A Surprising Stop on the A Train

I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.

~L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

This beautiful October Saturday's harvest festival featured pie contests, cake walks, live music, scarecrow decorating, children's activities and fun for all. Ahhhh, I do love a good fall festival, and this was one of the best.

Two things were surprising here: These photos were taken at the last stop of the A Train north of NYC just outside The Cloisters--hardly the location of a Deep South State Fair or a church carnival.

Secondly, the food was all complimentary.  Abundant, beautiful, carefully prepared and presented food--free for all. Homemade cinnamon sugar donuts.  Cookies of every kind. Brownies. Apple cider. The welcome sign meant just that. We knew no one there, and we were still welcome.

Just a delightful scene to come upon when I least expected it. We were on the way to somewhere else when we encountered the merriment. It beckoned us in.

I left wondering if our churches could be a little more inviting to those who venture near. 

Do we send the clear message that all are welcome, no matter who they are? 

Do we share with others as abundantly as we have received from our Heavenly Father's bounty--extending forgiveness without price, offering our best we can prepare in our relationships, not waiting to see what we can exchange in return?

That's the simple beauty of a fall festival: it's all about a community's celebrating the yield of the kitchen or the crops and enjoying October blue skies at their best. A wonderful precursor to Thanksgiving, October festivals serve as our warm up act for a season of giving thanks. Just to get the juices flowing, if you will. 

Thanksgiving is not merely a holiday; it is a way of life. Let us live as those who are willing to welcome others as we share what we have, especially in the life of faith.

No reason ever to be bored...

Twinkies and Pringles and Stuff that Lasts

There is a widely circulated tale that the shelf life of a Twinkie is infinity because of all the additives and preservatives it contains.

"This urban legend is false, although Twinkies can last a relatively long time (25 days or more) because they are made without unstabilized dairy products and thus spoil more slowly than most bakery items. In reality Twinkies are on the shelf for a short time, a company executive told the New York Times in 2000 that the "Twinkie is on the shelf no more than 7 to 10 days," Wikipedia reports.

Now the iconic Twinkie is in the news again with Hostess' business reorganization, and its future may be in jeopardy. Can it survive the present economy?

Likewise, I have it on reliable authority that Pringles chips will float on the water when tossed from a canoe and not become soggy and sink, waterlogged. Ever. Or almost forever.

What is in this stuff?

We are shaped by what goes inside us as well as what covers us.

FEED on things of substance.

NURTURE one another in that which will sustain life and offer food for the journey.
A junk food diet will play out when real life hits, and we will not have the essentials needed for coping with all that life is sure to present to us.

COVER with prayer our own frailties as we seek wisdom and the courage to change where needed.

CHOOSE TO LOVE as a way of life.

Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. ~ I Peter 4:8

Healthy Holidays

I saw this image on Sam's Fitness Food & Faith, and it looked so appealing, with its various fonts and cute colors. As I am walking through a time of illness with a precious friend and becoming more aware of foods that offer healing benefits, this really caught my eye. Why cannot all things that are good for us come packaged in appetizing, tantalizing colors? Then we'd want to do what is healthful, right, rather than load up on the empty sugars that drag us down and harmful fats that clog our bodies.

But wait, I realized; they already do.

It doesn't take a playful font in a memo style prompt to direct our eye to desire these foods above. God has already packaged them for us in the most extravagant way! See how they are created to appeal to our senses. I look at the complex and varied textures offered in the healthy foods-- smooth ripe tomatoes in eye-popping red shiny skin, multi-floral cruciform broccoli stalks, bouquets of leafy greens like kale and Swiss chard, walnuts and almonds in amazing little hard shell cases to keep them fresh and portable, and super-food blueberries eaten fresh or frozen continue to offer a feast for the eye and palate alike. And who can deny the pleasure of chocolate melting away, triggering the same good feelings in our brains as the sense of being in love.

God did all this and more to draw us to the things that are healthful and good for us, I believe. That's just a nice reminder of the gifts we have in nature that I take for granted each day, especially when holiday food tends to mean fat-laden, sugary richness that offers pleasure but leaves a calling card of lethargy and excess weight gain in its wake.

Choose wisely, I hear a little voice in my heart saying.

Ethel's Kitchen Caper: Summertime Down South

Living with zeal to savor the moment and find something to be grateful for in everything has its challenges in soaring August temperatures during this heat wave of 2011.

My savoring yesterday was the unexpected delight of having an afternoon off, so I went to the old farmers' market, bought bags of summer veggies: fresh tomatoes, squash, cucumbers for marinating, okra and peas. I came home with boxes of freezer bags, fresh produce and an enthusiasm that surprised even me in the sweltering 102 temp my car had cooled down to on the gauge from 103.

What was the source of this burst of energy--this nesting in the kitchen in August?

I donned my coolest, lightest whites like a summer camper, tied on my favorite lavender-blue apron, and got to work. Looking for all the world like a double for Ethel in an old "I Love Lucy" episode, I was fully present to the task at hand.

