Have you noticed the growing number of comparisons between religion and environmentalism? This analogy seems to have sprouted legs, and is scampering its way across the punditsphere. For a definitive and perhaps seminal read on the subject, check out Michael Crichton’s 2003 speech to the Commonwealth Club, in which he elaborates with astonishing clarity the similarity of going green to going to church.

Although I have no conversion plans, I admit that I am intrigued by the notion of adding April 23 to the calendar of saints and feasts. I also believe that this new religion might be just the ticket to revive the moribund sect known as the Shakers, and I am all for that.

Shakers as you know broke off from the Quakers and found their way to upstate New York and New England. They lived simply, in harmony with the land: they ate what they grew, built furniture to last, and believed in the virtue of thrift. Yes it is true that they expressed their faith by sometimes speaking in tongues and by a rather prescient form of modern dance, but even the most spiritual among us needs a hobby.

Shakers were also decidedly ahead of their time in their attitudes about gender and divinity, seeing in the body of the lord both male and female characteristics. For this reason, among others, Shakerism (the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing, actually), was organized around a matriarchal hierarchy. Mother Church, Gaia Hypothesis…the Shakers were definitely on to something!

It is also true that Shakers believed that as God’s chosen people they were singled out for being, well, single. Celibate, they grew their ranks through adoption and conversion. Imagine if you can (I cannot) a world in which single women were not only the norm, they were in charge! Imagine if you can (I cannot) a world in which marrieds were the second-class citizens, accepted by the group but looked at askance and ineligible for the top jobs. Talk about heaven on earth!

Heaven on earth is of course an oxymoron. If earth were heaven, I suppose we would have no religions at all. We wouldn’t need them. So I suppose it is too much to hope that today’s neo-Shakers, the members of the AGW Church, incorporate the tenet of single supremacy into their religion. Pity. If they just made this one sensible change to their dogma, they’d win a new convert.

American society was a web of relationships in church, family, and community.  The basis of friendship and responsibility acted as a safety net during trials in life as well as celebrations.  Church members, family members, and communities would take care of each other when there was a death, a birth, or lack of food, etc.  However, with the industrialization of America coupled with available land, an unforeseen freedom arose.  Individuals now were able to move away from their established relationships and start a new life with their own land, away from religious, family, and community values and lifestyles.  They left their safety net behind and embarked on new journeys and adventures.  With this new freedom came questions of whether it was wanted. 

Secular or materialistic success left many wondering if there was anything more; that there must to be more to life than just waking, eating, earning money, spending money, and sleeping.  Deism recently became the general belief, that God created the earth and then left his children alone.  Before the Awakening, people allowed their fatigue of life to keep them from church.  The Second Great Awakening began to attempt to answer questions and change these attitudes. 

In the 1820’s and 1830’s, New York experienced a “Great Revival” and from Albany to Buffalo, which became known as the “Burned-Over District.”  Kentucky experienced similar revivals in rural regions where religion filled in the place of weak political structure.  The purpose was to help people who already had a belief in Jesus to realize their sinful ways, repent, and come to Him for their salvation.

In addition to revivals, Communitarian believers created communities to solve problems they saw in American Society.  One example of these groups was the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearance, also known as Shakers, who were worried about slavery, bondage, and women being degraded in marriage situations with their only purpose to biologically create.  As a religious community they believed their founder, Anne Lee, was Christ returning in female form as the Holy Mother of Wisdom.  The communal life was based on strict equality of the sexes.  They practiced celibacy, separate communal living for men and women, to prevent the inequality of women in marriage.  They believed that everything they did was to worship God; their work ethic was affected by this attitude and they focused on making work easier for all people. With their innovative persistence they invented seed packets, clothespins to dry on clothes on line, flat brooms, and their famous furniture.

One thing most of the communitarian groups had in common was the religious issue of slavery.  These attempted utopian societies were created to try to internally fix inequality between men and women as well as slavery with no participation in that culture.  Ultimately the failure of these societies led to the Civil War, when peaceful religious means were not adequate in reaching a solution.  While the Great Awakening got people on the path of religious thinking and practices, it also elevated the tension of anti- and pro- slavery sentiments.

Once upon a time, I was blessed with long hair, had a fabulous beautician on speed dial, and had an abundance of luck. As one of my former professors would say, I was always falling with my backside in the butter. Opportunities that I didn’t deserve presented themselves to me. I found great mentors by stumbling over them.

That’s how I lucked out in getting a treasure trove of Marilyn Kern-Foxworth’s papers. I was in the right place (the hallway of Skinner Building at the University of Maryland) and the right time (the cleaning out and merging of two professors’ offices).

One of the professors, James Grunig, called me over and handed me a sheaf of papers in a folder marked MKF. He said, “I think you would like these.”

