Welcome to another installment of It's 9 PM: Time to Pickle the [fill in the blank]

This might seem a bit redundant, but tonight I pickled some pickles.  Working in the evening, the house quiet, the chores of the day done, I'm able to drift through food preservation projects talking to God and watching a pot that actually will boil if you're looking directly at it the entire time.  Never let them convince you it won't fly, it won't ring, or that it won't boil.  It will.

This is the closest we farm-chicks get to a spa vacation--standing over the canning pot sweating and singing.  When I put it that way, it sounds kind of nice, doesn't it?  That's because it is.  And how many spas hand you 4 quarts of homemade, organic, garden grown, gourmet pickles as you walk out the door?  That's what I thought.  Only two.

Soaking in water and sea salt.

Measuring out the pickle spice Nora and I mixed up today.

A world inside a jar.

Back in Georgia, I remember eavesdropping on conversations between Donnie (our fearless, banjo wielding lead singer) and Andy (artist, carpenter, humorist, recording engineer) about growing and making their own pickles one day.  At the time, it sounded dangerous and impossible to me.  Another part of me must have believed in this crazy scheme because I listened a little too closely to the conversations, like I might actually use this information later.  Have you ever had the ears of your heart prick up?  It only took 10 years for me to realize why I never forgot their seemingly random pickle conversation.  (Do you remember random conversations like that?  It might be a clue about something.)

And while the pickles processed, I cut up potatoes and butternut squash (also garden grown) for tomorrow's supper.  The squash is from last year--they last forever in their protective skin--God is a gardening/food expert.  And rather than throw the seeds in the compost like I did last year (proof of this mistake can be found in the 356 volunteer squash plants in my garden), I'm saving them back.

I think of seeds like the characters from Mad Max think of gasoline.  I know.  It's hard to imagine desert- bound, futuristic pirates fighting inside a gigantic gerbil cage over a pumpkin seed while listening to Tina Turner. But it could happen.

Anyway...if you'd like to save seed too, you'll need to do the following:

1.  Buy a copy of the soundtrack to Mad Max/Thunderdome.
2.  If the seeds come from a "wet vegetable"--tomato, squash, cucumber--scoop them out and put them in water, stirring until they separate from the flesh of the veggie.  You can let them sit for a day or so this way.
3.  Strain them and put them out to dry on newspaper or wax paper.  Make sure they are completely dry before you store them in envelopes or jars unless you'd like to see the whole shebang sprout in storage.
















Today Nora and I threshed the dill seed I'd dried from last year.  That's easy, too.
1.  Buy a copy of Tammy Wynette's greatest hits.
2.  Wait for your herbs to go to seed in the garden.   Before they do this, they'll flower and look beautiful and bees will visit, carrying the cilantro nectar to some amazing hive that I wish I had access to, you know, if I wasn't afraid of being stung by bees.  Or eaten by bears.  But that's another story.
3.  Cut them before the seed falls and hang them upside down somewhere in your house.  Let them dry.
4.  When you're ready to use the seed, put the whole thing in a paper bag and shake until the seeds come loose.  And that's how you handle "dry seeds."

Oh, this is a good book.


I'm all over the place, I know.  I've just got a real passion for all this homemade living.  I wish I could remember the passage in the Bible that says we should build homes, plant gardens and orchards and raise a family.  Those are simple instructions.  I like simple.

You, Bird, Must Sing.

1.  I have a friend I met in a hallway.  I was admiring her corduroy jacket and pretty dang certain that we could get along just fine.  So when I visited her house and she asked sort of shy and excited, "Would you want to hear a couple of songs?" I said yes and sat in her living room while she dug me out of a rut with a voice like a strong shovel meant to open up fertile ground in the heart of anyone near enough to hear it, and I was near enough.  And I couldn't believe it.  I don't even think I was able to articulate to her what I was hearing.

2.  And when she goes on stage, she owns that stage, and it's easy to see that she feels good there, too.  And if you look into the audience, they feel pretty good where they're at, as well.   Seems to me as if we have a good match.

3.  She wrote a song for me, and when she sang it the first time, I don't think I breathed.  She handed me a balm I had yet to apply to my wounds, and it worked.  She has the gift of healing songs.  And she took the time to write it.  And that is something I'll never let go of--that she didn't just listen to what I'd said.  She made it into something, gave it back to me and my life was suddenly a gift, and I could accept it, every portion of it spelled out in chords and deep, knowing words that knew me better than I knew myself.  And this is why we need her.

And this is what my friend calls "kicking the devil in the diamonds."

I was standing in the kitchen tonight resting my head on the white cabinets facing the alone time of Friday night, some terrifying blank wall.

This is not easy, Lord.  I don't feel like things are easy right now.  I'm not asking for easy.  But I'm not sure how to get through this hard nothing space.

Nora kicking, screaming as I pick her up in the middle of the kiddie pool, my skirt getting wet up to my knees.  She would make an excellent protestor.  

