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some things i know, some things i don’t

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i know rain on this New Mexico Olive in the morning as i brush against it taking feed to the far bowl in Nogal and TenZen's yard.  The raindrops this morning, double click,  were like jewels

 

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i know Kochia,  the DOMINANT weed here,  always here,  always dominating and this year a Bumper Crop.  It has a high protein content…good for Goats and if i could let them Out,  they would make quick work of it ……BUT  ONLY after making quick work of the trees,  the bushes and so,  it's there for me to pull and hand feed as much as i can.  Weed Whack the rest.    Kochia = Work.

 

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what happened here, i DON'T know…..   This week's pound cake.  Same recipe but divided in half.  I am not good at math,  but i think i can divide by 2 but maybe not.  At first when i looked,  it was rising up all over the outside rim of the bread pan,  like Really, rising up all over it so i took it out and cut off the rim stuff and put it back in for some more minutes.  What did i DO????????  Obviously, something,  but i really have no idea……………….

 

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and then here.   NO IDEA.  But the Cloth is strong.  OK.  Strong even that  separated curve of SKY…why?  how to deal with it in stitch?  What is it DOING?  WHY?  But as i try to change it,  it won't happen,  so,  i look.  Waiting.  Looking.   Many  "possibilities" came and went throughout the rainy day but at the end,  it's just this much.   OK.  Tomorrow then.

"Thus it is that the world often seems divided between false hope and gratuitous despair. Despair demands less of us,  it's more predictable, and in a sad way, safer.  Authentic hope requires clarity….seeing the troubles in this world…and imagination,  seeing what might  lie beyond those situations that are perhaps not inevitable and immutable."    

                                       Rebecca Solnit     Hope in the Dark

 

 

 

 

 

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22 responses to “some things i know, some things i don’t”

  1. Mo Crow Avatar
    Mo Crow

    “Imagine all the people

    Sharing all the world…”

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  2. Mo Crow Avatar
    Mo Crow

    that song keeps beaming hope into our broken but beautiful world

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  3. cynthia Avatar
    cynthia

    i so like it when a post puts a song into my head and then i scroll to comments and there it is..the separated curve of sky so mimics the very changes in the air..clouds..mist..that i watch across the valley where the mountains break..forming hollows
    and i am looking at your pound cake thinking this is what happened..it ran away with the maple oatmeal cookies..a no fail recipe..that ran over and beyond the pan edges yesterday ..and who knows why..that i made ..hah yesterday.
    .ok and here the corniest but truest thing that is filling my head right now as day breaks so beautifully and the newly come to us red tail hawk is sailing so quietly across the meadow from the biggest pine at the farthest edge..
    my head loses imagine and goes back further..my mama singing along with her stack of recordings of musicals
    i hear the human race
    is falling on its face
    and hasn’t very far to go
    but every whippoorwill is selling me a bill
    and telling me it just ain’t so
    i was going to just end there,,being somehow half embarrassed..well it is from a song called a
    cockeyed optimist… but then i remembered so strongly that we sat down and had probably the first talk i had ever had. about racism as she explained what really happened in the movie south pacific.. we had seen the play and then the movie and i found it so confusing.. i was 11 and thought the children were simply so lucky to live in such a beautiful place..thought france nuyen the most beautiful woman ever..really nelly faded from my view totally…and my sister and i went around singing you have to be carefully taught..for about a year as our anthem…
    who knows where this came from..but it was a nice few minutes for me out of your post..realizing maybe that at least for a little while hope is authentic here in this small place..gentle day grace

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  4. patricia spangler Avatar
    patricia spangler

    authentic hope. is that the same as accepting the “just-is” ness of reality?

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  5. patricia spangler Avatar
    patricia spangler

    and reality? yesterday i had a tea bag message–
    “the difference between a weed and a flower is a judgment.” so there’s that as well.

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  6. tracy Avatar
    tracy

    Oh no, you popped your pound cake and it fell. You have iris, those are real wealth.

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  7. grace Avatar
    grace

    EEEEEEEEEEE…is this then, a case of a
    fallen
    cake?
    I’ve never seen a fallen cake. Warned severely by my mother
    to NOT open the oven door to look before time, warned not
    to let the oven door slam shut…..
    so i’ve never SEEN what a fallen cake looks like….is THIS IT???
    and i did probably pop it….(like a pimple)….when i scraped
    off all that getting too browned rim, it was all puffed at
    that point, only when time was up and i took it out did it
    look this way….
    Would it have been “normal” if i’d not popped it???????
    i am not a cake baker, never have been. Used to make cakes
    from box for the kids when they were little. But i am a true
    committed pie maker…..
    do you really think this is what happened??????????????

