call it Black Friday. And wonder why I bothered cleaning at all yesterday. I probably wonder this every year.

The cats and I are sitting in bed together, procrastinating. It’s all about teamwork, my friends.

The turkey turned out great, despite sort of overflowing from its capacious roasting pan:

I am not convinced that the two day dry brining extravaganza was notably more delicious than my American grandmother’s simpler technique of rubbing the bird with butter, salt, and sage and then throwing it in the oven, but I’m glad I tried the fancy. Certainly the meat was moist, even the next day.

Here you see Jonathan making gravy while Jessica supervises:

The honey and harissa roasted Brussels sprouts with their piquant relish were a hit, even among the sprout agnostics and atheists. They vanished pretty fast, along with the cranberry-bourbon relish.

Erica and Jessica brought an exquisite version of Tarte Antoinette with them:

I think this is the fourth version of this delight: last year’s original, then the Bûche de Noël version, then the Junapalooza tartlet version, and now something that looks like a sheet cake, but is actually a pie. Sheet pie! Note that it is decorated with rose geranium leaves, which smelled divine, and sprinkles for festivity and cuteness. You can never have too much.

Jonathan brought tarts he made from huckleberries picked last summer. They tasted like a summer day:

I took a stealth photo of Jessica in her lovely thrift store dress:

Now that she is grown-up sized, I feel weird about making her pose in front of other people. She noted that it is a relief now that she can buy grown up clothes, since clothes designers seem to feel that kids have no taste.

Jarrett and Kalli joined us. It had been too long since we saw them, and it was great to catch up. They brought the irrepressible Archimedes with them, the artist formerly known as the World’s Cutest Puppy, on the fourth anniversary of his adoption.

The cats were not impressed with this canine visitor. Clyde hid in the studio, his desire for petting and admiration for the crowd warring with his dog terror, and Audrey sat on the stairs, gazing at everyone, but especially Archi, with utter disdain and disgust. It’s how she rolls.

Lichen was missing, on this, his birthday evening, but you know how he is about his birthday in particular and the holidays in general. We missed him, but we did have Clayton with us, our intrepid partner in cider making, who had ridden up here on his motorcycle from San Francisco on Thanksgiving Day. I love it that we are seeing him more often these days.

Jonathan expertly tapped the keg of our home-made cider, and we, the cider makers, toasted each other, the orchard, and the day we made that dream come true. I will always remember that day as a particularly special one.

Because everyone is always welcome at these celebrations (or any time, really – my door is literally open), some of my brother’s ham radio buddies joined us, bearing an odd selection of jumbo-sized gifts: a huge jar of marinated artichokes; a jug of cheap red wine; and a chocolate cheesecake the size of a wagon wheel, which has cornered the market on the valuable real estate in my refrigerator.

The rain held off so that the outdoor living room could be used, and after the guests left, Megan and I sat by the fire, drinking Cointreau and discussing the party. As Jessica sighed happily that evening looking around her with a plate of food on her lap, “I love my life!”

A YEAR AGO: It was T-Day eve. And things were not going according to plan.

Moon Set Morning

This spectacular sky greeted me as I arrived at work one morning last week. I stopped to take a picture as I marveled at its beauty. On Monday, the super moon had been so huge and close to the ocean that there was a shining pathway of light across the rippling waters. I kept being distracted by the breathtaking sight and sneaking peeks as much as I could as I drove to work.

I wish now that I had stopped to take a photo of it, much as I wish I had taken one of the double rainbow over the ocean on my mother’s birthday a couple of years ago. It has finally occurred to me that one really does regret things one hasn’t done much more than those one has done. So I think my new year’s resolution is going to be to stop and take photos when I see something amazing, and to try and have fewer regrets about things left undone.

My resolution of spending more time with friends and family has been pretty successful. My sister texted me to meet her at Ledford House after work on a Friday night, and even though we arrived after the sun had set so we couldn’t enjoy the view, we did enjoy kirs (local champagne dashed with framboise liqueur and a twist of lemon) and hanging out. We did some Thanksgiving and Christmas plotting, and laughed at memories of Christmases past, including the one where Megan had to stitch me up at home, leaving me with a rakish scar. Hopefully this year will be a little less eventful.

A YEAR AGO: Enjoying Benedict Cumberbatch’s amazing Hamlet.

I saw a dream come true.

Years ago, my siblings scratched and clawed an epic 80 foot by 80 garden out of the pygmy and the scrub. The next year, they added an orchard, bringing the whole thing up to a palatial 13,000 square feet.

The orchard includes peaches, which is how you make the world’s most expensive peach pie, plums, cherries, Asian pears, and many different kinds of apples, which is how you make the world’s most expensive cider.

After years of pruning and care, the trees finally produced enough apples to be ciderized. There was some debate about when to pick them. Too early, and there wouldn’t be enough sugar. Too late, and they’d be falling off the trees and/or breaking branches because of the weight of the fruit. Eventually, the day came, and crates and crates were picked by hand.

Then our good friend Clayton came up with his trusty, theft-proofed van, which was loaded up with freshly-picked apples:

and driven over to Rio’s new estate, which she could not have bought at a better time. Not only did it provide mountain lion free lodging for Clayton, it also provided the perfect venue for cider making.

