Reflections on the Eighth Week of Winter – “You’re Doing What?”

Spence Turning Pork

“You’re doing what?” From my perch on the rustic chair, I swiveled my head to stare at my husband.

In his boots, jeans, long sleeved undershirt, and stocking knit cap, Spence paused by the front door―one hand on the knob and the other holding a box of matches. “Starting the coals.” He flashed a duh-grin then opened the door.

A gust of freezing air enveloped my body.

I shivered.

He closed the door.

Glancing through the sliding glass door, I gazed at lumpy gray clouds and the inch of snow they’d dumped on the ground. Grilling food on snowy February 11^th?

The front door opened, and Spence reached inside to pluck his winter vest off the coat tree. “It’s colder than I thought.” He slammed the door, and his boots clomped across the porch.

The day before, while I’d roughed out my chair blog, [See “Rustic Chair” February 11, 2019] he had studied the weather forecast on his computer. “Yes! Mild temperatures and no precipitation tomorrow.” I didn’t link those comments to his pulling a package of nine pork ribs out of the freezer. I thought he planned to revive his hoop house [See “Ups and Downs with Mr. Hooper” January 7, 2019] in the south garden.

Monday, he tramped down the slope to the basement door―not to the south garden. The door squeaked open, and the grill rattled while Spence pulled it outside and onto the gravel walkway.

I resisted the urge to text You won’t believe what your father’s doing to our children. [See “I’m Gonna Tell Your Children” June 17, 2018] Instead, I leapt out of the chair, fetched the camera, and sprinted outside to the porch railing. Brrr. But if I ran back for a coat, I’d miss the picture.

On the ground below the porch, Spence bent and grabbed the handle of the grill cover.

“Wait! I want a picture.”

He let go of the handle, straightened, and crossed his arms over his chest. Wispy smoke rose from the charcoal starter chimney.

Peering through the view finder, I said, “You could cook the pork inside, you know.”

He set the lid on the grill with a clank. “It wouldn’t taste as good.”

Like his mother, Spence cooked for savory flavor. But grilling in the snow?

A half hour later, while I squinted at the fifth version of the now day-late chair blog, Spence clomped into the kitchen and picked up the Styrofoam tray of defrosted pork ribs. He paused by the front door and hoisted it. “Two dollars a pound. I couldn’t resist.”

“Your mother would be proud of you.” She’d spent her life sorting coupons and shopping for bargains.

Blood dripped off the plastic that wrapped the tray of pork.

Spence beamed. “She did like great deals.” He shut the door.

I wiped the puddle of blood off the floor tiles then grabbed my camera and hustled outside. Brrrr. Maybe next time I would grab a jacket.

Spence had dumped the coals and placed the ribs on the cooking grate. He held the grill cover while I focused the lens. As I lowered the camera from my eye, he lowered the cover onto the grill.

Would those raw, red ribs cook in 31ºF (-0.5ºC) air?

When Spence, carrying tongs, walked out the door, I slipped into my winter jacket, grabbed the camera and peered over the porch railing.

Fat sizzled on coals.

Flames licked the ribs.

Aroma of smoky pork tickled my nose.

I stared at the diagonal lines seared onto the ribs. “The outsides cooked. Will the middles?”

“Yep. Low and slow.” Spence covered the grill and closed the top vents. “Three hours should do it.”

Spence Ripping Off a Taste

Three hours later, without his vest but with a plate, he tramped to the grill for the last time. Aroma of pork rose up the basement stairs before he did. Taking a deep breath of the savory aroma, he walked down the hall and set the plate on the kitchen table. With his fingers, he ripped off a piece, put it in his mouth, and closed his eyes. “Mmmm. That tastes great.”

Like a child returning to a bag of Halloween treats, Spence ripped off a some pork and popped it into his mouth each time he passed the kitchen table.

After his fifth trip through the kitchen, I said, “You’re eating the pork as if it were candy.”

“It tastes like candy.” He ripped off an extra long piece and tucked it into his mouth. He swooned. “Aah.”

Okay. Grilling in the winter might be worth a little shivering.

Three days later the temperature rose ten degrees. From my perch on the chair, I swiveled my head to stare at my husband. “You’re doing what?”

Spence paused by the front door―one hand on the knob and the other holding a jug of motor oil. “Changing the truck oil.” He flashed a duh-grin then opened the door.

A gust of chilly air enveloped my body. “But the melting snow’s making the ground soggy.”

“I’ll lay on cardboard.”

Wind chimes clanged.

The image of laying on the cold ground in the breeze made me shiver. “You could go to Jiffy Lube. It would be warmer.”

“I’m avoiding Jiffy Lube.” Stepping onto the porch, he called over his shoulder. “I can do it cheaper.”

Sheesh. He’s his mother’s son.

Spence Under Road-Splashed Truck

Reflections on the Seventh Week of Winter – Rustic Chair

Aspen Table and Chair

 We fretted over different things.

Holding a pile of four blankets on my lap Friday morning, I bounced on the pickup’s passenger seat and wondered if the special ordered chairs would feel comfortable.

