JERUSALEM SAGE AND MEMORIES

Jerusalem Sage is the plant of the day. I don’t remember where it came from, but I’ve handed off starts to other people. It’s become a rather large clump just south of my water feature although it was much bigger before I trimmed it back and gave away starts. 

I looked it up to make sure I had the name right because I was calling it Jewish Sage. Since I’d looked it up, I decided to read about it and found out that I should leave the tall flower stems with their seeds because they provide food for birds in the fall and winter. I didn’t know that and have been cutting them off once the flowers are finished. I also wonder if those seeds will germinate on their own in other places and become a problem.

Wednesday I was so fortunate. Not only did I get to see Arayli and Xander, but I also got an almost immediate dog grooming appointment for Karma and Kaizer at Hippie Hounds in Shoreline. I wasn’t sure they were even back open. I’d called PetSmart and the first opening they had was July 19^th. My doggies needed to go NOW and I do very much prefer Hippie Hounds. So glad I left HH a message for a call back. And, the doggies are now soft and silky and smell good.

While I was waiting for the doggies to be washed and waxed, I ran a couple of errands and then found a shady spot on a nearby street to wait for the “they’re done” phone call. I have to admit I kinda waited for a police car to show up and ask what I was doing, but didn't happen. I have a friend, Ernie, who lives nearby, but I figured he wouldn’t be happy if I just popped in, so I amused myself for an hour with my Hidden City game on the I-pad and then continued to read the latest Martin Walker mystery. I love his Bruno books and only wish a person exactly like Bruno existed so I could kidnap and keep him forever just so he’d cook and garden for me.

Seriously, Bruno is the police person for this little town in France. He knows everyone in the area and has the best friends. He horseback rides every morning with Balzac, his basset hound dog. Then his travels about are accompanied by good eats, coffee, bakery goods and wines. At other times, he and Balzac look for truffles beneath the oak trees he planted, plus he has a garden to which he goes often for produce which he then uses in the meals he prepares. And Bruno always has the proper wine for each course. I just love the idea of slapping some duck fat into a cast iron pan followed by whatever his recipe calls for. Seriously, Martin Walker’s wife is a chef and she vets each of the recipes in the books. In fact, there is apparently a book of recipes based on the mysteries. People have also contacted Martin Walker for tour guidance of the area, so he’s also published a tour book.

This is a wonderful series of about 12 or 13 books now. I’ve never looked at the recipe book or the tour book, but perhaps when this pandemic is over and I could travel to France I’ll use his tour book for planning purposes. As for the recipes, I’m not sure I have any idea as to where I could obtain goose fat, plus cooking for only one person, I’d most likely have to have whatever recipe I made multiple times.

On Thursday, my walking partner Kathy and I ordered from Ono Poke in Edmonds. Kathy picked it up and brought it to my deck. I had spicy salmon and she had spicy ahi. I made a lemon ice box pie Wednesday night and we had that for dessert. I sent a little less than half the pie home with her for her husband and son. Some of the things we discussed while enjoying the food and the company.

I have two photos of me in front of the house in Gem, Idaho. In those photos, I’m holding an Aunt Jemima doll. Kathy said she had one as well when she was little but it had a different name. I don’t know what happened to the one I had…if it weren’t for the photos, I wouldn’t even know I’d had one. Amazing how something that would be considered hugely racist today was just run of the mill in the late forties and fifties.

We also talked about having the same kind of moon experience. I remember my folks taking me to a drive-in movie and watching the moon from the car window as my dad drove us back up the canyon. I wondered why the moon was able to stay right beside me the entire way. Kathy’s family was driving from Illinois to Michigan and her mother made a bed in the back of the station wagon for her and her older brother. She remembers wondering how the moon was able to stay with them as well.

There was a totally white cat named Snowball. I remember my mother giving her a bath so she’d stay soft, white and pretty. According to my mother, we’d play hide-and-seek. I’d go hide and Snowball would come find me. Kathy said she does that now with her cat Cokey. One evening we came home after dark and Snowball wasn’t anywhere to be found. Living in the woods like that, she quite possibly became someone’s dinner. I waited for days for her to return, but she never did.

I also remembered an Idaho kid named Teddy. A bunch of the boys had made wooden swords for fighting. Somehow Teddy ended up having a very pointed sword enter his chest and barely miss his heart. There was a really big discussion throughout Gem among the parents about no more pointed swords or anything else that might cause an injury. I didn’t have one because I was a girl and played with dolls and paper dolls.

It snowed a lot in Idaho in the winter. I remember my mother dressing me in a snowsuit that made me almost as wide as I was tall. It was so I could go up the street to the post office. Everything was solid white, the snow was coming down and how I managed to get there and back without ending up lost in the snowfall, I have no idea. I don’t remember being frightened, but I can’t imagine a parent allowing something like that these days. I also remember going out the front door just in my flats and losing my shoes in a snowdrift. Daddy wasn't happy rummaging around out there to find them.

There was also a little store up around the corner I think; or it could have been clear up in Burke. It was a real treat to be able to go in with a nickel or dime and buy a bunch of candy. That’s why I think the store may have been up around the corner because I could have walked there. And helicopter parents hadn’t even been thought up then. I could disappear for hours to my cousins, up in the woods, down to the rock slide; just about anywhere within walking distance. Never once did my mother ever appear to be concerned or upset when I came home.

Living in Idaho really was a pretty perfect time in my life. Mom was a housewife and between her and Grandma, they baked every single day. Mom made the best cinnamon rolls and even made donuts. During spring, summer and fall, they canned a wide variety of foods and jams. I remember having a slice of pie or cake for breakfast a lot of times probably as a reward for eating my oatmeal. I didn’t have a clue about Leave it to Beaver back then; and while my mother didn’t clean wearing pearls and daddy didn’t drive home in a suit and tie, it was as close to living that television show as I ever came.