In Praise of My Not-so-nice Grandma

 

In Praise of My Not-so-nice Grandma

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Grandma raised me. When I was born, my Dad was overseas fighting in The War. My Mom had what we today call mental health issues.

For all know, from stories told me by that side of the family, she might have been Mad as the Proverbial Hatter. Uncles and Aunts rescued me often and I’m sure they were glad to hand me and Mom over to Dad when he returned.

My Dad was a Farmer. He loved farming. He loved my Mom. Mom loved Dad. Mom did not love farming. I was three when my sister was born. By the time I was four and my little sister, who, by the way, was in braces for feet problems, Dad knew he could not keep us safe. Mom was taken to the State Hospital and was there until de-institutionalization in the70s.

Years later, when Mom was dying, a doctor reviewing her file at the Hospital, told my Aunt and me that a big part of Mom’s problem was post-natal depression and today (early 80s), she would have been treated much differently.

All my Aunts and Uncles had young children. I don’t imagine they were fighting over who got raise us. Rightly so. Dad wanted to keep us with him. As a child, I did entertain fantasies of living with one or another of my numerous relatives.

After having brought up seven of her own, Grandma came to our house to raise me and my sister, Judy. Grandma didn’t like me. In defense of this woman who had a child-free life in Indiana and came to the wind-swept valley in Montana, I understand.

Grandma doted on Judy who  was a neglected baby. Grandma thought I had gotten all the loving.

Not so. Having somewhat raised myself, I might have been a brat. I don’t know. The way Grandma handled it was to lavish Judy with love and to teach me the rudiments of Everything Housekeeping until I was deemed old enough to handle the household on my own. Then Grandma boarded the train back home to Indiana.

That might sound like Judy got the best deal and the young me would have agreed. The older me, long years ago figured that perhaps I got the better deal.

Cooking put me onto this train of thought. Tracy sent me a recipe for a simple Middle-Eastern dish consisting of lentils, rice and caramelized onions. This is not a dish my Grandma would have made. If I could set a plateful in front of her, she would not eat it.

Grandma taught me basic farm-style cooking. Meat, potatoes, vegetables. Pie or cake with dinner because that’s how we ate. Grandma would never have gone out to the herb pots to grab handfuls of aromatic leaves for seasoning. Seasonings came from McNess.

At Grandma’s side I made slaw, pickles, butter and jams. Anything you would find on a farm dinner table, she taught me to make. Canning, preserving, rendering lard, preparing meats and veggies for the freezer, I did it. I did laundry, cleaned house, made soap. I learned to sew, to embroider, to crochet.

Judy, always younger, never lifted a finger. We talked about this years later.

That sounds fierce, but it wasn’t. I found spare time to poke my nose into numerous books, some of them forbidden.

The best thing Grandma did, a side-effect perhaps of her training me up in the way I should go, was teach me to solve problems, to think things out for myself.

For example, consider this dish I’m cooking, which smells delicious, by the way. Tracy’s recipe serves six people. I ignored the recipe, the ingredients are simple, so I pared it down for myself.

I think of my mean Grandma often. I think of her fondly. Near the end of her life, she told me why she treated my neglected sister and me (maybe much loved), differently. She told me she was wrong. I hugged her, very aware of the sacrifices she had made for us.

I’m not so sure she was wrong so much as out of balance in how she raised us. She did a huge thing to give up ten years of her life to raise another family. She gave me gifts I use daily.

I love you, Grandma. By the way, this dish I just cooked is scrumptious.

Caramelize thrice the onions than you think you will need. Use an equal amount of lentils and rice. Pre-cook lentils so the lentils and rice will finish at the same time. I dumped lentils and rice into chicken broth, seasoned with salt, pepper, cumin and garam masala. Stirred in the caramelized onions the last five minutes. I ate mine with a dollop of sour cream. Yogurt would be good. Or a tomato-cucumber salad. Or hard-boiled egg to make pretty. Enjoy.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

End of August, too soon

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Tricycle, Tricycle, Tricycle!

 

Tricycle, Tricycle, Tricycle! 

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I want to ride my tri-cy-cle. I want to ride my trike!

Queen, I shall sing you all day.

Do you remember your first wheels?  Mine was a tricycle, all metal, sparkly red. I remember the size, the shape, the feel of leaning over the chrome handlebars, skinny legs pushing the rubber-clad pedals with all my might, wind in my face, tooling down the lane between the house and the barn.