We took over the studio building with the car port, setting up tables with cutting boards and knives off to the side, and the press itself in the place of honor in the middle.

We had a tub of water just outside. First you wash the apples in the water, then put them in buckets to bring them to the chopping block:

It was sort of gourmet apple filling!

There the apples were chopped in half and put in bowls:

eventually being tipped into the wooden hopper of the cider press and milled by hand:

As a storm gathered its strength and started howling outside the carport, Jonathan observed that even if the power went out, no electricity was required, since every step of the process was done by hand, even wheeling the pomace to the compost pile:

After the bucket was full of crushed apple, a wooden lid was fitted into it and it was pressed down to extract the rest of the juice:

It took all day, but we pressed nearly 40 gallons. It was nice to think that we were doing it the same way it had been done for hundreds of years.

Jonathan saw it as a tribute to our English ancestry, since cider is such a tradition in our father’s homeland. I often used to drink cider with him at the pub with his old dog Jesse sleeping peacefully at our feet.

When we planted the orchard, we hoped that one day we would be able to make our own cider from our own apples, and that dream came true on a stormy Saturday, with all of us together, celebrating the past, the present, and the future, all together.

A YEAR AGO: Our good friend Paul was here. And I got up close and personal with my buddy, the Moon.

At the Fair

If it’s the middle of September, it’s time for the County Fair!

It was a Magical Microclimate Tour as Megan and I drove from the chilly, foggy Coast through the redwood forests to the golden Valley, where it was about a million degrees and achingly sunny. Megan’s parking karma held true as she parked about a block from the the Fair – in the shade! – and as we stepped out of her little red car, she asked me if I was wearing sunscreen. I was, but only on my face, so she gave me some for my hands and suddenly exposed arms. I thanked her later.

The first thing we did upon admittance was buy a hat for me:

It is so pink and so Suzy, while also actually being useful, a rare combination indeed. Then we looked unsuccessfully for the slushie vendor. It seems that my blue raspberry slushie dreams are as doomed to unfulfillment as my dreams of being Idle Rich. We settled for frozen lemonade and went in search of Erica.

Unsurprisingly, we found her in the Fiber building. Surprisingly, she had not entered a single thing this year. I imagine there was much rejoicing in the Valley over that one, since her absence would allow someone else to win a prize or two for a change.

Erica said that Jessica was hanging out with her friends on the Midway, and suggested that we go and surprise her there, adding that Jessica now has her own phone and giving us the number*. Erica stayed in the Fiber building to covet spindles and wool and we went to find Jessica.

She greeted us with hugging and excitement despite the presence of her friends, and I felt a spark of hope that her auntourage would not become entirely obsolete. I took this stealth photo of her so as not to embarrass her in front of her crew:

That’s her equally precocious BFF Bella at her side.

We watched the kids ride the rides – I was pleased that Jessica waved at us from the giddy heights – and went to reclaim Erica and meander through the rest of the Fair.

The theme in the Garden building was “Fairy Tales”, and my favorite was this Cinderella themed exhibit:

I also loved this glamorous use of twigs and mirrors:

The goat who loved me! He kept bumping his head against me and kissing my nose:

I love this beautiful bunny’s attitude. It’s like he’s saying, “You lookin’ at me?”

My favorite quilt was this one, showing fog through the redwoods, a sight I love:

I also liked this kind of op art piece. So unusual:

And this one, which looks like washing on a line:

When it was time to go, we hugged our girls goodbye with a promise to get together soon. I am still plotting a sleepover where we will share movies and giggles. Stay tuned!

*I thought that was a horrifying sign of Jessica’s hurtling into adulthood until I learned that she has friends with driver’s licenses. How did this happen?

A YEAR AGO: Hello, darkness, my old enemy.

First things first: it’s Rob’s birthday! As soon as it’s a reasonable hour by Rob standards, I will wish him happy birthday and remind him of how happy I am he was born. His Rob-ness never ceases to delight me, from his view that the dump is a two way street to his wry sense of humor to the way he puts his head to one side when he’s listening to you. And he really listens.

Not to mention that my entire house is Brought to Me by Rob(TM) and that he makes all our lives better and happier. I love you, little big brother!

As for me, the full moon is blasting like a spotlight outside and I am attempting to improve my own outside after a grueling week. I have GlamGlow applied to my eyes and Fresh Vitamin Nectar mask on the rest of my face. Radiance, y’all! Clyde, however, has other ideas and has chosen to barf on the carpet, ruining the relaxing mood. Why do cats always throw up on the carpet instead of the wood floor?

It’s all in keeping with this week, though, which featured the second of back to back audits. Like most sequels, Part 2 was worse than Part 1.

The first one was the audit which is done every year. I thought that was a hassle until the Feds descended on us in all their glory. I had prepared (I thought) for this by creating a nearly 1,000 page binder and putting it on a flash drive for their inquisition convenience. Like the great Iggy Pop, however, they needed more, so I was running around collecting the required documents every day this week.

