A SHORT VACATION Kate’s Journal

“Dancer” stoneware sculpture by kayti sweetland rasmussen

Dr. Advice does not cook. I mean he REALLY does not cook, so in preparation for my short vacation for a tune-up, I am preparing a bit of sustenance in advance. So far a chicken vegetable soup, a chocolate cake and a few enchiladas. He used to feel sorry for our friend Emmett Oliver after Georgia passed away when Emmett stocked his fridge with frozen dinners. Personally I think that was very smart.

This appointment for surgery popped out of the blue a day or so after the stress test. One of those “voices” informed me that the doctor was ready. There was no chance to say “Wait a darn minute–HE may be ready but I haven’t finished reading the brochure”.

Having a bypass of a leg artery may or may not correct my “spaghetti” legs. I don’t think there is a need to drag out my dancing shoes again, but perhaps I can pass along my wheeled transportation. It seems a very positive endeavor. I just hate to be rushed.

THE YEAR THE MOUSE ATE THE GINGERBREAD HOUSE Kate’s Journal

Episode 21 Christmas, 2015, Fremont

The Christmas cakes and cookies have been baked, and the cards were made and sent on time for a change, the presents bought and wrapped. I’m feeling pretty good about Christmas this year instead of having a near panic attack as is usually the case. But one thing I’m not making this year, or maybe ever, is another Christmas gingerbread house.

We made some pretty limp attempts when our children were small, but one year when the grandchildren arrived, I went all out and built the world’s biggest, most fabulous three-story gingerbread Victorian mansion ever imagined by man or child.

It stood about 18 inches high, and the gingerbread was totally covered with either frosting or candy. It was beautiful beyond belief and everything a gingerbread house should be.

At the annual Christmas party it was the hit of the evening and as its architect and builder, I glowed with pride. It stood on its own separate table in the place of honor, but unfortunately, I have lost the photos I took of it from every angle, so you will just have to take my word for it.

When the season was over, we carefully lifted this enormous confection and lovingly packed it away till the following year. We protected it with tissue paper and bubble wrap, and carefully sealed the cardboard container against dust and dirt in the attic.

The following Christmas, while taking down the collection of holiday decorations, I opened the large cardboard box to find—–nothing.

Going downstairs, I asked my husband, Dr. Advice, what he had done with the gingerbread house. Just as puzzled as I, he looked into the box and found instead of a glorious gingerbread house, one or two pieces of candy. Nothing else–just two pieces of candy.

As we all know, it gets pretty cold and lonely outside for a small mouse, and our mouse obviously has a sweet tooth as well, so who can blame him for seeking shelter in a warm box containing an irresistible feast fit for a king, and even inviting some friends over for a snack or two? Not I.

LEARNING TO GET ALONG Kate’s Journal

Episode 19 Oakland

By 1951 the patterns of our early married life were being formed, convivial, but hardly ever serene. Two diametrically opposed personalities frequently clashing.

The trucking company had been sold, and Sam went to work at the Fireman’s Fund Insurance Co. where he was to remain for nearly 40 years. His expertise in transportation and in safety engineering sent him up and down the West coast from Monday to Friday every week. The dye was cast for him to become “Dr. Advice” in the future.

Meanwhile I was what came to be known as a “stay-at-home” mother, just as my mother and all the women I knew then were. I learned to knit, crochet, sew, wallpaper, garden and cook. I tried my best to be perfect, still too young to realize that would never happen. (In case you wonder at the wallpaper skill, it was very important in the 50’s. Every room in the magazines had wallpaper.)

Our older women friends had long since realized that none of the above were important skills, but I still fed on their praise when I was showing off. Much like the feeling I got as a small girl when I got approval for being a “good girl”, or learning something new.

Since Sam traveled all week, and we lived in a more rural area, I thought a dog would be a good idea. Calling a pet adoption organization, I expressed the desire for a large dog. The woman said they had one but it was too much dog for me, so I took him home. Sarge was a slow, sleepy and very large Great Dane, who wanted badly to be part of someone’s family. He slept in our downstairs family room, and late one Friday night when Sam returned home from traveling all week, Sarge refused to let him into the house. Though Sarge was a family dog, it became clear that ours was not the right family.