My friend Janet bought an electric tricycle and she is excited. Her excitement is infectious. I caught a case of trike fever.

I have not had an automobile since moving to Mexico. Public transportation is so good here, even in our small town. Then I got used to depending on my helper, Leo, to take me shopping, to conduct any business, to see a doctor or go for an ice cream. Whatever my needs, it was simple to arrange transportation with Leo and he eased any language problem I might have. That last part is a plus and a minus. Made me language-lazy.

I’ll be moving to a small village, v e r y small. I can still get a taxi or the autobus and I have friends there who will gladly take me out and about. No wheels, no worry.

Inspired by Janet, I did the thing we all do now. I went online and looked at electric trikes for seniors. Ah, the array! The variety! The options!

It didn’t take me any time at all to figure I want one with big fat tires and good suspension to bounce over the cobblestones. And a comfy seat with a back and arm rails. A basket in front for when I lean over the handlebars and pedal on down the street to the closest panaderia for an empanada. Add a basket in back for Lola to ride along, nose sniffing the air, ears on point.

Also, it became immediately apparent I want a more expensive one with add-ons so I will have to save a good while before I get a trike.

There are bike shops in town, many bike shops. I have not checked out what they can do for me.  Or in Ahualulco, which is very much a bicycle town and when you maneuver a vehicle through the narrow streets, you understand why so many people ride bikes.  Or, or, imagine going to the huge bike shops in Guadalajara to feast my eyes on the best of the best. I’m all aflutter with possibility.

Michelle gave me some pointers for what to look for in performance. She’s had three electric bikes and loved them, but her bicycle days are over, she says.

I said, “Picture this. Let’s say we all get a tricycle. Here we go, all in a row, you and Ana and Rick and myself, each on our own trike, wearing leather vests, do-rags around our heads, each with a dog in the back basket. We would be a gang. Everybody would be scared of us.”

Michelle seemed to think we would generate more laughter than fear.

That’s okay too. I’m just dreaming the dream.

I want to ride my tricycle. I want to ride it where I like.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

August 22, 2024

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The Year of the Hibiscus

 

The Year of the Hibiscus

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Here we are, smack in the middle of August, wondering how we got here already. Yes? As a friend said, “What do you mean, August? It’s only June.”

Yes. June. I mean, August! The days move along too quickly on their progression through the equinox. You can feel the difference in the air, can’t you? It might be subtle but it is there. The air has a different scent, a different brush against your skin. A different energy.

Summer is still with us. The signs of the season turning are here. For me, when I see the signs, my mind skips autumn and turns to winter. It is one of my failings. I love autumn and dread winter, even here in this sub-tropical land where mornings can be quite chill.

The three-month-long heat dome messed up a lot of expectations. My Haas avocado tree died. My fig tree was set back, struggling. She’s a baby tree. While standing next to her in the garden, I ate the only fig she gave. Oh, glorious fig.

My mango tree started with an early growth spurt, went into delayed reaction to extreme heat for a month-long hiatus. Now, a month late, two month’s later, I’m finished with harvest. My ever-generous papaya is doing the best she can.

All my garden pots are cleaned up and resting. I won’t plant veggies, tempting as it will be, until after I’m settled in my new home, probably near winter. So I say today.

I mourned my Magnolia. She went into severe decline, leaves burned away. Rains brought revival; the lady is still damaged, not very pretty, but she is giving us her first aromatic flowers. If I were to take you on a garden tour, many plants, bushes, trees would tell you a similar story.

Our daily rains, oh, blessed daily rains, no longer visit with regularity. The rainy season is not gone and done, just slower, lesser, erratic.

Through every change, through every season, the blooming hibiscus, well, blooms.

When I first moved here, eight-and-a-half years ago, I planted hibiscus around the perimeter of my yard. Like the bougainvillea, hibiscus takes seasonal changes in stride and flowers through it all.

I planted all colors. I planted many varieties. I’ve flowers of red, yellow, orange, white, salmon, pink, solid colors and mixed colors. Some are the familiar standard hibiscus you see in every yard. Some are exotic, doubles and ruffles. One has three colors on one bush. One has variegated leaves. One has tiny leaves but big ruffled flowers. 

One, back when it first opened a flower, made me ask my garden helper, Leo, “What flower is this?” “Hibiscus,” he answered. “No.” “Yes, look at it closely. See how it sticks out its tongue.” “Oh. It is a hibiscus.”

