Normally I work at home in what could best be described as pseudo-jammies – clothes you shouldn’t be caught dead in outside your door but still are when you need to make an appearance at the woodshed or the garden or the country store for a gallon of milk.   Once in a while, however, I scrape the barnacles off and work in town at the cafe on the other side of the mountain.

I’ve become a confirmed hick, so a trip to a town with more than 1000 people is like going to the big city, and the cafe doesn’t disappoint, serving a very sophisticated salad. Last week it came with slices of lemon and, knowing there’s never enough dressing on my salad, I decided to dilute it.

As I squeezed the first quarter of sun-yellow fruit I suddenly forgot all my to-dos as I suddenly thought of my mother.

Mom puts lemon on everything. EVERYTHING.  Except for possibly chocolate and ice cream, and I’m not 100% sure about the ice cream.  It’s kind of a southern tradition.

She’s not from the south, but her mom was, and she lemon-ized everything.

The juice rained down, and I wasn’t thinking about all the things mom and Grandma lemonized.  Instead my mind was suddenly filled with their stories of growing up in an era and social circle where girls went to finishing school, and then (my mom literally was told this when she graduated), they were ‘finished’.  Ready to get married.

But neither of them was finished.

They both took control of their educations and went out and did things.  Grandma worked for other women to have choices.  Mom taught.  Mom still teaches.  They mommed.  And then they Grandma-ed and they looked good doing it (I still can’t figure out how they got everything without the occaisional visit to the local store wearing pseudo-jammies).

I had drained every drop from the first slice and a quick bite of salad revealed a new meal infused with flavor. I couldn’t help but notice the irony that something so beautiful and small could have such consequence.

It’s a lot like my mom and grandmother in that way, and even though no green leaf was un-flavored, I picked up the other slice.   I was in the mood to feel a little stronger.

Hypnotized by the hum of humanity at another table,

I fail to mark the moment or the path

And wantonly wander into new worlds

Unfolded on the pages in front of me

Because, today, I do not want a way back.

I wish I knew who this guy is.  He’s the one that just sat down a few tables away.  He’s one of the ‘real artists’.

Every Tuesday, he plops down his drawings and gets coffee and then begins to lose himself to that hypnotic rhythm that all artists – fledgling or fulfilled – know and love.  Every Tuesday, I pass his table to drink in what has already transpired on his page and I breathe out awe.

I wish I knew this guy, and I’ll bet he’d love to talk about his art, but a little demon whispers in my brain, “he would only talk to another real artist, and you are not in that league.”

And sometimes I whisper back, “There are no real or unreal artists. There are only people who need it with every bit of their being and people who don’t.”

But every Tuesday I leave wishing I were brave.

Remember once upon a time, before there was cable TV and VCR’s or Hulu and Netflix, and you had to wait untill Thanksgiving to watch the Wizard of Oz? Then the Christmas specials would begin, and our family would close out the season watching Sound of Music on Christmas night.

I know it was Thanksgiving yesterday, but I was actually thinking about the Sound of Music, and it’s not just because of the foot of snow on the ground urging us to begin the Christmas season prematurely.

It’s because I spent most of yesterday morning watching fourteen year old Thing1 –  with only minimal prodding – trudge outside to shovel the driveway so his grandparents could get to the door safely before shoveling a path to my now-collapsed greenhouse so that I could get in and assess damage. With his dad and eight year old Thing2, he helped to move the snow off the greenhouse.  After some cleanup, our two good things hopped in the car with us and chattered cheerfully as we drove down to one of the big box stores to deliver some Thanksgiving cheer to people who were working this holiday..

Most people that know me know that I’m pretty agnostic. I’m actually the wisest person on the planet because I can freely admit that I know nothing (I think that’s what some old Greek dude said anyway). I’m happy asking lots of questions, but I know absolutely nothing.

Well maybe I know one thing.

I know that line from the song in the Sound of Music with Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer singing to each other in a gazebo drenched in purple light. You know, it’s the one where she sings “nothing comes from nothing.”

I thought about that all the time yesterday because not too long ago I was leading a very checkered and extended childhood.  The things I did may make great fodder for a writing life, but I don’t look back on my early adulthood with pride.

I do look at my boys with pride and also once-unimaginable joy.

And on Thanksgiving I think about wine and how grateful I am and how if there is a God, that being is unbelievably forgiving.  Or forgetful. How else can you explain these two people who have taught me to feel thankful beyond words this day and everyday of the year?

Kathy Stiles is the winner of the Thanksgiving giveaway.  Thanks for all the suggestions folks.  I ended up making corn muffins, banana nut, blueberry-apple and chocolate chip.

I’m loading the muffin tins as I stir the bacon and celery for the stuffing in the bird tomorrow.  We’ll take the muffins down to people who are stuck working tomorrow and play Thanksgiving Santa-Turkey (we need to come up with a name for that mascot) and then come home and put our bird in the oven for 5 or 6 hours.

My sister’s family is joining us when the storm in Vermont dies down tomorrow. Usually their family spends holiday mornings at the soup kitchen.  I’m thinking of their example this evening and realizing it’s not about charity or assuaging guilt.   It’s about connecting with our fellow human beings.

If the muffins are any good, we’re going to pick another set of ‘victims’ for Christmas.  We’re thinking the road crew (they don’t get holidays on stormy days.  Or maybe our local sheriff or the volunteer firefighters who are on call.  What do you think?

Sometimes I think the powers that be are smart asses.

When I was a kid I loved to draw.  The first thing I ever drew was a field mouse from a fairy tale I can’t remember. I do remember the field mouse though. I remember how natural it felt to draw and that the end result didn’t stink.

I drew in high school, and, while my work will never be mistaken for a great master’s, I could make a tree look like a tree.  I had a few fantasies about art school, but, because I lacked the courage to forge my own path at the time,  they never went beyond fantasies.

Then a few years ago, I fell back into drawing.  And I can still make a tree look like a tree.  And this time, I have had the courage to keep forging ahead and keeping it part of my life.

And then the powers that be said, “Hah!”

June brought news of a degenerative disorder in my right eye.  The left eye, not wanting to be left out of the regular poking and prodding the right one now gets, decided over the weekend to join the party.

Part of me wondered if the great guardian of good art in the sky was trying to tell me something.  At first I though it might be trying to protect the world from my doodles.  It might be, but, over the last few years, I’ve developed a stronger ability to ignore the inner critic who whispers these possibilities in my ear.

So as I drove back today, thinking about adaptive devices and getting my 4th lens prescription in 6 months,  I decided to find  a more positive message in the diagnosis.   It’s the message that says to make hay – or doodles of hay for as long as the sun finds away into my lenses; to make every moment for as long it’s possible.

The future did get a bit cloudier today, but sometimes things are clearer without the white hot sun shining on them.  So as long as there’s any light – clouded or clear, I will focus on what is possible now and not on what might not be possible down the road.

I’m giving away a signed 5×7 print of our resident turkey who, while grateful we ordered our holiday bird from the local turkey farm and allowed him to keep raiding our front yard, still wants to remind us that next Thursday is Thanksgiving – not Christmas or Hannukah.

So, while you may not want to put this anyplace where guests can see it, if you think it would bring you a little Turkey-day cheer, leave me an answer below to the great cosmic question below –
If you were making muffins for 5 or 6 dozen people, would you make a Sweet or Savory muffin?

I’ll pull a winner at random on Monday.