Pulling out my big bowls and pots, I mentally assessed if I actually could wash, cook and put away all the peas I had lugged into my kitchen. You know when kids' eyes are bigger than their stomachs? I was that kid at the farmers' market! I bit the bullet and bought the -- what are they? 10 pound tubes ?-- of bulging, shelled lady/cream peas and pink-eye peas. With a small fortune invested, I had to make good on the challenge.

And it worked.

I slaved over a hot stove, tackling more peas than ever before in my life, and I found some perverse delight in being able to do so. Call me crazy.

With summer on its last leg, it might have been my last chance to earn my stripes in the kitchen doing something our Southern women forbears could and did do each week. And with a new-found interest nationally in canning and such (I don't know how to do much, I confess) I felt downright up-to-date in my pursuit!

And as I rinsed, cooked and cooled peas (did I mention there were LOTS of peas?) in my kitchen, I felt anything but alone. Revived and energized, I felt my brain synapses firing rapidly and displayed an industriousness that belied the deadly heat outside. It was a kitchen extravaganza to be sure.

I get these bursts from time to time....this consuming zeal to get in the kitchen and turn out some good food. And then I go for days or weeks dulled by the routine of meals. Such is the case for my spiritual life, I realize.

Sometimes I bolt out of the starting gate of each day with enthusiasm and vigor and a commitment to abide in the Scriptures for that day's sufficiency. Other days, I am not as fervent, and find myself coasting through, as though I can dip back and draw from the reserve tank of last season's spiritual fuel to carry me on the journey.

Like manna in the wilderness, God provides for us daily. All that we do can become acts of gratitude. Or, we could become hoarders, seeking only to promote our own comfort and convenience through our own efforts and fail to acknowledge the giver of all gifts.

I'm thankful that the Lord's provisions are vastly much more dependable than my own initiatives. God doesn't operate in fits and starts, in on-off bursts as I do in my kitchen.

God's grace is always operating to draw us unto the Father of all mercies. God's mercies are new every morning and the table is always set with a feast before us!

O, taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the one who trusts in God. Psalm 34:8

Ready for a Fresh Start?

Overheard at the bank this afternoon: "...I'm just gonna have to start boilin' an' bakin'!"

The teller chimed in enthusiastically to agree with her customer who had lost some obvious poundage by taking matters into her own hands and changing her eating habits.

"I got tired of being hot and tired," the customer declared, "and I decided to do something about it." She needed a fresh start.

I thought about her as I left. Boilin' an' bakin echoed in my ears as I walked. She sat on the cusp of giving up fried foods and eating more fresh veggies, as she continued within earshot, and wisely knew something would have to take up the space and fill the vacuum of her old habits.

Something always does.

How many of us wish things were different? Wish we were different?

That we were healthier. Thinner. More secure.

Had a loving family.

A great job - or any job.

Had a home.

Had compliant children. Had any children.

Had a different skill set or coping mechanism for life's ups and downs.

When we contemplate all the things we collectively wish for, we see our longings represented all along a spectrum of life. The dream of one person fills the discard pile of another, who wishes for MORE.

Wishing it doesn't make it so.

On the other hand, to meditate on a thing...to prayerfully commit...to ponder and seek wise counsel, and step by step to act in regard to a possible new position--this gives wings to a new plan. The new plan may take root after its genesis.

Such a new start animates the drive within us which can propel us to action.

We will have many false starts along the way when we fail to follow through with our best intentions. Learn from them. Our mistakes and failures are probably more instructive than our successes. They, too, are part of the rhythm of life. But we are not tethered to the mirey pit feeling defeated and unable to budge.

One day we will cross over to the place where we are tired of being hot and tired about a pertinent issue. We will choose to do something. And it may start with a little help from our friends.

Some things we can change with courage and hard work. Other things, we learn to let go and pray for contentment to fill the void. That, too, is the task of a lifetime. But we must begin somewhere.

We may not need to start boilin' or bakin', but we may need another commitment to a lifestyle change for our good health--spiritually or physically. What is it that holds us back with invisible shackles?

Come to Jehovah Rapha, the God Who Heals, the One who loves us as we are--hot and tired!--and lovingly prepares for us a way when we cannot see clearly a path for ourselves.

Blue Ribbon Night

I heard my husband's voice coming down the hall before I saw him. "I'm worried about Daddy," he said. "I think he's sick!"

"Let's go check on him right now. What's wrong?" I said, shifting into overdrive.

"He wants to go to the Fair," Ben deadpanned.

With that highly out of character request, we changed clothes quickly and picked up my eighty-something father in law and his wife who cannot possibly be near that age, and drove to the Mississippi State Fair 2010 on a beautiful October Sunday evening at sunset. Parking close by the Coliseum made the walking easier and the terrain smooth on asphalt. My husband was anticipating all the little things that might be an obstacle to their enjoying the evening.

