mysteries, beets, and water

Sunday, March 29

Hi Everyone,

The morning I slept in (7:30!). The sky was already bright, and Tim was on his way out with the dog. After watching the video that Dad sent around about how to protect your family, I felt more comforted than I have for weeks. I lay in bed for a while thinking about Passover - how we'll have a Zoom Passover all together and how that will be fun. Yesterday on my search for flour, I found matzo (a sign from the Jewish ancestors - No flour, yes matzo!). So now I feel prepared. I figure all the other ritualized foods can be substituted with something, but not matzo.

I've noticed I do a lot of thinking about food during this time. Planning meals is one of the more fun things my brain wants to do. So I got up and opened a cookbook, looking for recipes that use coconut milk. Mark Bittman has one for tofu and peas in coconut curry. I opened to that page and found this tucked into the book:

Now, this really looks like Mom's handwriting to me, right? But on the back was a poem, dated March of 2007: 

The poem date makes me think the handwriting can't possibly be Mom's, unless I used the recipe as scrap paper to print out poems on, but I don't think I'd do that. So if anyone has an answer to this mystery, please let me know! It's quite possible too that I didn't write this poem. It sort of sounds like me, but I have no memory of having written it. 

Speaking of Mom, I pickled a bunch of beets:

I didn't add hard boiled eggs, but still might! 

In other news, Benjamin's been playing his mandolin since his cello is being repaired. (The luthier let the cello sit for three days before touching it. Seems a little excessive, but then maybe the virus can penetrate wood?). Lucy made an excellent powerpoint on what it takes to be an astronaut. I'll have to share it next post. And Alice has been mulling over her college decisions. It's nice to have options and hard to know what to do! The financial aid info comes out next week, which will probably shed some clarity on things. 

I'm still learning about water in the West. If you want to be scared about something other than the COVID-19, read about the shrinking Ogallala Aquifer. At the rate we are going, there will be basically NO crops growing in the West in about 50 years. Or, they could keep growing crops for humans and stop growing crops for cattle, and we'd be ok. But they'd have to stop raising beef just about now, and for some mysterious reason, that isn't happening. Truly, of all the insanities, the raising of beef for food is THE MOST insane thing. But I'll say no more because my goal is not to depress or scare anyone more. 

Please post fun things! Especially for those of us who don't use Instagram!

Huge love to everyone! 

Julie