Visualize whirled peas

My baby was born to eat. We all were, really. It's a necessary part of life, a key to survival. With almost every gulp of milk or spoonful of vegetable puree, she makes small, grateful "mmm" sounds, as if to say "Thanks. This is just what I needed, and it's good stuff."

Now that she's sampling vegetables and fruits herself, without me as the processing middleman, she opens her mouth wide, showing her brand-new serrated teeth and eagerly awaiting the spoon delivery of her fruit and veggie mash. She loves each bite -- but somehow, she knows when to stop. She knows when enough is enough, and she trusts that when she gets hungry again, her daddy or I will be there to fill her up again. She has no need to stock up -- no matter how sweet those pears are, or how creamy the carrots -- she trusts that we will provide, and stops when she is full.

How do we lose this sense of "enough," this trust of the hands that feed us?

Waiting for the storm

The wind is picking up. Doppler radar images reveal bright green splotches moving rapidly eastward from Ohio. The honeysuckle breeze that smelled so sweet an hour ago is now mingled with dust and the maple leaves show their underbellies in the frenetic gusts.

A storm is brewing.

What is it about storms that's so appealing; so satisfactory? Natural as they are, they are violent nonetheless and decidedly inhospitable. Yet who can deny the sense of wonder and excitement we experience at the sight of the gathering clouds?

I suppose a storm is like a good, heated argument with a lover; everything that's been lurking in the shadows of our private hearts and minds is brought out in the open to clash and collide. And when the winds die down, the thunder silent, and the lightning just a spark on the horizon, there is peace.

Adjusting

Someone told me yesterday that motherhood is pretty much just a series of adjustments and readjustments. Parents experience a progression of their children's stages -- from newborn to college graduation and everything in between -- and just when you get used to one phase, it's time for the next one to begin.

Actually, it seems like much of life is like this. Seasons come and go. We adults go through stages, too, even if they're not as dramatic as the developmental leaps our kids are making. This is perfectly natural.

But it does take time to adjust to each new stage in our lives, and I wonder how many people really give themselves the space to make healthy transitions; to fully enjoy each season and prepare themselves for the next one.

There's one thing that gives me comfort as I make space for healthy change. Adjusting is normal, and I should just expect that I'll spend the rest of my life doing it.

Page 56

The past few days have been an exhausting blur; hence the blog silence. Just to keep things going, I'm posting this:

Blog exercise (thanks to a fellow blogger)

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 56.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the sentence along with these instructions.
5. Don't dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST.

Here it is:

There are some kinds of food that consumers cannot even buy anymore, as regional products vanish from the shelves.

– Slow Food: The Case for Taste by Carlo Petrini

Deep. Concerning. What does your book say on page 56?

The Pittsburgh Left

No, it's not a political constituency. It's a way to drive. Found on the excellent user-maintained travel site wikitravel.org:

Visitors may want to be careful of the "Pittsburgh Left." At red light intersections, a driver wishing to turn left will do so as soon as the light turns green, regardless of whether another vehicle would normally continue straight through the intersection. While not done much by the younger generation, the Pittsburgh Left still has its adherents.

I think Mr. Incredible could add a few more irritating Pittsburgh driving habits and traffic patterns to this entry, but here's another one that is oh-so-true:

Another traffic irregularity that often confuses outside drivers is the "left only" lane. You can be driving straight down the road and suddenly the lane you are in becomes a "Left Turn Only" lane, although you did not change lanes. This is common in other cities in the right lane but not the left. However, there is no rule for when this will happen in Pittsburgh, and it can happen in right lanes also, so drivers tend to drift back and forth from left lane to right without signaling. If you are new to the city keep an eye on the signs leading up to each intersection.

I know things like this really irk many people -- and I'll admit they get me sometimes, too -- but for the most part I guess I accept them as some of the last vestiges of local flavor. It's getting so you can go just about anywhere and find a KFC but there's no local café in sight. And everybody in the country wears pretty much the same clothes and buys their housewares at Target.

So, as annoying as it is, I salute the Pittsburgh Left for its uncompromising disregard for homogeneity.