And I did. I gobbled up the research and writings in that packet. Finally, I was able to link the phrase “acrylic vault” to a precise citation, and I had an original copy of the research.
Marilyn Kern-Foxworth, Ph.D., is responsible for the first wave of research on diverse practitioners and their experiences in the field.
Other notable achievements:
• She’s a past president of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC).
• She received the Kreighbaum Under-40 Award from AEJMC.
• She wrote Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben and Rastus: Blacks in Advertising, Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow and edited Facing Difference: Race, Gender and Mass Media.
As I read through the documents that James Grunig handed me one spring day, I realized what a trailblazer Marilyn Kern-Foxworth was. No one was talking about racial and ethnic diversity inside the industry before her. No one was doing that research before she started.
Stella Nkomo’s brilliant and groundbreaking piece, The Emperor Has No Clothes: Rewriting Race in Organizations, documented the various phases of organizational research on race and offers a good way to frame Marilyn Kern-Foxworth’s public relations research. Dr. Kern-Foxworth instigated the initial wave of research on diversity in the field. This first wave or phase was based in an ethnicity paradigm that hinges around questions on why certain groups have not assimilated into the mainstream. From there, other scholars have taken on the challenge to broaden the view of diversity to include ethnicity, class, and sexual orientation and to push alternative frameworks to explain stratifications in organizations. But unless there was a basis, we wouldn’t be able to press forward.

Thank you, Dr. Kern-Foxworth, for your contributions.

This post is long overdue as these items have been sitting in the queue for weeks now. It was entirely inspired by these fantastic earrings by FunkyLobez on Etsy.

Pumpkin Spice by FunkyLobez on etsy

Now what to put with them…

How about a pixiebell hat ( love pixiebell’s hats, variety of colors and styles)

either

cable beret in butterscotch by pixiebell on etsy

chunky cloche hat in butterscotch with amber buttons by pixiebell on etsy

Cabled Front Alpaca Leg Warmers in Rusty Orange by kraftlady20

which is on sale btw . I particularly adore coats and jackets. Well structured ones always tend to fit and look great.

For a necklace perhaps

firefly...fiery orange_gold_red sapphire gold filled arc necklace by bellajewelsll on etsy

fiery necklace by lindenoak on etsy

fiery infused glass and gold leaves bracelet by martimouse on etsy

pocket pal wallet in golden delicious by jennalou06 on etsy

and for a little fun, why not throw these in your pocket

and if you like larger carrying capacity why not try this bag

colors of fall hand felted bad by crafts2cherish on etsy

And for when you want to wear boots but you’re afraid it might get too warm…

gotta break up those warm colors with something.

Now certainly don’t go overboard and do it all at once, but if you’re fired up for Autumn and into sunrises, go take a closer look at some of these. (clicking the pictures with take you to more info on each item and the shop it came from )

Enjoy!

As always, if you have more to add, please post in comments!

DUIN: Halloween spurs tales of the occult

Two key excerpts:

“Dubbed the Burned-Over District, the region was the perfect incubator for Mormon founder Joseph Smith, a well-known clairvoyant before his famous visions. His family owned magical charms, divining rods, amulets and other esoterica. “

Next …

“Plus, a lot of mystical subcultures have gone mainstream and have been Christianized. Mr. Horowitz did a brilliant job of tracking down how positive thinker Norman Vincent Peale borrowed his core self-help philosophy from a religious movement called New Thought.

“I listen to [megachurch preacher] Joel Osteen frequently on Sunday mornings,” the author said, “and he’s giving sermons that are discourses in positive thinking. He’s standing on the shoulders of an occult tradition.”"

Further proof that no nation, America included, can be a “Christian nation” for “founded on Christianity” or “founded on Christian principles.” The road to destruction is easy and wide and has many entry points, but the road to heaven is narrow and rough and can only be entered by the cross of Jesus Christ!

Don’t throw your light bulbs in the recycle bin. Here at Espirit Cabane the magazine of crafty and green ideas has a tutorial for turning your light bulbs into hanging vases and/or salt or pepper shakers. Pretty cool, huh.

Has anyone tried recycling their light bulbs into a craft? If so, what did you create?

People collect for a variety of reasons: interest, consumerism, fetishes, documentation of the past, and more. Museums collect to preserve, conserve, and interpret. No matter the reason behind the collecting the bottom line is that it happens.

Who cares about 17th Century Dutch furniture, paintings, etc that were collected by a former prominent family in the Albany area? The better question is not who cares but why should people care about these collections? Museum collections preserve the past so that we do not forget who we once were. At the Hancock Shaker Village in Pittsfield, Massachusetts their mission drives their collecting policy. They “brings the Shaker story to life and preserves it for future generations.” They have a difficult time of relating their collections to the every day visitor. They attempt to relate similar themes from the Shakers to modern day themes such as being green.

