My partner and I went to the Green Markets in NYC yesterday. Spent the morning roaming around. Originally, we were going to get the ingredients for ratatouille, but there was no zucchini to be had. So, I had a thought, why not make a vegetable stew? Better, let's cook it in a small pumpkin. Thus this recipe was born.
My partner is vegan and is also on something called Dr. Fuhrman's Diet, so there is no salt or oils added to this recipe. You can, as with any recipe, adjust to your taste.
Reticent Blatherer's Vegan Pumpkin Stew.
5 pound sugar pumpkin
1 small eggplant
1 large piece of garlic
1/2 pound of fingerling potatoes
1 small winesap apple
1 medium small onion
1 tomato
1 teaspoon each of ground cumin, ground allspice and ground black pepper
Open the pumpkin and remove the seeds. Remove about a half of the meat inside the pumpkin and set aside. Cut all the ingredients up and mix them together with the spices and pumpkin meat. Place it all back into the pumpkin and put the top on (probably won't go). Wrap it up in foil and bake in a 250 degree oven for 3 hours.
-Reticent Blatherer
Sunday, November 11, 2012
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Riding the storm out
Two weeks ago, the promised "superstorm" finally hit the New York Metro area. Much of the Jersey shore is damaged, some of it is gone. A week after that, a nor'easter hit the same coastline. Many people who had gotten their power back after Sandy were again plunged into cold and darkness. While my house did fine, it's on a hill and no big trees around, I lost power for four days after the hurricane and another two or three after the snowstorm.
There are many kinds of storms that interrupt our lives. There are the physical ones, of course, then there are the more subtle ones that people observing you may not even know are happening to you. People looking at you from the outside may see you as happy and outgoing. They may see you smiling. They may see you laughing. They never, ever, see the shadow over your shoulder. Bankruptcy. Insolvency. Thoughts of suicide. Crippling depression and anxiety. Fear of failure. Failing others and much worse, to fail yourself.
This has been brought home to me again and again in my life. There is a thin, almost porcelain veneer that most of us have over the inner us. A barrier that others are rarely allowed into. A barrier that shatters if it is examined to closely. A barrier that shatters if the wearer moves too quickly. In that shattering, all the pain and angst inside are laid bare to a psychic barrage of lemon juice and salt: fear and self loathing.
So how does the person inside the porcelain mask deal with this kind of life? As best as you can. You take better life through chemistry. That is limited, of course, and the finding of the right cocktail is it's own form of hell. The short answer is that you "Do the things that you know you have to do". You force yourself to get up. You force yourself to bathe. You force yourself to look like you give a flying fuck. Maybe you can convince yourself, too. You have to convince others.
You look to the others. The ones that have glimpsed behind that veneer and not been disgusted by what is seen there and run shrieking into the night. You hold onto them like a drunk holds onto a light pole, staggering home after a bender. You care for them, because they care for you. You dig yourself out.
Depression is an illness of management. Depression is insidious. I won't lie to you, it is a curse. A curse that not many understand. A curse that has brought us some of our greatest literature. A curse that has brought us some of our greatest tragedies.
-Reticent Blatherer
There are many kinds of storms that interrupt our lives. There are the physical ones, of course, then there are the more subtle ones that people observing you may not even know are happening to you. People looking at you from the outside may see you as happy and outgoing. They may see you smiling. They may see you laughing. They never, ever, see the shadow over your shoulder. Bankruptcy. Insolvency. Thoughts of suicide. Crippling depression and anxiety. Fear of failure. Failing others and much worse, to fail yourself.
This has been brought home to me again and again in my life. There is a thin, almost porcelain veneer that most of us have over the inner us. A barrier that others are rarely allowed into. A barrier that shatters if it is examined to closely. A barrier that shatters if the wearer moves too quickly. In that shattering, all the pain and angst inside are laid bare to a psychic barrage of lemon juice and salt: fear and self loathing.
So how does the person inside the porcelain mask deal with this kind of life? As best as you can. You take better life through chemistry. That is limited, of course, and the finding of the right cocktail is it's own form of hell. The short answer is that you "Do the things that you know you have to do". You force yourself to get up. You force yourself to bathe. You force yourself to look like you give a flying fuck. Maybe you can convince yourself, too. You have to convince others.
You look to the others. The ones that have glimpsed behind that veneer and not been disgusted by what is seen there and run shrieking into the night. You hold onto them like a drunk holds onto a light pole, staggering home after a bender. You care for them, because they care for you. You dig yourself out.
Depression is an illness of management. Depression is insidious. I won't lie to you, it is a curse. A curse that not many understand. A curse that has brought us some of our greatest literature. A curse that has brought us some of our greatest tragedies.
-Reticent Blatherer
Monday, September 24, 2012
Roller Derby
About six months ago, my oldest daughter came and asked me if she could participate in roller derby. You did read that right, the sport that my tiny grandmother used to crowd to the rail and yell at people back in the 1960s has experienced a resurgence, I think mainly because of the Drew Barrymore movie "Whip it". The story of a young woman who learns "Derby" and comes into her own. I am willing to admit that I'm wrong, that's just where I heard about it from.