Going to the Oakland Flower Show, Oakland in those days had a more upscale social life.

I tried to rejuvenate my painting skills, but I soon realized I needed help. I submitted a painting of my daughter to the “Famous Artists Schools” which was a correspondence school for illustrators. I received a thumbs up from them saying I had possibilities which planted a seed in my brain.

I waited for an opportune moment and announced my intention of signing up for the school. It was met with the utmost of negative reactions. As a matter of recollection he said “Over my dead body!” I believe I said OK!

Many years later I met a gentleman who had been a graduate of that school and had become a very successful illustrator of women’s clothing for newspaper advertising. This was before photographs of actual people were used.

Not being at all deterred in my quest for further education, at the beginning of the next semester, I entered the California College of Art in Oakland, sharing baby sitting with a neighbor, and walking two miles to catch a bus. The halls of higher education held wondrous possibilities, and though my intent was to someday call myself a painter, there were other avenues to pursue as well.

EVOLUTION OF A GARDEN

“Sachi” watercolor painting by kayti sweetland rasmussen

The Japanese period began with teaching my Campfire Girls troop about children’s holidays in Japan. There were many little Japanese friends while growing up in Long Beach, California, and it was fun to hear about “Girls and Boys Day celebrations. When a CampFire Girls troop opened up it seemed like a good project to teach them about children’s customs in Japan, so a lot of study began on my part first.

What started with the CampFire group, extended to studying the language, and to the decoration of a new home and garden.

Antique Japanese Screen

“Japanese Lady” stoneware sculpture by kayti sweetland rasmussen

While we tore the house apart and rebuilt, restored and re-imaged it, we began to tackle the flat, uninteresting patch of grass in the backyard. We suggested a swimming pool, but our girls said they would rather go to the two neighborhood pools where their friends swam.

San Francisco has a world famous Japanese garden which we frequented often getting ideas for a garden of our own. It had to begin with a pool of course, and Dr. Advice spent many evenings after work digging. The hole was soon about 4′ deep, 12′ long and 8’wide, so I suggested he stop. Ultimately, there was another pond with waterfall at the other end of the yard, and a red moon bridge over the larger pool, leading to a small teahouse among the trees at the other side. A wooden finial on the top of the roof was carved by a woodcarver friend. We were indebted to our late brother-in-law and another friend for joining us in all the digging, hammering and celebratory beer drinking after the job was finished. Our good friend Tak Fudenna helped us get rocks and offered suggestions.

The bridge had a slight accident a few years later when it groaned under the stress of about 15 high school girls posing for a photo-op before graduation. Dr. A groaned a bit himself when he called home from a business trip and heard the news.

A visiting Japanese friend who came during a home and garden tour, said “It’s lovely now, but wait another ten years and it will be spectacular.” I visited it several years ago, and he was right.

AMAZING GRAZING~~~~Pork Medallions With Grapes

Charlie waits patiently for a morsel of food to fall at his feet. He has an oral fixation. When I am cooking what I call “weekend food”, which means a bit more labor intensive than weekday meals, he cannot be driven out of the kitchen. Years ago I developed what I call the “puppy shuffle”, which involves sliding your feet around the dog who cannot seem to keep out of your way. Most of the other dogs we have had got the idea pretty quickly and stayed out of the kitchen, but a JRT is like no other dog; they seem to be resistant to human body language.

We missed out on a bite of the new Trader Joe’s mini coissants because I forgot to read the directions: let rise overnight. They had received a grand review in the paper, so I bought them as a treat I didn’t have to make. Now I’ll make them for tomorrow’s breakfast. I believe in giving these new things a try. Some are good, some not so good. Just like people or dogs.

My birthday was last week, and I made these pork medallions with a side of rice pilaf and grilled asparagus. Cook them quickly while still slightly pink inside and they are meltingly tender.

Silver In The Barn asked for a carrot cake recipe, so here is one I like a lot.

