The Spice of Life

As clichés go, “variety is the spice of life” has maintained its richness better than most. I am thinking of it because my life last week was a stew seasoned with everything from anise to wasabi. Some of the flavors were bitter, some were sweet, some were savory and some packed heat. All in all, there was almost too much to fully digest. I didn’t have time to write a blog post then. I can’t cover it all now and won’t try, but I'll give you a taste.

The last Sunday in March showcased the vagaries of spring – at once sunny, windy and cold. My friend Chris Doig, who is a professional pilot and lives at the end of a runway, kindly offered to take me for a plane ride. She brought along the barf bag and seemed quite concerned that I would lose my lunch before it was all over. The ride was in fact a little bumpy but I guess I’ve done enough flying, sailing, rafting and mountain driving to immunize myself against motion sickness. We soared up the Delaware River to the Water Gap, back over Lake Nockamixon (where I do a lot of my bass fishing), and circled our Bedminster Township neighborhood a few times before touching back down without nausea. It was particularly interesting to view Drumbore Farm (where Trish and I reside) from the air and compare the scene to our enlarged 1930-something aerial photo showing the same perspective. Here’s what our property looked like last week (that's the barn in front). Thanks Chris!

The next day I finished preparing our tax returns for 2010. Ouch! That was definitely one of the bitter spices. Someone get me a Rolaids.

There was plenty of sugar in the next spoonful. I sought recovery from the tax hangover by going fishing, of course. My friends Eric and Bernadette Schaffhausen have a great pond on their farm. Bernadette was skeptical whether the bass would bite so early in the season but I’d gotten a good report from a guy fishing nearby so I decided to give it a try. As it turned out, the largemouth bass weren’t pushovers, but a slow, deep presentation of a crawfish imitation was adequate to fool them into biting, and within a matter of minutes I had a hefty specimen in hand. I yanked out my Droid and snapped a picture before sending him back to his lair.  Thanks Eric and Bernadette!

When I got home that evening I received some downright painful news from an old friend. It felt like getting a Chinese hot pepper stuck in my throat. It took a couple of days to swallow it, along with my pride, but I believe some good came out it in the end. The flavors of introspection are exceedingly complex, but when you indulge in them, your psychological palate becomes more sophisticated. I’m stretching the spice analogy pretty far, I realize, but the truth is that my emotions drew from the full rack. In any case, my stomach has settled back down now and the friendship is richer. Sometimes you have to adjust the salt and pepper even after you think you’ve finished cooking.

On Thursday evening I attended my monthly Writing Club meeting. Suffice it to say that we chopped up some powerful herbs to ingest alongside Bernadette’s marvelous seafood bisque (that’s not an illegal drug reference, trust me – just more play on the spice theme). We all seemed to have some issues to sort out. Good wine, a great meal and some excellent poems and essays made for a fascinating evening and we all left satiated and wiser. Thanks to my fellow Writing Club members!

On Friday night Trish and I had dinner at the Black Bass, which sits high on the banks of the Delaware, with a couple that we just met. We quickly learned that we had a lot in common. The tastes and colors of our conversation did a lot to lift my mood, which had been declining until then. Thank you Jim and Gayle!

Saturday dawned bright and warm, which was very welcome after a chilly wet week. I got up early to join some of my fellow Trout Unlimited members and assist the Cooks Creek Watershed Association in a road cleanup project. We spent the morning picking up litter along a highway near Springtown. I was hoping that no one I knew would drive by.  Wearing orange vests and carrying garbage bags under the watchful eye of local law enforcement, our crew appeared to be a group of convicts performing forced public service. In fact we were just volunteers. This work is important. All those bottles and cups and other pieces of trash don’t just blemish the natural beauty that people enjoy in the Cooks Creek area, but they also wash down into the creek and ultimately into the Delaware and then into the ocean, where they aggregate and swirl around in vast seas of garbage. Check out a few of the images at the following link – incredible. Thanks to TU and CCWA for caring!

http://www.google.com/images?rlz=1T4SKPT_enUS424US425&q=seas+of+garbage&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&sa=X&ei=f-aZTfKiCOfI0QHtoPCADA&ved=0CCEQsAQ&biw=1345&bih=601

Later on Saturday Trish and I attended Kristine Keating’s terrific show at the Stovers Mill art gallery, which also sits atop the banks of the Delaware River. We purchased a moody, moon-infused, impressionistic acrylic rendering of the river painted by Kristine. I was fascinated that such dark, mysterious paintings emanate from such a warm and smiling person. We ran into several friends at the gallery and chatted for a couple of hours. Then we hooked up with two other couples with which we share a lot of fun time, and enjoyed drinks at the Boat House and dinner at Rick’s in Lambertville. Thanks to Kady, Melissa, Jo Ann, Will, Christine, Pat, Jill and Harlan for a great afternoon and evening! All in all, Saturday had an aroma evocative of our little greenhouse and its pots of rosemary, thyme, sage and chives. The tastes and smells of the week lingered on my tongue and in my nose all day Sunday as I worked in our gardens, preparing the ground for new flavors to enjoy later this year.