Perhaps this is a special skill honed by the Feds, but they also had an unerring ability to request supposedly random files that were incomplete, including the file of a doctor who works for the clinic as a contractor. Repeated phone calls and emails to him of increasing desperation were unreturned, so our new Operations Director went to beard him in his lair. They must have just missed each other, because a few minutes after she departed on her mission, he arrived, slouching Spicoli-like into my office in sweats, clutching a Starbucks cup, wearing shades, and saying, “What the fuck, dude?”

I explained that the fuck in this particular case was that his contract expired last year and the Feds looked askance at his treating our patients with no contract. He signed a new one while grumbling that he needed a raise, and headed off to catch a wave. I clearly harshed his buzz.

This was a joy compared to the complexities of providing lunch. At first they asked for sandwiches, so I got Deli A to fax me a menu. Then they wanted salads, and very customized ones at that. I called the deli and was told that it was prêt-à-porter or nothing, since two people had called in sick that day, making bespoke salads impossible. Back to the drawing board. I got the menu from Deli B, printed it, and presented it for consideration. They wanted to know what the soup du jour was, so I called and asked (the winning answer: vegetable beef). Needless to say, none of them got the soup.

Also, for fear of bribery with soup and salads, they paid for their own lunches, meaning three separate checks and lot of change. Why not?

The Feds judge every health center in America on 19 elements. They told us that the average across the country is 5-7 “not met”, or fails. They further clarified that they do not round up, and 98% is still “not met”, aka a fail. Our report card was 6 “not mets”, making us entirely average, while yet feeling that we had been called to the principal’s office and/or were getting detention.

When they finally left on Thursday afternoon, my boss sent me home, a welcome gesture since the shortest day I have logged in the past two weeks was 11 hours and the longest 14. I was just settling down to read Kate Summerscale’s “The Wicked Boy”, a relaxing read about a 19th century boy murderer, when my 21st century phone buzzed with a text from my boss. There had been some attempted fraudulent use of her company credit card, so the bank canceled it, and now all of the travel booked on it has to be re-done with the new card. By me. My estimate is something like 20 reservations. You know what I’ll be doing this week. At least the federal government isn’t involved.

A YEAR AGO: At the fabulous Fair with my fabulous sister and our equally fabulous friend.

I woke up early on Sunday and crept downstairs to make coffee (and more importantly, let Her Majesty outside). It made my heart smile to see Ben sleeping peacefully under Nana’s quilt. I really grew to love that kid in the short time he spent here.

After we had coffee together, he packed up his few belongings, to which I added jars of peach preserves with lemon thyme; blackberry jam made from the wild berries my siblings picked; salsa verde; and relish, so he will have a little taste of Hooterville when he is back home.

We headed back to the property so my brother could give Ben’s car a quick once over before he started home. You may remember that my brother installed a nice cement mechanic’s pit in the carport which houses the washer, dryer, and body size freezer. Definitely a step up from groveling under cars in muddy ditches. He topped up the fluids and opined that the car needs an oil change. Also that whatever is going on with the engine (beyond my limited ability to understand) may cause the head gasket to blow. I do know that blown head gasket = having to buy another car. I’d say Ben has gotten his $500 out of this car, though. He put more than 6,000 miles on it on this trip alone.

One of Rio’s children lives in Portland, so she drives there fairly often. She pulled out some maps and showed Ben the best route to take and warned of a tricky intersection.

After our unpaid mechanic finished working on his car, Ben picked a few apples to take with him. Then, with hugs all around, he drove off as we waved and watched him out of sight, our family tradition. I have to say, his visit was a real joy, all the more for being unexpected, and I will treasure those memories as I do those of his brother’s Bar Mitzvah.

Ben has been texting me from the road, which has been fun. He made it to Portland in about 12 hours and was glad for Rio’s advice, especially at that tricky intersection. His route took him through the magical Lost Coast, then to Portland, then Seattle. After that, it was Vancouver, then Calgary, and then Saskatoon, where he took a break from his 12-14 hour days to rest up before the final push to Manitoba. So far the car is holding up, but Ben thinks that Jonathan is right and its days may be numbered.

He is already talking about coming back next year with his girlfriend, a fellow engineer who has wanted to visit San Francisco her whole life. Here’s to Ben’s safe return home, and his return to Hooterville!

A YEAR AGO: The absurdity of dental insurance. You can’t make this up!

The Orchard

After the delights of the circus, we headed over to show Ben the delights of the family estate.

As an engineer, he was fascinated with the solar arrays, batteries to store the power, and all the other intricacies of the system as well as the fact that the entire place is powered only by solar, entirely off the grid. My brother is exempt from the power outages that plague his sisters.

Megan gave Ben a tour of the garden and the orchard. The garden is beginning to wind down for the season, but there is a plot afoot to plant a winter garden of garlic and other hardy crops. There is also a plan to make hard cider this year. I think this plan is likely to become a reality, because they already have the cider press and have staked out space in the studio for it to ferment. It might even be ready to drink at Christmas!