Disaster struck the other day, and for some unknown reason, I suddenly lost over 4,000 photos. That computer is now having a vacation in the repair shop to see if anything can be retrieved. I decided not to make a big deal out of it even though it tore my heart out. If the house had burned down, we would start all over, so that’s what I’m doing.

Meanwhile, get busy on the pork medallions:

PORK MEDALLIONS WITH GRAPES IN POMEGRANATE SAUCE

1 large pork tenderloin (about 1 1/4 pounds)
1 Tbs butter
1 Tbs olive oil
3/4 tsp black pepper
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 pomegranate juice
1/2 cup chicken broth
2 Tbs. ketchup
1 cup seedless grapes
3 Tbs. dried cranberries

Trim pork of most of the fat and silverskin and cut crosswise into 1 inch thick medallions.
Heat butter and oil in large heavy skillet. Salt and pepper meat and arrange in skillet and cook over high heat about 2 1/2 min. on each side. Transfer to plate and keep warm in oven.
Add pomegranate juice and broth to skillet, bring to boil, reduce heat to low cover and cook 4-5 min. Add ketchup, grapes and cranberries. Boil for about 1 min. or until sauce is smooth and slightly thickened.
Arrange medallions on 4 warm plates, coat with sauce and grapes and breathe a happy sigh.

Remember that cooking is like life: you have to make do with what’s in the fridge! Make sure it’s something you will like.

TROPICAL CARROT CAKE WITH COCONUT CREAM CHEESE FROSTING

CAKE:
2 1/3 cups flour (260 g + 1/3 cup)
1 cup flaked coconut
1 c dry roasted macadamia nuts
3/4 cup chopped crystallized ginger
3 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp.baking soda

2 cups sugar (400 g or 14 oz)
1 cup vegetable oil
4 large eggs
2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 cups finely grated peeled carrots
2 8 oz. cans crushed pineapple in its own juice, well drained

FROSTING

3 8-oz packages cream cheese
3/4 cup butter
2 cups powdered sugar
3/4 cup canned sweetened cream of coconut (such a Coco Lopez, find it in a liquor store)
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp coconut extract

(Grind coconut, nuts and ginger in processor and add with dry ingredients)

Bake at 350 in 3 9-inch cake pans or 3 8 x 2″ for about 45 min.

50+ LIVE BETTER, LONGER

As the Mills Brothers said years ago “No one wants to be old at thirty-three”. But some people really Are old at that age. A friend asked me how we were handling the aging process, and I realized what a great question that was for ANY age you might be. No one wants to be considered OLD, but as the joke goes: think of the alternative.

In Nora Ephron’s best-selling book, “I Feel Bad About My Neck”, she laments about the sorry state of her 60-something neck. “Our faces are lies and our necks are the truth.” Well, it’s true I’m sorry to say. You can only get so much “stretch” out of skin, and unless you have a long neck, what’s the point? Face lifts are great and I know a lot people who have them. One doctor friend came to a function of ours, looked at another guest and stated “Face lift and nose job”. And he was right. Another friend approaching her second or third marriage had a lift so that she would knock the socks off the groom. Unfortunately it turned out badly, so she postponed the wedding until things calmed down.

We do spend a lot of time and money trying to reverse the signs of aging. We need to get over our stereotypes about growing older and the loss of our beauty. But it’s going, so do what you can and forget it. It’s even bad to refinish antique furniture because you greatly diminish its value.

The change of decades in our lives brings many different reactions. Long ago, a friend asked if he might spend the evening with us as it was his wife’s 30th birthday and she was feeling testy. I began asking people how these changes affected them. Several men seemed to feel anxious at forty, feeling they had not accomplished what they had hoped by that age. It’s different for everyone. Dr. Advice seems to take a great deal of pride in informing people that he will soon be 89. Women, while not exactly hiding their age, do not broadcast it so readily.

Don’t get bogged down in all the hype about aging. There’s nothing you can do; the clock is going to tick away.

Your life won’t stay the same, aging changes everyone. Our frame of reference changes. Our bodies change, and ill health sometimes puts us out of commission. A dose of healthy denial can improve your attitude. The people who do that aren’t thinking that much about getting older. They have accepted the changes and are aging gracefully.