The Shakers made beautiful furniture, most people know that. When you visit the Hancock Shaker Village you walk into period rooms where the Shakers once lived and see artifacts that the Shakers once used. There is an eerie calmness in the air as you wander from room to room filled with artifacts but no people. How can Hancock and other historic house museums bring to life the stories of the past? There are interpretive paneling and interpreters at hand but that does not do it justice. We see the collections and we might obtain a small understanding of them but do we really see how their collection relates to us?

How can historic house museums change to better serve the public and relate personally each and every museum visitor? Are re-enactments the key? Are costumed interpreters what needs to be done? It all seems a bit dated. If we can find a way for every visitor to leave a museum with a better understanding of the collections then I believe that we truly are here for the public good.

My son just turned 12 months old and his toys are becoming boring to him. I am on a quest to find him some more stimulating toys, but I am on a tight budget. Here are some ideas I came across and have worked!

Balls: Any size balls will work. My son loves to play with balls. I place several different size balls in plastic container or a basket. My son likes to take them out, bounce them, and place them in different containers.

Containers:

• Stackable bowels was a great idea. I bought some stackable cereal bowels from the dollar store for $2 (6 total). He enjoys stacking and unstacking them. This can keep him entertained a a while.
• Stackable plastic cups
• measuring spoons/ cups- he enjoys putting them together and taking them apart
• Mixing bowels- different sizes and different colors. We already had a set at home. I just let him play with them. Great because it did not cost me a thing.
• Plastic Tubberwear- The cheap plastic food containers that you throw away worked great as toys. I have a few I have received at Christmas time or when people have given me food. I have given them to my son to play with. He will stack them, try to put on the lids, and throw them about the room. He will even take tiny objects like puzzle pieces, balls, shapes, and plastic sorting items and put them in the plastic containers.

Board Books: My son loves to turn the pages of board books. He loves touch and feel and books with flaps. Buying books can be very expensive, so I have started checking out a bunch of board books from our local library and changing them up every week. This keeps him happy and less bored with the selection because I keep changing up the books weekly. You could also buy cheap board books at garage sale or dollar stores.

Shakers and Sound Makers: I have taken old plastic water bottles and jugs with various materials- beans, rice, colored water, pennies, and small rocks. He likes to shake them and stand them up. It keeps him occupied for a while.

Climbing Obstacles: He loves to crawl over things and crawl under things. I set up pillows on the floor for him to crawl over and make tunnel with blankets for him to crawl under. This keeps him busy for a while.

Create Your Own Piggy Bank: Save the tops of the plastic milk jugs and use them as coins. Then with an old formula container or oatmeal container, cut a hole in the top and use that as the slot to insert the tops from the milk jug.

Boxes:

• Old Food Boxes as building blocks- You can save a bunch of cereal, cracker, pasta, and other food boxes to use a building blocks. You can just glue or tape the flap shut. You can leave them plain or decorate them with colorful wrapping paper.
• Big Boxes as forts- You can take a big box and put a door on it or make tunnel to crawl through. Then decorate the outside with paint or markers
• Put items inside old boxes and let your child take them in and out. You can put balls, milk jug tops, small toys, etc.

Pictures:

• Photo Albums- Children love to look at picture. You can take an old photo album and put pictures of your family in there. You could also clip pictures from a magazine of bright colorful pictures and put it in there. Pictures of animals are always a hit. You can image on the internet and print them out to put in the photo album.
• Key Ring Pictures- you can laminate pictures and punch a whole on them and place them on a large key ring. You can also take large index cards and cut and paste different photos from old magazines, internet, or even old books.  You could make a key ring to have a theme. For instance the whole key ring could have things with the color red or the number 3.
• Poster Board- You can take a large poster board and cover it with various colors, photos, and images. Then hang the poster board at eye level with your toddler where they play.
• Digital Frame- if you already own one, place it somewhere where you toddler can look at the pictures throughout the day. My son loves to watch slide shows.

Touch & Feel

• Grab Bag/ Box- with empty bags or boxes, you can put different textured items in the box. Your toddler will enjoy touch and feeling the different items in the box
• Texture Wall- using a poster board, paste different textures on the poster board. You could use sandpaper, sponge, soft cotton, etc.
• Touch & feel Book- Create your own touch and feel book. Glue different textured items on a large index card. Then with a large key ring punch whole and connect all the cards together.

For Other Suggestions:

http://kids-toys.suite101.com/article.cfm/educational_and_cheap_toddler_toys

http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2006/11/04/free-toys-for-your-infant-or-toddler/

http://everydaytlc.com/blog/2009/06/make-your-own-toys-for-babies-and.html

http://www.mops.org/page.php?pageid=2339

Why hasn’t anyone thought of musical holes until now? We guess farting harmonically counts! Get it here.

