The Simple Precinct of Home

Yesterday I dodged a few raindrops as I dashed into a local polling place to vote.

Once inside, after both my identity and my vote were duly processed, I began a slightly more personal ritual that goes along with my election day experience. One of my precinct judges is an acquaintance I used to see weekly back when I was yet a living pillar in a worshipping congregation.

While this precinct official can still be found in the pews week to week, I can not.  So, if things are slow election wise, we step to one side and take a few moments to get caught up.  

She spoke of a trip they will take later in the month, and how it is the first time her husband has been out of the country since his High School days.  She and I agreed he was past due for a journey.

I've been thinking over that idea, that a person "must" travel, at least occasionally. As is often the case, I am of two minds.  While I thoroughly enjoy exploring "other" spaces, I also believe Dorothy and the Wizard had it right all along, though poet Billy Collins phrased it more elegantly...

How much better to command the simple precinct of home
than be dwarfed by pillar, arch, and basilica.

(from "Consolation", via Poemhunter.com)

Broadened

“Too often travel, instead of broadening the mind, merely lengthens the conversation.” 

Elizabeth Drew

I used to envy people who travelled for business regularly.  Travel is supposed to be broadening.Broadening is usually meant in the sense of "you learn new things" as opposed to "you gain weight", but typically when I am away from home for more than a day or so, both meanings apply.
Case in point. The Hub and I flew to Fort Lauderdale Florida recently, so he could attend a professional meeting.

Immediately we noticed airports and airplanes are all a lot emptier than we've ever seen before. Economic downturn becomes ever so much more a reality than a phrase when you are seeing firsthand the nearly empty corridors of what is more typically one of the busiest venues we ever purposefully visit (DFW airport).

Florida is a gorgeous state taken over all, even with its continued frenetic pace of development.Problem this trip, was the weather. Last week, Florida was significantly more wintry than central Texas.  That pretty much left us out in the cold. The weather for our visit in Florida was ironically unpleasant in ways that had folks unable to resist fatuous questions about where global warming was when you needed it. Both visitors and residents were donning extra layers and avoiding spending time out of doors.With gray windy skies and low temperatures the new rule, a trip to Florida becomes pretty much a waste of an otherwise perfectly good ocean and beach.

No red suits here. 

Even the local version of Baywatch were bundled up.

Or here. 

Good thing the lobby was scenic since it was the only comfortable place to hang.

I learned that while some resorts have gone to great lengths to create an ambiance of warmth and caring for your well being, sometimes room service will be only about getting food to your room, rather than doing anything to produce a good meal.

Mediocre food aside, I heart little jars. I have a weakness for anything small, but especially condiments when they appear in their own teensy single serving glass bottle. I know it is not environmentally groovy. I just adore the little bottles that show up on room service carts.   I think I'd bring them all home if I could.

I learned if you are bored enough, everything looks like it might make for an interesting photograph from 22 floors up...only to return home and be baffled by the multiple photographs of traffic islands.  I think I was thinking those shots could be tweaked in some way to become "artsy".

Traffic islands are not artsy. Not even shot from 22 stories up. Not even when the bright little red and yellow cars look like matchbox models.Or maybe, especially not then.

HVAC units for an entire resort complex. while impressive in scale, are probably not going to make for arty photos either, although these come close(r).I was reminded why it does not pay to park on the roof of a parking structure at dusk.

Cue Hitchcock

I determined those who are faint of heart ought not use that antique scale at home they also use to weigh themselves to first weigh a laden suitcase, and then stand where the precise scale at the airport for that packed bag will shine out the truth about how many pounds off that scale is reading.  It is better not to know.

Now the dust has settled, I am glad to have had the opportunity to travel with Hub. It reinforced for me how much I like where and how we live. I won't require slipping off ruby slippers at security checkpoints to understand.  There really is no place like home.

“Travel is glamorous only in retrospect.”  

Paul Theroux

Cookamnesia

An interesting aspect of being away from home is that you get to eat without cooking or cleaning up after cooking as part of the daily routine. You might try new foods, or rely upon comfortable chains when speed and predictability are called for, but you are only responsible for finding and ordering and paying. No prep work enters the picture.While I usually miss the cooking a bit, especially when I am paying high prices for a dish I know I reliably turn out better than what is on my plate, I never (ever) miss the cleaning up afterwards part.Problem is, after I've been gone from my kitchen for long enough, I tend to fall prey to what I call "cookamnesia".

