Breakfast is Over

The cake is almost gone and the fridge is full of leftovers from our meals out. Carm and I are flaked out on the sofa, exhausted from our late nights. Birthday weekend is coming to a close and none too soon or we'd be having to let out our pants!

Friday night we met up with Bruce and Tina for the annual Keg steak gorge. For the last several years we've been meeting on their birthday (Bruce is the same day) and indulging ourselves. Many of the previous years we've overnighted in a downtown hotel, but this year we came straight home - with a giant container of leftovers.

Saturday night we went to Sol d Acapulco down on the St. Lawrence to celebrate with friends there. Another big meal – crispy schnitzel, German potato salad and cold German beer. A spice cake smothered in blueberries weighted us down further. Seven deer and 12 turkeys were spotted on the way down, just two deer were seen on the way home. None were very close to the road (that we saw!).

Sunday morning my alarm sprung me out of bed, I grabbed a coffee and met up with my brother and his kids at the arena. My nephew Erik had a hockey game so I went to watch. I was glad that I hadn't over-imbibed the night before as a hockey game is LOUD. Yelling parents, blaring horns and wicked cowbells, not to mention the heavy metal played over the intercom. All was good though, but sadly Erik's team lost.

They all came back to my place for some brunch (pizza from the freezer anyone?) and while we were sitting at the table Juliette noticed something running across the field. Once it was out of sight we got onto google and figured out that it was either an otter or a fisher. We are leaning toward fisher. I was so glad the dog's weren't outside as I KNOW they would not have come when called, and the snow was too soft to handle my weight.

If we listened to our intellect we'd never have a love affair. We'd never have a friendship. We'd never go in business because we'd be cynical: "It's gonna go wrong." Or "She's going to hurt me." Or,"I've had a couple of bad love affairs, so therefore . . ." Well, that's nonsense. You're going to miss life. You've got to jump off the cliff all the time and build your wings on the way down. ~Ray Bradbury

Cake for Breakfast Day

Snow – bah humbug! There have been many years when Carm’s birthday has been snow free with crocuses pushing through the grass, ones where we’ve been out in t-shirts and having lunch in the sun. Alas, it is still very much winter out there, with the current temp at –5C and it is in fact snowing as I write this.

I started making his traditional burnt sugar birthday cake yesterday afternoon after I got back from the writing group meeting. There are several steps and since I only make a cake once or twice a year it takes me some time. First sugar is slowly melted until it is a dark golden brown. A volcano of splattering sugar erupts when I add the boiling water. The syrup boils until it is a bit thicker than maple syrup.

Butter is whipped in my stand mixer until it is a fluffy butter colour – oh, it was an almost dead match with the painting we did last fall. Sugar is added, the crystals blending with the butter in a creamy mixture. Now is when I add the cooled syrup and the pale yellow is suddenly transformed into a rich, red brown (almost the same colour as Kabira). Flour and milk mix together and the cake batter is ready. Hurray for stand mixers as there is much beating required.

My oven has only a variable temperature setting – meaning it doesn’t matter what you set it at, it will chose it’s own temp. Not good for cake making, but I kept a close eye on it, adjusting the knob as the oven thermometer varied. I’ve baked dry, crumbly versions many times, but I’m happy to say that this year’s was moist.

This morning I made the icing – heaps of brown sugar, butter and cream that boil on the stove creating sweet fumaroles. At just the right moment the pot is whisked off the stove and a few more ingredients are added. The electric beaters whisk it up until it is just about to turn into fudge. The caramel aroma almost makes me swoon. I stop the beaters and we have 1 1/2 minutes to get it on the cake before it hardens into fudge and is unworkable. It is a two person job to ice this cake!

Remember when your mom let you lick the beaters? She was being a pretty good mom cause I bet she wanted to lick them herself! Carm and I each got a beater and then fought over the pot. yummmmmmm.