There were chips and two different kinds of salsa made from garden produce: salsa verde made from tomatillos, and regular tomato salsa:

We had a simple, but delicious dinner of burgers made from beef for red meat eaters and turkey for the rest of us, topped with pepper jack cheese. Even though it was my brother’s birthday, he still manned the grill as always, noting that he never finds cooking to be a chore.

I reminded him that he was promoted to being my big brother last year, when he turned 50. Megan asked if she would ever be my big sister (she is nine years and nine days younger than I am), and I said, yes, when she turns 50. It might be hard for me to pass myself off as her younger sister when I am 60, but hope springs eternal. Maybe I need to consider botox.

We toasted my big brother’s birthday and Ben’s epic journey with fizzy local-ish wine (from neighboring Sonoma County). His road trip from the wilds of Manitoba included New Mexico, the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone National Park, Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills of South Dakota, Death Valley (where he pulled over with an overheating engine to find the coolant bubbling in the 112 F degree heat), and Las Vegas. It was the trip of a lifetime.

As we ate tarts my brother made from raspberries he picked that day, we sat by the fire and watched the stars come out. The Milky Way was so intense that it blurred over some of the other stars in the clear, black sky. It was such a joy to be there with people I love.

A YEAR AGO: My big brother’s 50th birthday.

I dropped by my brother’s place on my way home on Friday night. I found the path from the parking area to his place littered with spent shell casings, not a usual occurrence. I picked up about half a dozen of them.

I was greeted by Rio, who was making dinner, and my brother, who was sitting with his hands resting on our grandfather’s cane, much as Hoho used to do. The cane has a brass plate from his American Legion. It was nice to see it and know that Jonathan could use it, but not so nice to know that he had messed up his knee trying to shoot a particularly obnoxious mountain lion.

Apparently this lion has been making a nuisance of himself lately. He makes a peculiar screaming noise, and is completely unconcerned by light and human habitation. Jonathan shone the flashlight right in his eyes and the beast didn’t flinch. My brother fired a couple of rounds over the lion’s head, and he didn’t retreat.

This was the scariest part to me. This creature was deliberately hanging around human habitation instead of avoiding it, and not fleeing from bright lights or loud noises. Rio thinks there might be something wrong with this particular intruder. Jonathan finally shot right at the animal, which is always a last resort, but it’s hard to shoot with any accuracy in the dark, since you need both hands for the rifle and don’t have an extra one for the flashlight.

Eventually the monster retreated into the bushes, but I am horrified by the fact that he is skulking around and also that Clayton and Rio’s daughter Paloma camped out in the garden lately with the monster loitering with intent.

Jonathan did something to his knee pivoting the wrong way in his haste to chase the mountain lion, so he is still crutching around, cursing the mountain lion. Jonathan and Rio were planning to go for a hike on his birthday, which is this Saturday, but unless he has a miraculous recovery, it looks like he will still be caning and crutching around for now.

I contacted a dear friend who is wise in the ways of the wilderness, and he shared some tips for ridding your property of unwanted wildlife, which I passed on to my appreciative brother. Jonathan has contacted Fish and Game to see if they would be willing to do some mountain lion removal, but we don’t know what their criteria are to do this, or how long it will take them to respond.

In the meantime, we are being cautious. I guess this is the side of country life that you don’t read about in Martha Stewart.

A YEAR AGO: A run in (though fortunately not a run over) with a deer.

And it’s back…darkness, my old friend.

Yesterday, I noticed that there were high beams conditions as I left for work at 6 am. Unfortunately for Me, it was also the foggiest it had been in some time, so using the high beams merely threw the glare back at me mockingly. Back to the anemic puddle of light, my friends. And driving slowly, hoping for a deer-free ride.

Human nature – or at least Suzy nature – being what it is, I was once more surprised by how speeds that seem decorous to the point of annoyance in the daylight seem alarmingly fast in the dark. Also how the familiar Ridge, which I drive nearly every day, can sudden seem a completely foreign and scary place.

Speaking of darkness, I was very disappointed to come home last Friday to a power outage. I am convinced that we have had more out of season power outages than we did all winter. It appeared that someone had misjudged the curve at my friend Jim’s road and plowed into a power pole, plunging us all into darkness.

My modest plans to watch “Feed the Beast” with a glass of wine after tossing in a load of laundry were foiled. I still had the glass of wine, but while reading Gay Talese’s creepily compulsive “The Voyeur’s Motel”, about a man who ran a motel in Colorado for 30 years, during which he “observed” his guests, unbeknownst to them. And while reading about his dirty laundry, I was unable to do anything about my own.

The power was still out when I went to bed, so of course when it came back on, it woke me up. All in all, not a great Friday.

On the other hand, our dear friend Clayton came up from the city, staying in palatial accommodations on the family estate:

He was there partly to visit us and partly to get his van theft-proofed with my brother’s help. Clayton is a painter of houses and buildings, and thieves in his neighborhood have enjoyed helping themselves to his tools in the van and sometimes the van itself. So the boys outfitted it with an epic series of locks, which will hopefully deter the would-be criminals.