My husband, his elbow on the console, drove with a clenched jaw as if he mulled over how to get the log chairs and end table into our house. An armful of fire logs is heavy, and a chair made of logs is much heavier. Not needing a hernia, Spence had reason to fret.

Wind swirled snowflakes through the frigid air while we rode the thirty-eight miles to Cherry Valley Furniture, an Amish Barn Store  in Andover, Ohio.

Last fall our hunt for easy chairs, made of white pine logs to match our sofa and coffee table, had included three furniture stores. Each had a catalog with one style of log chair. Multiple Google searches ended in astronomical prices. Then Spence spotted Cherry Valley, a furniture store he’d passed when forced to detour on one of his many trips for lead safe volunteering in Cleveland.

In early December, we walked into Cherry Valley, which had a faint wood scent and resembled an immaculate museum. I gawked at chiming clocks, furniture so polished the surfaces looked like mirrors, bags of tempting snacks, Amish sayings on wooden signs, and toys that made me wish I were three again―faceless Amish dolls, a tricycle pulling a wooden wagon, and a metal ditch digger with lever controls.

Ambling through the store, we found log furniture in a back corner. Three easy chairs waited for my fanny. Like Goldilocks, I sat in each one. Too high. Too low. Just right. Though that third chair cradled my body with soft, firm support, its back arched thirty-eight inches wide. A pair of those chairs, with our other furniture, would eliminate all walking space in our twenty by fifteen foot room. Sheesh. I’m too old for crawling over furniture.

Dreading more futile searches, I let my shoulders slump. We might have to buy another pair of Adirondack chairs to replace the ones with wobbling, scratched arms and loose, wooden pins that sort-of kept the chairs from collapsing.

“Try this one.” Spence rested his hand on the back of an aspen rocker. Light colored logs formed every part of the chair except the seat and rockers.

“It’s a rocker,” I said as if he hadn’t noticed. “Rockers trigger my vertigo.”

“Just try it.”

Planting my feet on the floor so that the chair wouldn’t rock, I sat. Ahhhhh. The tilt of the chair let my back relax, and the armrests met my forearms as if the carpenter had used me for a model. I rubbed my hands against the smooth wood. “But it has rockers.”

“Maybe they can make one without rockers.” Spence swiveled his head in search of a sales person. None. “We’ll ask at the front desk.”

At the thirty foot long front desk, we stopped by the sign reading Lovina. Behind the sign a short, slender woman looked up so quickly I thought her stiff white hat would fall off her head. She peered at us through granny glasses, which added a serious quality to her youthful face. In a clear voice, she said, “May I help you?”

How could such a tiny, young woman speak with a volume that could be heard over a dozen roaring creeks?

She followed us through the store and watched me sit in the chair. “We can take the rockers off,” she tipped the chair forward so the back was in an upright position, “but the chair won’t slant back.”

I rocked the chair backward. “I want the back to tilt.”

“My relatives could make the front legs longer than the back.” She reached behind her long bib apron and whipped out a tape measure from the pocket of her dress. Crouching, she measured. “They could make the front legs eighteen inches and the back legs fourteen. Is that okay?”

We special ordered two chairs and an end table with a drawer, all three in natural aspen―as close to white pine as we could get.

The end of January, Lovina left a booming message on our answering machine. “Your furniture is ready for pickup. Come at your convenience and bring your receipt.”

This past Friday, we paid the rest of the bill at the long front desk then Spence drove the truck around the store and backed up the ramp to meet Lovina.

Loaded Truck

When he stepped out of the truck, she said, “Back a little more. I’ll tell you when to stop.”

He inched the truck toward the dock while she waved her hand in a circle. When the tailgate touched the dock, Lovina called, “Stop.”

Then she picked up a sheet of cardboard four times her width and lay it in the truck bed.

Because I didn’t want to risk scratches on our new chairs, I spread a blanket over the cardboard.

Lovina picked a chair up by its arms and strode into the truck bed.

I marveled that her strength matched her powerful voice. “How much does that chair weigh?”

She lay the chair on its side. “I don’t know. But it’s not heavy.” She walked back for the second chair. “We’ll need to put a blanket between the chairs so they don’t bump against each other on the drive.”

Pulling my great-grandmother’s nine patch quilt from the pile, I tossed it over the first chair. Lovina nestled the blanket between the chairs and returned for the end table.

“I don’t suppose you’d come home with us and unload the furniture,” Spence said while Lovina set the end table on the truck bed.

Her laughter rang like wind chimes clanging in a storm, and her cheeks turned a shade of rosy pink. “I wish I could, but I can’t.”

I squeezed the other two blankets in my arms. “Shouldn’t we put blankets over the furniture for the ride home?”

Spence reached under the furniture for his bungee cords. “We don’t need them. The furniture is wrapped in plastic.”

After securing the load with bungee cords, he drove away from the dock, down the driveway, and headed home.

Leaving the furniture in the truck, we prepared the room.

Our cat Emma didn’t help. While Spence and I moved my Adirondack chair to the basement and the old end table to the porch, she napped in the Adirondack chair she and our son Charlie shared. I slid the chair down the hall with her in it.

