ranting and raving


















If you are my friend you have undoubtedly heard me rant about partially-hydrogenated oils, chemicals, and other questionable ingredients present in too many grocery store items.  So it was with some disgust but a growling tummy, on the evening ending a very busy day, that I popped this frozen dinner into the oven. 

I try to boost the flavor and the nutritional value of such frozen entrees by adding ingredients or at least spices and herbs.  This night I tried to assuage my self-disgust as well.  Knowing I would be a lucky girl if there was more than an ounce of angel hair to be found in the small plastic carton, I put a pot of water on to boil then dropped some pasta; one with texture to it, coming straight from Italy.  

If you are my friend you have undoubtedly heard me go on about the importance of cooking pasta al dente, not only because it tastes so much better but because it is healthier, having a lower glycemic index rating, meaning a better insulin response. 

When the frozen dish was hot and bubbly, I tossed it together with my al dente angel hair and turned it out into a bowl.  Look; what a difference!  Al dente strands stayed firm, even nesting together while the packaged ones, slimy and bloated from overcooking, slid to one side where I let them remain. 

I can't say I'll not have another frozen dinner now and then when busy and hungry collide, but I can say, with certainty, that I'll continue my ranting against bad food. 

If you are my friend you have undoubtedly guessed this though, haven't you?

when writers come to town

I dropped myself smack into the Roaring Twenties one evening last month, into a crowd dotted with pencil-thin young ladies showing off exquisitely coiffed hair, costumed in flapper dresses, strands of pearls wrapped all around; all of which would have jolted my Ganny Lowder instantly back to her youth. 

Having arrived early, I passed the time in the Dallas Museum of Art's Atrium Cafe, where I tolerated a terrible chardonnay while devouring some great food from the cafe's American 20's Inspired Menu. 

How I love a pre-show hour;  unhurried yet bursting with heightened anticipation! 

The vast, white staircase beside the atrium, is in itself art to me, strategically a sharp contrast to the vibrant, colorful glass vine adorning the large window opposite.  That sculpture was created by Chihuly, the Venetian artist whose show comes to our city's arboretum in a few days. 

I've tried at home to adhere to the premise that rooms should leave one wall or at least one space, bare.  "The eyes need a place to rest," I've always heard, and in this mass of people, I uncannily found myself often looking upward.

I wasn't here for the Youth and Beauty art exhibit, and I wasn't here for the performance of Twenties Era Music which was about to start, the musicians readying on the small central floor as I was preparing to leave the tiny bar table I'd so patiently waited to snag. 

I saw George just then, George of the McKenzie Quartet I follow around town.  We spoke briefly later in the night when he passed me as I stood in the long book-signing line, just as I'd done the night Pat Conroy came to town.

That evening was not my first time to see Mr. Conroy but it was the first time I thought to bring him a yellow rose, welcoming him to Dallas.  A few pleasantries were exchanged in a matter of seconds as he signed my book. 

I'd wanted to talk about Beach Music and Rome, the low country and gardenias but it was late, the end of the line, and I found myself embarrassingly at a loss for words.  I thanked him sincerely and read the inscription as I walked away:  "For the love of Texas". 

I cringed, my heart racing, fighting the two feet wanting to run back to the table so I could explain.  "No, no, you've misunderstood; I was born in Charleston!  You see, I'm not from here!  I don't know why I'm here!  I miss the south!" 

I wanted to cry. 

I did have a few tears that festive Friday night as Paula McLain stood at the narrow podium and reintroduced The Paris Wife to us, her rapturous audience, reading a few first pages of the prologue with the voice she'd imagined and given to Hadley, giving it then to each of us. 

That is why I had come.

With nothing less than a lump in my throat, I've since reread those paragraphs several times.  The first, just because.  The second time to Spoke, late one night.  Tears came before I got to the third sentence even, but he made me continue, knowing instinctively that there was much there, much in the lines and between the lines that I wished to share, that was important for me to share with him. 

I'm waiting now for Ann Patchett to return to Dallas, maybe this time to the art museum where she'll stand at the same rostrum as did Conroy and McLain and where I'll hang on also to her every word.  I'll happily bide time in the book-signing line, however long and on any given evening. 

Several years ago she signed my favorite of hers, the beautiful Bel Canto: "Nashville sends its love. Come visit."  I think sometimes not of visiting but of moving back to Nashville.  I've considered ways to convince Spoke of the city's merits.  I've imagined us in other places too. 

"What would I do there?" I ultimately ask myself each time the thought of moving entices me.  It's very clear I'm still trying to find my way in Dallas, but I'm beginning to realize, to admit; I'm having so much fun doing it. 

sister's day

Today is Sister's Day! 