Predictable

I walk out the back door at 7:44 a.m. and wind around the house, my bag swinging from my shoulder, heavy with the same items as yesterday: lunch, water bottle, cell phone, wallet. A weed — that for some reason I’ve never bothered to pull or spray with Roundup — hangs in an arc over the sidewalk next to the house, swaying slightly in the breeze but not in any danger of dying, despite its lack of soil. I step on it, like I do every day, hoping that this will cripple the plant and lead to its eventual decline. I should bend down and pull it up, but I don’t have the time — I have to catch the 8:53 bus.

Down the steps, then, and up the street I go. A neighbor is bending over, fussing about her flower beds, like she was yesterday, with her butt in the air and no regard for what passersby might think. Another neighbor, dressed in blue scrubs and bearing a stainless steel coffee mug, heads for his car. Right on time.

I turn into the alley. Two blocks ahead, a 77F bus heads up Stanton Avenue.

Clunk. Someone drops trash in the dumpster from the third floor of some notoriously run-down apartments.

“71A — Downtown” says the recorded message as a bus opens its doors on Negley Avenue one block over. The disembodied voice echoes through the alley just as it does every ten minutes.

I’ve reached Stanton Avenue. A man in a grey business suit and light pink shirt stands at the corner, pacing slowly in his whiter-than-white sneakers and dragging heavily on his cigarette as he waits for the bus. His square face reminds me of a pale, pissed off Lawrence Fishburne every morning.

The bus arrives. A woman with the most curiously sprayed and sculpted hairstyle gets off the bus, her pointed features sending the same message as always: leave me alone. I flash my blue bus pass and the driver, a cheery, middle-aged woman with a youthful haircut, smiles and pushes a fare button. In the first row, a man rises to give me the window seat next to him.

“Good morning!” he says. “And how are we doing today?”

“Pretty well. How about you?” I respond, settling my bag on my lap and pulling out my book.

“Nice weather we’re having,” he remarks.

“Yes, yes it is,” I reply, diving headfirst into my novel to avoid further conversation. I’ve already heard everything he has to say: Babyland is being renovated, the city should really do something about this or that building, that program on Randy Pausch last night was really “touching” and the Mayor is an imbecile. I wish it weren’t true, but there’s nothing new under his sun.

The regulars get on and off at their respective stops. A tall woman with foamy black hair boards in Friendship, wearing her button-front denim skirt, plastic-rimmed glasses from the 80s and toting a small workout bag. She sits down, her legs a little too far apart for other riders’ comfort (especially considering the short, button-front skirt) and takes out her Hebrew scriptures, a thick rubber-banded packet of tattered, unbound pages. She meditates on each page for several minutes as the bus draws nearer to our destination, flipping each sheet over and placing it at the back of the stack before continuing on.

“Liberty and 10th,” the disembodied voice of the bus calls out, announcing my stop. It’s 8:16.

I rise, thank the driver, and head out into the sea of familiar faces going the same directions with the same expressions as yesterday — hoping that today will bring something fresh, something new their way.

Everybody wants to be an executioner.

Or so it seems from all the marketing copy I’ve been reading and editing lately. When asked what they do best, companies continually answer:

We execute.

When asked what differentiates their company from the rest; what they excel in, they say:

Execution.

What concerns me about this is that, if you take their meaning to be that they “get things done” and that they “excel in the implementation of their solutions to customers’ problems,” that’s not really something to brag about, is it? That kind of execution barely keeps you in business, let alone propelling your company to the front of the pack.

Therefore I must consider: are these companies doing some side jobs for the mob?

I know that’s not what these companies mean, but seriously – come up with something original to do, and an original way to express what you do, or I will assume that you’re whacking people in the back room.

On a lighter note, all this talk of execution makes me think of the almost-fate of Bartholomew Cubbins, the 500-hat-wearer of Seuss fame. Check out the book if you’re bored; it’s one of my childhood favorites.

Of Pop-Tarts and split infinitives

I am not a Pop-Tart eater. What’s more, if I were to consume a Pop-Tart, I would certainly not choose the frosted variety with hot pink sprinkles. But in order to satisfy a post-lunch need for carbs (which I should have predicted, since I brought salad for lunch), I ate one today. Two, actually, since they come two to a pack.

Now, I’m a fan of Brian Regan and his legendary rant regarding Pop-Tart instructions. How stupid do you have to be, truly, if you need to read the instructions in order to toast your Pop-Tart properly?