If you live to be 95 years old you’re a survivor. You probably are not going to be living in a big house and driving your car to the grocery store and walking a mile for exercise. Life grows smaller, we get slower, and our steps get shorter. But if you know that ahead of time, it’s much easier to manage it.

But is it possible? Of course it’s possible. It may take a little more effort than you have become used to, but we all have to accept the challenge and learn the new “language”. You don’t REALLY want to be younger again no matter what your age. You simply want to fit in with whatever age group you are with.

One of the best parts of growing older is you have so much more to remember, but you need to keep making those memories all along. Keep learning new things; remember that people are learning from you. The GenFab (those in their 80’s) have no role models; they just have to keep making it up as they go along.

OUT OF THE WOODS

“Out Of The Woods” sculpture by kayti sweetland rasmussn

It’s incredible what crazy thoughts come to fruition when wine glows sleepily in the stomach and the fire glows happily on the hearth. It was so for us many years ago while enjoying good after dinner conversation with our friend Emmett Oliver after a day of fishing. “Why don’t we all go hiking through the Olympics” he asked. It seemed like a good idea,and it was his home territory and the fact that he would come with us made it the best idea in the world.

Emmett Oliver’s house on the Hood Canal

We got the maps out, and from our location at Lilliwaup at the Hood Canal, Washington, there were no end of good starting places. Rivers ran straight through the Olympic Mountain to the ocean, and with some bearing fascinating names like Queets, Duckabush, Hamma Hamma and Dosewallips, who could resist.

We were city folk living in California at the time, and though we were long time campers, I had never seen a backpack let alone carry one. Our plan was not to hike the entire width, but to do a manageable 15 or 20 mile hike and then come back. It would condition us for a longer future hike.

We had to take advantage of friends who had Boy Scouts in order to borrow backpacks and other necessary supplies. We borrowed a couple of backpacks, one with wooden frame from a father and the other smaller one with exposed metal pipe frame from his son. We gave them a trial run around the block, and then began loading them up for a ten day hike.

We drove back to Seattle and the Hood Canal, and found that Emmett could not go with us. So we strapped the loads which would be our homes onto our city slicker backs and set out for the Duckabush trail.

We first stopped at the General Store in Brinnon and bought candy bars and a large bag of grapes. I began to feel the weight of my pack with its metal frame cutting into my tender shoulders before we even crossed the highway into the woods, but Dr. A. ex-Boy Scout as he is, strode confidently into our new leafy green home.

Along with the discomfort in my shoulders and back, my feet began to join the painful chorus as my new unfamiliar boots began to pinch.

To take my mind off the pain, I sang loudly. It wasn’t long before my stomach began to rebel from the sweet grapes, and I begged to sit on a nearby rock. We had not made very good time toward our expected resting place for the night which was a small hut used by backpackers deeper into the woods.

We were soon overtaken by a noisy group of people coming our way, disturbing all sense of peacefulness in the forest. Coming around the bend, keeping a fast pace was a troop of small Boy Scouts and their Leader, behaving as if they were on a day walk in the park (which they were) instead of on this great hiking experience like us. They would learn the secrets that old trails and stones only tell children. I would try to learn them in the next ten days.

The first night, while listening to the forest sounds, I imagined bears and mountain lions as well as bearded unwashed tramps joining us in the campers’ hut. Though no large four-legged beasts attacked us during our hike, we always had the company of small furry critters who scampered across sleeping bags and faces each night.

The early mornings were one of my favorite times of the day, when birdsong greeted us and sunlight lay in bright puddles on the floor of the forest. The other time was at the end of the hiking day, when nursing bruises and back pain, I could drop my pack and lay on my back watching the bats take off on their evening flight for food.

Olympic Rainforest

Some of the largest trees on the planet cradled us to sleep each night. Douglas Fir, Sitka Spruce, Red Cedar, and always ferns and moss. We were not to escape the frequent rain giving it the rainforest name, and on nights we did not reach a camper hut, we were sheltered by our small and cozy tube tents which had the habit of leaking, until we awoke several times with soggy sleeping bags.

