memories – Retirementally Challenged

A freshly baked short story

This story was inspired by a recent blogpost by Deb, The Widow Badass. Her post (if you missed it, you can read it here… but don’t forget to come back!) told of finding a cookbook in a thrift store and discovering a cake recipe tucked between the pages. Speculation about the women – whose name was on the recipe – ensued in the comment section. Secret Ingredients is a story about that woman, her dear friend, Lettie, and how the recipe ended up inside Deb’s thrift store find.

Secret Ingredients

It had been a week since Lettie had attended the funeral of her best friend, so she was quite surprised to receive a package addressed in Violet’s hand with her return address affixed to the corner. Judging by the package’s shape and size, it most likely contained a book but Lettie was baffled. Why had her friend, knowing that she was close to the end of her life, made the effort to wrap, address, and mail Lettie a book?

Lettie carefully slipped her fingers under the tape and slowly unwrapped the package. When she saw what was inside, a flood of memories washed over her. The Christmas Cookbook had been an often-used and much-loved reference when Lettie and Violet were young mothers. They spent many enjoyable hours in their kitchens baking for their holiday celebrations. Lettie couldn’t recall if she or Violet purchased the book originally but it had been passed back and forth countless times. The last pass must have been to Violet before she and her husband moved across the country, and now she had returned it to her friend.

Through tears of loss, Lettie began to page through the book. Just about every recipe reminded her of happy times in their long friendship. The Edible Cookie Ornaments had delighted their young children and decorated their trees every year. The Black Forest Trifle disaster that had covered Violet’s kitchen in splattered chocolate and dissolved the two of them into fits of laughter.

When Lettie reached the cookbook’s index, she was surprised to find an envelope inserted between the pages. She held her breath as she retrieved the paper from the envelope, then let it out in a gasp. It was Violet’s recipe for her Christmas Cake, stained and wrinkled from years of use and with several barely legible handwritten notes in the margins.

Lettie and Violet had been best friends since high school. Almost from the moment they met, they knew theirs would be a special friendship – the sister neither of them had. They shared freely with each other: their hopes and dreams, clothes, makeup, and, best of all, the confidence that they would tell each other everything. No matter what.

After graduating high school, they attended the same college and, four years later, settled down in the same small town. When each eventually met the man they wanted to marry, they were relieved when the other gave her full approval. As close as they were, their husbands had to be friends too.

The only bump in their three decades of friendship happened about 15 years ago when Violet brought a cake to Lettie and Jim’s annual holiday open house. Lettie had worked hard getting ready for the party. She had been cooking for several days and was proud of the results. Despite all of the beautiful decorations and delicious food, it seemed that the only thing her guests talked about afterward was Violet’s amazing Christmas Cake. Everyone, including Lettie, asked her for the recipe but she declined, saying it was an old family recipe that needed to stay in the family.

It was the first time Lettie could remember that Violet wouldn’t share something with her. The fact that she said that it was a secret family recipe made the hurt even worse. Lettie considered Violet to be family and thought that her friend felt the same way.

Lettie knew that she was being overly sensitive so she did her best to talk herself out of her hurt. Violet was her best friend and a silly cake recipe shouldn’t come between them. When Violet brought the cake to other gatherings, Lettie joined in the praise. When her cake won second place at a holiday baking contest, Lettie congratulated her. Lettie liked to think she had completely moved on, but she knew that wasn’t true.

Now, years later, here was Violet’s Christmas Cake recipe. As Lettie looked over the ingredients, she couldn’t see what was so special about it. Flour, butter, eggs, sugar, dried fruit. Big deal. She read the handwritten notes carefully to see if there was any secret combining or baking techniques. Nothing.

Feeling a little let down, Lettie refolded the recipe and was about to tuck it back into the envelope when she noticed another piece of paper inside. Pulling it out, she saw that it was a letter written in Violet’s tiny, neat handwriting.

Dearest Lettie,

I have been going through my things when I’ve felt strong enough, putting aside items for the special people in my life. When I came across our old Christmas cookbook, I knew that I had to get it back to you. I hope you have as many fond memories of us baking from it as I do.