This year my hibiscus trees or bushes, are more glorious than ever. Lusher, fuller, more flowery.

If ever I doubt life, all I have to do is look out my windows or walk around my yard. Hibiscus, my ever-blooming hibiscus, assures me that life wants to live. Life wants to live fully, to thrive, to flower in profusion.

Seems to me to be a lot of parallels to our human lives in a garden, maybe especially a garden under duress. Changes are not always welcome, often feared. We may want to hide, to shelter in a cool cave. Metaphorically, we may need to push down deeper roots or prune expectations, but we always have an option to try to grow through the changes. So says my hibiscus.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

August 15, 2024

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Honey, they’ve shrunk the house!

 

Honey, they’ve shrunk the house!

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When I moved to Etzatlan in Jalisco, Mexico, I said to myself, as well as to anyone who would listen, “I will live here until I die. This is my last best place.”

Unless I die in the next few weeks, I find that I have one more last best place to experience in this life.

It had been a month since I’d visited my new house in Oconahua, a casita tucked into a corner of property owned by Ana and Michelle. This morning Leo helped me load his car with a few things I could take over early along with a deep-dish mango pie I made yesterday.

Somehow, my very first impression could only be expressed as, “Honey, they’ve shrunk the house!”

I know my new place is smaller than my present small home. I know the patio is smaller. I know I won’t have a bodega in which to store extras. I know I won’t have the luxury of a yard. I know all this. I’m agreeable.

Little by little, I’ve been packing. Winter bedding. Winter sweaters. Dishes I can do without but want to keep. Keep—I am keeping the bare minimum. Bare. Minimum.

My constant questions to myself: Keep? Throw? Give away?

I am many things but a hoarder I am not. I moved here with what I could cram into a cargo van. And, yes, I have accumulated bits and pieces. I believe everything I own should be used. If I’m not using it, I want it to have a good home. Or, a different home.

Frequently, over the years, I’ve looked at my items with a critical eye. Often, the trash can is heavier for my effort. Keeping things because they might have a use someday may be a virtue. It is a virtue I don’t have.

On the other hand, if I had the space and the inclination, there are some lovelies I would find nice to collect. Collecting is not hoarding. Right?

Collections have no place in this chapter of my life. 

Back to my shrunken house. While diligently packing and purging over the past several weeks, in my imagination, I’ve configured my new space with those pieces of furniture which I will keep. I’ve filled the drawers and cupboards. In imagination, I’ve moved things around, here, no there, or maybe over against that wall. This cupboard in today’s kitchen, might live nicely in tomorrow’s bedroom. I can drive myself batty-watty with this mind game.

My new abode is beautiful. Windows and doors are works of art. The bathroom is lovely. Floor tile is being laid this week, or maybe next week. I’ve never moved into a pure space, new in every way. Unique doors made from century-old outside doors, can slide to separate the spaces. Rather dazzling, it is.

Standing inside the casita this morning, I realized that the only way I would really know what to keep and what to re-home, would be to wait and see. I have to wait until me and my stuff are all moved, all in one place. Placement will be trial and error or maybe, trial and trial is a better way to say it. Trial and trial again.

After the house tour, we gathered around my friends’ table and face-planted into mango pie, mangos from my last harvest from my own mango tree. Not to worry. Everyone has mango trees. In season, somebody will drive up the street past the house, announcing mangos for sale. All I will have to do is step out my door, stand on the stoop, and agree to a price.

This afternoon, my mantra is “Lead me not into temptation. Oh, lead me not into temptation.”

My inclination, the temptation I don’t need, is to unpack and repack everything I have packed, just so I can reassess, keep, purge, give away. I know that the blue glass pitcher is in one of the book boxes, because it fit the empty space. The dinner plates nestle in a bin between folds of winter bedding. And so it goes. All a-jumble.

So far, I’m white knuckling it, resisting the urge to empty boxes and bins and repack, still using my best guess as a gauge, and how futile would that be.

Instead of giving in to temptation, I am going to paint my little cupboard which holds my sewing supplies, both because it could use a fresh coat of paint and because it will look dandy fine in its new home, in my next last best place.

I will not repack. I will not repack. I will not, will not, will not.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

August, I can’t believe it is August 8!

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Tragedy in Etzatlan

 

Tragedy in Etzatlan

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Lest we forget. I tell this story lest we forget.

