Playing in mud

I started a pottery class last night. My friend, Chanelle recently started going to college again. Perhaps she enjoys my company A LOT, or perhaps she thinks it is a good idea to have a professor as her friend in any class (even if it is unrelated to what I know well), or perhaps she thought it was time to put the potters wheels in my garage to good use. I don't know what her reasons are, but she went to a lot of work to get me into the class. She found the class and delivered the information to me and got the materials list and went with me to get supplies and then called and reminded me about class and we went together. (Quite a friend huh?)

The first thing that the teacher announced is that they have been so frugal in years past that they had a huge excess of funds and so we didn't have to pay tuition for the class. No, I'm not kidding. It was weird but I'm okay with free pottery classes. I still had to fill out a registration card and get officially enrolled and then when I had done that, the teacher gave an excellent demonstration about centering clay and turning out a bowl.

My goal for the night was just to get the clay centered perfectly. I didn't care if I had a piece by the end of the night, and I remembered how critical centering was for glass blowing. I think that all the glassblowing classes Laura and I took payed off because I centered the clay once and came very close a second time. I may be able to get faster at it, but I think I can do it now. Then I moved on to throwing things and worked on bringing the clay up and keeping an even edge of top. I would pull it up and up until it got too fragile and collapsed, or until my long fingernails (which I was informed have to go) got stuck in the clay and tore it. I didn't care when the pieces fell apart, I was playing in the mud and learning at the same time. How much better can it get? I threw pieces and collapsed them and then I would wedge the clay to get the air bubbles and some of the moisture out and then I'd rework the clay over and over again until it got too soft and then I'd get a new piece and start in on that. Everyone thought I was nuts to keep collapsing my pieces, which the other beginners thought were really great. Honestly though, I wouldn't have paid 50 cents at a thrift store for anything I had made so why would I fire it? My goal for the class (besides having fun and hanging out with Chanelle) is to be able to make dishes that I can eat from and that seem cool to others as well. I have a long way to go, but perhaps I'll get there. When I do, you may all get handmade dishes from me for Christmas, kind of like when I got into knitting and made lots of hats. Hopefully the dishes turn out better than most of the hats did.

Autumn

Autumn is good. I am stylishly wearing gray and brown nail polish and I started pulling out long sleeved shirts to assess my fall wardrobe. I found that most of my clothes are too big and that's kind of nice, but kind of not since it means I have to go clothes shopping.

It has also started raining. I am hoping that it might help some of the farmers successfully finish growing their crops. We just went down to the Church vineyard in Madera and harvested grapes that will become raisins. That farm is almost entirely cared for by novice volunteers who know nothing about grapes, but it always yields a lot of raisins. There are many more than the hungry need, so the rest get sold to Sun-Maid and the money gets used for other charitable causes. We could tell it was especially dire this year because we had to watch a training video about how to maximize the grape harvest. I think they should have made one ages ago. It would have stopped a lot of bickering between the people who think they know what they are doing. I guess it was never worth it though.

Feminine

I have been contemplating femininity a lot, but I haven't been quite sure what to say about it. Today it kind of came together as I walked up the hill to the science building. There was something being broadcast at many more decibels than was really comfortable to listen to, and when I got close enough to the speakers so that the echos and distortions of sound were at a minimum, I recognized that it was a rebroadcast of the September 11 attacks. I was in New York when those attacks happened. Not the city, but the state, six hours away in Rochester. It still felt very close and way too close for comfort. My mother, sisters and cousins called to check on me that day. Besides the towers falling, I got an inquiry about whether I had been in Central Park when a gang was terrorizing that area and raping women. Thankfully I hadn't been, but the concern for me was still appreciated.