I’m also sending you the Christmas Cake recipe. I’m not sure if you remember, but years ago I brought the cake to one of your fabulous holiday parties. As you can see, the recipe is a simple one. Truth be told, I had found it in a magazine. After making a few minor changes, I claimed it as mine but it really wasn’t “my” cake. When you and several of your guests said they loved it and asked for the recipe, I was flustered. Out of embarrassment, I made up the story about it being a secret family recipe that I couldn’t share – even with you. Though you didn’t say anything at the time, I know that hurt you very much.

I should have shared the recipe with you years ago and I am so sorry. You are my sister and my family, and I hope you can forgive me. I also hope you think of me when you make it and maybe laugh a bit at my silly vanity.

Love always,

Violet

Lettie wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and looked over the recipe again. She realized that she had all of the ingredients on hand to make the cake. As she gathered everything together, she could feel her friend standing beside her. For the first time since Violet’s funeral, Lettie found that she could not only smile but laugh – at her friend’s vanity, at her own mistaken assumptions, and at the memories of all the fun they used to have together in the kitchen.

A few days after she finished the last bite of cake, Lettie decided to type a clean copy of the recipe, incorporating Violet’s handwritten notes. She was about to hit Print when she reconsidered. She moved her cursor to the top of the page and added her friend’s name to the title. It really is your cake, Violet, she thought. You always added the most important ingredient: your love. Feeling the warmth of her friend’s embrace, she inserted Violet Burke’s Christmas Cake recipe between the pages of The Christmas Cookbook and carefully closed the cover.

Metallic Bonbons

‘Tis the season for festive blog link ups. Two of my favorites are Terri’s Sunday Stills photography color challenge, Metallic, and Festive Bonbons holiday question challenge hosted by Donna, Deb, Sue, and Jo. I am going to do my best to combine them both into a single post.

Christmas Tree? We haven’t had a Christmas tree for years, mostly because there isn’t a good place in our house to put one. At first, I missed the tradition, but now I’m relieved not to have the mess and bother. Even without a tree, we decorate to make the house look Christmassy. I don’t particularly like the traditional red and green combo, favoring instead blues and silvers.

I love how the late afternoon sun adds a golden glow to the silver ornaments and copper deer.

Christmas Carols? My all-time favorite is O Holy Night. Even though I’m not religious, it never fails to bring tears to my eyes when the singer hits those lovely high notes.

Christmas Books? I love A Christmas Carol and How the Grinch StoIe Christmas, although I admit not having read either of them for many years.

Christmas Movies? Love Actually, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Bad Santa come to mind but I’m sure there are more.

Fruit Cake? A friend and I passed one – yes, the same one – back and forth as a gag gift for many years. Do people actually eat them?

Chocolate, Nuts or Fruit? Yes.

Christmas Traditions? So many throughout the years (do they count as traditions if they change?). Boat Parade of Lights, my father’s springerle cookies, Grandpa’s Eggnog (not my grandpa, but a much-loved holiday contribution from a friend), nighttime strolls to enjoy the lights and decorations, to name just a few.

A family of silver deer decorate this front yard.

What’s on your Table? Tamales on Christmas morning. Most likely a roast of some sort, potatoes, and roasted veggies for dinner. Our tree is bursting with oranges, so maybe a citrus dessert or cocktail… or both?

Golden (that’s metallic, right?) oranges ready to be picked.

Christmas Memories? I have so many great memories, many from when I was young. My parents always made a big deal about Christmas for my two brothers and me.

Lots of silver tinsel carefully placed in individual strands by my mother.

Visiting Santa and his reindeer with my brothers.

All I want for Christmas Is? For everyone – across the globe – to get vaccinated. Let’s get this done!

Desktop Travel

A few weeks ago, I wrote that my computer had died and needed to be replaced. Although I wasn’t happy about the inconvenience or expense, I have discovered a silver lining (and, don’t we all need a few extra silver linings these days).

Sometime early last year, I took on the challenge of culling and organizing my digital photos. It took me several weeks to go through them all, delete duplicates and disappointments, and finally create eight distinct topic folders under which my images could be filed. Full disclosure that one of the eight folders was titled “Miscellaneous” but… whatever. I was awfully proud of myself when I finished and have been careful to keep everything mostly organized since then.