We have suffered a tragedy in our little community.

You are probably tired of hearing me celebrate every raindrop. The rain that makes this mountainous country look like the green, green, green of Ireland, wears the familiar comedy/tragedy mask, same as any country with arroyos and gullies. Water will wear and tear channels through mountains, valleys and hillsides.

Last week the rain turned its tragedy cheek toward our town.

Etzatlan was established by the Spanish in the 1530s as a major shipping point from the gold and silver mines in the mountains above the town; from the mines to Etzatlan, to Guadalajara, to the Gulf Coast and across the Atlantic to Spain.

One of the bigger mines, El Amparo, the ruins of which still stand, is located just a few short kilometers above our town and was still being mined as late as the 1930s. A handful of people live at El Amparo, in homes near but outside of the old mining buildings. The actual mines, the area around them, is huge, as you might imagine an area mined for 500 years.

For the rest of us, it is a fun place to explore, to walk the trails. For one family in town, a place the area had become their camping mecca. My gardener, Leo, knew the family. The young man, 35, and his wife 32, two children, girls 12 and 8, were neighbors. Leo told me the young man was a hard worker, a good man. The family didn’t have much money but they spent many weekends together, tent camping and exploring in the hills, the ruins, the old mining areas at El Amparo.

This is not a cliché. It truly was a dark and stormy night. Lightning flashed and crackled. Thunder crashed and boomed. Rain poured from the sky as from a bottomless, never-ending, tilted bucket.

We will never know the details. Did our family go to their pickup truck for shelter from the storm? Was it the next morning, searching for a better campsite? Did they get caught in a flash flood, as a wall of water roared through the arroyo while they were crossing? Did they misjudge the depth and strength of the waters?

I tell you this story because every community in Montana has a similar story. Any country riddled with canyons, arroyos, gullies, with creeks dry most of the year, or gentle rivers, until the rivers are not gentle. It is easy to forget, to not pay attention, to misjudge the dangerous strength of water.

A couple days after the stormy night, the family pickup truck was found in the river with the bodies of Dad, Mom and the younger daughter. The older daughter, the 12 year old, was nowhere nearby.

Immediately, the grieving community came together to search the area, which encompassed numerous side streams and a huge burn from last year. The National Guard, the Army and Navy were all engaged in the search along with Police from all the communities around us.

Four days after the storm, the body of the other daughter was found and brought to town to join her family for burial. This sadness, this grief, touches all of us, even those of us not native to this place. We all feel the loss of this young family.

Take care. Be vigilant. We may not live at the bottom of a coulee but we either live in or drive through lands prone to flash floods and surging waters.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

August 1, 2024

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Threw a Party

 

Threw a Party

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It was not the usual party. Bear with me while I paint a picture for you of the background that led to this strange, but not unfamiliar, party.

First thing, Baby Marley, my great-granddaughter, who spent the winter in the hospital NICU in Billings, who is still fighting the effects, came down with Covid. Oh, yes, the whole family fell ill, one by one, like a standing-on-edge row of dominoes.

Every morning I’d check in. How is Marley? How are Kyla, Leilani, Tate, Jessica and Damon? How is Grandma? Whew!

The whole week I lived in a cloud of worry. That fog dominated my senses. I knew I wasn’t thinking straight. But I couldn’t seem to shift gears.

I even managed to work myself up into a couple days of my own minor illness, mirroring my family’s symptoms without benefit of Covid.

During this time, three of my friends, three of the other homeowners here, flew in for various periods of time. Every day they were off gadding about, doing fun things. I succumbed to a tinge of envy.

Now, these three women have known each other all their lives. Two of them are here for a short period of time, will be back come winter. It is only normal that they would cram in every minute of fun that they can.

Of course, they don’t invite me. They know I am saving every peso for truck rental when I move, maybe in two or three months. I turn down every invitation.

Doesn’t matter that I wouldn’t go with them. Doesn’t matter that “no, thanks” would be my decision. I still felt left out. Feelings are so weird, not to be always trusted, eh? I didn’t say this was going to be a pretty party.

Then, while purging and packing a cupboard, sorting through posters from plays I’d been in or had directed, I caught a bad case of the “remember whens?” and that, on top of the aforementioned,  led me to my degeneration into a pity party, one lone party pooper attendant, my own self.