Lichen joined us for dinner, with his sweet dog Keeper, and some of Jonathan’s ham radio buddies came too, so it was a busy and happy get together. We grilled up chicken and veggies and made them into fajitas, served with rice, black beans, salsa, cheese, and tortillas grilled by Megan. Ever since she started making grill bread, she has been the griller of all things bread, or bread-ish.

Jonathan’s girlfriend Rio made a gorgeous apple pie with apples from the property. It was almost too pretty to cut into:

But I’m glad we did, because it was magically delicious. And it was a great evening.

A YEAR AGO: Of Dentists, dogs, and James Dean.

Hi! Here’s what’s been happening the past few days.

Work has been getting in the way of writing, and I expect this to continue for about another month. I am still working six days a week, leaving only one day to get ready for the next six and to accomplish miscellaneous Cinderella chores around the house as well as squeezing in a little time for R&R. And we are up against two audits at work, one the annual financial one and one from our friends at the Feds, who provide a lot of funding. As always, stakes are high when the Feds come to town, and so is the stress.

I must have been showing the pressure, because Megan turned up one day with a beautiful surprise for me:

She said it was to give me something beautiful, and to remind me that she is always there for me. She really is the best sister ever. And it’s like having a little sunset in my office. When things get crazy, I can look at it and think how beautiful it is and how lucky I am to have such an amazing sister.

I met Monica after work one day at a new restaurant in the harbor:

I wish there was an “unglare” feature in iPhoto, to deal with those overly sunny California days. Such a terrible problem.

The restaurant has a big, rustic wooden deck overlooking the harbor, where we watched the fishermen come in with that day’s catch on their boats as the sun began to set. We had a great time and promised each other to meet up more often. Monica is always so inspiring.

On a less delightful note, my Mac fell ill with a virus or TEN. I started getting pop up ads all over and new tabs resulted in something unpleasant called Chumsearch with Bing. Bing! I tried disk utility and restarting to no avail. I emailed a former co-worker at the jobette, who is a genius, and he recommended software with a free trial. It took almost four hours, but it found and ate nearly a dozen viruses and things are back to normal. I hope.

You expect this kind of thing with PCs, but not with Macs. I still have no idea how I got it, but as always, I am thankful for my family and my family of friends.

A YEAR AGO: It was a busy time of year in the garden.

Dad’s Flowers

Every year, we plant sweetpeas in honor of our father. They were his favorite flowers.

We had a little bouquet of them at his memorial service, along with a photo of Dad and his beloved dog, Jesse. Our wonderful stepmother Margaret later scattered Dad’s ashes with Jesse’s on the Common where they loved to walk together. It comforts me to know that a boy and his dog are together always.

And it comforted me that our beloved Lu chose to carry some of Dad’s sweetpeas in her bouquet and her lovely hair when she married her best friend Rik this summer. It made me feel like Dad was there, and I was glad to think of him and his special flowers on a happy occasion.

No matter how long I am without him, I will always miss him. And I will forever cherish the treasure of his love and friendship.

A YEAR AGO: Brian Wilson said it best.

After work last Saturday, I stopped by the family estate for a small, impromptu BBQ with my siblings.

Summer is not only high season for tourists, it’s also high season for friends to brave the drive, isolation and lack of cell phone service to visit us. So most summer get togethers have guest stars, and it was nice for it to just be me, Megan, Jonathan, and Rio.

Summer is of course high season for the garden, too, and my siblings are firmly in the canning and preserving part of the year. They had also picked 24 pounds of wild blackberries the day before, some of which can be seen here with my brother:

and some of which ended up as jam:

The part that didn’t end up as jam ended up as cobbler, which ended up in our stomachs, along with chicken burgers which were seasoned with basil grown on the property and grilled by our brother, the expert grillmaster:

and garnished with relish made from cucumbers grown on the property and made that very day.

It was relaxing to sit under the tent with my feet up on a cooler of hard cider to rest my aching back (it is slowly getting better, but still hated me on that day) and catch up with my family. Even little Scout made an appearance. She does seem to have gotten more friendly lately. We made a concerted effort to get her inside at night for a few days after Jonathan saw a very pushy mountain lion strolling around. My brother kept his rifle loaded and ready, but the monster seems to have moved on and Scout is unharmed. I know she is a survivor, but it was hard not to worry about that little cat who has such a big place in our lives.

Thursday was date day! I met my friend Randy for lunch and after work, I had Friday eve drinks with my friend Jim.

Randy used to own a lovely antique store in the Village. He still handles some consignments, but is mostly retired. He has had a very interesting life so far, having worked at Princeton University and the American embassy in Moscow, among other places. I never get tired of hearing his stories. He happens to be a neighbor of my friend Richard, another of my frequent date companions (though I hasten to add that they have both been happily married for many years to their lovely wives). Richard recently bought the house he has been renting for some time, so they are officially neighbors now.

It was great to take a break from the madness of work and spend it with civilized conversation and good food. I hope we can meet up again soon.

Needless to say, I was running late leaving work to meet Jim at our usual spot. I tried to text him, but it wouldn’t go, so I emailed him in desperation to let him know I’d be fashionably late. I had doubts that he’d be checking his email, but as it happened, his phone binged with the email as he was passing his neighbor’s house (it seems this neighbor has an open wifi connection, probably thinking no one would be using it way out here in the boonies), so he did know I’d be late.

