I was out picking up some of the larger sticks and boughs that had fallen into our yard lately. (Don’t worry, I left all the mulchy smaller stuff for the bees.)

I didn’t expect pink.

I’m not a very good “expressive” gardener, but I like to think I’m a decent “receptive” one.

As long as they show up on their own and agree that I’m not liable for preservation or maintenance of life, I agree to be a grateful audience to their beauty and grace.

There was also purple.

And more purple.

And then I forgot about the sticks.

It’s funny what you see when you suddenly wake up to where you are.

Plus smells. And sounds.

The black thing out there was one of several sea lions drafting by, flipper in the air in salute and barking a cheery “Hello! Hang in there!”

I don’t believe that herbs capable of overwintering and thriving on their own can be considered “gardening.”

Same with voluntary food. (Chives are a kind of  onion, right? Or maybe they’re technically aromatic grass? Either way, in my world they count as a vegetable, hence, a voluntary food. I rest my case.)

Honestly, I did try to get back to the sticks, but then…

Itty bitty BOOM!

I gave up and went for a walk in the woods with the dog.

Thank God for pink and sea lions and dogs and woods and light.

And you.

We are stronger together.

Stay well.

“It’s been so long since I’ve blogged,” I complained to the Muse as I flipped the slow bacon.

“Write,” she breathed.

“Write already.”

(She’s heard this sad refrain a lot lately. I understand her weariness, although that’s probably just projection on my part.)

There’s no sense whining to Her about not knowing where to begin when you’re stuck; you start where you stand.

For me, today, that means I write where I am, right where I am.

All right then… slow bacon it is.

Before Emily and Sara came to visit us a couple of summers ago, I had no idea that if you cook bacon on low and flip it regularly, the bacon cooks flat and the grease sizzles calmly in the pan, making splatter cleanup unnecessary and fryer wash up as slick as, um, bacon.

I now think of Em and Sara every time we cook “slow bacon,” which is every time we cook it.

Bacon has become a trigger for delicious Em-and-Sara gratitude waves, and it’s not even mostly about the bacon.

At the end of the counter sit our dining table candles, doubling as ziplock bag drying racks.

Why? The amount of plastic going into oceans and landfills these days is really starting to piss me off, so I’ve started to warm-soapy-water wash viable ziplock bags for re-use.

Baby steps…

I learned “conserve resources” over three decades ago from Adele Schmidt, who washed commercial bread bags for freezing her delicious homemade bread, and from my Granny Lever, who saved and re-used aluminum foil, a habit from her war-informed Great Depression days, and no doubt from my own Mom, in ways too numerous and close up to be visible (although something about twist ties floats in on the fog…).

I’m grateful for ziplock baggies, Adele and Florence and Jane, and our one, beautiful, irreplaceable planet.

Did you know you can control how quickly avocados ripen by regulating their surrounding temperature? This is important insight into a fruit that lives (and dies) by the motto I saw recently on a poster:

“Not yet…
Not yet…
Not yet…
NOW!
Too late…
Signed, Avocado.”

Since we often buy them from Costco, it was a welcome epiphany that keeping avocados in the fridge will substantially delay their ripening, allow us to stagger their demise consumption by bringing them one or two at a time onto the window sill, where we allow them to die at a more dignified pace, rather than en mass in a green string bag.

Sort of figured that one out by myself, although I’m still very grateful for avocados in general.

This summer our friend, Al Linden, taught us there’s a way to defrost meat at max speed with no chance of a microwave-induced “Whoops! Hope there’s no botulism in that prematurely cooked bit at the end!” episode.

Remove the plastic and foam tray and set the icy goods directly on a metal cookie sheet.

The metal dissipates the cold, and you’ll be astounded at how quickly shrimp, scallops, chicken breasts, and, apparently, bratwurst will thaw. The bad boys above went from a solid block to bbq-ready in 1.5 hours.

We think of you, Al, every time we forget to pull something out for dinner.

I don’t know if this was helpful to you. It certainly was a good afternoon for me.

But maybe the next time you get stuck, you’ll remember to start right where you are. And maybe I will, too.

“I need a day off,” I said.

So Good ‘Ol Saint Rick shouldered the list of all the town errands and drove off to brave the last-minute Christmas Costco gauntlet alone.

Winston assumed the seasonal pose. I didn’t have anything in particular to do, aside from a bit of gift wrapping and maybe making our traditional family recipe of sausage balls* (recipe below: it’s old school and OUTSTANDING) for Christmas Eve.

Well, that and all the other ordinary stuff a person has to do in a day, like walk the dog, make breakfast, clean the kitchen, throw some laundry in, shower and wash my hair, and so on.

