Cabin Fever

Just for the record--this is not our cabin, though to hear our daughter tell it as a child, it might as well be.  On the wall of the Colorado manse is a routed sign with one of her trademark whines: Welcome to Crummy Old Colorado.  Every year we get to head to our little place on Little Cone, for a couple of weeks.  It's never enough, but it's always refreshing.  And now that she is grown up, the girl-

child agrees.

Spring can be tough.  There's often enough snow left at 10,000 feet to be troublesome and it's no longer pristine and pretty.  The runoff can create prodigious mud.  In the old days, before the road was so well packed, chains front and back could be required to negotiate the way up the mountainside.  These days, mostly just a good slathering reesults, but enough to make one think twice about hiking when returning to a cabin with no way to wash muddy clothes except in the tub.

Summer is wonderful: long, lazy days, never too hot (at least by comparison), plenty of hiking and, if inclined, lots to do in town; lightning storms converging over the Wilsons.

Fall is better: cool weather, the mountainsides covered in color;  between seasons, so that the town is not over-filled with tourists; and the occasional light dusting of snow to remind you that the season will change again, soon..

But the best is winter, when we can get it.  Winter is a challenge.  Being 8+ miles form the main road means that the way to the cabin is not always plowed.  We've had to snowshoe in the last mile on occasion; a couple of years ago in February we were first snowed out --hiking in from the driveway without benefit of snowshoes in knee-deep snow--and then snowed in.  That time was particularly interesting because we were hosting guests--5 of them--who were valiant and made the trek and had a great time.

The cabin in the snow is magical.  Apart from Point Reyes, California, I've never been to a place more silent.  In winter, all the sounds of life are absent and the quiet emerges almost like a being of its own.  It's worth the risk of weather to get there.

A cabin in the woods.  What better place for a writer to be?

More Providences

It's surprising the folks you meet on the writing path.

This is an image of a friend, Wes Ely, who is a professor at Vanderbilt University College of Medicine.  We met as a result of some of my other writing--PewSpective, a blog on topics spiritual.   He invited me to talk to a CMA meeting, where I met yet another remarkable man, Fr. John--and by extension, a remarkable palliative care nurse in Australia, AnnMarie Hosie and a prominent bioethicist, Ashley Fernandez (who is neither female nor Hispanic, as he is fond of pointing out).  

We began collaborating on a topic near to our hearts: End of Life Care.  The end result?  A paper on the topic of feeding tubes, just accepted for publication in the Journal of the National Catholic Bioethics Center, high cotton indeed.  This is not to mention a wonderful and collegial friendship that permits us to talk about all manner of topics, heady and mundane, with great comfort, knowing that disagreement is permitted and disparagement is not.

All because of a little blog that only about eight people in the whole world actually read.

It makes me wonder where Dying for Revenge might lead.  Certainly it will be an unexpected path!

Providences

Looking back over the creation of Dying For Revenge, so many things fell perfectly into place, not the least of which, oddly enough, was losing my job in January, freeing me to do what I wanted to do: keep writing and along with that, market the Lady Doc series.  Even my literary agent was a gift--an old friend reconnected with after many years.  The decision to keep the story much as I had first envisioned it led to finding a publisher whose mission encompassed my vision.  On and on, one knot after another untied.

Soon after I lost my job Br. David returned to  our lives.  We've known him for several years, since a couple of Christmases ago when he joined the family tribe for Christmas festivities.  On his way to his last gig at Camp Buck Toms as camp chef, then on to a new stability at the Monastery of Christ in the Desert, he graced our home with his presence for a couple of weeks.  Just in the nick of time.

I am reasonably computer savvy but not all that great at troubleshooting and fixing.  Brother David is the machine whisperer.  There is not a machine, instrument, or electronic gadget that he does not have some deep kinship with.  He can fix anything and within a day had all the limping electronics in our house up and running--including a perpetually anemic network.  A good network, let me tell you, is an absolute necessity for a writer.

When I realized only a day or two before I was off to Ireland that I needed a book video trailer, he stepped in to the rescue.  I gave him some of my groom's images of Telluride and a little text.  He snuggled up to his computer and created a first class video, with help from Fr. Carter on the details of the story and the text of the video.

Thanks, everyone, but here and now, especially Br. David whose name did not make it into the acknowledgements because of timing.  It takes a village, it seems, to write a book!

And he forgot the book!

In response to my request for photos of folk reading Dying for Revenge, a friend sent this one--from the wilds of a Louisiana swamp--with the comment, "Can you photoshop the book into this?"