When I arrived, Jim was comfortably ensconced at the bar, which has a stunning view of the ocean:

I ordered a glass of local sparkling wine and settled in to catch up with my friend. Jim was delighted to hear about the couple using Joel’s memorial bench at the Gardens, as I knew he would be. He said that was exactly what he hoped for. I still think we picked the best location, a secluded area overlooking a rushing stream.

While we were talking, my phone binged with a text. It was Megan, asking where I was. When I told her, she responded “I’m on my way!”

While we waited for Megan to join us, I asked the bartender what drink she was mixing. It didn’t have a name (suggestions, anyone?), but she muddled cucumber and lime, added ice, Collins mix, Hawaiian white ginger gin, and elderflower cordial and shook it up, topping it with a spritz of cold soda water. She gave me a small glass to taste, and as soon as Megan tasted it, she ordered one of these nameless, delicious concoctions:

We had a great time catching up with each other, and Megan and Jim are planning to walk their dogs together soon. As we headed back to our cars, we promised each other we would do this again soon. I love my family and friends!

A YEAR AGO: A camping party!

One morning, I heard a text while I was getting ready for work. Usually, texts at 6:00 am are from my sister, who is still at work after her long night shift. So early morning texts do not scare me the way late night phone calls still do*.

I went to see what was up, and it turned out to be my boss, letting me know that the power was out at the clinic. A flurry of texts ensued from other staff members with updates as I applied mascara and lip gloss and headed out the door. Since the power had gone out at about 3:00 am, I figured it would be up and running by the time I got to work around 7:00.

This prediction was correct, but although there were lights and power, the servers were still down, rendering our computers useless plastic boxes, at least temporarily.

While the IT guys worked away at the computer issues, I caught up on my filing and other things that did not require computers. It was a good feeling to get that stuff done. I always wonder why I don’t keep up with it on an ongoing basis. I have the same thoughts after cleaning the house, but with the same (lack of) results.

Speaking of electricity, Jonathan and Rio acquired a fantastic vintage TV set (delightfully) called a Predicta:

Like the computers at work, the Predicta is temporarily non-operational, but I have faith that my brother can get it back in working order. If he could make a temporarily non-working very vintage telescope into a NASA-worthy contraption, he can do the same for the Predicta.

While he scouts for parts, we are amusing ourselves by thinking of appropriately retro TV shows to watch on it, like The Munsters and Peter Gunn and Perry Mason. And we are always going to refer to it as The Predicta.

A YEAR AGO: Dinner and a movie.

* I still think “Mom” when the phone rings, even though she has been gone for so long. And I always think it will be bad news.

I didn’t love being woken up at 5:30 on a Sunday morning, aka the only day of the week I can sleep in.

Audrey, however, is uninterested in the sloth of Staff, and in fact deplores it. There are standards to be kept up and doors to be opened, and Her Majesty does not appreciate waiting.

On the other hand, it gave me time to blog while my detoxing face mask worked on the wine I drank the night before and the sun glowed golden through the dark trees.

Thanks, Audrey?

I headed over to the family estate after work* on Saturday. Rio’s daughter Paloma was visiting from LA, and this was the first time any of us had met her. When I arrived, the guest of honor had not, and it turned out that Rio had given her daughter the wrong address, which made it hard for her to find us.

Find us she did, though, and even Scout the mini cat came out to say hello:

Scout surprised me by hanging around much more than usual. She is generally skittish around humans, especially in the great outdoors. She is hard to photograph because she tends to run away when approached, so this is the best I could do:

Jonathan was grilling onions and peppers while Megan picked plums and zucchini for me:

and remonstrated with me for not shopping at the family vegetable emporium more often.

As I peeled the peppers and Jonathan chopped them up, he realized that he hadn’t grilled the chicken yet. So he did that while Megan and I chatted and drank wine with Rio and Paloma. Finally, dinner was served at the giant picnic table Jonathan built. With the grilled chicken and veggies, we had black beans and fresh basil grown on the property, all wrapped up in tortillas. It was delicious, and we all had a wonderful time. It was a great end to the day – and the week.

*My favorite visitors that day were a young couple from Connecticut with their three year old, curly haired daughter Lucy. They had just come from Montgomery Woods, where some of the tallest and most magnificent redwoods can be found. Lucy excitedly told me that they were taller than her father (who was quite tall himself), and her father said that he was still in awe of what he had seen there. “I had to wonder if I was a good enough person to have seen it,” he said. It’s a magical place.

A YEAR AGO: Unexpected showers and traffic incidents. You never know what you’ll find on the Hooterville back roads!

Lu & Rik’s Wedding Invitation

The invitation definitely set the tone for Lu and Rik’s wedding. Drawn by Rik’s daughter Rachel, it invited us to a “BBQ bash and wedding celebration” and “a glorious time with family and friends”. It was all that and more.

When I arrived at Rik and Lu’s home after work on Saturday, it was a perfect sunny summer day. You could tell it was Rik and Lu’s wedding from all the EMS and search and rescue stickers on the guests’ cars. They have been EMTs for many years, so naturally most of their friends are in the same line of work. As I observed to Megan, the guests could not have been in better hands in case of any possible emergency.

