Pam – Page 110 – New England's Narrow Road

Remembering Thanksgiving

My favorite Thanksgivings took place long ago when I was a kid. There were no microwave ovens to quickly heat the cooling food, but I remember it always tasted great. All the Aunts and my grandmother pitched in to help get everything ready and my sister and I (if it was at our house) had to set the table. I couldn’t wait for everyone to arrive – it was exciting!

We had turkey and stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, boiled onions and carrots, cranberry sauce and homemade pies made by my mother, Nana and Aunts. My Nana used to make “Monkey Faces” which were little mincemeat cookies and also mincemeat pie. It was the only thing I wasn’t crazy about. What the heck is mincemeat anyway??

The meals I remember best were when we ate in our big living room with a couple of tables put together, or at my Grandmother’s house. She lived at the bottom of my driveway and her house was small, but some years we’d all cram in there and it was great. My cousins and my sister would share the kids table and we usually ended up laughing at something and couldn’t stop. Then we’d get in trouble, and that would make us laugh more.

After I grew up I really didn’t like Thanksgiving. It was a family time and I didn’t have much family. My parents had split up and I had moved south to live in Florida. My husband had a big family but they lived up here in the north. Thanksgiving became a day of work for me. In fact, for a few years I worked in the Flower Shop of a local grocery store and I did have to go to work for the morning on Thanksgiving Day. Then I’d stand in the kitchen for hours cooking the whole, huge meal by myself, and then spend more hours cleaning up. Before my mother got Alzheimers, she’d come over and bring Pecan pie – my favorite. Unfortunately she also brought her bum of a husband which totally ruined the day.

Then one year my husband and I and our kids took our pontoon boat out on the Intracoastal for Thanksgiving Day. My mother’s idiot husband had stuck her in a nursing home by then, so we really had no family. Going out on the boat was a good decision and it was such a good day. I hadn’t enjoyed that holiday so much in a long time. I cooked the turkey days before and packed turkey sandwiches for the boat. It was a peaceful day of family togetherness, cruising around and fishing, and I wondered why the holiday couldn’t always be so good.

Happy Thanksgiving to my faithful readers, and to all the ones who stumbled across this post. May your Thanksgiving Day be yummy and peaceful.

When It Comes to Ticks, We Can Be Quite Vicious

Name one thing that everyone hates. Ticks! What good are they? What purpose do they serve? They are nasty, blood-sucking things that leave itchy welts when they bite and cause concern over Lyme disease for all of us who live where deer ticks are found.

What I know is that having animals that go outside means they will bring ticks into the house and then they will end up on you. I used to comb my cat Richie when he came in from hunting all day in the woods and fields, and sometimes I would find 11 ticks on him at a time. It used to be that we got a break from the ticks after Spring, but this year Fall is bringing them back. I recently pulled a couple off my other cat.

In Florida I always sprinkled Borax around to keep the flea population down and it kills other things too, so I did a Borax experiment with a tick. I closed in a jar with borax in the bottom and waited to see if he would die. I waited for days and he didn’t die. So I flushed him like I usually do.

My landlady used to burn them with her lighter, and my neighbors loved the fact that their chickens ate them.

It is snowing now, so I hope this means the end of ticks until Spring.

Pretty Floral Bouquet in Pink and Green

I love flowers but this is the beginning of the flowerless season, unless you count all the Poinsettias and Christmas Cactus. I don’t know if I will have any Poinsettias this year because of “Mayhem” my new cat. I don’t want her to eat them and get poisoned. Her real name is Skittle, but that is too cute. I have renamed her May (short for Mayhem) because she is a terror.

Anyway, I usually pass right by the grocery store flower shop and consider buying cut flowers and little plants an additional and unnecessary expense on top of the huge amounts I pay for food. But, something recently made me think differently and I bought two small bundles of flowers this past week. I came across a couple of my favorite little vases (yes, I’m still unpacking) and knew they needed to hold bouquets.

The little white pitcher with tiny blue painted flowers was purchased years ago at a yard sale and I used to have it in my beautiful Florida bathroom. I knew I had to use it once again after years of not having a place for it and my small drab bathroom needed some color – so there you go. I think the pink flower is a Gerbera Daisy and the green one is a Spider Mum, but I’m not sure. The rest of the bouquets were put into a pottery vase on my kitchen table.

If having flowers in the house makes you happy, splurge once in a while and brighten your winter days.

Pink, green and bronze flowers in a vase — Daisy and Mum Bouquet

House With A View

Just up the road from where I live, I discovered this great view. There are several houses at the top of the hill, but one is located in the open and can clearly see these hills year round. They don’t have much of a yard as it is steeply sloping – like most of our yards in this neighborhood, but who would care with this mountain view!

View from the top of a hill — Just Up the Hill - This View!

I only recently discovered that I do live higher up than I thought. I had just never walked into this particular section of the neighborhood.

Now that most of the leaves are gone from the trees, I am able to see things that I never knew were there. Homes that were built back in the woods have lost their privacy for winter and I imagine that some people welcome the season for the long distance views from their porches and picture windows that were blocked by foliage all summer.

What would be your choice – living up high with a view, or on the water?