Within a few days of the 9/11 attacks we heard that there was too much blood that had been donated. What the survivors really needed were pillows, blankets and bedding. It didn't have to be new or anything, just warm and clean and in reasonably good shape. I had purchased two new pillows the week before. I couldn't afford anything more but I donated my two pillows and went back to using the old flat ones that had served me so long. At the drop-off site, there was a mountain of bedding so tall that I didn't know how people had put things on top of it. There were many women bringing bedding and whatever other comforts they thought practical and adding them to the pile. There were a few dads there too, with their sons, but mostly women were there.

I remember the effects that those attacks had on women much more clearly than men. At the day of mourning service I went to, it seemed like I had arms wrapped around me by countless women and I can't even begin to remember how many I held while they cried on me. My friend Elaine had a cousin who was with her daughter in the plane that struck the pentagon. Lindsey knew people who worked in the towers, but who hadn't been in them when they collapsed. Bev collected stories from survivors. Julia from Ukraine told me how she sat there thinking that she hated America as the towers collapsed but that she told her friends back home to be quiet when they said that America deserved what it got. Collectively, women agonized over whether their families should assemble for Thanksgiving or Christmas when the apparent risk for having their families blasted apart in a lasting way seemed great. Almost universally, the families I knew decided to reassemble despite the recent attacks. While most mothers left the decision of whether to fly or not up to their children, most of the children decided to risk it so that they could see their mothers, give them support, and seek the comfort of being home and safe. While soldiers were being sent over seas to fight the groups who had terrorized America, or allowed it to happen, women gathered their families and fought the actual terror that had come over America in whatever ways they could.

I read a description of "being feminine" that included doing nails and make-up, reading Vogue, talking on the phone for hours, and cleaning a house to impeccable perfection. I have fond and feminine memories of doing all of those things, and my sisters and mom are in every one. I also do those things on my own, but those memories feel more like chores than me reveling in my femininity.

Recently I joined a canning club where we combine the produce from our gardens and turn it into salsa or jam and then pack it away for later. While we were working we started talking about why women don't run the world and what's holding women back. I suggested that the main reason is that women think raising children is more important than being a CEO. The mom who was there agreed with a smile while the other single woman there said something about THAT being our problem.

I meant that comment about motherhood more as an observation than as an opinion or judgement of what women do or don't do. The epidemiologist in me was just coming out. Since then however, I have formed an opinion which follows: It is entirely impossible for a woman to feel feminine without the presence or context of a family in her life.

However, women I know who have more than two children are literally terrorized for being irresponsible, taking on too much, sacrificing their careers, consuming too much, and overpopulating the planet. The shift in thinking that has promoted this sort of attack has certainly affected the planet much more that the destruction of the World Trade Center. However, there are women quietly fighting those attacks too... as they give birth to and lovingly raise their families.....then send their children out into society to work, contribute, influence, and enjoy........then gather them back to be together again.

Another Fan Joins the Club

If infants and toddlers were slightly more mobile, there would be hordes of them chasing Dad down the street. Olivia (5 weeks old) just joined the throngs of little ones who go gaga over him. Despite her floppy neck, Olivia was craning her head to get a better look at him and to smile at him. This comes only weeks after Hazel started crying when her mom lifted her from Dad's arms. He claims that their fondness for him simply results from him treating them as though they are as intelligent as adults. He always allows them to see what is going on, provides age appropriate mental stimulation, and explains things to them patiently. Similar efforts by others however, do not seem as successful. This leads one to wonder if there is actually more involved. Perhaps Dad is really a super-hero who simply engineers rocket boosters by day for a fun alter-ego. Please report any sightings of Dad wearing a cape, tights, or a superhero logo and send in pictures too.

Two unlikely occurrences

I didn't realize that there were 100 miles between gas stations in the Mojave Desert, so when my low fuel light came on, I wasn't too worried until after driving quite a while, a sign came up saying that Needles, the closest town, was 67 miles away. I called Brett to see if there was any little town closer to me that might have gas. I tried Essex. There are a few trailers and a lighted building surrounded by a razor wire fence, but no gas station. Even with the 8 mile detour, I still made it to Needles. The most surprising thing though was that Brett stayed on the phone giving me moral support the whole time. He hasn't even teased me much about it since.

