… and, by “new year” I don’t mean 2023, I mean “new year” as in embarking on my latest year-long journey around the sun. I turned another year older a few days ago.
Birthday celebrations now are very different than they were when I was younger. I don’t want to open gifts or go out to a fancy dinner. I’d much rather spend the day exploring someplace interesting, enjoying a home-cooked meal, and, of course, consuming a piece of the delectable Caramelized Orange Cheesecake my husband makes me every year (happy wife, happy life).
Check, check, and check.
You may have read about all the rain California has been experiencing lately. Gosh knows we need it, but maybe not all at once. Here in the southern part of the state, the weather has been milder, but the king tides and stormy surf have brought big waves and some flooding to our coastal areas.
On my birthday, following a day of especially high tides, my husband and I drove to a local beach to watch the pounding surf and see the aftermath of surging water, seaweed, and sand.
This boardwalk is usually filled with walkers, skateboarders, and bicyclists. It will probably be a few days before all the sand is back on the beach… where it’s suppose to be.
Although we missed all the excitement, we heard tales of waves plunging over the seawall, leaving a thick layer of sand that will have to be shoveled back onto the beach.
Our walk also took us to Belmont Park, a beachfront amusement park built in 1925.
Although the interior has been modernized, I’m glad they maintained the Spanish Renaissance style façade.
When I was very young, our parents often took my brothers and me swimming at The Plunge, a huge indoor pool located in the park. The building and pool have recently been renovated, but the sound of kids playing, and the smell of chlorine still brought back many happy memories.
After visiting the pool, we walked around the arcade and midway area for a bit of people watching. That’s when I decided I had to ride the Giant Dipper—the historical wooden roller coaster that was also a part of my childhood—again. Although the roller coaster has been refurbished since I last rode it, it still had the bone-rattling twists, turns and downhill plunges I remembered from my youth.
There is something about a roller coaster that brings out the kid in us.
Topping off the first day of my latest journey around the sun, I dug into a yummy husband-cooked meal before plunging into my favorite birthday treat: Caramelized Orange Cheesecake.
It was the perfect ending to a perfect day.
This week’s Sunday Stills prompt is Plunge. Please visit Terri’s site to see how other bloggers took the challenge.
This short story was written for Donna and Deb’sWhat’s On Your Plate? monthly food fest. Although the story is fiction, the relish is not… and it’s pretty darn good!
Nancy arrived at her aunt’s house, clutching her Thanksgiving offering to her chest. As soon as she opened the front door and crossed the threshold, she could smell the delicious aromas wafting from the kitchen. To her right was her aunt’s living room, where she could see her extended family gathered for pre-dinner appetizers.
Before anyone noticed her arrival, Nancy dipped into the dining room to deposit her bowl onto the buffet table. Looking at the side dishes other guests had brought, she again felt uneasy about her recipe choice. She suspected that it was her tiny kitchen and questionable cooking skills that prompted Aunt Trish to ask her to bring cranberry sauce, a recipe that would be difficult to mess up. All she had to do was to follow the instructions on the package. Few ingredients, easy recipe, crowd favorite – what could go wrong?
The answer would have been nothing, had she not been listening to the radio Monday morning and heard NPR’s Susan Stamberg’s rich, dulcet voice describing her mother-in-law’s cranberry relish. Her recipe sounded simple enough and nothing like traditional cranberry sauce. Nancy thought it might be just the thing to impress her family. All she needed to do was to purchase a few additional ingredients: a small onion, sour cream, and horseradish.
Looking back, she realized she should have reconsidered when she read the first step: grind the raw berries and onion together. When she scanned the rest of the recipe for cooking instructions she found none. Odd, she thought. But Ms. Stamberg wouldn’t steer me wrong.
The night before, Nancy pulled out her little-used mini-chopper, cutting board, kitchen knife, mixing spoon, and her one serving bowl that had a plastic lid. Seeing everything laid out on her counter had been both scary and exhilarating. I can do this.
Since her chopper was small, she had to work in batches. As soon as one batch was reduced to chunks (do not puree, the recipe warned), she dumped it in the serving bowl and added more berries and onion to the chopper. When she finished, she admired the confetti of red and white bits for a moment before moving on to the next step.
She added the sour cream, sugar, and horseradish to the bowl and started to mix everything with her spoon. That’s when it hit her that she may have made a huge mistake. The more she blended, the more the mixture took on a bright pink hue. Oh my god, it looks like I’ve made a big bowl of Pepto Bismol.
She glanced at her watch and realized that it was too late to go back to the store and start over. She was going to have to push on. Following the directions, she covered the bowl and put it in the freezer to freeze overnight.
An hour before she was expected at her aunt’s house, she moved the bowl from the freezer to the refrigerator to thaw. The overnight miracle she hoped for hadn’t happened: the concoction was just as pink as it was the night before. I will never hear the end of this.
***
The buffet table was crowded with the usual side dishes expected at Thanksgiving dinner, including—to Nancy’s relief—a few bowls of traditional cranberry sauce. Sitting among the other dishes, her chunky pink goo looked like a drunken harlot had appeared, uninvited, at a black-tie affair.