She raised her head, flicked back her ears, and dug her claws into the cushion. The chair kept sliding. Merrah! Merrah! Ducking under the armrest, Emma jumped to the floor and scampered into the bedroom.

Spence folded her chair and carried it to the basement.

I swept the floor, wiped it with a damp cloth, and grabbed my camera. “Ready.”

Leaving Emma to sulk, we walked out to the truck. Without Lovina guiding him, Spence backed, got out of the truck to see where landscape lumber marked the path to the deck ramp, got back in the truck, and backed another two feet. He jumped from the truck again, looked at the back wheels straddling the lumber, and laughed a third of Lovina’s volume. “The truck’s wider than my tractor.”

Moving Chair

After unfastening the bungee cord supports, Spence lifted the end table out of the truck bed and trudged up the ramp. “Don’t try to lift the chairs,” he called over his shoulder. “You’ll break your poof-a-loo,” his grandmother’s word for an unspecified internal organ.

I took photos and carried the blankets.

Spence returned, grabbed the first chair by the arms, lifted it two inches, and set it down. He frowned. Reaching around, he held the back of the seat and hugged the chair to his chest. With a grim face, he slow-stepped up the ramp.

Scowling, but not panting, he lugged the second chair up the ramp and into the house.

His fret had finished―time to belay mine.

First, I unwrapped the plastic wrap and stood by the sliding glass door to admire the shiny furniture. The light aspen logs blended with the white pine of the sofa and coffee table. The new furniture enhanced the rustic ambience of our home. Would it be comfortable?

Though wobbly and scratched, the old Adirondack chair had cushioned me for years. From it, I’d gazed out the sliding glass door at visiting animals and passing seasons. And in that chair I’d written two hundred twenty-nine blog posts. Could the new chair nurture me for another two hundred twenty-nine?

I sat.

With less of a tilt to the back and longer legs, the aspen chair gave me a higher seat and a better view. My feet rested easily on the floor, and my elbows relaxed on the armrests giving me a yoga posture comfortable enough for meditation. Okay!

Reaching over to the coffee table, I picked up my computer and settled it on my lap. Because my knees no longer angled higher than my fanny, the computer slid toward the floor. I grabbed the computer, put a pillow on my knees, and made a mental note to buy a triangular pillow on the next trip to town.

Next I opened a document file, put the mouse on the armrest, and typed.

The mouse slid down the armrest and moved the cursor through different paragraphs. Sheesh. A mouse pad wouldn’t fit on the narrow armrest so I placed the mouse on the keyboard touchpad that I’d turned off because it moved the cursor if I’d brushed against it while typing.

Computer balanced and mouse stationary, I wrote. Forty-five minutes later, my fanny numbed from pressing into the wooden seat. I grabbed another pillow, placed it on the seat, and sat again.

Comfort fret done.

Emma padded back into the great room, stopped in front of the chair replacing the one she’d involuntarily ridden, and glared.

“Jump, Emma,” I said to encourage her.

She swished her tail and merrowed.

“You can do it, girl.”

Sitting on her butt, Emma merrowed.

“Let me help you.” I lifted her into the aspen chair.

After circling so she faced forward, Emma sat up as straight as the wood stove poker. She turned her head right then left and merrowed. Inch by inch she eased her body down, crossed her front legs, but didn’t take a nap.

Afternoon turned to twilight, and Emma jumped off the new chair. Turning her head to study the strange intruder, she spit out a merrah as loud as Lovina’s laugh. She marched across the room, wiggled her butt, and jumped onto the sofa.

In time, cranky Emma will belay her fret over the rustic intruder, jump onto its seat on her own power, and nap encircled by its polished aspen arms. Until she does—days, weeks, or years from now—I’ve got blog posts to write in my own rustic chair.

Emma in Rustic Chair

Reflections on the Sixth Week of Winter – Encounter

Encounter

I admire the writer Alana Lorens, actually my writing friend Barbara Mountjoy. I met Babs when I joined Meadville Vicinity Pennwriters. She’s crafty. She mixes disparate ingredients into her intriguing suspense novel Encounter.

High powered lawyers on a team building retreat

Positive staff facilitators

A truck load of undocumented immigrants

Coyotes out to make big money, and

A freak March snowstorm in the New Mexico desert.

When I gushed about enjoying the book, Babs asked what I liked.

I liked her character development. Each character, in a cast of many, is distinct. Each has an individual arc. And I liked that the engaging story involves issues that matter. Because of the diverse characters, all views of undocumented immigrants emerge in the novel. A freak snowstorm in March brings them to the final “ENCOUNTER” and resolution.

A Book Store Review

Encounter: So Much at Stake

Alana Lorens mixes high powered lawyers, desperate undocumented immigrants, greedy coyotes, and sensible retreat staffers with a New Mexico desert snow storm for a suspenseful novel.

Her masterful character development makes each character easy to distinguish. Characters follow their own arcs. This diversity allows all sides of the immigration issue affecting the storyline to arise naturally.

Fiction readers who care about people and like page turning adventures will like Encounter. Those with un poco de espanol will enjoy the story even more.