I totally know now why there is no book about the anxieties of parenting… Well, I guess there could be a book about it and I would never know, because I am a parent and don’t have time to read anything other than notes from the schools and a 2nd grade reading book with my daughter … But I’m pretty sure that there is a gap between the books of how to have great kids/how to be a great parent and how to fix your kids/how to fix poor parenting.  But I decided the other day, while sitting in the Driver’s License Testing area waiting for my daughter, that it is my time to shine… fill that void in the book world, write my book and pack my bags because Oprah will be booking me soon..

Writing a parenting book… Not just any parenting book, but a book about parenting that will change the world because all of the secret things that people conveniently forget to tell you will be revealed.  I know you may be asking what qualifications I have to write such a book and my answer would be … “None.”  Nope, no qualifications at all.  In fact, my pen name will be Unqualified Mom….but that’s not the point.  I just decided that writing a parenting book would easily be a top seller without much effort…. here’s why…

First of all, I don’t know one single parent who has time to sit down and truly read a parenting book.  Now maybe when you are expecting your first child  … or maybe when you are expecting your second child and the first one is in school or napping, but if you have more than two kids I can pretty much guarantee a parenting book becomes nothing more than prop to even out a wobbly table.

Secondly, parents want to be good at what they do so and if nothing else, they want to look like they know what they are doing… possibly even create an intimidation factor for the kids, so they will load up the book shelves with parenting books that would impress any grandparent.  Therefore, a parenting best seller need nothing more than an appealing title and an eye catching cover…. maybe even an interchangeable cover to match any decor.  It could be filled with substance but if it sells just because of the outer images, then why bother…

While sitting in the driver’s license testing center waiting for my daughter to take her road test the other day, I tossed a few book titles around in my head….  “Parenting for the Book Smart” (I’m pretty sure Parenting for Dummies is taken) … no……..”Have a New Kid by the End of this Book or Decide not to Have Kids by the End of this Book”….. no…….. “Kids…. Who knew?”….. no….. then finally… the one that Oprah will promote… ” The Parenting Code (Momma Never Told You but I Will)”.

This was the winner because of the gimmick factor and also the great possibility that Oprah would actually probably expect me to answer some questions about it….  so, for those who are parents and are truly wanting to read a parenting book (I still don’t think it is possible), I will add a bit of parenting wisdom and it won’t really matter what I say because it will totally in code form. (I figure if you have time to read it then you will have time to figure out the code.) The code will make it seem more intellectual and mysterious… taking it totally to the number one spot on the New York times list.

The little tidbits of wisdom I give will be all about those little things no one told you about being a parent because if they did then, just like the Shakers (Google it), civilization would die… yes, you read that correctly… if people were told about all of the sleepless nights, the anxieties, the worries, etc then there would be no procreation… so my wisdom would enlighten many and help them deal with the realities of the parenting life.

All of this came to mind that day because, try as someone may have to tell me to expect this, it just sank at that moment ……that as they grow and spread their wings and fly into adulthood you still ache when they ache, rejoice when they rejoice, and would fight tooth and nail to keep them safe…. Though the idea of a more convenient daily routine was enticing, I still think I would be okay driving her around for a few more years, but it was not to be.  Despite forgetting to turn on the ignition during her driving test, my daughter passed the road test and is now a licensed driver.

I was told that life would never be the same again.. (See if you can figure out the code in that sentence)

So this is the only qualification I have to write a parenting book on the “silent code” to keep civilization booming… I am a parent and I always will be… no matter how old they are.  ….Now that I think about it though, I would hate to be the cause of the end of civilization.  So therefore, maybe I should focus on the “Parenting for the Book Smart.”

And for the record, my daughter got her license last Tuesday….. And she totaled the van last Wednesday.  So I am definitely qualified!

Philippians 4:6-7

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus”.

It’s a dark, windy, rainy mid-October day. I’m listening to a Pandora station that seems to be taken entirely from my own iPod library. But still, it’s good. It’s just a little, well, sad. All the songs of love, loss, home, journeying, hope, despair — with strong overtones of a capella.

In addition to writing a complex query and laying out (yet another) pdf report, I’m thinking about what to do with a long weekend. It looks like the weather has a chance at brisk and glorious. Here’s what I’m thinking about for a glorious Saturday…

We’ll rise earlyish. I’ll let Grey finally finish the Avatar episode he’s started 3 times this week, and I play with Thane in his room. Thane loves, loves his bedroom in a way Grey never has. He’ll bop the Weebles down the slide, crawl between stacks of books, and then imperious hobble over to me, a Weeble-princess in one hand “Horn to Toes and In Between” in the other and announce “Boo! Boo!” We’ll eventually pile our sons into the car, carefully loaded with snacks and entertainments and drive North through the Merrimack River valley. Grey will be confused, wondering if we’re going to daycare on a Saturday.