Nancy quickly forgot about her culinary catastrophe when she entered the living room and was immediately engulfed by her relatives. She loved this time of year when holiday celebrations brought everyone together. After greeting her aunts, uncles, and cousins, Nancy made a beeline for her older sister and brother-in-law.
Seven Thanksgivings ago, when her sister, Anne, brought Marty home from college and introduced him as her boyfriend, Nancy was smitten. She loved how Marty could energize a room just by being there and envied his self-confidence. He expected people to like him, and they did. That he was funny, kind, and good to Anne, made Nancy love him even more. When Anne and Marty announced their engagement a few years later, Nancy knew that she was about to gain the big brother she had always wished for.
Soon, everyone was called into the dining room and took their traditional places at the large table. Aunt Trish placed a huge platter of sliced turkey in the middle, then distributed the side dishes to be passed around. Murmurs of anticipatory pleasure could be heard as the bowls moved from hand to hand, at least until Cousin Ned was passed the bright pink concoction.
“What the heck is this?”
“It’s cranberry relish,” Nancy said. “It has horseradish in it,” she added, hoping that piece of information would make the dish sound more enticing.
“Hmmm,” Ned responded, spooning out a tiny bit of the relish and depositing it on the very edge of his plate.
Nancy could feel her face grow hot as she watched her bowl move around the table. Some took a small amount, but most passed the bowl on without comment. Why did I have to try something different? When the bowl reached Marty, he looked straight at her, gave her a wink, and took a large scoop.
“This looks great,” he said loud enough for everyone to hear. “I bet it would be really good on the turkey.”
Nancy gave him a grateful smile and was pleased to see several people taking larger scoops as the bowl continued to be passed around.
After everyone had helped themselves to turkey and sides, the dining room filled with lively conversation and the sounds of utensils clinking against plates.
Amid a friendly debate with her uncle about who was going to win the World Cup, Nancy’s attention was distracted when she heard, “This pink stuff is really good. Have you tried it?” She looked to her left and saw that Cousin Judy’s turkey slices were covered with her relish. Glancing around the table, she noticed bright pink scoops on almost all of the plates. Suddenly, her embarrassment from bringing a dish no one wanted was replaced by a feeling of pride. Her cranberry relish was a hit.
***
Of all the Thanksgiving traditions she enjoyed, one of Nancy’s favorites was helping her aunt clean up after the guests were gone. It gave them some quiet time to talk about the evening and share family updates the other might have missed. Standing at the sink, Nancy picked up her bowl from the stack of dishes waiting to be washed and was happy to find most of the relish gone. After she washed the bowl, she handed it over to her aunt for drying.
“Thank you for bringing your relish,” Aunt Trish said, smiling. “It was really different, but in a good way. Can I ask you to bring it again for Christmas dinner? I think it would be perfect with the roast I’ll be serving. You just may have started a new family tradition.”
Mama Stamberg’s Cranberry Relish
2 cups raw cranberries, washed
1 small onion
½ cup sugar
¾ cup sour cream
2 tablespoons horseradish
Grind cranberries and onion together until chunky (not pureed). Add everything else. Mix. Put in a container and freeze. An hour or so before serving, move the relish from the freezer to the refrigerator to thaw.
One of the many things my husband and I love about Mexico are the public celebrations. Religious celebrations, wedding celebrations, birthday celebrations, and who-the-heck-knows-why celebrations are often at least partially held where onlookers are welcome to share in the festivities.
Every weekend during our stay in San Miguel de Allende, a wedding (or three, or four) was held in the stunning Parroquia church. Once the wedding mass was over, the bridal party and guests would spill out into the courtyard and onto the street in front of the church. A fancy car or horse and carriage would often be waiting to take the newlyweds to their reception, but not before the invited guests – and anyone in the area at the time – were swept up in the joyful celebration.
The bride and groom waving goodbye before leaving for their reception.
On our way to dinner one evening, we stopped to watch an expat’s 70th birthday celebration. Along with her and her partner’s guests, lucky onlookers enjoyed the revelry, which included a mariachi band, dancing in the street, and the antics of the giant mojigangas (pronounced mo-he-gan-gas) that were decorated to look a bit like the couple.
Betty, celebrating her 70th birthday.
Dancing in the street with the giant mojigangas to the music of the mariachi band.
One event that is unique to San Miguel is Dia de Los Locos (day of the crazies), which is an annual celebration that takes place in June. Los Locos has deep religious roots but much of the festivities appear to be completely secular. Although the day begins with a mass at the San Antonio church (which was just a few blocks from our housesit), once the participants head out to the streets where the crowds are waiting, all vestiges of religion fall away.
As the flamboyant procession moves along the main avenue, onlookers are treated to wild (and often delightfully politically incorrect) costumes, loud music, dancing, and hard candy projectiles being tossed their way. Over 10,000 participants join in the parade costumed as cartoon characters, politicians, clowns (both friendly and scary), and fantasy figures, while an even larger crowd watches from the sidewalks that line the route.