After a day or so of whatever steps it takes travel wise to return home, I re-enter my kitchen, typically half exhausted, where I am confronted with a relatively empty refrigerator and/or pantry. I stand there staring into cabinets and my refrigerator and wonder.What in the world will we do for meals now that we are back at the mercy of my skill set? What will it take to rekindle my willingness to extend myself along culinary lines? It is a bit disconcerting to finally stand back in my own sweet kitchen, take a good look around, and rather than experiencing joy at the reunion, feel more a strong desire to grab my keys and head back out towards the closest source for take out.

And that is centrally it - cookamnesia. A dissociation that occurrs between marshaling the energy towards planning and executing a meal and the eventual reward of the good food personally prepared to share with my family. Usually cookamnesia is short lived and after a couple of easy entry level meals I am once again filled with ideas and energy to tackle the challenges of eating well while maintaining a certain level of health, fiscal and social responsibility.

This go round I have been away for six days, helping my daughter get settled in to new digs in Ann Arbor prior to starting law school next week.I made sandwiches while in Michigan one time, the closest thing to a home cooked meal we had there and the closest I'd gotten to planing and preparing a meal for the entire trip.

The first of the two flights it took to get back home to Texas was diverted to another field for refueling which added in another two hours of "sitting on the runway inside the plane fun" into our travel day. Once we finally got here, my husband and I stopped for a very late fast food dinner on the way home from the airport. The next day in between laundry loads and a run to the grocery store, I made an oriental chicken salad for lunch and then a dolled up frozen pizza for dinner.

So here we are, two meals in, and so far I've done nothing that really counts as cooking. And somehow, rather than gleefully anticipating putting something wonderful together for dinner tonight, I am finding excuses for even thinking about what I'll do.

Folks, I am going to the well, throwing down the bucket, and coming up empty.

As I sit here now trying to work up any enthusiasm for planning tonight's dinner, I have about decided to give it up and take it easy on myself. I may have to accept that offspring resettlement residua, travel fatigue, and the ambient heat of Texas in late August all in combination mean it will take more than 24 hours for a kitchen enthusiasm rebound.

If after a couple of days more I am still not finding the energy or imagination to put together anything that goes past "edible" for a main meal, I suppose I'll look around for some form of kitchen intervention and seek professional help.Perhaps a nice quiet restaurant dinner in combination with a Food Network marathon will rekindle the culinary flame.Has this ever happened to you? When you get back home from a trip do you arrive raring to go, kitchen wise? Are you filled with new recipe ideas and things you know you want to try? Or does it take you a day or more to get back into your own kitchen zen zone? I'd really like to know.

Away Game

I am going to shamelessly stoke my ego and assume that not only have you been checking here regularly and expecting the usual near daily fare of new posts, but also that you might have done so for the past week and, not noting any new content wondered, "where the hell is Texas Deb?".Well I'll tell you - I've been in Ann Arbor, y'all.

Rarely is yours truly persuaded (read: forced by circumstances beyond her control) away from computer and homestead long and far enough to experience much outside the Austin/Central Texas culinary world. But this past week found me handing off my CSA basket to a family friend (thank you Alycia!) and joining my hub and daughter, hopping on various planes flying us to Detroit to visit the gorgeous little burg of Ann Arbor. As in Michigan. As in sure enough cold in winter but delightfully cool (to us) in the summertime.

Sidebar - "hopped on a plane" - where did that phrase come from? Can you imagine any activity more likely to invite a strip and/or cavity search? Especially with our current "Orange" security level. I use the phrase with a huge pinch of "don't take me literally" salt certainly.My family and I are all such total control freaks that arbitrarily relinquishing the amount of say over what we do and how we do it to so many others in order to fly anyplace has us engaged in activities that look a lot less like hopping and a lot more like intentionally zoning out.

Travel stressors aside, there we were in Ann Arbor, checking out the place and trying to find a new spot for our youngest to call home for the next three years while she attends the University of Michigan Law School. (Did I just casually work in another Mommy Brag about one of my kids? Why, yes! Yes I did, and thanks for noticing.)

Our crash course in assessing properties and talking "lease legalese" often took on a somewhat Gilligan's Island surrealism. (a..... three.....hoour........tooooour.....")Leasing, something none of the three of us had actively engaged in for some (cough!) decades is a fascinating/creepy enterprise. You drop off your driver's license just to look at a unit after which you are asked freely share the very same information you'd ordinarily closely guard with a succession of Red Bullish peppy, falsely enthusiastic/confidential leasing agents. All this just to figure out if they'll allow you the extreme privilege of paying extra for a covered parking space in their "community".

