Lughnasa and the Lughnasa Moon
Wednesday gratefuls: Rigel next to me last night. 48 degrees. Rain. Move that Smoky sign. Kep and Rigel up here with me. Two loft dogs. Flank stead, romaine, tomatoes, red onion, a fancy vinaigrette. Talking with Diane. Mary. Mark. New York Times. Washington Post.
Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Internet
Tarot: Six of Cups
Wrassled that sheet onto the Tempurpedic. Heavy damned mattress. A king. Trying to solve the creeping bed corner problem. Saw some bed suspenders. Not sure how they’d work on this big a sheet. Even so.
Not sure if I’ve mentioned this here before but I’ve discovered a secret in common domestic chores. Yes, they’re repetitive and, yes, they often deal with dirt. Wash clothes. Dishes. Sweep. Vacuum. Dust. These are not solvable problems, they reoccur, sometimes within minutes.
But. They ground me. I’m right there, in the moment, digging a load of wet clothes out of the machine, transferring them to the dryer. Rinsing dishes and trying to put them in the dishwasher with some reason. Broom and dustpan. Dyson vacuum Seoah wisely recommended.
Cooking. A bit different. As is grocery shopping. Both. Grounding. Here and now stuff, not off in the future, big plans for conquering the world. Cooking brings out a creative side. Tweaking recipes, making up a meal from what’s hanging around in the fridge. Learning how to make salads. My current learning curve. Knife work. Cast iron pan. Herbs. Salt and peppa.
As a single guy, I’m surprised at how much I like doing these things. My impulse is to put them off, trained into me, a guy thing I imagine, but I’ve learned they all feel better done in the moment, not later.
Pretty sure this is the idea behind chop wood and carry water.
Yesterday, for example. Went to Safeway. Actually went inside. First time in a long time. Norm is pickup. My salad though needed tomatoes and they were out of heirlooms. I wanted to choose my tomatoes in person.
While there, I convinced myself, again, that shopping online saves money. Why? Oh, that looks good! Geez, I’ve always wanted to try that. Salami. Cheese. Pretzels. Where did those come from? Frozen entrees. What did I come here for? Oh, right. Tomatoes and butter. Fun once in a while.
Back home I pulled out the flank steak. The red onion, the cherry tomatoes, and the romaine came out later. I stuck the romaine in some water to help it recover some crispness.
Mixed up the vinaigrette. Garlic. Thyme. Marjoram. Salt. Pepper. Dijon. Balsamic vinegar. Whisk. Drizzle in olive oil. Mix well. Poured some on the flank steak, covered it, and put it back in the fridge.
Wait four hours. Tear Romaine into bite size pieces. Cut tomato and onion into wedges. Cherry tomatoes in half. Turn the heat up to medium high under the cast iron skillet. Toss the flank steak on the smoking skillet. 4 minutes. Flip. 4 minutes. Check. Yes. Red. Off the heat. Rest.
Assemble the salad. Plenty for the next few days. Eat tonight’s portion while watching Naomi Rapace save Zoe in Close. Kep and Rigel by the chair.
Got my workout in, Ancientrails written. Took a nap.
Oh, and added some soil to an asphalt divot in front of the house. Mark, my mail guy asked me to, said other mail trucks had come by, hit this, and damaged themselves. I said I’d fill it in and communicate with Jeffco Public Works.
Six of cups: Nostalgia. Childhood memories. Feelings of well-being. Matters of the heart. Wistfulness.
A Celtic man looks through a window, perhaps his mind’s eye? Seeing back to his childhood when pleasure was simple, tactile. Maybe the girl is now his wife. Or, his sister. I get the sense that he may feel his true treasures, the ones that bring him authentic pleasure, are his memories, his childhood.
When I talk with Diane, my cousin, as I do each Tuesday, childhood memories get triggered. We’ve known each other since, well, probably, infancy. I visited her and her family often on the farm in Morristown, Indiana. Lots of memories there. Good ones.
My childhood, a 1950’s small town idyll. Playing with friends. Going to the field. Racing down hills on our bikes. Baseball at Carver’s. Wagons, collecting pop bottles for money. In and out of the house, often for hours at a time. The world was small and it had streets named Monroe, Harrison, John, Church.
I’m not a past oriented guy though. These kind of memories, while precious, are not my touchstone. If it were me looking through the window, I’d see myself in a library carrel or in a chair at home reading, perhaps taking notes, perhaps eyes up, looking toward the ceiling or the sky. Or, typing. Painting. Cooking. Cleaning. My true pleasures. Getting off a plane at some new destination. Wandering the halls of a great art museum. Sitting in a planetarium watching a star show. Maybe at an upscale Italian restaurant or a sushi place. Those sorts of things.
Sæhrímnir
Even pagans have a conflicted relationship with nature. Yes, she provides soil for crops, rain and sun from them to grow, and game to supplement domesticated animals like goats and cows and chickens. But she also had predators in the wild like wolves and game animals like the boar, who killed many hunters.