Until…

When setting up my new computer, old files were transferred from my two back-up hard drives to my desktop. Although this was done by a “professional,” the way the transfer was made pretty much set me back to square one. Suddenly, my new computer was full of all the duplicates and disappointments I had previously gotten rid of and there were multiples of everything, including several copies of the eight organized folders.

Someone less anal and terrified of losing anything probably would have just kept one complete set of the eight folders and deleted everything else. Not me. I had to go through everything once again to be sure what I was keeping and deleting was what I wanted to keep and delete.

I have finally finished the job and the images in my Pictures folder are all organized in their correct folders. No duplicates and very few disappointments (not every photo is a winner but some of the less-than-perfect ones can still be quite loveable).

I knew the task would be time-consuming; what I didn’t expect was how uplifting it would be. I got to travel again to Cuba, Canada, and Mexico, enjoy a cross-country road trip with my girlfriend, visit the Pacific Northwest and Atlantic Northeast, tour San Francisco and Key West, and get my kicks on Route 66.

I also was able to travel back in time and enjoy dinner parties with friends and family, summer gatherings on our deck, and celebrations – large and small – with absolutely no social distancing, masks, or BYOEverything.

It was glorious.

If you are like me and have a lot of pictures filed away on your computer, I encourage you to do some time travel of your own. Just because flights have been canceled, travel delayed, and planned get-togethers put on hold, doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a trip down memory lane.

It might be a good time to organize your photos and make sure everything is backed up, too.

GratiTuesday: I’d Do It Again

After thirteen years of “dating” (which included buying and remodeling a house together), my husband and I officially tied the knot in 2003. In a few days, we will celebrate our fifteenth wedding anniversary.

When we made our wedding plans, we both agreed that we didn’t want anything too formal. Neither of us are religious so a church wedding wasn’t even considered. We wanted our wedding to be a joyful gathering of friends… kind of a party during which two people happen to get married. When a neighbor offered his big, flat backyard, we knew that it would be the perfect venue.

When I look at our wedding photos, I am reminded of how much our wedding reflected our personalities… then and now. Our guests were encouraged to wear “casual, tropical attire” and our flowers, linens, and decorations were bright and colorful. Dancing began with a conga line recessional and continued into the evening to the tunes of the rocking blues band we hired.

Many of our guests remarked that, if they were ever to get married again, this was how they would want their wedding to be. They shared that their weddings were as much (or more) about what their parents wanted as what they desired.

Looking back on our wedding day, I am filled with gratitude. Most of all, I am grateful for the man I married. Our invitations read, “This day I will marry my friend… the one I laugh with, dream with, live for, and love.” That is just as true today as it was then. I am grateful for my memories of that glorious September day, filled with love, laughter, and dear friends. I am also grateful that, when I look back at that day, I wouldn’t change a thing. I’d do it all again, just the same.

How we lost 200 pounds in two weeks… and a little bit of ourselves along the way

A few posts ago, I wrote that my husband and I were beginning a period of intense paper-purging. Our file cabinets had become over-stuffed and we had boxes of papers on the shelves of our offices and in the garage. Our goal was to get rid of what was useless and to better organize and store the records we needed to hold onto. Simplify, organize, purge.

Although not yet finished – will that ever happen? – we have made great strides. We’ve dumped at least 100 pounds of paper into our recycle bin and have taken another 100 pounds or so to a commercial shredding facility. Our house feels lighter and our drawers and shelves have room to breathe.

As freeing as it has been to offload so much unnecessary paper, both of us were unprepared for the loss we are feeling too. Along with the financial statements that can now be found online, saved recipes and travel articles the internet has made irrelevant, and other paper flotsam and jetsam that we’ve squirreled away over the years, a lot of what we tossed was part of our history. Employment records, correspondence, reports that we’ve written, notes for talks we’ve presented, and even some recognition and awards we’ve received over the years.

Over 40 years of work either recycled or shredded.

Gone.

It’s hard to describe the conflicted emotions both of us are experiencing. While we are happy to be retired – thrilled not to be a part of the work-a-day world any longer – it is difficult to completely divorce ourselves from those two people we once were. We were full-time employees longer than we were students or have been retired… combined. Our careers meant a great deal to us. They helped to define us. Our job descriptions were how we answered the inevitable question, “What do you do?”

