I first started doing so. After all an egg in its shell has a kind of natural beauty all its own. And cooked eggs bring back so many happy, delicious memories. As a little girl, on Sunday mornings, I remember my dad frying up eggs and bacon in that cast iron frying that was blackened and crusted with age. Just thinking about it brings to mind the wonderful, comforting aroma that permeated the home. When I visited Europe, I learned that eggs for breakfast are associated with Americans. Especially, eggs fried sunny side up. It seemed to me that the Germans and Austrians tended to think of them as symbols of our culturally youthful naivete. I suspected they believed we saw life as sunny side up and we wanted our eggs that way too. And now we are told that that lovely egg can be a missile of death!
Is this really true???? Perhaps the threat of eggs to our health has been exaggerated. Yet for some time I have been thinking we would have to pay for placing profit over the natural needs of animals. The latest news has it that even organic eggs may be suspect. I’m off to check this out, but part of me still wonders how a lovely egg could now be a fatal attraction. Now, where did they say to go on the net to check this out?
Wordsworth, poetry, and me
Posted on August 26, 2010 by June
I think it was in fifth grade or so when our class was introduced to Wordsworth. Though my mom and dad were intelligent and very loving, they were not what you would call “book lovers”. Poems were just what others called poems, and pretty much remote from the substance of my life. That is, until I met up with Wordsworth’s closing lines in his poem” I wandered lonely as a cloud” “…and then my heart with pleasure fills and dances with the daffodils.”
Those words hit me, somewhere deep inside, somewhere between my young mind and my heart. That cold, dreary morning on the walk to school, I also “lonely as a cloud” had been lifted from my dismal surroundings by the graceful shape and dazzling yellow of some daffodils. The pleasure of the moment was exquisite. And it was amazing to me that I could experience emotions that had been felt by a famous poet, emotions that had been expressed so wonderfully.
From that time forward, poetry had new meaning for me. Poetry wasn’t just lines of verse written in accordance with established rules, as it had seemed to me at the time. It wasn’t until many years later that I learned of how Emily Dickinson said she knew when she was reading poetry. It went something like: “when I feel as though the top of my head has been cut off, I know it is poetry!” Although I will be 80 on my next birthday, if I am lucky enough to get there, I have never found a better definition. Thank you, Emily, for rejecting all those high fallutin‘, scholarly formulas. I understand what you meant, and you were and are SO RIGHT!
Potato chips, the girl down the block and WWII
Posted on August 29, 2010 by June
Some may think living in an apartment building that belonged to one’s parents might be a pretty good way to grow up, and it was. That is, looking back over the years from an adult perspective. After all, it was the largest apartment building on the block. Of course, like most kids, I wanted more than anything else to blend into the pack. Being a landlord’s daughter, and living in a small apartment in our building (though it was first floor front, as my mother pointed out), did not make for a life I would have sought out.
No, I wanted to be just like the girl down the block. SHE lived in a real house that was surrounded by well-tended lawn and gardens. SHE had a mother who stayed home all day and twirled her daughter’s naturally curly, blond locks around her fingers after the girl emerged from a carefully drawn bath. SHE could pluck crisp red and white radishes from her garden and offer one to me. SHE had a large, welcoming front porch with a comfy swing. And I noticed with a pang of envy that she seemed to have a pack of friends.
I vividly remember sitting with her on her front steps while the two of us carefully licked the salt off Mrs. Japp’s Potato Chips before swallowing them. We were convinced we had discovered a new method of eating them that brought their flavor on our tongues to a new level. Little did passersby realize that the two little girls in sun suits on the steps were gourmands in the making!
A touch of harsh reality colors the picture, however, when I remember that World War II was just around the corner. Suddenly Mrs. Japp’s became Jay’s because Japp sounded just like Jap, and who would want to buy potato chips associated with those fiends with buckteeth who were out to kill us? The government told us these people were so dangerous to us that they had to be hunted down and thrown into camps for our protection. Yes, fortunately, as years passed this demonization of the Japanese gradually faded from the public memory.
But what a lesson here for me. My visit to Japan years later would, of course, confirm my positive appreciation for the Japanese people and culture. Actually, there are many things we could learn from them, including their awareness and respect for elders. Sure good for nothings are found in all cultures and old age is not a guarantee of character. Yet the expressions of courtesy for old age bring something beautiful into our lives, something sometimes missing in our growingly callous society.
And do you know something? Occasionally, I still lick the salt off of my potato chips. There’s food for thought there.
Keats and me and anonymous
Posted on August 31, 2010 by June
Thank you, anonymous, for nourishing me with your praise. To tell me that my blog conveys truth and beauty and helps to make life a little less hectic for my readers is the highest complement I could hope for. It wasn’t until it was later in life that I really comprehended the significance of the poet John Keats’ words: “Beauty is truth, truth beauty, –that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.” (Ode on a Grecian Urn)
How true! When we read the large body of superb poetry that Keats produced during the twenty-five years that he graced this planet, we have to step back in awe! And when we ponder the works of the great thinkers in the course of human development, we come back to the wisdom of his words. Some may find this truth and beauty in the Bible, some may find it elsewhere. Sometimes this truth and beauty can be found in the smile of the clerk at the checkout counter at the grocery store, or sometimes, in the supportive words of a loved one, if we are so fortunate.
Keats’ personal letters also reveal the astounding mind and heart behind his works. To know what he knew at such a young age and to reveal himself in such profoundly beautiful writings, what a gift to the world! And thank you, anonymous, for your priceless gift to me. When I wonder about the value of writing a blog at 79, I can savor your high praise. I only hope to merit it!
Strawberries and my mom
Posted on September 1, 2010 by June
Oh, how my mother loved strawberries! Strawberry pies, strawberry ice cream, strawberry cream filled chocolates, strawberry tarts, strawberry everything! I remember how she would wait for the peddler coming down the alley shouting strawberries, or at least something that sounded like strawberries. His voice would be hoarse from the repeated shouting, but we all knew what he was calling. When the price was right, and only when the price was right, my mother would buy them in quart sized cartons and make her memorable strawberry pie.
She would roll out her tender pie dough, fill it with the sugar coated scarlet berries, and then carefully interlace the narrow strips she had set aside to top her work of art. When the pie emerged from the oven, the color of the berries had changed to a rosy pink, and the glistening berry syrup ran out of the small diamonds created by the latticework and gave off an enticing aroma. I can still smell it.
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