And because these things happened on a “day off,” I didn’t feel like I was already behind and these tasks were standing between me and what I really should be doing.

I stood contentedly in the forest, listening to the birds and the rain-turning-to-snow sift through the monster cedars to splash onto the ferns by the path while I waited–again–for the dog to finally quit sniffing and pee.

I bonded with my fancy new flipper from What’s Cooking in Qualicum Beach as I fried two farm-fresh beauties for my stand-by “Fried Egg Sandwich With Ketchup” (no recipe needed: just fry an egg (break the yolk) on both sides, make a piece of toast, put the fried egg on the toast and apply as much ketchup as you can get away with). And then I ate the sandwich. And life was good.

[Editor: There will be no photo provided to illustrate the paragraph below. Instead, we offer you this somewhat random image of melting Brie. We’ll make it work.]

By the time I was sudsing up my hair with my favorite-scented shampoo (I go by smell) in a warm shower with great water pressure, gently stretching my neck muscles as I massaged my scalp, I was feeling like those actors in shampoo commercials who carry on like this shampoo experience is, bar none, the best friggin’ moment of their entire life, like melting Brie.

And that’s when it occurred to me that it hadn’t taken me any more time to walk the dog, cook and eat breakfast, or shower today than it does any other day. I just enjoyed each activity in the peaceful space that seemed to have opened up around them, moment by moment.

And then I thought, “Hey! Why not every day? What is stopping me from enjoying my shower as much on a work day as I am today? In fact, why not enjoy work itself this way?”

Why not, indeed?

We wish you all the merriest of seasonal joy and peace in ALL the moments.

Love, Kathy and Rick

Rick and Kathy’s Christmas Sausage Meatballs (as stolen verbatim from Kathy’s Mom’s recipe box)

Meatballs
l lb pork sausage
l slightly beaten egg
1/2 cup fine cracker crumbs
1/3 cup milk
1/2 tsp sage

Sauce
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup ketchup
2 tbls brown sugar
1 tbls vinegar
1 tbls soya sauce

Combine all meatball ingredients, beat at high speed for 5 min. Drop teaspoonsfull on a cookie sheet, cook @ 350 deg until brown (approx. 15 min). Mix all sauce ingredients, bring to a boil while stirring, remove from heat. Combine meatballs and sauce, keep warm in a chafing dish to serve.

[Note: if you don’t have a chafing dish or even know what one might be, you can use a small slow cooker or decorative serving pot on a kitchen warming pad to serve them with toothpicks at a party. Or you can just stand at the stovetop and eat the whole pot by yourself with a big spoon. Your choice.]

There’s almost always food involved.

Scratch that… there is ALWAYS food and an adult beverage involved.

And giggles and snorts and the guarantee that you WILL NOT get away with even the slightest lapse of attention…

… or the teensiest error, like when you intend to call someone a “monkey” and it comes out “schmonkey.”

It’s all in gentle fun, of course, because… cousins.

It’s okay to screw up with these people.

When they look at you, they somehow recognize themselves, or their sister, or Grandma Daisy, and who could be genuinely nasty to Grandma Daisy?

We document our lives together…

… and are documented unto.

Cousins are dolphins who swim tight alongside when we need support in rough waters, and who take pictures and laugh with us when we’re sailing smooth.

Adopted cousins can marry in, too…

… although this means assuming some risks, naturally.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for risking the leap that landed you in this messy clan, and for so wholeheartedly adopting us into yours.

The laws of physics and economics dictate that it’s not always possible to live close enough to all your cousins on both sides of the aisle to know and enjoy them all equally, yet.

But we count on the reality that dolphins will be dolphins, wherever we sail.

Here’s a fun game:

Pick a random Friday night after an intense work week in a city far from home.

Grab a seat by the window of the lounge looking out at the tarmac and watch the clouds roll in, and try to guess how much your flight will be further delayed every time you check Flight Tracker.

And then realize that even though you’re probably not going to make it home this night, you might as well settle in and enjoy the show…

and see what happens.

“Our current perspective will influence our sense of everything else. For this reason, never look at something that is moving if balance is critical. If you ever need to walk across something narrow, say, a fallen tree that crosses a stream or river, then don’t look at the moving water—it makes balancing almost impossible.”*

Note to self: when life throws me off balance, focus on What Never Moves and trust my inner ear.

*Tristan Gooley, from The Lost Art of Reading Nature’s Signs: Use Outdoor Clues to Find Your Way, Predict the Weather, Locate Water, Track Animals—and Other Forgotten Skills