Now that we have empty space on our shelves, room in our file cabinets, and a garage that doesn’t feel quite so stuffed, we want to keep it that way. Like many retirees, our focus has is switched from acquiring stuff to having experiences. I imagine that the tinge of loss we are feeling now won’t last and will completely dissipate as we move on to our next adventure. Right now, though, we are feeling a little sad as we say goodbye to our younger selves and move further away from what we did then towards what we do now.

Road Skills

I am back in Southern California following my two-week vacation (“Practice Retirement”) spent driving across the country with a friend. The trip was a positive experience overall and I’m happy I was able to have the adventure.

Looking back, I have several observations that I need to consider for future road trips I hope to take with my husband after I join him in retirement.

Bring a paper map
In an earlier post, I wrote of my love of paper maps. Although we were well-equipped with a GPS, two iPads, and a smart phone to help us get from here to there, I would have felt lost if I hadn’t had my US Road Atlas with me so I could track our progress along the way.

Keep a journal
I brought along a small tablet for general note-taking, and, every evening, to write a page or two about my experiences that day. Because often details can slip away from the memory banks, keeping a journal helps me capture moments I don’t want to forget.

It will also come in handy, if I ever pass that way again, to help me remember what not to miss – places to eat, things to see, experiences to be had.

Be aware that small moments can become big memories
Random conversations with strangers, eating at a local hole-in-the-wall, seeing a rainbow through an opening in an otherwise cloudy sky. These are the experiences that stay with me and make the journey most memorable.

Don’t be shy
I am not an extrovert by nature, but, over the years, I have become more and more comfortable striking up conversations with people I don’t know. Away from home, I think this practice is even more important. I had a so many enjoyable interactions and learned so much just by opening myself up and initiating conversations.

Two new friends with benefits (they can cook!)

Often a simple “hello” said with a big smile can be the beginning of a memorable exchange. Even if I only got a smile in return, that’s one more smile to add to my day.

Try the local cuisine
Since we were traveling along a southern route, we had the opportunity to chow down on barbeque in Texas, slurp gumbo in Louisiana, and sample fried pretty-much-everything in multiple southern locals. I’m not a big fan of bacon fat and I prefer my vegetables fresh as opposed to being smothered with oil and cooked beyond recognition, but I thought it was important to at least taste everything.

When we wanted to take a break from heavy food, we looked for, and often found, a Panera along the way so we could supplement our diet with fresh salads.

Make room in the suitcase for a little vanity
Because it was just my girlfriend and me for two weeks, I didn’t bother to bring any make-up. Although it was freeing to just wash my face and go, I often wished that I packed a little something to brighten the bare face that stared back at me in the mirror every day.

Although I don’t wear a lot of make-up (and often none at all on the weekends), I know that wearing at least a bit makes me feel perkier.

Allow for alone time
Even though it would have been cheaper to share, it was money well spent to have separate hotel rooms along our route. My friend has very different sleep habits than I do (she stays up late, and rises late in the morning), and, after spending many hours together in the car, I needed to have some time by myself.

Fortunately, my husband and I share sleep schedules so we won’t be needing separate rooms, but having a bit of time by myself allows me to recharge my batteries. I do much better and am much less cranky if I can carve out an hour or two of “Me Time.”

Only pack what is needed (and learn to need less)
I had envisioned that I would post to my blog regularly during my trip. In the end, I managed to make only one post, and it was more difficult than I thought it would be.

I love the writing process. I write, I edit, I rearrange, I delete, I fuss, I re-write. I brought along a laptop because I thought it would be too hard to do that on an iPad. Now, I’m not convinced that the laptop helped at all, and it added bulk and weight to my luggage.

Before going on another trip during which I want to blog, I need to practice writing and posting from my iPad.

“If you never did you should. These things are fun and fun is good.” ― Dr. Seuss — “If you never did you should. These things are fun and fun is good.”
― Dr. Seuss

In two weeks, we went through three time zones and fourteen states. We experienced temperatures up in the 70’s on down to the low 20’s. We enjoyed warm sunshine, thick clouds, bone-chilling wind, and driving rain storms. I rode a bigger-than-life, cut-out buffalo, visited Elvis’ birthplace, and got to view Edward Hopper’s painting, Nighthawks so close I could almost smell the coffee.

I missed my husband, my house, and sleeping in my own bed, but I’m so happy I didn’t miss this journey.