The carport was transformed into a buffet, decorated with flowers, where there would later be a taco bar and cake. The outdoor clawfoot tub was the bar, filled with ice holding beer, wine, soda, and water. Next to that was spiked strawberry lemonade and mojitos in big glass jars.

Friends were playing music:

as we gathered on the lawn (you can glimpse the groom and bride at the bar behind the musicians in the photo). Kids and dogs, including Rik and Lu’s dogs Harlow and Sweetpea (seen under the hammock on the wedding invitation with their ever-present ball) were running around and playing together. There were hay bales arranged in front of the deck where the ceremony would take place, covered with colorful cloths. The deck was beautifully decorated:

Rik built it himself over 36 hours. It must be very satisfying to build the place where you will be married with your own hands.

Lu carried flowers from our family garden in her bouquet and in her hair, including some of the sweetpeas we plant every year in Dad’s memory. She had cut her dress, but not as much as Megan and I had feared, and Lu thought it was still too long in the back, though I said it was like a train. She wore sparkly red sandals and no make up. She looked like our beautiful Lu, only more radiant and joyful than I had ever seen her before.

When it was time for the ceremony, the bride and groom came out of their front door hand in hand, accompanied by the Justice of the Peace who officiated. Rik jumped the gun a little by kissing his bride before the vows, to the crowd’s laughter. He looked like had won the lottery during their simple, yet deeply moving vows:

They exchanged rings made of gold they had panned themselves on trips to California’s gold country. They love to travel, and have had many adventures over the seventeen years they have spent together, with many more to come.

At last Rik was allowed to kiss his new wife:

as the crowd went wild, including Jonathan, Megan, Rio, Rob and me. I love how the whole wedding was so them: warm, unpretentious, loving. I can’t tell you how wonderful it was to share the love and joy of these two beloved friends with my beloved family. It was a day I will never forget.

Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Davis! Here’s to the new chapter in the story of your love.

A YEAR AGO: Erica’s brilliance. Do I have amazing friends, or what?

Gifts are not a big part of Junapalooza, but the gifts this year were definitely sentimental in nature.

Rio, whose birthday it was, asked Megan, Erica, and me to each choose a number from a little bag. Then she produced a basket lined with greenery and filled with delightful, locally produced things: candles, cider vinegar, jam, and chocolates. Rio gave the basket to Megan, who chose number 1, and she chose something from the basket. Then it was Erica’s turn, and then it was mine. We kept passing the basket around until all of the goodies were gone. So fun!

Erica had asked for a Spirograph. Apparently she had always wanted one. When it arrived, the giant box (why?) it came in was badly dented, and so was the tin the Spirograph was housed in. I brought this to the seller’s attention, and they shipped me a new one and said to keep the damaged one. Rob was delighted to get the dented one (needless to say, he has already undented the tin). Two for one Spirographs: what’s not to love?

Megan made Rio her very own Mouse. You may recall that Megan started making Mice when she was a very small child for our father to keep him safe on his many travels. Later she made Mice for Jonathan and for me. I carry mine every day I drive to the Big Town, and I only recently learned that Jonathan does, too. Our Mice have never failed any of us.

Rio is a native southern Californian, and most of her family lives there. The rest lives in Oregon, so she travels a lot. Megan thought Rio needed her own Mouse, both to keep her safe on her many journeys but also to let her know she is part of the family and that we love her very much.

It’s safe to say that mission was accomplished on all counts. She was delighted.

As for my gift…

A few months ago, Megan was cleaning out her bedroom and came across a fragile old quilt that our mother’s mother, Nana, had made. She showed it to me excitedly, and I’m sorry to say that I burst into tears, surprising both of us. Nearly 40 years after Nana’s death, seeing something of hers so unexpectedly affected me more strongly than I would have thought.

While this was not exactly the reaction Megan anticipated*, it gave her an idea.

She also found a quilt Nana had made but never backed. So Megan, Erica, and Jessica all worked together to find fabric, quilt it, and bind it to the nearly 80 year old quilt. They chose a black and white backing to be neutral:

compared to the bright pink quilt and its colorful pieces. I know that some of the fabric Nana used in it came from Mom’s baby/child clothes, some from Nana’s aprons, and some from Hoho’s (our grandfather’s) ties:

It took a superhuman effort not to cry in front of all of those people, but it was one of the most wonderful gifts I have ever received. I like to think of subsequent generations working on my grandmother’s quilt, and of her never-still hands stitching it, choosing which pieces to use in her pattern. I’m glad that it has finally been finished and restored and can be used again.
Thank you, Nana. And thank you to my sister, my chosen sister, and the daughter she had for me. I love you all.

*A few years after my grandparents died, I came home from college for Thanksgiving and took my grandmother’s hand crocheted tablecloth out of the sideboard to use for dinner. I was sobbing over it when Megan, who was about 12 at the time, walked by and snapped, “At least you have something to cry about.” She was 6 when they died and knows she missed out on something pretty great. Also? I did stop crying. Even at that early age, she had the skills that would stand her in good stead in the ER and on the ambulance.