You are not the only woman who has had to hitch up her skirt and pull her child out of deep water.

The busy time when I begin pulling in the harvest.  I can't seem to keep up with Your blessings.

Forgive me for the gaps where things fall through:  the daughter who wants to play while I wash dishes, the poems I didn't respond to, the pint of gooseberries gone bad waiting to be made into a pie.

I don't know how to do half of the things I'm doing.  85%.  Tonight, almost all of it.

Lord, I feel like I'm failing.  A disappointment.    

How easily one can believe the voice of the liar, when he has you convinced there is no point in trying because you've already failed beyond repair.

And I walk into the kitchen, and it's a mess, two big bowls of green beans snapped but not steamed and bagged, dirty dishes, all my canning things, a pot full of salsa that needs to be bottled and frozen, bananas that need to be turned into bread.  And there are tears and shuffling feet and I'm walking in circles looking for the starting point, the one that will pick me up and out of this.  I think I'm too tired to complete this work.

My burden is light, and my yoke is easy.  Will you let Me in?

And the most honest prayer I can think to say with my head resting on the cupboard is, "I need a hug."

Woman, thou art loosed from thy infirmity.

We are walking through her garden, the one we thought dead from spray drift, weeds, animals.  And we find it still growing.  "God put a powerful will to live in all the things He made.   Have you noticed that?"

The infirmity of doubt, of self-worry, of thinking I am responsible for what it is I'm allowed to do, what it is I can do.  Through Him.  Not through myself.  And I am suddenly putting the kitchen in order, finishing what I started, what He started in me.

Take that.

It's 9 PM. Better pickle some green beans.

After Nora hits the hay, like most moms out there, I've got to decide how to spend the next few hours.  I usually run through about 15 things I need to do:  grade discussion posts, wash the floor, get an early start on the laundry, alphabetize my wardrobe...

I think I'm like most of you: there's this window that opens at night, a solitary, magical one that's hard to close even when the hour gets too late.  I saw that window open, and I decided to try canning some of the green beans that have been filling grocery bag after grocery bag since those little purple flowers decided to sprout edible offspring.  (The whole concept is amazing, don't you think?  First you have a plant, and then the plant makes food you can eat.  Amazing.)  I was recently talking to a writer about creating another world, how much we love entering some other space--one where the rules bend gravity, distort the flora and fauna so they can speak or shine, but when I walked out in the night tonight with a pair of scissors in my hand looking to snip a few stalks of dill for the green beans, I entered that other world right here.  Dusk.  Fireflies.  Moon rising over trees.  Sound of cicadas.  Dill.  We live in one wild and beautiful world.  I think I'm going to make Nora stay up later.  She shouldn't miss this.  

Anyway, here's the book I've been using of late. 

This truly is a great book.  All the recipes use the water bath canning method, so you don't have to worry about blowing a hole in your roof with one of those pressure canners.   Plus, she works in small batches, so you probably already have the pans and whatnot to get the job done.  From the pickled radish to the cucumber relish, everything I've tried out of this book has been amazing.  She has a young daughter, too.    And I love that she wrote a book about something she loved doing and the book turned right around and supported her love for canning and being with her daughter.  Anyway...

You need otherworldly dill and kosher salt.  Fresh green beans cut to fit the pint jars.  Hot pepper.  Garlic.  Brine.

One thing about canning, you've got to be precise.  When the book says, "2 pounds of trimmed green beans," you'd better make sure you've got 2 pounds--no more, no less.  Even the size of the jars you use matters.  Don't think you can make bigger batches using quart jars.  The amount of time they have to process has been determined based on the size of the jars.  In short, canning is easy and safe as long as you follow the instructions.  Don't let green beans be the death of you.

I can't show you the pictures of me packing the jars because you have to be fast, faster than photography.  I actually used some of the moves I learned watching "The Bionic Woman."

And here they are:  Late Night Otherworldly Window Pickled Green Beans.  Come on over and try some with me.  Seriously.

Small Potatoes are Never Small Potatoes

It was Good Friday:  Nora didn't feel like going outside.  It looked like it might storm.  I'd picked up a bag of potato "seed" at Orscheln's and wanted to have them in that day, so Nora and I came to an agreement--I would only be 15 minutes outside at the most, and then we could go inside and play Barbie.

Sidenote:  Potato seeds are actually potatoes that have sprouted "eyes"--you know, those yucky root things that sprout when you've had a bag of potatoes too long.  Yeah, those are what you plant--the whole thing with at least two eyes on it.  But don't try to plant store bought potatoes.  They're sprayed with some sort of chemical to keep them from sprouting.  Not that I would know, but...uh, anyway...

I grabbed the shovel, found a patch of ground in the garden that wouldn't be in the way when it came time to till the rest of it, and started flipping up black pieces of dirt opening like lids, literally throwing one of the potatoes in and dropping the lid of dirt back down on top.  I dug 24 holes--well, 23--(Nora wanted to keep one of the seeds as her "baby potato") and called it good.  At 8-10 pounds of potatoes per plant, I'd be looking at 200 pounds of potatoes and 35 pounds of weight gain if I deep fried all of them.   I was counting calories before they'd hatched.