We’ll pass through the lands of concrete onto smaller and smaller roads, through impossibly picturesque New England towns with white steeples and lots of acrimonious town politics, until we get to the Shaker Museum. Grey will get up close and personal with a livestock. We’ll stand in a room built by hands dedicated to equality and pacifism. No one lives there now. Perhaps there will be a hayride. I’ll feel torn between permitting my youngest to explore his world and forbidding him to explore cow-patties. I’ll buy a token of my memory of this period of unworldiness and optimism.

Last time I was there, my mother bought me a pin that was also a vase. It could hold a pansy — called heartsease — in water on your chest. It was stolen from me in a burglary we experienced on September 11, 2009.

Unless fortune truly smiles at us, we’ll have to leave when one or more boys hits too-tired. We’ll put them in the car, hoping for a nap. The child who desperately needs to sleep will not. We’ll drive to our next destination. 5 minutes before we arrive, the child will fall asleep and silence will descend on the car for the first time all day. We’ll drive in circles around our destination, afraid to stop until just a little more sleep has been obtained.

We’ll go to Moose Brook State park. The boys will play on the playground, swing in the swings. We’ll play with the great stomp-rocket Grey got for his birthday. As the shadows loom long, we’ll get a campsite and build a campfire. I imagine sitting around the fire, watching embers fly up to the stars, singing songs together and telling stories. I imagine putting our sticky, sweet, sleepy children into the car and silently returning to our daily lives back in the suburbs, flying down thick freeways in time to be at church the next morning.

Thus I imagine. I have enough experience to know that it’ll be nothing like this. It will be better. It will be worse. There will be a moment most sublime. There will be several that will be quite banal. I give it 50/50 odds that Grey throws up at least once.

On a melancholy autumn day, I think about these days and moments. This is my sons’ childhood — their one and only. It’s desperately brief. You get one shot at being a child, and one shot at giving the people you created their childhood. Will Grey remember this trip on a melancholy autumn, some day 30 years from now? Will these journeys be the touchstone for him? When the smells of October waft through his office window, which of these memories will pop unbidden to his mind? Which cobalt sky will define perfection in cobalt skies for my sons? Will he remember the laughter? The hot dogs? The feeling that the world is a bigger place than he realized?

There’s a Simon and Garfunkel song (“And the Flowers Never Bend With the Rainfall”) that says “I don’t know what is real, I can’t touch what I feel.” I sometimes think about how few of the things I touch are real. When is the last time you ran your hands across the bark of a tree? Do you remember how silky soft the inner petals of a dandylion are? I sometimes fear that so much our world is created, constructed and extruded that my sons will never touch what is real, to know it when they feel it. I suppose that’s a funny thing to fear. But my roots still reach down to the water table of the wild. I drank great draughts in my youth. I can only hope to help my sons know that it is there if they choose to reach for it.

I hit the jackpot today, scanning to find a song that is at the heart of one of MamaKitt’s and my favorite stories from high school. Be forewarned: It’s possible I will remember it incorrectly. She’ll let me know.

M-Kitt and I had most of our high school classes together, along with the same other dozen or so people. Among these was one character named Josh, whom we adored. Always cracking wise, always teasing the lizz-adies, always making teachers laugh against their better judgement. I don’t think either of us has seen him since high school, and he’d probably be appalled (or, equally likely, delighted) to know how often we talk about him.

Other important things to know about Josh:

1) He wore MC Hammer pants.

2) He went gray when we were in second grade.

3) I have a picture of him making out with a mannequin at the Shaker village near our high school.

Anyway, as I remember the story, it was 1991 or thereabouts, and we were all in calculus class, and Josh was cutting up as usual. Our teacher (who was so icky, and not in the good way) had a difficult problem up on the board, and it was taking our collective brain trust a while to come up with a solution. The drudgery went on and on, til finally the sharpest tack among us, math-wise — who had probably known the answer all along — spoke up, and had the right answer. At this point, Josh threw up his hands, turned toward the sharp tack, and exclaimed, “Oh, you just think you’re Mr. Big, don’t you?!?!”

And friends, then he busted out with a loud, impassioned rendition of ”I’m the one who wants to be with you / Deep inside I hope you feel it too,” etc.

Because, um, remember that band Mr. Big? That had that one song? With those lyrics? Yeah, I’m realizing now that this story is potentially not that hilarious to anyone but me and MamaKitt, and that you DEFINITELY had to be there, but trust me: It was a flocking riot, and that song never comes on that MK and I don’t think of Josh and tell the story to each other and remember it as one of the funniest moments of our young lives.

Oh, Josh. How we miss you.