While there we also toured the Law School which reinforced our understanding that while our daughter will be living in Ann Arbor and actively engaged in scholarly pursuits, she will be doing a lot of reading... and studying....and after making the payments for tuition and her abode with it's add on charges for pets, covered parking, doors and windows, she will have little if anything left over for the amazing array of wining and dining opportunities Ann Arbor has to offer.

As her loving parents, we asked her to investigate the hot spots she'd like to try out on us during our first shared visit.  She set certain price parameters on her own and choose our venues for lunch and dinner accordingly.

Sure, I'm her Mom and I think her grocery lists are brilliant, but my daughter did a fabulous job of finding just the right combination of "local", "responsible philosophy of food", and "deliiiiicious". 

Here they are, a quick run down of our short list of some of the best eating available in Ann Arbor without breaking the bank, a saga in 4 meals.

Dinner Day One: Our family has a dangerous tendency upon arriving in a hotel after a day spent traveling (aka:freaking out see above) to simply unpack, put our feet up, and reach for the room service menu. Seeing as we were only spending 3 full days in Ann Arbor, the alluring convenience of room service had to be overcome by something equally appealing. Enter the Grizzly Peak Brewing Company. [Grizzly Peak Brewing Company 120 W Washington Street ]Catch this as incentive to ignore room service:Fresh Brewed Beer to go!  We indulged in an after dinner "Growler" - 64 ounces of glass jugged brewer's best takeaway.Dinner Day Two: Noting the philosophy of the Arbor Brewing Company Pub & Eatery [114 E Washington] who had no online menu because they were busy regearing their kitchen and resourcing as needed to implement an all natural/local when possible/organic/make it from scratch rebellion, we were not at all discouraged by the need to sit out a 15 minute wait for a table at their historic bar.The beer battered onion rings we ordered for the table set the tone for another delicious foray into a second fresh/local/organic/responsible dinner for three.And another Growler.  Go Blue!

Brunch Day Three:Our last full day in Ann Arbor found us selecting "the" spot for our daughter's new home away from Texas, and to reward ourselves for such diligence and industry we were slated for brunch at the locally famous Cafe Zola [112 W Washington]followed by our official University of Michigan Law School Tour.

Cafe Zola has a simply amazing menu. Despite weathering the "worst performance by an employee impersonating a waitress", we thoroughly enjoyed our choices of various crepes and an omelette worthy of it's own zip code.Dinner Day Three/Meal Four: Had we peaked? Was there anything left to stun our somewhat sated palates after amazing brew pub eats, two growlers and the brunch to end all brunches? Why yes! There was still our piéce de resistance, Vinology [100 South Main Street].I will let their website speak for itself. We think this sweet spot of the unheralded food centric Ann Arbor stacks up favorably to the highly touted Bin 36 in Chicago. We had a series of amazing small plates at Vinology, a decent yet affordable Montepulciano d'Abruzzi, and finished with a shared panna cotta dish and cheese/fruit platter that filled and thrilled without our regretting a single sip or bite.

Ann Arbor is not your run of the mill sleepy little college burg. They have a bustling downtown filled with exciting places to eat and drink including a lot of ethnic food that we didn't have time to explore. They have cutting edge design appearing in unexpected places, such as this new local library branch that has local tongues wagging in a heated debate over "cool" vs. "ugly". They have an adorable water tower and regularly occurring visual surprises such as this Montessori school fence.Ann Arbor has an annually occurring event featuring four simultaneous juried art fairs that runs mid July. This fair is known nationally, featuring as many as 1200 artists and drawing upwards of a half million visitors. Apparently they block off most of downtown to anything but foot traffic, and nearly every flat surface of any size is transformed into gallery space. I am grateful we missed the fair by a few days, not desiring to share this small space with that many other tourists on our first go-round, but smiled to note one home just west of downtown that had not quite made the transition back to whatever passes for "normal" in Ann Arbor.

Did our visit go off without a single hitch? Nearly. Forgetting in one early morning pre-coffee haze that we were in the Land of Kellogg, renowned Clairvoyant Physician, my sweet husband tried to order a non-Kellogg cereal for breakfast in our hotel restaurant. Fortunately the waitress (who seriously pulled a face that looked as though she was struggling to recall if she had ever even heard of our family favorite Honey Nut Cheerios) was not inclined to judge, much less punish, and we all lived to tell the story.

Michigan was a beautifully green and cool respite for our three sets of July heat glazed Central Texan eyes.  I am looking forward already to our next visit and a chance to try out more of their amazing array of eateries.

Meanwhile, Monday I pick up my very last CSA basket of the season.  I'll be back to report on the bounty available from an organic farm after some tropical storm rains perked up the produce. It was fun to have played around some in the cool green of Michigan in July, but it is sure great to be back home!