Prickles

All my life the favorite shoe of choice has been flip flops. Now more than ever they are the only cover and protection for my feet unless ofcoarse I am dancing. Although dancing in Texas can be done in anything from bare feet to flip flops to high heels, the native Texican prefers wearing her boots for scooting around the dance floor. But flip flops are cool, quick, easy, and affordable so I can have a pair in every kind and color.

It's risky business walking the pasture wearing skimpy flip flops. I can feel rocks poke the bottoms of my feet through a layer of thin rubber, spear grass stab me, sticker burrs dangle on my skin like star studded jewelry, and fire ants meander over my toes and ankles looking for a tender spot to embed their small but oh so sturdy stingers before getting flicked off by my middle finger.

What's most amazing is the way I hardly flinch at all the prickles, stings, and annoyances that crowd me while I am here in the serene Texas Hill Country. From the simplest to the most complicated task, there are prickles just putting one foot in front of the other, to get from point A to point B. Tromping around this part of Bandera County in flip flops, I trudge ever onward without spending a jaded moment on the discomfort of my feet and legs, as I did when I was young.

I suppose it's that way in life too. After awhile what seemed unbearable is tolerated. Like the sun. All day it blisters down on me like hell itself, only to give way to unspeakable beauty at sunset, spreading out the comfort of evening like a soft bed for a weary traveler.

Life's prickles in the evening of life are welcome signs that let me know I can still experience this world of mine. I've got the calluses to prove it.

Enhancing Your Glow

According to the experts, as I read a magazine, every one of us gals should exfoliate our faces before retiring to bed. Removing dead skin, making skin look brighter and wrinkle lines less obvious, exfoliants perform anti-aging miracles. But for this magic to come true, it is up to us to perform the ritual at the end of each and every day. It doesn't have to be expensive nor time consuming. Choosing the right products will, with consistant use, put us on track for that healthier look we covet.

A simple task promises to give so much. I wonder if we could use the same principle to exfoliate cares and worries acting as barnacles that adddle our minds over time. Like cleansing our skin, a ceremonial series of acts performed nightly could bring big results in the way that we experience life the next day. Shuck off the baggage that is too heavy for us to carry. Send away the evil thoughts. Scrub the cares and worries, preventing them from clogging precious moments of time.

Yes. Exfoliate nightly and enhance your glow.

Siezing the Day

Last load of laundry in by 8am, kitchen open with Fig Cobbler in the oven by 8:15, Squoozie’s (pronounced skoozie-nickname given by brother-in-law, Jaime Trial) *Sweet-n-Sour Pork Chops baking in a clean kitchen before 9am. “I can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never let you forget you’re a man”, from an Enjolie perfume add in the 70s. Jacque Lou, a true pioneer in seizing the day, has it right all these years, rising with the chickens means you get fresh eggs. If you’re reading between the lines, you’ll see that I am feeling fresh as the morning, and living in Texas, it just feels better in the early hours this time of year with temps reaching 100 degrees by the time I’ve finished morning ablutions. No doubt, early morning is the only time to do wash and stand over the cook-pot.

Here is a follow-up pic of the figgy dessert recipe on yesterday’s post. If you have a disdain for figs, one bite of this cobbler will turn around your opinion. It is worthy of the finest table in Texas, any time of day.

*Recipe to follow-you won't want to miss this 'Chirstmas-in-August' dish.

Feelin' Figgy

Posing as the sun that kissed them and the windmill that watered them, I have chosen a lone Texas Sunflower to stand guard over a bowl of sweet bulbs, shown in the pic. The figs are ripe, tender, Brown Turkey and popular variety here in Bandera County.

Mary Allen Perry, a member of the Southern Living Food Team, says, “The warm honeyed taste of just gathered figs is the sum of summer’s goodness. The names alone are a seductive roll call of Southern sweetness and earthy delight.” Popular with the Romans in an earlier century, the fig is somewhat of a love/hate fruit down here in my neck of the South. As you read between the lines, you'll notice that I am compelled to add "summer's goodness" to my day. I'm feelin' a little figgy, finding myself adding them to my bath using Aveeno's "positively nourishing" Fig & Shea Butter body wash, snacking on them as I scrape golden puree from the bottom of Greek yogurt.

Next, I shall freshen the aroma in my home using mother's delightful yet simple recipe that has her husband hiding leftovers from company so there is more for him to enjoy. Stingy? Nope. Just a delicious cobbler that tastes like more! Try one for yourself. Add some "earthy, summer goodness to your life today. We all need some.

Old Fashioned Fig Cobbler
Preheat oven to 400
2 cups figs-chopped and handful of blueberries
1/2 tsp allspice
1/2 cup sugar
1 Tbl cornstarch
lemon juice for tartness
Mix all ingredients together
Cook in oven for 10 min. Stir and return to oven for 10 more min

For topping
1 cup Pioneer Buscuit Mix [San Antonio's own]
2 Tbl melted [real] butter
2 Tbl milk
2 Tbl sugar
Drop by tsp over fig mixture and bake 25 to 30 minutes

Pieces

Pieces. Pick up the pieces. Put down the pieces. Store the pieces. Lay out the pieces. Put them together. Take them apart. Collect them. Throw them away. Broken pieces. Misfit pieces. Pretty pieces. Pieces I will never use. Places that don't have enough pieces. Pieces I don't like. Pieces I treasure.
Life has all of these. Wisdom tells us what to do with them. Don't ignore wisdom. If so, my pieces will never be delt with correctly.
Patitence for all is required.

Today

Sitting at my window, inside my hidey-hole, mid afternoon it's 86 degrees, breezy, and humid as grandma's kitchen in front of the swamp cooler. All traffic is incoming and rolling past me toward the water like a trail of fire ants. The 4th of July brings folks to families, the Texas heat brings 'em all to the water.
As my pyromaniac husband (he would admit to that description) is occupied with readying his fireworks project for dark-thirty, I use memories to bring my family in close, where I can hear that blessed family commotion when chaos knocks heads with fun. Those times are a blotch on a square of calendar having a paper trail of more than 30 years. I was born to love a family. Life made me NEED love. I have spent 56 years living every day for the future, always doing what I do now so that something will be a certian way in weeks, months, or years to come. I yearn to live for now, using the minutes and hours as if they were presents to unwrap one by one, revealing today's moments as most important. During all your planning and readying for the future, make it a habit to live for today, savoring what it serves up.