Who has the most allergies?

Okay family, this should be fun. It's a game of who has the most allergies. (All of the little ones can play too). I'll list mine and then everyone else who wants to play can do so in the comments section. (Laura will probably win. She is the luckiest after all.) I'll give some Claritin-D to the winner as a prize. Maybe we should also have a prize for the strangest allergy too, but Laura will probably win that as well. After that, we should have a survey to see which one of us is the nerdiest ( in everyone else's opinion) and then we can see if the two are correlated.

Mim:

Wheat

Peanuts (but this probably shouldn't count because I eat them anyway. I'm tough. I can handle constricted airways)

Sage brush

Mold & Mildew

Nickel

Most hairsprays

Most perfumes

Anything from Bath and Body Works (besides soap and only because that gets washed off)

Vitamin E

Most mascaras

& Coal Dust

I'll get Mike too since he can't. Maybe Laura can help with this.

Mike:

Poultry ( I think he should get double points for this since he goes into anaphylactic shock)

Coal Dust (It's a guess, but I think a safe one)

Life without wheat

Eating food with no wheat is not so bad really. When I started living wheat free, I was pretty determined to not try to force other foods to be wheat. I started eating more potatoes and vegetables. I successfully made oatmeal raisin cookies with oat flour from blenderized dry oatmeal. "Not so bad really to live without wheat" I kept thinking.

After smelling warm cinnamon roles at Ikea, I cracked. I almost got the cinnamon roles, then had a vivid memory of how badly my stomach hurt last time I ate wheat and decided I was happier without. However, I decided I had to come up with some more food options.

I attempted to make baking powder biscuits out of rice flour. I figured that gluten is undesirable in biscuits so that might be a good place to start. I ground some Basmati rice and gave it a go. I noticed some problematic differences with rice flour quickly. It doesn't absorb liquids as well as wheat flour, so the dough was looser and wetter. I let the dough stand about 30 minutes and it did get thicker, but it still wasn't quite right. I decided to just move on with it and see what happened in the baking. The biscuits spread out and ended up looking like macaroons. The texture was about right once they were cooked though..crispy outside and crumbly inside. The worst problem was the flavor. I had guessed that the flavor would be off because I was using basmati rice, which has a wonderful aroma that is nothing like wheat. It was worse than I thought though. That wonderful aroma is way too funky for southern cooking. Also, I used shortening instead of butter because it is technically superior and textures usually come out better with shortening. The trade-off of course, is flavor. That trade-off is worse with rice though. The shortening kind of causes a bitter after taste that is just bad.

So the biscuit thing didn't quite solve the cinnamon role problem, so I went and got some sprouted wheat bagels to give the sprouted wheat thing a try. They were in the gluten free section (which is about 6 cubic inches) so I didn't check the ingredients as carefully as I should have, but they had regular flour in them. When I got home, I realized this so those were out. I then got potato starch and some tapioca flour and tapioca pearls.

I made tapioca that night and it was like the best tasting thing on earth. So light and yummy with all the egg whites and sugar folded in. I have eaten far too much tapioca in the past three days, but it is just so good after a month without wheat. I will probably eat more today. My next plan is that I am going to try to force tapioca flour and rice flour to be like wheat and I am going to attempt to make some reasonable muffins (no more Basmati though).

The weirdest thing about going wheat free is that I need to find a new deodorant. I always have to do this when I move and I figure it's because different microbes live in different climates. I didn't realize that going wheat free could have the same effect but I guess it makes sense.

If you have actually read to the end of this detailed and probably boring blog entry, you are patient. Thank you for your patience while I figure out how to live without wheat. Family, you are the best for coming up with gluten free pasta and rye crackers. Mom, the oat flour idea was absolute genius.