But today I found that, in my relative inexperience with this fruit-filled toaster pastry, I needed to read the instructions. Remember, these were frosted. Given that we have both a traditional vertical toaster – designed for speed and even browning of toast and bagels – and a sophisticated-looking toaster oven – perfect for reheating pizza, melting cheese on bread, and other messier jobs, but very slow – I was left with a choice.

Do I wait six minutes for the toaster oven to barely warm these processed strawberry treats? Or do I choose the fast track, inserting them on their sides into the toaster (all the while praying the icing doesn’t melt, gunking up and possibly shorting out the appliance)?

Choosing life on the edge – and a swifter return to my desk – I went vertical. As I waited and watched, planning the Pop-Tarts’ emergency exit from the toaster should it become necessary, I wondered why the package did not stipulate the orientation of the toaster pastry. Surely others like me have wondered if it is safe to toast them on their sides.

But what I learned today is that Pop-Tart manufacturers have designed icing that defies heat, resisting meltage, even at the high temperatures that render the filling too hot to eat. This leads me to believe that it is not truly icing, but some form of sweet, marginally edible ceramic substance that allows morons to keep their vertical toasters in clean and working order.

On a completely unrelated grammatical note, I also cemented my personal views on split infinitives. I know they’re messy – even, as many people would note, wrong – but they’re far more musical and dramatic than their grammatically correct counterparts.

Which is why, when it comes to Pop-Tarts or anything else, my goal is to boldly go where no man has gone before. “To go boldly ” just doesn’t cut it.

When I bite into a York Peppermint Pattie

I get the sensation.

It's a well-known fact that peppermint patties are my candy of choice. And why wouldn't they be? Refreshing mint -- which actually is a necessity after some meals -- enrobed in chocolate. In recent years, York Peppermint Patties have also been shown (on their packaging, at least) to be "a lowfat food" and "dark chocolate covered," which certainly gives them a couple more points in my book.

After a lifetime of loving peppermint patties, the candy now has for me associations of memory and emotions that even further endear me to it.

When I was a kid, Hershey Foods (which unfortunately does own York) ran these amazingly cheesy, yet evocative, commercials along the theme of "When I bite into a York Peppermint Pattie, I get the sensation," featuring normal, everyday people who get the sensation of skiing in the Alps just from a piece of minty chocolate (even though they're actually just standing on their coffee table, pretending to feel the rush of an Alpine avalanche).

My grandma apparently shares my love of peppermint patties -- or at least, the commercials -- and I will never forget her impersonation of that commercial. Yes, she did jump up on the coffee table, and yes, we worried about her mental and physical health. But oh, did we ever laugh.

For my bridal shower, my best friend made sure to have both peppermint patties and Starburst -- my two favorites -- in abundance. And when my husband wants to give me a little encouragement, he brings one home for me to enjoy. In some ways, it's not so much about the candy itself as it is about your loved ones knowing and caring about the little things that make you happy.

I've been a little disappointed over the years, as I've noticed the sugar content rising . . . frankly, we don't need it, and it only contributes to tooth decay and weird aftertastes.

But overall, the peppermint pattie has moved into the 21st century unchanged. It still arrives in that retro foil wrapper with the simple design that takes you back to the 40s.

I'm not sure I believe that peppermint patties are truly a "lowfat food" or that they really contain two percent of my recommended daily intake of iron . . . but they do give me the sensation, I'll give 'em that.

Buzzword alert

One of the business buzzwords I’ve been seeing a lot of lately is “turnkey.” Usually found in the context of “offering turnkey solutions to fit your company’s needs,” it’s one of those great words that people must think sounds easy and smart without actually meaning or promising too much.

But with my particularly odd eye, all I can ever think when I see this word is “turkey.” Somehow my eye skips over the “n” to reveal the true silliness of it all.

Today I challenge you to offer turkey solutions for all your clients. They'll thank you, I'm sure.

There are some things that money can't buy.

Vanana yogurt (that we bought by accident when we wanted plain) = $2.99

Strawberry granola bars = $1.99

The cashier at Trader Joe’s thinking you’re a cute couple because you and your husband delight in smelling the bag of potatoes while in the checkout line = Priceless.

Risotto, a simile, and some news

My life is like a saucepan of risotto:
I stir and add broth, scrape the bottom of the pan,
Stir again, add more broth, scrape, scrape, sccrrAAAape
For what seems like an eternity.
(Forty minutes, in fact, of continuous stirring.)