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  8. Kristin Avatar
    Kristin

    Yep, Grace….that is what happened for sure. Like when you pop a balloon, there is no way to get it big and full once again because that which held the fullness of the cake, filled with pockets of air was deflated….the slamming of the oven door might sometimes have that effect as well. Your measurements divided by two were probably just right. Sometimes the atmosphere just really puffs up baking things. I make the same 6 muffin recipe for grand-kids after school snack often – seldom is the result the same…it is always about the air and rising.
    That week looks like one of the most successful “growers” in your yard – glad that some of the crop works for goat feed. The greening of your yard after a rain is a huge change, for sure.
    The cloth will tell her story…she just needs a little time.
    Namaste

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  9. Marianna Avatar
    Marianna

    Rain. Heaven. It missed us here, as it usually does. I think there is a bubble in the valley that forces the weather around us. I’ve seen those precious jewels, and understand the awe.
    As for your cake. I’ve not attempted to bake since I arrived here. Could it be the altitude? It took me 4 years to learn to hard boil eggs at 5,200 – 6,000 feet above sea level.
    I’m also wondering if you could coax some ‘green’ out of the Kochia? Says the novice (not even that) dyer.

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  10. grace Avatar
    grace

    O Hey!, hello! Well…just last week i made the whole
    recipe which was 2 cakes and it came out just fine….so
    who knows. I think Kristin and Tracy are right. I popped it.
    So i’ll try again. The mission of the pound cakes is to
    get some fat back on this skinny old frame….makes porch
    sitting more comfortable.
    And i’ve tried dying with the Kochia. Nada.
    i will be watching your indigo work with your Chanins.
    Thank you for coming by!

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  11. grace Avatar
    grace

    ALSO along the ditch bank roads you should have Yerba Mansa.
    I once used some dried up stems and flowers and it gave
    the most wonder FULL amber color.
    I need to go to where i know there is a lot here and
    dig some plants to transplant. It WILL grow with little
    care. Is a true New Mexican, that plant…..

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  12. handstories Avatar
    handstories

    I am in love with this cloth already, that crack in the sky is what struck me first.
    & oh, her way with words…that “predictable” “sad” safe” way of settling into despair, I do remember that time from long ago…
    & wondering, did the cake still taste ok?

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  13. grace Avatar
    grace

    imagination is at the core of it all

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  14. grace Avatar
    grace

    i love SO MUCH cynthia how you can follow a thread of
    thought/feeling/memory
    it’s quite extraordinary and takes me places as it
    goes….
    and i think all we need is some few minutes as often as
    they come for authentic hope
    Big Love to you

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  15. grace Avatar
    grace

    i don’t know yet
    am trying to look at it anew without the preconceptions i have

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  16. grace Avatar
    grace

    always blind or habitual judgment trips stuff up

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  17. grace Avatar
    grace

    yes….i think you and Tracy are right. We’ll find out
    next time. For now, the fallen cake tastes just Fine.
    i am used to the seasonal changes by now…took a lot of
    years to relax into it…i remember feeling like if i
    didn’t get all of that Kochia “under control” that i would
    be buried under it, but by fall, what hasn’t been
    dealt with just dries up till the next Spring and everything
    is just ok.

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  18. grace Avatar
    grace

    hey Hazel….she is giving me such a Gift with this book
    and the cake, yes! It tastes great. I reduced the vanilla
    and added 2 T fresh lemon juice and i like that better than
    the first one. Am determined to perfect the recipe and
    the technique.
    am not one for sweet stuff but as i said, needing some
    fat on the bones and i like pound cake cause it’s not
    SWEET but rather rich. I can imagine it with some fresh
    fruit on it, like raspberries or maybe peaches

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  19. saskia Avatar
    saskia

    how green your garden grows

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  20. JennAnn Avatar
    JennAnn

    Your cake made me smile…I am the master of cake disasters, but have not yet had one “pop” (although, like you, I was warned by the women bakers in my family to tread carefully while a cake bakes).

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  21. grace Avatar
    grace

    HEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! hello!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    am just finishing the last of it today and it tasted Fine and
    it’s doing the TRICK….
    ~ i have plump little legs~
    after two weeks of pound cake everyday, i can report that
    i have acquired some FAT!!!!! No longer the skin over bone
    that was worrying me
    So GLAD to find you here today (the 20th) Hope all is
    well in your world!

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  22. grace Avatar
    grace

    My botanical garden of Weeds….

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