It's the thought that counts.  And for the record, I'd probably leave the book behind, too--and I prefer my swamps in the dead of winter.  Fewer critters to hassle with when the water is cold(er).

Reading Chairs

Reading chairs are important.  Almost the first thing my daughter did in her new home was to set up a reading corner with a comfortable chair.  For those of who love to read, a reading corner, complete with reading chair, is a sanctuary in the midst of the bustle of life.  An escape, perhaps, but one right in the middle of where we are supposed to be and therefore, connection rather than isolation.

I've had many such chairs in my life.  As a teen I used to drape myself over the arms of the wing-back chair in the living room.  In college, I had my spot in the stacks, not comfortable but at least cozy. When my husband and I first had kids, a leather recliner was the reading chair, with the children balance on our laps at first, then later, on the arms when they got too big to sit, both of them at the same time, in the seat with us.

These days it's either the settee on the porch or one of the many rockers distributed about the house, my favorite perhaps being the platform one that reminds me of my grandmother's reading chair.  I can still see her by the dining room window, lit by morning sun, her white hair luminous as she read whatever devotional material was her fare that day.  She was a hard woman, formed of a hard life, but in those small moments, or when she was teaching me to cook, bake, can or make preserves, she was a gentle and refreshing as a morning breeze and I knew that in her way she loved me dearly.

But the first chair, that might be the best. It sets the pattern for all the rest of the chairs.

My two brothers are much older than I; I came a child late in life to parents who were not expecting me.  From my perspective, it was like having three fathers and both my brothers gave intensely personal gifts to me, each in his own way.  The older one dropped out of his senior year to care for me when our mother was bedridden with tuberculosis, of his own accord.

The reading chair was a gift from the younger of the two.  He saved his lunch money to by a child's rocker for me, so that I'd have someplace to sit and rock and be safe and disappear into the books I was learning to read.  That little chair started out red and went through a legion of colors over the years.  It still sits in my office, laden with picture books, waiting for a grandchild, the only piece of furniture that I have from the family home.

I wouldn't trade it for all the world.

One Picture, 1000 Words

A few readers have sent me photos of them, taken while reading Dying for Revenge.  I really enjoy seeing them, so if you are willing to share (and permit me to post), send them along.

This one is of my sister-in-law, Jeannie.  Her husband sent it with the note that he was anxiously waiting for her to finish so he could read it as well.  Isn't family great?  I wonder whether my big brothers (13 and 15 years my senior) realize that all those stories they read to me as a child helped form me as a writer?

And that the little rocker that one of them bought for me out of his lunch money that still graces my office?  I used to sit in it and look at picture books by the hour.

You know what makes a writer?  A reader, that's what makes a writer.

Of Tortillas and Love

One of the great joys –and challenges—of writing Dying for Revenge was giving voice to Isa and her companions.  I’ve had a love for Hispanic culture ever since Mrs. Mildred Hankemeyer came to our second grade class to teach us Spanish—something almost unheard of in those days, even in Florida.  She not only taught us the rudiments of the language (sadly, I still speak it rather like a toddler) but also stimulated an interest in Mexico, where she went every summer to study.  She brought back all sorts of exotic memorabilia, fascinating to those of us who had never left the US, most of us having spent our young lives in our home state, some of us all in the city of Jacksonville.

Isa is the more prominent character but Pilar is probably my favorite.  I went to college in Arizona and was mothered by more than one woman like Pilar who took pity on lonely college students, in part to fill up a space in their own generous hearts.  More often than not, they did so by filling up spaces in our perpetually empty stomachs.

I’m passing on Pilar’s recipe for Tortilla de Papas.  Forgive her, she doesn’t measure much!

Eggs
Potatoes
Onions (yellow ones, the hot Spanish kind, not the sweet kind)
Olive oil (Pilar would say the Spanish kind is better—who am I to argue?)
Salt and pepper
Grated cheese 




Cut potatoes and onions into thin slices.  Put enough oil to cover the bottom of a fry pan; heat and then add potatoes and onions.  Fry until tender and a little brown.  You can add a little water and cover the pan to steam if needed.

When the potatoes and onions are soft, beat the desired number of eggs together, season with salt and pepper, and pour on top of the onions and potatoes.  Either finish on the stove (covering helps) or put in the oven (350 degrees) and bake until set and fluffy.  If desired, top with cheese and melt before serving, though cheese is not traditional.

Turn out onto a plate, potato side up.  Cut into wedges and serve with warm flour tortillas (or good bread and butter if you insist), and coffee.

By the way, Pilar would tell you that your grandmother’s cast iron pan works best.