Five days into the woods we had reached our goal and turned back toward civilization. We were seasoned hikers by now, though our blisters would take awhile to heal, and at the end of the trail, we were ready for the next long distance hike, this time with our own back packs.

Through the years, backpacking became a favorite kind of vacation, often with grandsons who still load up and take off into the woods.

WHAT IS IT ABOUT TITLES?

“I Am Home” original watercolor painting by kayti sweetland rasmussen
,

We are always advised to make a title inviting. To use it as a “hook” to get people to read or look at something we have created.
After all, who would want to see something bland and uninteresting? I have been making art and writing for most of my life, and I have yet to find the composing of titles an easy job. It has even been suggested to me that the titles I apply to my blog posts could be a bit more….you know. (My loved one is so forthcoming.)

Early on I used to try and think of great titles for my paintings or sculptures. I was even known to think of something and do a painting to match the title. As the years went by if the art stayed around, I would change the name on occasion. I have even found myself lazily changing the name of a piece which was sold long ago on its archive record. Dr. Advice will often ask “Wasn’t that painting called ….?” I am ashamed to admit I do not remember. Once out of my hands….. Foundries to which I have entrusted a piece sometimes suggested a better name, to which I often shrugged a shoulder. What’s really in a name?

Long time readers will remember that I frequently changed my own name as a child as well. Serving as my own shrink I determined some years ago that a change of name was an easy way to shake up the status quo and enter the world of pretend.

We too all have titles. Miss, Ms., Mrs. Are they really important in telling people who we really are? Emily Post and Miss Manners tell us there is a right way in written address for unmarried women, married women, divorced women and widowed women. How many people pay attention to those rules unless printed on heavy white bond paper in a social situation? According to that I am not kayti sweetland rasmussen, but a replica of my husband with Mrs. planted in front of it. Mrs. Dr. Advice probably doesn’t fly.

We are each unique. Many artists resort to the number system. If you can’t think of a name for a piece of art, give it a number. If you give it a big number it makes it seem as if there had been many precursors which is intriguing to those who decide to like what they see and they think you must be very important. I hesitate to resort to that method when recalling that prisoners and Holocaust victims are given numbers.

I have known people to give their pets the same name as their predecessor. That must be rather insulting to a new dog when he realizes that when their name is called, their master is remembering another.

In studying some of my family records, the name Hiram comes up three times, one after the other. It makes it hard to distinguish which Hiram made the dresser in my guest room, Hiram one, two or three, without looking through the papers. My own name, occurring in several generations, presents the same problem, though none of us was a cabinetmaker. It’s left to succeeding generations to make the call.

WOULDN’T YOU KNOW IT?

I woke up a month or so ago and took a good look at my thinning hair and its effect on the wrinkles on my face. It was clearly a cry for help; namely another wig/hairpiece/style. There seems to be some sort of stigma attached to the wearing of a wig, so we will refer to it as a “style”. I have no idea why this disturbs some people. Celebrities obviously would never be caught dead in their own scraggly locks. Watching an old Lucille Ball show, Dr. Advice chirped “There! You can see she isn’t wearing a wig!” Really?! I don’t think his poor old eyes were twirling in the right direction. Not only is she wearing a wig, it isn’t even the right shade of red.

Anyway, I ordered one from a reputable place in whom I placed great trust that they would choose a complimentary shade of grey from their 50 choices. Wen it came, I thought it must be wrong, because my hair is blonde-ish, not silver. Well, Dr. A. liked it anyway, so I wore it to Seattle, and first cracker out of the barrel—my daughter did not. I hung it over a door knob during my visit and vowed to try again.

This time I bought from a catalogue with a picture of my hair color. The trick to ordering from the catalogue is to cover up the faces because they use adorable young women as models, who probably don’t need a wig anyway. You have to imagine yourself wearing it and flipping it about as you would something actually attached to your head. You don’t want it to scream “WIG” do you?

