Just Beth

Time to just write, so please excuse the verbal vomiting that is about to take place.

I find myself coming back to this place day after day, opening up a new, blank screen and NOT finding the inspiration to write.  I don’t know why.  It bothers me, though… a blank page is the most divine thing I can imagine.  It represents new beginnings, endless possibilities, coming to terms with anything that’s been bugging me.

That may be the problem, there’s been too much bugging me lately.

I’ll start with a day, May eighteenth.

It’s a big day for me, at least this year.  Two things have happened on May eighteenth that beg me to give them space here, to discuss and think about and then hopefully leave here.  The first is an anniversary.  In 2008 we bought this house.  It closed on May eighteenth.  My daughter Sally was born in July, so I was approximately eight years pregnant when we moved in.  I unpacked and organized the kitchen first, moving the plates, etc about a dozen times.  It truly, truly sucked.  Now, I love my house… rather, I love WHERE my house is.  Its a funky, old, poorly built house set on the point of a long, warbley triangle of land covered in evergreen trees and magic fairy ponds.  I  see green, lush foliage out of every window, and when I walk out back I hear rushing streams – two of them.  I love it here.

May eighteenth is also my older brother’s birthday.  Did you know that I have an older brother?  Well, I did, anyway.  Now all I have is a hole in my heart where he used to live.  Last year he created, lived in, and then routinely destroyed this place in my heart.  He did it like any dirt-bag man uses women, callously and with no care for anyone but himself.  To say that I am still hurt is an understatement, a silly conglomerate of words that lack the depth of my feelings.  I had thought for weeks about an appropriate (or rather, inappropriate) post to dedicate to him on his birthday, even coming up with the title.  Wanna hear it?  I’m going to screw up the apostrophe’s, so forgive me, but you’ll get the idea.  It was going to be called “NOT My Brother’s” Birthday.  And it was going to be about what a total and complete waste of space he is.  The more I thought about it the less I felt inclined to say, which sounds like a good thing but I am still so pissed off and hurt by him that I WANT to talk about it, to purge it from my system and close off that fucking hole he made.  I guess it’s not time for that yet.

Next lets talk about medication.  Many of you know that I suffered MAJOR post-partum depression after I had Sally, and continued after I had Bobby.  Well, it was time to go off of it, so I did.  I quit cold turkey.  Not the most fun thing I’ve done but it felt right, even when I was pretty certain that I was going to lose my mind and never return.  So I bought chickens instead.  No, I’m not kidding, and no, I didn’t REALLY get chickens to keep me from the brink of insanity.  I bought chickens because A) I want them; B) I have this aforementioned lovely patch of land, which includes a chicken coop, and C) because my family and I LOVE eggs.  Adore them.  I make about a half-dozen eggs a day, almost every day.  The real question is why it’s taken us so long to do this.  I bought five chicks, three Welsummers and two Buff Orpingtons.  They are currently living in a plastic tub in my ‘guest’ bedroom.  We’ll get a bigger ‘brooder’ box next week and they’ll begin living outside.  They’re so cute and they make the nicest little chirps when I come into the room.

I digress, though.  I felt horrible for about a month and REALLY terrible for another couple of weeks, but I’m doing great now.  If I could get some sleep, there’d be no stopping me!

Anyway, hopefully this will jump start my creative juices so I can start regaling you all with my hilarity and wit once again.  Tomorrow, I’ll post some pics at the very least.  Because oh my LORD child, the THINGS I have done with my hair…!!

Thanks for stopping by… ~xo, b!

*my* version of Cynthia Lair's Read Bean and Quinoa Chilli

I started cooking about three years ago.  Yes, you read that correctly.  Yes, I have a fourteen year old, a three year old and a two year old.  See, I spent most of my teen years pretending I didn’t exist, hiding in my bedroom with a novel shoved under the covers and acting like I was doing my homework.  My mom was a good cook, and she scared the hell out of me, so I stayed OUT of the kitchen and decided I wasn’t the Stay-At-Home-Mom TYPE.  (*GUFFAW*)  I entered my adulthood truly handicapped and without skills.

When I got pregnant with my eldest, his father had been working at a restaurant as a cook.  He was (is) a great cook, actually… when we were together we were going to start a restaurant and call it “Stick O’Butter”, because everything he made was delicious and he usually used an entire stick of butter in it’s preparation.  God, sometimes I miss the South.

Anyway, then when I married Andy, he was also the cook in the relationship.  I won’t get too far into it, but the man can make a three course meal including stuffed Portabello mushrooms and crab legs on a hot plate.  True story.

Don’t get me wrong; I used to cook the SHIT out of a couple of chicken breasts, topped with a slice of cheese, brown rice and broccoli for my eldest about three times a week.  I could also boil pasta and heat up spaghetti sauce, and make my mothers tuna casserole, which no one but me ever eats even to this day.

Then I met Cynthia Lair.  She is my mentor; my guru.  It was happenstance, really… see, I was attending my very first La Leche League Conference in October of ’06, and had a time where there wasn’t anything I truly WANTED to attend, and so went to her session on Whole Food cooking for the family.  It was before everyone on the planet figured out the goodness of whole foods, and I feel that I was a big part of the reason everyone is eating so well these days.  *wink*

I bought her cookbook, (which she SIGNED,  woot!!) took it home and studied it like a bible.  I picked what I thought would be yummy, made lists and lists of ingredients and spices, and started cooking.  It was hard at first, but it was like a trial by fire and now I feel like I can actually COOK.

Nothing frightens me (cooking wise, anyway!) anymore.  So when my friend Lorna started putting recipes on her blog, I tried them.  Well, OK, sorry Lorna, but I tried ONE.  This one, the one for refried beans.  And OMG, they’re DELICIOUS.  I highly recommend them!

Crock Pot Refried Beans

Ingredients:

3 cups dry pinto beans
9 cups water
1 onion, diced
1/2 jalapeno pepper, de-seeded and minced (WEAR GLOVES FOR THIS.  I’m not joking.  and if you don’t use gloves, do NOT use the potty for the next twenty four hours.  Trust me.)
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp cumin
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper

I don’t pre-soak these, although Ms. Lair would.  She would also add some kombu to hers… kombu is a sea vegetable (read; seaweed) that adds iron and other good for you minerals to your beans.  I bought a package and used all of it…  if you want to try, you would cook the beans and kombu and then remove the kombu before you mash the beans.  It’s slimy and difficult to get all the way ‘out’, just so you know.  And yes, you should get it all out.

Anyway, so you throw everything into the crockpot and cook it.  Honestly, that’s it.  When it’s done cooking, you’ll know because you will be able to easily mash the beans (and it will smell divine).  I will normally put mine together at night and set it on low for ten hours, that usually does it.  You can put it on high for six hours if you’re in a hurry, but I would recommend doing it slowly.

When the beans are done, drain as much of the water as you can, SAVE IT, and mash them with a potato masher.  You can put them in a blender if you’d like, but I find that the consistency is better using a masher.  You will need to reintroduce the liquid as you mash to get your desired consistency.  You will also want to have some of the liquid on hand if you are going to re-heat them.  I’ve kept mine going and good for nearly a week this way.  I haven’t had the opportunity to freeze them, although I made a double batch today and I am going to try freezing some of them.

There you have it!  Enjoy!

~xo, b!