Well, you know about the organic aphid spray.  

And when I went out today to survey more of the damage, this is what I met:

Yep.  That's all that was left of those beautiful, green, blooming potato plants.  This is what I'd expect to see if someone decided to go after the aphids with a flame thrower.  I should have done that.  It was around the 4th of July after all.

Nora was on her new swing, which we'd anchored with dog chain stakes and large metal washers--my stepdad is a problem solver.  I grabbed my gardening fork--I still don't know what to call it.  Luckily, it responds to physical rather than verbal cues.  And I turned over a patch of dirt expecting to find a few quarter-sized potatoes.  I think you know what's coming here.  Hiding under all that dirt and burnt looking foliage--40 pounds of beautiful, red potatoes.

I was yelling at Nora from my side of the fence while she flew air bound on the swing, "Buried treasure.  Nora!  I just found buried treasure.  Hey, do you wanna see where potatoes come from?"

Yep.  That's where potatoes come from--dirt.  They're tubers attached to a root system.  Did you know that?  I didn't for a long time.  It's kind of neat to learn about this stuff.  Since beginning to garden, I've been amazed by the amount of dirt that has to be washed off of the things we eat.  My kitchen and (aptly named) mud-room is a mess right now because food grows in dirt.  The grocery store tells a different story--potatoes that grow on trees.  That's the only way they could be that clean, right?

And when we'd installed the swing, and her butterfly garden was blooming and the cucumbers and sweet peas were climbing the north and east sides of the fence, and she stood still for a moment on the sidewalk as the breeze lifted her hair, Nora said:  "This is God's glory.  Did you know that atoms are like the glue that God uses to put everything together?  Mom, is my swing set made of atoms?"

"It is.  Don't you think it's funny that the first man was named Adam?  And it sounds like Atom?"

"Being outside is really nice.  This is God's glory."

"Yes, it is.  Where did you learn that?"

"I just knew it."

Loves

1.  Nora's first experience with corn starch and water.  We all need a little "weird" "how does it do that" "watch this!" in our lives.

2.  Sufjan Stevens.  Late nights with headphones, a crochet hook, an (internal) ball of yarn and endless miles of scarves issuing from my fingers.  "I'm counting it out, I'm working it out, I'm counting it out inside."  He inspired me to buy a banjo and take up the fiber arts again.  He helped me count it out.  He still does.  I like how he's always packing up his recording gear and making albums for his friends.  I'd like to do that, too.

3.  My cousin Stephi appearing out of nowhere with her proofreading heart, intelligence and an offer to help me look over my application.  You know, I didn't even know you could read, Steph.  Did you go to school or something?  I thought you were still riding ponies and mixing kool-aid.  Oh, and you have lettuce breath.

4.  Time tomorrow after the new swing (thank you Grandma and Grandpa!) is anchored to dig through the garden.  Green beans are here.  And I may actually have about 10 pounds of potatoes under all the burnt stems left over from my failed attempt at organic aphid control.

5.  Real letters in the mail with tea in them.  Gardening magazines.  The last movie in the series I've been watching.  (And, yes, you got me.  It's called "Love Comes Softly" and you can probably catch it on the Hallmark channel.  Listen, there's a reason I was hooked on The Waltons when I was seven.  This is quality programming, folks, the kind that reminds you how things could be if only your name was John Boy and you lived in the "olden days.")

6.  [                                                                                           ]

Crazy Times, Folks

I believe by tomorrow night I will be able to sit still and write a decent post for you.  For now, I will say that we are home in Nebraska again after a week-long trip that turned into a weekend trip due to cold/flu.  Two states.  700 miles.  Three generations of women.  One minivan.  Many weak cups of coffee.  (Mom, I think we may have a coffee snobbery issue.)

Even after a few days the garden is out of control.  Apparently, I killed the potato plants with an organic bug spray I put on them the morning we left, so I don't have to worry about the aphids or the potatoes anymore.  Phew.  And thank you, Adam and Tiffany, for watching the place while we drove in circles.  5 farm cats + 1 invincible goldfish + 3 bird feeders + 1 overweight hamster + 1 baby toad + too many flowers to count + savage garden + little limestone farmhouse = safe and sound.

This Friday Concordia posted a job opening for an Associate Professor (creative writing emphasis) in English and Communications.  While driving, sneezing, praying, and visiting, I have been composing the statements and lists and forms necessary for the application, which I hope to have complete by tomorrow.  Friends, I could use your prayers on this one.   I've been on the adjunct train, single-mom incoming it, and I just might think...I am praying that God thinks this is the job for me.  If I can just get this letter, CV, and statement right..."Sometimes done is better than perfect."

And, oh boy, I am definitely not perfect...but I might be reasonably okay for this job.  So, if you are reading this, and don't mind, a little prayer for us would go a long, long way.