I loved it immediately and plopped it on my head to show Dr. A. I got a thumbs up, so I wore it to Southern California to visit my other daughter. She loved it too, so we went out to lunch at a favorite Mexican place in Camarillo, which is conveniently next door to a wig shoppe. ( I spell it that old fashioned way because it is just on the verge of being posh.) We had with us that day our eight year old great granddaughter Savanna, who flipped out when she saw all the plastic heads staring at us from the window dressed in varying lengths and shades of blonde, brown, black and even one with purple strands throughout, (it was Halloween). Naturally we went in, and since I was wearing the new style, I asked the lady behind the desk if she thought it could use some touches. She played around with it, gave it a spritz of hair spray and off I went, pleased as a puppy with a new bone.

That evening my friend Greg said he wouldn’t have known it was a ‘you-know-what’ and I choose to believe him. Now it sits alongside all my other hair styles, some of which really are not my color anymore; there may even be a strawberry blonde one because I always wanted to be a redhead. They probably have more fun than blondes. Vanity, thy name is woman. (I read that somewhere years ago when I was first married. It obviously made no impression.) This will now give Savanna something more to dwell on along with what she calls my fake teeth and fake shoulder. The rest of her family is perking along on all fours.

Forgive the idiocy, I simply had to tell you.

THE GENERAL AND THE MADAM

Stephen Watts Kearny was promoted to Brigadier General when the Mexican-American War broke out. He had been serving as military governor in California for a few months, but upon his promotion he gathered a force of 2,500 men and led them from Fort Leavenworth in the Kansas territory to the town of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Kearny was a handsome,serious and youthful 52 years old at the time. He had been well-liked during his governorship, and Kearny Street in San Francisco was named for him.

The Mexican soldiers stationed in Santa Fe scattered when they heard he was coming leaving Kearny to take control of the territory. He appointed Charles Bent, an American trader living in Taos, as governor, and left for California with 300 men. He left 800 soldiers in Santa Few and sent another 800 to capture El Paso

However there was a minor problem. The payroll for the U.S. soldiers was late in arriving in Santa fe, and the soldiers weren’t getting paid.

At the same time, there was in Santa Fe a successful madam, who ran a gambling house that the American soldiers patronized. Maria Gertrudis Barcelo realized that Santa Fe under the Americans would be very good for her business.

Her saloon, with sparkling crystal chandeliers and floors covered with European carpets, was described as running the length of a block in the center of town. Barcelo, known as La Tules, was very good at gambling. According to reports, she was always richly dressed and covered with jewelry. Some said she was beautiful, others reported that she was not so good looking, but everyone agreed there was no one better at the card game monte than she was, dealing night after night often until dawn.

She was well-known and politically connected in Santa Fe, and it was said that Kearny gave her a military escort to the Victory Ball at La Fonda Hotel. It was also said that she was the one who persuaded the Mexican governor of Santa Fe to leave and let the Americans take over the place.

When La Tules heard that the American soldiers weren’t getting paid, she lent the U.S. Army the money to take care of the payroll.

Because she heard gossip in her saloon by highly placed political figures of every make, she could also pass valuable information on to the U.S. Army. In December, 1846, she warned the Army of a Mexican-Indian conspiracy that threatened the Americans.

La Tules died a very wealthy woman and left a good part of her fortune to the church, ensuring an impressive funeral presided over by Archbishop Jean Baptiste Lamy, whom you will remember from Willa Cather’s fine book “Death Comes To the Archbishop.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A few years later, in the 1960’s, Dr. Advice with a group of colleagues, stayed at the La Fonda for two or three weeks. Twenty years later, on another visit to Santa Fe, he asked if the owner was still living, and was assured that she was on the premises and would be glad to see him. A very elderly lady emerged from the back office, and after being introduced she smiled and said “Oh you’re part of those troublemakers who stayed here twenty years ago! Of course I remember you.” She graciously paid our room tab and supplied a delicious dinner. The La Fonda is still a fine historic hotel in the middle of the Plaza. I never found out exactly what that group of youngish “troublemakers’ had done to warrant her remembrance.