To have a really good down-in-the-dirt pity party, one must feed it. What better food than comparing one’s insides to other people’s outsides. I always come out of this comparison feeling “less than”. If you have a need to feel badly, I guarantee this method works.

Fortunately for me, I felt myself hit bottom. Whoa. Hold your horses, woman. Let’s turn this team around. We don’t really want to stay at this party.

I would love to tell you that we left the party at a gallop. Party over! Well, it didn’t work that way.

For a good hour, I had to self-talk my way back out of my slump. It was hard work. There is something in my mind that gets a payback from a little self-pity and it didn’t want to let me go.

What I can tell you is that once I got my Tigger-bouncy mind calmed down, I was able to take that pity party in a strong grip, gather all my energy, plant my feet firmly, knees flexed, windmill my arm in my very best caricature of a baseball pitcher, and throw that party as far away from me as I could fling it. I think it flew over the mountains plop into the ocean.

That’s how I threw a party.

My family is in various stages of sick and getting better.

Baby Marley is still snuffly but has the “energy of a horse”.

My friends are packing their days full of adventures.

My mind has settled down to appreciating the wonders of the day.

Mangos are in full ripe juiciness. Life is good again.

Invitation to a party? Uh, no thanks. I’m partied out.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

July 25, 2024

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Homer gets a make-over

 

Homer gets a make-over

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Poor Homer. He started to look disreputable. Rather down in the mouth, long in the tooth, rusty around the edges.

Sadly, I had reached the age to consider procuring a companion. While Homer is not exactly a cabana boy, I was attracted to him the first time I saw him. His price was mind-boggling. It took me a good year of back-and-forth trips to Tonala, home of huge artisans bazaars, before I made the purchase.

This was back in the first couple years I lived here, when each trip to Tonala was a treasure hunt for fun and artistic touches for my casa and jardin. Every year I visited that corner shop and gazed on Homer with wanting.

Homer. I’d better explain further. He’s made of metal, same as the tin man in “The Wizard of Oz” but distinguished looking. Homer, a skeleton in a tuxedo, complete with spats and a top hat, cigarillo in one hand and a cane in the other, stands about 7’ tall. I do like a man to whom I can look up with admiration, especially one who doesn’t argue with my decisions, who lets me go about my business with complacency.

Still distinguished, but, yes, time has taken a toll, Homer looks a bit disreputable. He might be no longer welcome among the snoot-and-loot crowd.

I suppose it’s my fault. I let him live outdoors with nary a care for the elements. I began to think about giving my man a make-over.

My first thinking would have made Homer something of an art project. While not envisioning a face lift and hours at the gym to bulk him up, I was considering a complete paint job, adding tiny silver conchos with a touch of turquoise to gussy up his pant legs, though Homer’s legs are awfully skinny. And teeth. Poor guys teeth are more stained than mine.

The sheer work (and cost, all those colors) involved in a complete make-over seemed daunting and I managed to put it off, again and again.

I’m glad I did. Three women friends, Ana, Michelle and Susan, were over for a visit and we were standing around Homer while I told them our story and my plans for a paint job.

“NO!” they exclaimed, in unison. “Homer is wonderful just as he stands.” “Nothing looks worse than glaring white teeth in an old man’s mouth.” “He is aging the same as we are!” “Every ding and dent tells a story.”

Well, that’s me told. I listened. I looked. “I think you are right.” While more than willing to give up the hard work, I saw Homer in a different light. Aging along with me. I like that.

Michelle then said, “Why not just knock off some of the rust. Put some Coca-Cola in a spray bottle, spray the rusty spots, wait a few minutes, brush it off with water. When he is dry, spray him with varnish.”

 Yes. Why not indeed. I asked Leo to buy me some Coca-Cola, the national drink of Mexico, and here you thought that was tequila, and please pick up two cans of spray varnish for my metal man.

I got to work. I didn’t remove every speck of rust, but the process made me glad I’ve never been a big soda pop drinker. When I do want that fizz, however, I generally chose Coca-Cola. Notice the past tense usage there.

My big fear is that if I put any more magic remover on Homer, I might render him nude. Enough is enough, I decided.

I’ve never been a whiz with spray cans of paint but I gave it my best go, and voila, a new man emerged. Newish. Sort of newish. Cleaner, at any rate. Spiffy. Ready for the next phase of our lives.

Sondra Ashton

HWC: Looking out my back door

July 18, 2024

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