Celebrations and festivals are an integral part of Mexican life. In San Miguel, barely a day goes by that does not commemorate a patron saint, a beloved chapel, or a revolutionary hero. And then, of course, are the personal celebrations like weddings, anniversaries, or birthdays. We were very grateful to not only be there when many of these celebrations occurred, but also grateful to be able to join in and share the joy.
I would be less than honest if I didn’t admit that I miss my family’s traditional Thanksgiving celebrations. Unlike Hollywood’s version of dysfunctional families gathering for the annual angst-fest, our small family didn’t do drama or have arguments about grievances from long-ago. We all got along and enjoyed each other’s company.
My grandfather carving the turkey in 1964.
My mother and father hosted our family’s Thanksgiving dinners until it became too much of a burden for age-related reasons. At that point, my brother and his wife, who live locally, took over the duties and then raised the meal up a notch by introducing smoked turkey and prime rib to the menu. They also introduced a few of their friends to the mix and Thanksgiving became a bit livelier but still enjoyable and drama-free. My other brother and his family usually were able to make it down from northern California to join in the festivities.
Things started to change after my parents passed away. Like many families, they were the glue that held everything together and, once they were gone, my brothers and I slowly started to develop separate holiday traditions of our own. There were no discussions or explanations, we just began to move in different directions. I think we all understood that, even though we loved each other, our lives had diverged, and we had different paths we wanted to take around the holidays. The local brother and his wife have gotten very involved with their church and spend Thanksgiving with friends they have met there. My other brother and his wife usually spend the long weekend at a seaside hotel not too far from where they live.
Over the past several years, my husband and I have explored different ways to celebrate Thanksgiving. We’ve been invited to the homes of friends and we’ve invited friends to ours. We’ve traveled to be with relatives and we’ve stayed home and dined quietly on our own. Each version of a Thanksgiving celebration – big, small, home, away – has pluses and minuses but we’ve enjoyed them all.
This year, we have invited a couple of friends to join us for Thanksgiving dinner at our home. We’ll have the traditional offerings and are looking forward to a pleasant evening of good food and great conversation. Maybe next year we will find ourselves out of town – or even out of the country. But, no matter how we decide to spend the holiday each year, I am grateful for my warm memories of past celebrations, and for the flexibility to build new ones in a variety of shapes and sizes.
“The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival…. with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more.”
~John Adams, in a letter to his wife, dated July 3rd, 1776
John Adams was right about the “pomp and parade,” but not about the date. The legal separation of the thirteen colonies from Great Britain occurred on July 2, 1776. The Declaration of Independence (the statement that explained this decision) was debated, revised, then approved two days later on July 4th (can anyone imagine anything like that happening so quickly these days?). From the beginning, our nation has commemorated the date shown on the Declaration of Independence, not the date the original resolution of independence was approved.
I am grateful to be able to join in the “great anniversary festival” of my country’s birthday. I’m also grateful that it is today, not the “2nd of July” we celebrate… it just doesn’t have the same ring to it.
Although the timing of our recent stay in Oaxaca didn’t coincide with any of the large festivals that city is famous for, there was no lack of celebratory events. And, lucky for us, many of these festivities took place in public so we could experience the magic, color, music, and joy of an Oaxacan celebration.
We had no idea what this parade was for, but we were happy to join in!
Whether it was a wedding, graduation, quinceanera, or a religious celebration of unknown (to us) origin, the cobblestone streets were often filled with revelry and processions. What I especially liked about these celebrations is that they weren’t arranged by the chamber of commerce or designed to entertain tourists. Instead, they were authentic and steeped in ritual. That we were there to witness the festivities was fine, but the celebration was for the invited guests, the citizens of Oaxaca, and for those who roots run deep in its culture and traditions.
A wedding spills out into the streets from Santo Domingo.
Almost every wedding we saw had giant paper mache figures dressed as husband and wife.
Newlyweds celebrating in the streets.
Many of Oaxaca’s festivals trace their origin to indigenous rituals that were later combined with Catholicism, brought to the region by Spanish conquistadores. One such holiday, Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), is celebrated on the same day as All Saints Day (November 1st) and All Souls Day (November 2nd). Unlike the solemn rituals surrounding these Catholic holidays, Dia de los Muertos is marked with festivals, parades, and celebrations. The holiday and its rituals recognize death as a natural part of the human experience. The departed are seen as part of the community and on these days, they are awakened from their eternal sleep to share celebrations with their loved ones.
During the Day of the Dead celebrations, this cemetery will be filled with people and flowers.
Other festivals that are tempting us for a return visit include the huge Fiesta Guelaguetza, held in July, and the many festivals surrounding the Christmas season including Noche de Rabanos (Night of the Radishes), which brings people from all over the valley into the city center to display their homegrown radishes that have been carved into imaginative sculptures .
Whether they are remembering their departed loved ones, marking a religious holiday, or observing part of their ancient culture, the people of Oaxaca are creative and artistic, exuberant and friendly. They know how to celebrate and, best of all, we are all welcome to join in.
Retirementally Challenged 