And in the end I get a steaming, glutinous mass
Of short, stubby rice
With tender, golden onions
And bright green zucchini punctuating the creamy globs—
In short, a culinary masterpiece, the ultimate comfort food.

And nobody but me can understand why I would go to the bother of stirring, stirring, scraping
A saucepan of globby rice.

In other news, I have a new job, which I started today and I like very much. I am a writer (yes, I'm getting paid for it again!) for Brady Communications, a design firm in downtown Pittsburgh.

Disclaimer (Mr Wonderful insists I put this here): I did not take this picture. Someone has clearly aerated this bowl of risotto, and although it looks prettier than mine, I am confident mine was far more satisfying.

The best thing about Halloween

Is that when you're riding the bus and the subway, and walking around town, you get to try to figure out if people are wearing a costume, or if that's their normal look.

The unforgivable curse

So I've been thinking a lot about photocopiers lately, and why exactly they give me the creeps.

Today I finally figured it out: it's the green light.

You know, that eery green light that is just barely contained by the lid -- that light that can make you go temporarily blind? Well, doesn't that remind you of something? Something Voldemort-ish?

It's the same flash of green light that you see when someone issues a killing curse in the world of Harry Potter.

Weird, huh?

September hope

There is something about these early autumn days that just invites dreams and wandering thoughts that have very few practical elements. Autumn is the season of renewed hope -- of gathering up all the pieces of your life and actually believing that something good could come of them.

It's not spring, by any means -- there is nothing poking up through the soil for the first time, and the pace of life is not quite so frantic or harsh as the rapid growth of spring. In early fall, the time for growth has come and gone, and some things haven't quite turned out like you thought they would. If spring is hopelessly, naively optimistic, then autumn is the season of mature hope, when you've seen hard times and know they will come again but you have renewed energy to press on in spite of the past. Failure and a general sense of doom may be looming in the distance, but autumn is the time for squinting at it from afar and saying to yourself, "I think I just might be able to beat this" -- whatever it is, it seems there's always something like that in my life come September.

This September, of course, there are a number of things -- among them, just surviving in this new environment. And so, on this sunny, cool afternoon that's driven me to sip steaming coffee and pull on a waffle-knit henley . . . I am staring down the loneliness, the financial discomfort, the frustration with the state of our house, the fear that I might keep worrying and hating myself for the rest of my life, the thought that this whole Pittsburgh experiment might just fail miserably . . . I am staring it all down from afar with that against-the-odds optimism, and thanking God for His renewing strength this September.

A random thought about music
I was listening to the radio today, and was again annoyed by the trend that music artists are taking to calling themselves by singularly band-like names. If you heard a song by Feist or Iron & Wine for the first time, would it be instantly obvious that these are individuals, rather than bands? And if you heard a song by Rilo Kiley, would you guess that Rilo Kiley is a band? Of course not! So why do they do it? I have a theory: they are setting us all up to be mocked and ridiculed by their nerdiest, most dedicated fans who laugh and say to each other, "ha ha, she doesn't even know that Rilo Kiley isn't a person; Rilo Kiley is a band!" Music artists like this are drawing boundary lines between "true" fans and casual listeners who aren't absolutely obsessed with them yet.

Now, I know what you're saying: "But Dulci, you like Sting." And for those of you who didn't know I like Sting, please don't feel like this has to come between us. I know most people don't like Sting, and that's O.K. -- I won't try to push old Police albums on you or anything. Anyway, I realize Sting is somewhat of an ambiguous title for an individual music artist. But there's a bit of a difference here; most people have no idea that Sting's real name is Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner (I can see why he changed it -- Gord Sumner doesn't quite have the 80s rock appeal that Sting does). Whereas people like Leslie Feist have a sort of dual public identity; they have no qualms about telling people their real, full names, but on their albums, they go by their enigmatic stage name. See? There is a difference.

If you asked me to suggest an underlying social change that is contributing to this shift in the way that musicians refer to themselves, I could probably come up with some kind of B.S. about how today's artists are much more willing to openly admit that they lead a double life; that the person on stage and the person on the street are not the same by any means. But I'm afraid I'd have to do a great deal more research in order to really confirm that hypothesis, and like I said, it's B.S. anyway.