It was hard to resist cutting into it right away but we stepped back to let the icing fully set and cool. Fresh coffee was brewed and enjoyed with wedges of splendid sugary cake. Oh… the sugar rush!

 

I like birthday cake. It's so symbolic. It's a tempting symbol to load with something more complicated than just 'Happy birthday!' because it's this emblem of childhood and a happy day. ~Aimee Bender

The more sand that has escaped from the hourglass of our life, the clearer we should see through it. ~Jean-Paul Satre

WYL #10 Leaving Home

 

My Own Place

Palacious, Texas. The t-shirt lay on my bed, a taunting reminder of what was to come. My mom and dad had just come back from seeing the town of Palacious with the idea of moving there so dad could open a private practice. I had turned 19 a month before and had a new job… and a boyfriend. Did I mention I had a boyfriend? My plan was to stay in Ottawa and eventually get married. I wasn't ready to move out on my own, and being ripped from my family was no great hell either.

As it turns out, dad got a better job offer, one that wouldn't take them so far away. Toronto was reachable by bus and they'd still be sailing out of the Trident yacht club on the St. Lawrence, just 1 1/2 hours away. I started to feel excited about having my own place.

Mom and I started looking at apartments and saw all manner of accommodations, including some pretty creepy places. We settled on a bachelor apartment on Argyle Street. I'd be able to walk to work and it wasn't far from the university where Steve was studying.

It was in a gritty 10 story building and supposedly had a pool on the roof (I never went there and you'll soon see why). When you first came in the door, to the left were two closets opposite each other and a small bathroom at the end. The main room was MAYBE 10x12. Along the wall backing onto the closets was a tiny kitchen: fridge, sink, 1 or 2 feet of counter space and a narrow stove. It had an avocado green carpet that must have had more dirt in it than the Grand Canyon. I had my single bed sitting without its legs, lengthwise along one wall with pillows to fashion it into a daybed. Across from that was the desk my dad built. There was a dresser at one end of the bed (closest to the door), and a small shelf with my radio on the other end. There was barely room for the brown Ikea chair at the end of the desk. To give you an idea of how small the apartment was: sometimes I'd pull the mattress and baseboard apart to make a giant bed. The large rectangle reached the base of my desk and left no empty floor-space.

At the end of my desk, near the kitchen, I had my budgie cage hanging from the wall, a box with the hamster cage on it. The guinea pig lived in another box on the floor, and the rabbit in a laundry basket - the plastic kind with holes in it. I really should have skipped all the rodents and gone straight for a cat.

My sheltered up-bringing in middle-class neighbourhoods did not prepare me for living around people yelling and fighting with police arriving to take them away. Nor did it prepare me for creepy men knocking on my door telling me 'they know I'm in there'. No. I wasn't prepared. And you can see why I never went on the roof!

It was my first home and I made the best of it. I desperately missed my family, and my boyfriend was usually too busy with his studies to spend much time with me. Work was my only distraction and since most of my co-workers were middle aged men with families, the socialization didn't extend beyond work hours.  Of course my family visited from Toronto from time to time. At bedtime we'd pull the bed into one giant sleeping surface and lie ourselves out as if we were in a tent. A chorus of "good night John boy" would cause us all to giggle.

I wasn't making much money, but that didn't stop me from buying things to make it feel like 'my place'. I had red plastic plates, and glasses with splashes of red. My bed had a black, brown and white Mexican blanket and the throw pillows were black faux fur. The chair was brown fabric, and the wooden furniture was all light wood. It was a cute little place. I was lonely though. I think if I would have had a TV it would have been a bit easier.

By the time summer arrived, I was sick of the fighting and noise, plus I had a motorcycle which gave me more freedom, so I found a new apartment in a residential setting. And my boyfriend Steve moved in with me. Life was looking up!

~

Leaving home in a sense involves a kind of second birth in which we give birth to ourselves. ~Robert Neelly Bella