Over the past couple weeks I undertook the extremely dull and time-intensive task of uploading all 6,000 (!) of my photos to Picasa.  I had no choice because I wanted to install Snow Leopard (the new Mac OS) and it required a lot more room than I had on my hard drive, so I decided to transfer and then delete all my photos.

To make a long and boring story short, looking at all the old photos brought back a lot of memories.  I have a ton of pictures from summer 2006, the summer between high school and college, involving lots of hijinks with all my Tosa friends, and looking at the photos brought back especially intense sound memories (as we spent a lot of time rollin’ in the family Honda Accord listening to music).

With no further ado, the soundtrack of summer 2006 as filtered through senior-year-of-college nostalgia:

1) Beck, “Qué Onda Guero” from Guero. What a great album.  Not incidentally, the Marcel Dzama cover art inspired my subsequent purchase of my famous sad-ghost salt and pepper shakers.

2) James Brown, “Make It Funky (Pt. 1)” Allow me to write out certain key lyrics:

“What you gonna play now?”

“Bobby, I don’t know.  But what’s ever I play, it’s got to be FUNKY.  One.  Two.  Three.  Make it funky!”

Amen.

Neckbone.  Candied yams!  Turnips.  Spud steak.  Spud steak!  Grits and gravy.

3) Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins, “You Are What You Love” and “Handle With Care.” The entire album, Rabbit Fur Coat, is fantastic, so listen to it in full.

4) Gnarls Barkley, “The Last Time”

5) Shakira, “Hips Don’t Lie.” Because really, what else was on the radio that summer?

6) Miss B, “Bottle Action.” I don’t fight, I don’t argue, I just hit that bitch with a bottle.  Eastside eastside till we die.

7) Elton John, “Bennie and the Jets”

8 ) Etta James, “Something’s Got a Hold on Me.” I actually prefer “Let’s Burn Down the Cornfield,” but I couldn’t find a good video clip.  But look it up if you have a minute.  You can’t really go wrong with Etta, so I didn’t think you all would mind the substitution.

Another busy day today… After work I picked up my daughter from her audition at school… went to Applebees for my weekly Diva Dinner with my peeps from Christ Church Choir….  went to church and photographed a few things there… stopped at Carnival Kia to take some photos of their Ferris wheel (they were very hospitable) …stopped at Arby’s to take photos of the flag in front…didn’t get home until 9:00 PM.  After all that, my family help me decide on the photo I took at Applebees of the Salt & Pepper.  My son advised me to name it “Black & White, Black & White”.

Took the photos today with the Canon Powershot because my camera’s battery was low.

You can go to www.janscapturedmemories.com and see some of the other photos from today. They are in the folder named “Photos for 1 PicADay Project: Day 5.

It’s been a long time since I’ve mentioned the Shakers, but they’ve been on my mind lately.

Especially on Saturday as I pulled out tomato plants, which had all (but four) succumbed to the blight.  I pulled up Cream Sausage, and Persimmon, and the beautiful fluted Ceylon, Big White Pink Stripe, Black Prince, Palla de Fuoco and perfect little Ropreco.  I lined them up on the lawn, pulled off all the green tomatoes that were worth saving and packed the vines into garbage bags, and then bagged them again.

It was really sad. But it was Large Red that really hurt.

Large Red is the one tomato I decided to plant not based on its name, or because of a promise to keep me in sun-dried tomatoes through the winter, or because it would taste good in sauce.  I chose Large Red because it was a favorite of the Shakers and they grew it exclusively just a few miles from our house.  I reasoned that if it was bred for this area, it would be a survivor.  I was wrong, this summer was just too much for Large Red.

I first came across Large Red in the Shaker Gardener’s Manual.  Before the Shakers, there were no little packets of seeds available for the home gardener to buy at the local shop.  Seeds were sold in bulk for the large-scale farmer, or seeds were saved from the previous year’s garden.  But the Shakers saw an opportunity and sold their famous seeds in little packets in little boxes all over the country. And to help people succeed in their kitchen gardens, they offered a little manual.

The manual is chock full of tips, tricks and hints, many of which are still applicable today.  The Shakers were organic gardeners before the term was coined.  They believed the best way to grow a healthy plant was to make it strong by planting it in good soil, protecting it from weeds and watering it with moderation. The manual also offers a list of the vegetables and fruit grown just a few miles from where my garden is.  The only tomato they grew was Large Red.

And so when I yanked Large Red, heavy with fruit, out of the earth, I felt a bit like a failure.  But the feeling wasn’t going to last for long. I was going to make lemonade out of lemons, I was going to coin a new adage: When life hands you green tomatoes, make green gloop.