It was a decade ago I guess, when I first exclaimed that to Robin.  

I'd let my dad in on the secret from the very beginning.  I knew he'd think it funny that I'd made the day up, and I knew he'd find it even funnier when I said, jokingly, that I figured I'd get a gift out of the day.  He had some belly laughs those first few Aprils when I'd remind him that Sister's Day was just around the corner.

The second year, I remember Robin telling me of her confusion and frustration, unable to find a single Sister's Day card to send to me!  I didn't confess then but shortly after, wouldn't you know, the greeting card industry did, designate a day for sisters. 

Robin and I ignored it; for us it will always be May 1st.

The very best part about it is we never made a big thing of it, giving our full attention instead to the May date we'd celebrate with Mom and soon after, the June date when we'd celebrate our father. 

Ours has become rather like a simple blessing we wish for each other on that day. 

Once when I was considering giving up this blog, Robin said if I ever did, she would feel "so deprived".  Praise doesn't get much better than that and even though it came from her, my beloved but biased sister, it touched me and I took it to heart and so it's in part, in some small part, that I am here, still a blogger, and wishing her a very happy and blessed Sister's Day.




 

the long night

La Llarga Nit (The Long Night)

Jaume Plensa, Sculptor

Nasher Sculpture Center

bleu is blue

"This isn't blue cheese dressing!" I complained. 

A wedge of iceberg lettuce was bathed in vinaigrette and topped with crumbled bleu cheese.  I was disgusted.  I wanted sour cream!  I wanted buttermilk!  I wanted creamy calories I could afford back then, back in the seventies. 

Fast forward three decades; I wanted this salad for dinner tonight!

*** 

"Your tastes change every seven years, you know," I preached to Elizabeth, sitting together at Zanata's bar, sharing the Sampler.  There was brie and cherry marmalade to spread on crusty bread bread.  There were olives and warm pecans.  Beth was gaga over the small peppers filled with goat cheese until I stated the obvious. 

"Oh, but I don't eat goat cheese," she said, putting the half eaten pepper down on her plate.  "Uh, yes you do," I replied, stifling a Cheshire cat grin. 

"That can't be goat cheese.  I don't like goat cheese." 

"You might not like tangy, goat cheese but you obviously like lusciously mild, goat cheese, and this one is excellent," I explained. 

***

As I crumbled the cheese for tonight's dinner salad, I thought about the truth in that old wife's tale my mother passed on to me from her mother.  I grabbed a fork and vigorously beat the dressing, wondering if Elizabeth might like to try this salad. 

I laughed out loud; silly to even ask... 

She doesn't like blue cheese.

Salad with Blue Cheese

Two chilled wedges of iceberg lettuce

Three tablespoons olive oil

One tablespoon champagne or white wine vinegar

Salt and black pepper

One ounce blue cheese, cut into pieces
One ripe tomato, quartered and salted

Whisk together the olive oil and the vinegar until emulsified. 

Stir in the salt and pepper. 

Drizzle the dressing between the layers
and over the tops of the lettuce wedges.  

Arrange the bites of blue cheese across each wedge.
Serve with tomato and freshly ground pepper.


Serves two as a side salad, one a full dinner salad.
For a little seventies flavor, add handfuls of
French's, crispy Fried Onions.

 

STORE WARS!
Help Zanata win for Cystic Fibrosis; stop in and vote before May 5th!
Plano, 15th Street
Best Bar-Restaurant!

and then there was shade

February to April 
Did you spot her?  She's waiting for Spoke to throw out the seed.
Be sure to click on the last picture; glorious April sun shining through the leaves!

who needs paris

As a blogger who left her heart in Florence, it's easy to be envious of other bloggers living in foreign cities they love; cities boasting beauty with every forward step or sideways glance. 

"If I had a better lens and we lived in Paris, I could take photographs as striking as theirs," I say to Spoke, kissing him on each cheek, shouting au revoir as I leave for the arboretum. 

You might say it's become my little Parisian hideaway, this space of dense beauty with benches throughout on which to sit and savor, to think, or watch people stroll. 

How beautiful the arboretum was during Dallas Blooms!

I returned a second time to the festival, anticipating even more shots but the cherry blossom trees were by then hard to spot, a single bloom not to be found on their branches.  Wisteria had begun to pale and tulip beds, though still beautiful, were losing their fullness. 

I sat in the warm sun at a cafe table across from Crape Myrtle Allee, the arching canopy of trees which I showed you last fall.  The sweeping alley is my favorite spot in this park, perhaps in all of Dallas. 

It was then, with the briefest sideways glance, that I saw her and I took this photo. 

I think it's very striking.