A YEAR AGO: Remembering vacations past. Is there any other kind?

Jessica’s birthday card to Erica

Well, this year’s Junapalooza was awesome.

Erica decided long ago that she wanted it to be a fancy high tea. I had my doubts, because fanciness and high tea are not what you usually think about when you think about the family estate. But being Erica, she made it happen. When will I ever stop having doubts? Always trust the Erica.

Erica arrived dressed in a sassy little flowered dress, with a flowered clip in her hair and red Fluevogs on her feet. She wasted no time in covering the Waltons-sized picnic table with a length of sage green (washable) fabric and setting it with teapots, a wide variety of teas, and cake stands/plates. It was bring your own mug.

For those of us (like Self) who are not so tea inclined, Jonathan made some limeade (seen at the end of the panoply of delicacies):

Erica invited her friends Julie and Darius, who own the delightful café where we plotted Junapalooza over lunch, and whose daughter Bella is Jessica’s best friend. Being professional deliciousness purveyors, they brought little pasties filled with sausages, peas and potatoes, accompanied by a little pot of mustard, as well as tiny cucumber sandwiches (crustless, of course) and perfect little rhubarb and strawberry galettes:

Erica had made: miniature palmiers; asiago and scallion scones; lemon bars; sausage rolls sliced to look like spirals; mini chocolate bundt cakes brushed with coffee-rum syrup; and tartes Antoinette, which you may remember was the hit of Thanksgiving dinner last year. They are tarts filled with quince paste Erica made from her own fruit, topped with vanilla cream and then whipped cream. So Marie! And so delicious.

Add in my brother’s home-made cherry tarts and you have the high tea to ends all high teas on your hands.

Dave and Jennifer, my siblings’ land partners and our partners in ballet, were there, and Lichen also made an appearance with his sweet dog Keeper, who found a perfect spot in the wildflowers where she could rest and observe:

Jessica looked adorable:

An outfit of Jack Skellington t-shirt and a flowered bonnet pretty much sums Jessica up. I am hoping that she and Erica can join Megan and me for a sleepover/movie marathon this summer. I want Jessica to learn the joys of John Hughes movies and she wants me to learn the joys of Full Metal Alchemist. We’ll see how that works out!

As for Junapalooza, it was the best one ever. I’m already looking forward to next year!

A YEAR AGO: Doing wild, wild life.

My former boss gave me a very generous gift certificate to the Ledford House, where I recently met my friend Jim for a drink in the bar, and taking Megan out to dinner on her birthday seemed like the perfect use for it.

It was also a perfect day to be at the restaurant, which has a stunning view of the ocean. It looked like a postcard as we took our seats by the window. The server overheard me saying it was Megan’s birthday, and brought us complimentary birthday champagne:

Are there lovelier words in the English language than “complimentary champagne”? Well, there’s always “taxi” and “doorman”…

We toasted Megan’s birthday and I couldn’t help remembering the day she was born. I was called down to the principal’s office, walking through the empty, echoing halls. My nine year old body was full of dread and my nine year old brain was paging through the things I had done wrong and the things I could have been caught doing wrong. Arriving at the office, the motherly secretary told me that I had a baby sister. I don’t know if I was more excited about that or the fact that I hadn’t been caught at whatever mischief I had recently been perpetrating.

I skipped merrily down the hall on my way back to my classroom, where I shared the news. The girls all choroused “Yay!” while the boys chimed in with “Boo!”

Meanwhile, back in the present, my now grown up sister and I received a little white ceramic tray with spiced olives, house-made bread which was crusty on the outside and springy on the inside, and a tiny white ceramic pitcher of fruity olive oil to nibble on while we considered the menu.

I considered that since local sparkling wine made by Roederer in Anderson Valley (Roederer’s French vineyards make Cristal) was only $4 more than ordinary still wine, we should stay bubbly, my friends. With that important decision made, we turned our attention to the menu.

We shared a head of garlic, roasted whole with fresh thyme and olive oil, the top cut off to expose the caramelized cloves. We spread the cloves on wafer thin crostini and topped it with fresh chèvre. Simple but delicious.

Megan had gnocchi, which she said was the lightest she had ever tasted:

and I had mussels, on Dad’s principle of getting a dish at a restaurant which you would not cook at home:

The gnocchi were the lightest I have ever ever tasted, and the mussels were served in a complex white wine broth, garnished with a nasturtium and served with a rich, spicy aioli on the side. There was a bowl thoughtfully provided for the discarded shells. The bill came to $16 after the gift certificate was applied, and it helpfully listed what 10, 15 and 20% tips would be so no after dinner math was required. I left a $40 tip. The service was great – there when you wanted it, not when you didn’t, not too chatty and not too unctuous. And the server was probably in high school. The owner does a great job of training his staff.

I honestly cannot remember the last time I had a fine dining experience. The food and the view were great, the atmosphere was casual but refined, but most of all I think I enjoyed the feeling of being cosseted and taken care of. It was a wonderful evening.

A YEAR AGO: File under miscellaneous.