So, I made inquiries and learned that, indeed there was a Roller Derby league in the area, The Jersey Shore Roller Girls, but that you had to be 18 to join. My daughter was a disappointed 16, so we let it go for a while. A few months later, she called to tell me that JSRG had formed a junior league and could she please join. She gave me the big brown eyed look so we went. Then we went and dropped a lot of money on padding.
I wasn't sure what to expect from these women. I remember the Derby that my grandmother watched. The women who participated, I remembered as bruisers. Nothing really very feminine about them (Please keep in mind that, I was six, so this would be 1968. Memory tends to muddle things.) and the sport was ROUGH!
As I recall it, there were waist high railings around the entire ring. It was elevated from the center. The only rule seemed to be to absolutely DESTROY the other team. Elbows seemed to be the weapon of choice. It was not unusual for women to go flipping over the rails into the chairs behind and be pummeled by the little old ladies in the audience beyond, with their purses. I was letting my daughter get involved in this?
Well, it turns out that it has changed considerably since those days. The ring is now flat, not elevated. There are rules about using your elbows (It's frowned upon). It's still a full contact sport, mind you, but it seems to be, at least somewhat, sane. I don't understand the rules. I'm not even going to try to explain what I *do* know because I'm sure that, as soon as I publish this blog, one of the JSRG will fill me in.
Let me tell you the biggest and nicest surprise about the league: The women are not bruisers. Off the ring, they're not even mean. They're delightful women. The sport gives them self confidence and pride. They have jobs during the day as well: Teachers, Legal Secretaries, Moms, you name it. I have not met one, yet, that I didn't get along with and actively like. They also nurture the Junior girls. I've watched my daughter grow in confidence and bearing. It's an amazing thing.
Now the younger one wants to do it as well. When her arm heals from the spill she took trying to do something called a "plough stop", with no padding and the wrong kind of skates: we'll discuss it.
Reticent Blatherer
So, I made inquiries and learned that, indeed there was a Roller Derby league in the area, The Jersey Shore Roller Girls, but that you had to be 18 to join. My daughter was a disappointed 16, so we let it go for a while. A few months later, she called to tell me that JSRG had formed a junior league and could she please join. She gave me the big brown eyed look so we went. Then we went and dropped a lot of money on padding.
I wasn't sure what to expect from these women. I remember the Derby that my grandmother watched. The women who participated, I remembered as bruisers. Nothing really very feminine about them (Please keep in mind that, I was six, so this would be 1968. Memory tends to muddle things.) and the sport was ROUGH!
As I recall it, there were waist high railings around the entire ring. It was elevated from the center. The only rule seemed to be to absolutely DESTROY the other team. Elbows seemed to be the weapon of choice. It was not unusual for women to go flipping over the rails into the chairs behind and be pummeled by the little old ladies in the audience beyond, with their purses. I was letting my daughter get involved in this?
Well, it turns out that it has changed considerably since those days. The ring is now flat, not elevated. There are rules about using your elbows (It's frowned upon). It's still a full contact sport, mind you, but it seems to be, at least somewhat, sane. I don't understand the rules. I'm not even going to try to explain what I *do* know because I'm sure that, as soon as I publish this blog, one of the JSRG will fill me in.
Let me tell you the biggest and nicest surprise about the league: The women are not bruisers. Off the ring, they're not even mean. They're delightful women. The sport gives them self confidence and pride. They have jobs during the day as well: Teachers, Legal Secretaries, Moms, you name it. I have not met one, yet, that I didn't get along with and actively like. They also nurture the Junior girls. I've watched my daughter grow in confidence and bearing. It's an amazing thing.
Now the younger one wants to do it as well. When her arm heals from the spill she took trying to do something called a "plough stop", with no padding and the wrong kind of skates: we'll discuss it.
Reticent Blatherer
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Welcome
Another try at a blog for me. I haven't actually kept one up since March of 2008. Reticent Blathering was a rambling discourse on the progress of my divorce. With the divorce done, I didn't feel any need to keep the blog up. So now, I'm going to try this one.
The title comes from one of my partner's co-workers. A woman who used to be a professional baker and is now a fund raiser who fancies herself a database expert. During our conversation, I was asking about this worker's blog and suggested it was called "Baked Goods And Bad Data". Realizing that that wasn't, in fact, the title of her blog, I snatched it up.
Here we are. I hope to include in this thoughts, pictures, philosophies and maybe some short fiction I've written. I hope you enjoy. Feel free to comment.
Reticent Blatherer
The title comes from one of my partner's co-workers. A woman who used to be a professional baker and is now a fund raiser who fancies herself a database expert. During our conversation, I was asking about this worker's blog and suggested it was called "Baked Goods And Bad Data". Realizing that that wasn't, in fact, the title of her blog, I snatched it up.
Here we are. I hope to include in this thoughts, pictures, philosophies and maybe some short fiction I've written. I hope you enjoy. Feel free to comment.
Reticent Blatherer
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