Let me pause here. Enjoying an evening at the fair might be an oxymoron to many, and assuredly it had been for my husband's dad, Billy, who is more at home in a bow tie and dinner jacket than cruising the midway in his jeans. But despite decades of dislike for all things related to the fair, and repeated refusals to go to the midway with his beloved who has been known, she confided, to go by herself just to get Malone's taffy and walk around safely in the daytime, there we were: four Waltons embarking on a twilight study in Southern culture and gastronomic excess.

It was, in a word, delightful. Really. And it brought back memories.

As a child I remember the magic of the state fair in the fall. Magic was as vivid as tinkerbell's wand touching the top of Cinderella's castle on Walt Disney when night fell at the fair and the lights turned on. You just can't have a good fair without neon. In rural Lawrence County, Mississippi, we had an afternoon off in elementary school to attend the Fair, which extended into night in my memories of going with my family. They got lost when I was in fourth grade, and I had to go to the Sheriff's tent to find them. My classmates in 4-H and the FFA students in high school had worked on projects, produce, and livestock all year in anticipation of winning prizes in the fall. Blue ribbons meant big dollars for the best of breed in the barns. That was the meat of the fair for many. Literally.

Others came for rides. Spinning cages offering riders a glimpse of airbrushed Alpine peaks and buxom Swiss misses, and the various whirling apparatus attached to something resembling a giant drill bit visually enhanced by flashing strobe lights held thrills, chills and plenty of ticket money for the three minutes of adrenaline rush. I never rode anything more exciting than the Ferris Wheel, after embarrassing my sixth grade self when I could not navigate the vertigo house with the floor that kept sliding away while traversing uphill, and the laughter of boys outside trumped the ambient noise of the midway. Sixth grade girls are funny that way.

The fair was a great place to go with a date who could win a large stuffed dog decades ago, and from the look of things, that hasn't gone out of style. Today's prizes, however, look a bit more aggressive and hip with their Jamaican hair braided-stuffed-five-foot- long yellow bananas being all the rage this year. A few booths and tents had some - I'm not kidding here - rather charming and personable folks who used to be called barkers. There were some who might be called a little rough around the edges, but there were guys quite colorful and engaging and local folks there too. Jo Nash and her husband have been coming from Brandon for years, turning out one patted and homemade cinnamon apple pie after another. If I do not come away with anything else, I have a little bag of Jo's pies, never one to turn away a good cinnamon apple anything. We got a kick out of the banter between the very agreeable, winsome weight or birthday guesser ("What we doin' here, Lil' Man?"with a smile so big smile he would disarm even the most skeptical visitor) and his folks who stepped up to see if he knew their secret. He just needs a break and he'd be on Last Comic Standing! We just had to pause and smile.

I caught the delight of the little four year old girl in pink who held the sledge hammer and pounded the bell three times in a row and won herself a prize, though she never saw the young man operating the kiddie arcade manually lift the weight each time she struck it so that she would ring the bell. We took the time to see - really see some of the sights I might have missed in that sea of humanity had I not been looking to enjoy the gladness of the night. The old car show is still there though we didn't make it inside. Now I would probably remember driving some of those cars. They used to be old.

We saw candy apples, funnel cakes, cinnamon rolls, fried twinkies, fried oreos, blooming onions, Jo's apple pies, roasted corn, homemade biscuits with syrup, Pronto Pups, Penn's chicken on a stick, taffy dropping down the chute into red and white boxes, and - this was a new one for me - Fried Krispy Kreme doughnuts surrounding a cheeseburger with bacon. I am serious. Comfort for health enthusiasts: Fresh Never Frozen on the sign.

And the music scene fills the air at night with headliners a bit past their prime, shall we say. A few years ago, Big Al, Ben and I enjoyed Peter Noone aka Herman's Hermits (google them) from front row seats in a not-so-crowded Coliseum, and I still have his plastic guitar pick from that Mrs. Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter evening. The Grass Roots also played that night, with the lead singer in tight black leather pants (not unexpected) recovering from hip replacement surgery and leaning occasionally on a cane (unexpected). Time does move on. Last year Ben and I heard Credence Clearwater Revisited (new name for a split group) playing to a bigger audience of middle age people on the Geezer circuit of state fairs. I suppose ours will be the generation that has Motown playing on the Musak in the nursing homes, and we'll still be saying, "man, that was good music!"

I heard all of this and more as we strolled the midway last night. We had a delightful walk down memory lane with Billy and Frances. The lesson to me: be open to seeing something new even though it's been in your own backyard for 83 years. I am thankful for this simple pleasure of seeing the joy and gladness in something I have often found dirty and distasteful. Perhaps it is all in how we look at a thing...I keep learning that lesson day after day.

Blessed Lord, Thank you for giving me eyes to see from another point of view sometimes. Let me love the world and its people you made, and let me not think of myself any better than another. We are all your children who try to find love and satisfaction in the wrong places sometimes. It is You "who satisfies the longing soul, and fills the hungry soul with goodness." Psalm 107:9. We labor in vain when we try to fill it with Krispy Kreme burgers and other options just as ill-suited to satisfy our needs. Forgive our foolish choices and set us on a right path. Amen

(See photos from the night below at bottom of site.)