My parents were coming over for dinner so I decided to feed them with the wild bounty of our yard.  We had a salad of arugula, radicchio, peaches, nectarines, Croatian Dragon’s Egg cucumbers and prosciutto;  Isaac grilled one of the head-sized Ronde de Nice zucchini; and I made a pasta sauce of green tomatoes and mint.¹

The pasta sauce was so good that I spent Sunday cooking and pureeing the remaining green tomatoes and canning them to use over the winter.  The sauce is tart and sweet and green in a good way, and though it will never replace sauce made with ripe, red, sun-warmed tomatoes, it’s still good.

But there’s another reason I’m bringing up the Shakers.  We’re up to near 10 pounds of high-bush blackberries now, so rather than continuing to hoard them for jam, I decided to make a pie. The Shakers were also masters of pie, a point driven home to me with a pie crust recipe.

There are two blackberry pie filling recipes in The Best of Shaker Cooking.  I settled on Blackberry Pie No. 2, but then I had to pick a pie crust.  There was no question, it had to be Sister Lettie’s Butter Crust that was described as perfect for “all berry pies.”  But when I looked at the ingredients, I couldn’t imagine how the crust was going to work: 2 1/4 cups of flour, 2/3 cup of butter, 1/3 cup of water, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon baking powder.  It just didn’t sound like it could possibly hold together, and yet hold it did.

The secret is patience.  You sift the dry ingredients together, and then cut the butter into the flour with a pastry cutter.  It is imperative to use a pastry cutter.  Keep working the butter in until the crumbs are large and then very, very, very slowly add the water drop by drop by drop.

At least for me, the amount was exact, both times I made it (once on Saturday for dinner, once on Sunday for our neighbor who, out of the goodness of his heart re-graded our rain-ravaged driveway).  I didn’t need a drop more or a drop less.  The crust was so perfect, perfectly brown, perfectly savory, perfectly puffy, perfectly simple, perfectly perfect.

To make the pie I made the crust, formed it into two disks, one bigger than the other, wrapped them in clingfilm and put them in the fridge for a few hours. I cooked a quart-bag of blackberries with sugar and for one filling, a little orange liqueur and for the other, a little vanilla (I liked the vanilla-scented filling better) until it was thick and sweet and the fruit still had a little texture to it.  I cooled it in a water and ice bath and put it in the fridge to cool thoroughly.

Next I preheated the oven to 400°F,  and while the oven was heating I rolled out the bigger disk of dough and pushed it into a 9 1/2 inch tart pan with a removable bottom, and docked it with a fork.  Make sure to not trim the crust too aggressively as the dough shrinks a bit in the blind baking.  Slip the crust into the oven and bake 5-7 minutes or until lightly golden.

While the crust is baking, roll out the smaller disk of dough and cut it into strips with a fluted pastry wheel.  Remove the crust, turn the oven down to 350°F, allow the crust to cool for a few minutes then add the filling and dot with a few nibs of cold butter.  Form a lattice across the filling with the pastry strips and form a crust around the outside with the remaining scraps.  Sprinkle liberally with sugar and slip into the oven and cook for 30 minutes.  If the top isn’t beautifully brown, let it bake until it is. Saturday’s pie took an extra 2o minutes, Sunday’s only 15.

Pull the pie out of the oven and allow to cool for at least 30 minutes.  Serve with whipped heavy cream sweetened with just a touch of sugar.

Serve this pie and I can guarantee, you will not have to encourage anyone to “Shaker your plate.”

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¹ Pasta with Green Tomato and Mint sauce.

Cook garlic and leeks in olive oil. Add roughly chopped green tomatoes and  glug of vermouth.  Cook until soft add a handful of mint leaves and puree.  Taste and season with salt, lemon juice, sugar, a bit of butter and lots of grated cheese.  Toss with a frilly pasta, farro or another whole grain pasta tastes best.  Enjoy!

~ Adapted from Diane Seed’s Rome For All Seasons.

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P.S. Here are three great articles about Shaker cooking:

From NPR.org: Simple Gifts: The Shaker Way to Cook and Eat.

From the New York Times: Shaker Cooking: Simplicity’s Renewed Appeal.

From Rural Intelligence: Tasteful and Tasty: Another Side of Hancock Shaker Village.

Active minds and active bodies never grow old- Lee Salk

Some people are movers: they simply love to be active. Some people are shakers: they sake their hands as they sit and watch the movers. Regular and appropriate activity reduces insulin resistance in the body. These changes can help lower high blood pressure, improve your total fat levels, elevate HDL ( good cholesterol) and lower LDL (bad cholesterol), reduce risk for onset diabetes and decrease your weight and risk for heart disease. In all likelihood an active lifestyle will have synergistic effect.

Yes indeedy, what have we here?

I love acting, I guess. I’ve spent the last ~2 weeks taking part in a theatre summer programmey thing and had the showcase performance today. I haven’t had so much fun in ages.

