It's Yesterday Once More

January breakfast.  Yogurt, raspberries, Trader Joe's nut sack, and Mesa Sunrise Organic Cereal.  But dang if that January ain't bleak regardless.  I have to remember though that when it's about mid-August I am so ready for days like this.  Grey, wet and cold, seemingly hopeless.  All is calm, nothing is bright.

Not A Trace of Doubt in My Mind

It's always jolting just how good sauteed cabbage can be.  A pale unassuming leafy vegetable that holds it's integrity and absorbs the flavors of garlic and onion but also caramelizes so well.  I served a layered dish of meatballs over brown rice with cabbage and corn.  A side Greek salad.

You expect a big red tomato to burst with flavor or a bright orange sweet potato to be just that.  But the dull lifeless pale cabbage?  What a pleasant surprise!  I had white vegetable prejudice.  Past tense because I've seen the light on all that in the last years.  Yukon potatoes, are you kiddin' me?  Yucca, jicama, parsnips. Cauliflower is practically the new Bob Dylan.

Mona in one of her many contorted sleeping positions.

I Felt the Coldness of My Winter

Once in a while the winter will hit me way deep inside my plumb.  The coldness dissolves all the bullshit away and I can really see clearly and understand the world.  Not anything going on with real people, politics or current events, just the actual space we reside in, the air we all breathe.  All the energy that flows and tiny moments that pass.  The wind blowing in a particular direction. That stuff.  I stopped and watched a cat take a bath atop a makeshift shelter in Red Hook on my way to work.   It was miles away from Donald Trump memes and Twitter posts.

An old turntable sitting alone in the sun felt like an installation of museum art. The quietness of the street made it almost emotional.  Hormones have their moments.   

I went home that night and made a great soup from scratch, a chicken vegetable with carrots, corn, tomatoes, potatoes, celery and peas.  I went to the market and picked the best and freshest. The carrot was one of the biggest I had seen, more like a tree stump.  P likes Yukon gold potatoes and I did a couple of new reds mixed in.  The difference in taste of a real stock is so comforting.  Very warm and real going down.  Slightly salty but in the best way.  Why does it taste so sincere?

I served up two bowls and left the rest on the stovetop to cool before transporting it to the fridge. Soup the next day is even better. I was already looking forward to that bowl.  Thing is, I fell asleep and left the whole big pot on the burner overnight and had to throw it all out the next morning.  I pray that winter doesn't crush me just because it can.