Red Cedar
More apocalypse, less angst
In the Bookshed: Recipes for Good Living
This book has been sitting on my kitchen counter over the winter months, tantalizing not only the fresh-ingredients cook in me, but also the gardener. A two-in-one book, the first half of Four Seasons is dedicated to growing, while the second half is comprised of 120 recipes incorporating foods from the home garden. Damrosch and Coleman manage to provide an excellent overview of all aspects of edible gardening (including garden layouts, soil advice, and food storage) with the inspiration to try out new veggie crops and cooking techniques in the recipe section. This book is beautifully adorned with full-colour photographs and drawings which invite the reader to imagine their own harvest-to-table experience. This book would make an excellent gift for a first-time gardener or homeowner looking to turn their back (or front) yard into an edible paradise.
I have to admit, I find it odd that I am so drawn to a book about flower arranging – this being a topic I haven’t ever given much thought to despite the fact I grow and cut flowers for my home and table all summer long. The Flower Recipe Book is easily one of the most beautiful books I have ever seen on the subject – the floral arrangements coupled with gorgeous photography invite even the most cynical reader (me!) to linger and draw in the useful and instructional advice the authors give in their “recipes”. With 100 arrangements that cover all floral seasons, Harampolis and Rizzo break information down into simple instructions, including plant facts and care, the various vessels used in their designs and where to find them, and step-by-step explanations of how to achieve various visual effects (not to mention how to get the most longevity out of the arrangements). Although I do not have all the different vessels at my disposal to make these arrangements, I find the structural information on each arrangement easy enough to improvise with — and I love the fact that many of the containers are simple found objects, or in some cases, easily knocked together from some scraps of wood then lined with a tupperware (that’s my interpretation, not theirs). Thrift store tins, mason jars, wine glasses and old gift baskets are all pressed into service in these designs – and as a flower-gardener I am looking forward to a summer yard that provides the raw material for building them. This is another beautiful gift for the flower-gardener or home-aesthete in your life — even a very cynical one.
These things also didn’t change last night……
Gah! Losing an election is so disheartening, frustrating, disempowering, depressing. No matter how you phrase it, I know a lot of sad people this morning and I too have been catastrophizing since the results were announced last night. But having lived through several governments who I did not vote for (in fact, my party has only ever won a single election where I was eligible to vote) I am also fully aware that this is not the end of anything, just the beginning of another round of struggle. While walking to work this morning I was thinking about exactly this, and exactly what did *not* change last night besides the ruling government:
- I still live in an awesome neighbourhood with great, compassionate people surrounding me. One way in which that manifests is the return of birdsong to our community, which has followed the return of food gardening, boulevard gardens and natural features to our urban neighbourhood. Another manifestation is the return of salmon to Still Creek last year, which followed on the cleaning up and restoration of the waterway by community volunteers. Still another thing I love about my walk to work is the railway overpass at Raymur, a bridge that only exists because mothers in the community banded together in the eighties to fight for it. Point being, Liberals or NDP, we make positive change by our actions and there are reminders of that everywhere.
- Poor people are still destitute, young people still feel disenfranchised, and there are still not enough options for low-income housing in this province. Sadly, the NDP made few promises for change on any of these fronts ($20 per month added to a welfare cheque is an insult not a promise) so it’s not like that was going to change either way.
- If I want social and environmental justice, I must be willing to take to the streets. No government *gives* us rights and benefits. No government willingly gives up privilege. We are still a population who needs to learn our collective interest and our collective power.
- My community still includes love and music and art and parties and great friends and funny nights of drinking and community gardening fun and rad parents and weird kids and so much of the stuff that live is *actually* about. Losing at the polls while winning at life is a balance I can handle.
Perhaps I am somewhat of a Pollyanna – but I want to say – cheer up! It’s not that bad! At least we’ll have some fun at the barricades, right? And that despite the government I love my life and the fact that I have found such purpose in it; win or lose the election.
Renewing spring.
For those of you who don’t live in Vancouver – know this – we’ve been having incredible (and unusual) weather for the past couple of weeks. Which somewhat explains my absence from here – that and the fact that work has been kicking my ass lately because I’m working on a big project. So big I even get overtime (which never happens).
The better weather has allowed me to double my walking to work, and I have started walking home from work some days as well. Between that and a few other gym workouts each week (pilates, body sculpt) all my aches and twinges have gone away. No more lower back pain especially.
And I am now 38 days wheat-free which has given me plenty of time to assess how that’s working – my sinus pain is so reduced that for the first time in two years I have stopped taking advil every day, I no longer have acrid mucus that burns my sinus passages, my hunger baseline is lower and my blood sugar feels more stable. I haven’t lost gobs of weight or anything, but between the cutting wheat and the increased exercise I feel a lot less puffy, and more streamlined.
So that’s pretty awesome. I’ve lost almost five pounds over the past five weeks, so I suppose that’s not a bad rate either. It’s just nothing mind-blowing.
Otherwise I have been gardening like a fiend and I think I am mostly underway for summer veggie gardening – not to mention getting prepped to do more work in the front of our house.
I’ve started a new crochet project also for the first time in ages – a pullover sweater that may not be needed until Fall but oh well, I had this beautiful bamboo-wool that I really wanted to work with:
I have also started an attempt at fitted summer capri pants which I hope to sew up over the next couple of nights. Since I’ve been walking *a lot* (sometimes as much as 12 km a day) I need more pants so it’s not skirts with leggings all summer long.
So yeah, life is basically rolling along – I’m pretty happy these days and working on lots of domestic things plus getting in shape! That’s where I want to be in spring – renewing!
This is my walk to work – why East Van is awesome.
I’ve been walking to work almost every day lately – and this morning I pulled out my phone camera to do a little documenting of the amazing sights of my 6 kilometre trek. A couple photos didn’t get uploaded, they are on my work computer I guess – but I’ll post them some other time (one is a photo of my office – ain’t that exciting). My route takes me to Adanac and Penticton, down the bike route to Campbell, up Campbell and over to Pender, and then along Pender to Burrard. Almost every time I walk I am astonished by something new and out of the blue – which is one of the many reasons I love East Van neighbourhoods.
A little note about photographic evidence.
I just wanted to post a quick note about Friday’s blog article – on the question of whether a photograph exists of my great-great-Uncle’s plane in flight. While the original photograph does not exist, John Brown believes he has found evidence of the photograph existing as part of an exhibition which you can read about here. There has long been a rumour that a photograph once did exist that showed the plane in the air (according the news reports and eyewitness accounts) – and according to some analysis of an exhibition photo – it looks as though that was the case. Unfortunately it requires blowing a photograph of a photograph up to such a degree that all you can really see are blurry shapes that might correspond to an object in flight.
Personally, I don’t think the photograph is what matters because history isn’t based on what we have a visual record for and there is plenty of other evidence that I think is way more compelling. But John Brown does make a good case for the existence of the photograph and has some analysis about the way lithographs were used instead of photos in newspapers of the day. Worth a read, for sure.
Red Cedar 