Acting is great. Gives me a chance to use this old corpse for a different person, just to try it out. Gives me information and stuff with regards to a career in theatre. Gives me a chance to make an arse of myself, but not look out of place. And it gives me a chance to work with Bruiser, who have become my gods recently for being despicably good at what they do.

I also had to do an almost-kissing scene with a girl, which was interesting. Didn’t give me any great urge to slobber all over the dainty lips of some charming female, but it’s all part of the job. Had the opportunity to work with two fine tutors, who became quite the double act. And made friends, terrifyingly.

But, most importantly of all, I met a cute guy. And I complimented him, which is like a first for me. I don’t usually compliment boys, it generally results in sore testicles and overworked tear ducts. But he giggled. Doesn’t mean anything o’course, but I so would.

What else should I yell about now? Oh yeah. Re last post, I feel much better now. My hormones were giving me one hell of a kicking. Damn you, testosterone! You make me angry and stuff!

Count to ten.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. HULKSMASH. Eight. Nine. Ten.

I think it worked.

-Doxie

Every week, I will post a snippet about the organizations and people who have and are changing the cut, color, and shape of public relations.

First up: Inez Kaiser.

For the past six years, I have chaired the Inez Kaiser Graduate Student of Color Awards for the Public Relations Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication.

If you do a quick online search for Inez Kaiser, most of your returns are for the Inez Kaiser Graduate Student of Color Awards. Little about Ms. Kaiser turns up. Most of the students who receive this award have never heard of Ms. Kaiser and are clueless about her importance is to public relations.

I met Ms. Kaiser when I received the Kaiser Award at the 2003 AEJMC Kansas City Conference. And until last month, I didn’t know much about her except that she was the first African-American woman to belong to the Public Relations Society of America and the first African-American woman to head a public relations agency with national clients.

Beyond those accomplishments, Ms. Kaiser has led a very active, diverse life:

• Kaiser’s firm, Inez Kaiser and Associaties, specialized in public relations, advertising, and market research and had offices in Washington, D.C. and Kansas City. She started the firm after she left a teaching position.
• She is a cookbook author. According to Rose Nolen’s Hoecakes, Hambone, and All That Jazz, Kaiser received a masters degree in home economics from Columbia University and authored three publications: Inez Kaiser’s Original Soul Food Cookbook, Inez Kaiser’s Soul Food Recipe Cards, and Homemaking from a Teenager’s Point of View. Here is a newspaper article about Ms. Kaiser’s 1976 Founders’ Day speech to Beta Lambda Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. that discusses her books. (Also, Ms. Kaiser is a charter member of the Kansas City Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc.)
• In 1972, Inez Kaiser founded the National Association of Minority Women in Business. According to Organizing Black America:

Its president, Inez Kaiser, founded the organization as a result of a study that she conducted on female business ownership while employed by the U.S. Department of Commerce. That study revealed that minority women often experienced difficulty in gaining access to much-needed capital for their businesses and lacked the advantage of higher education or training in business.

• Here is an article about her work with the organization.
• On November 22, 1997, Inez Kaiser received the National Minority Advocate Award during the 15th Annual National Minority Enterprise Development Week Conference in Washington, D.C.

A proclamation from the Council of Kansas City best summed up Ms. Kaiser’s work:

Inez Kaiser is a meticulous and elegant individual that pays close attention to detail and style. This same attention is given to her work and is reflected in all that she endeavors to assume responsibility for, including her weekly column for the Kansas City Call that offers insight and wisdom to struggling professionals aspiring to enter the industry

Sadly, no one has documented the rich life and career of Inez Kaiser. I hope that changes in the near future.

Above is a video of me speaking the words of the Shaker hymn Simple Gifts while standing on the eastern end of Galveston Island. 

The video runs just over 90 seconds.

Behind me as I speak is a ship in Galveston Bay that is sailing out towards the Gulf of Mexico.

Simple Gifts is one of my favorite songs in the world.   

If you click this link, you’ll see the lyrics and the song will play.

The song was written by Joseph Brackett. Here are some very basic facts about Joseph Brackett.

Here is some information about Shaker music. 

Here is some history of the Shakers.

From that history—

One of the numerous religious sects who emigrated to American shores in search of religious freedom, the Shakers followed Mother Ann Lee to the United States in 1774. Here they established several colonies– the first in 1776 at Nikayuna near Albany, NY–whose governing principals included celibacy and agrarian communal living.

Here are some things you could see if you visited Galveston, Texas.

Here are some facts about Galveston Bay.

Here is the link to the Galveston Bay Foundation.

Here is a link where you can track the location of ships around the world. 

Here is some history of ships and boats.

The part of Simple gifts I like best is where it says that to bow and to bend we should not be ashamed. I would like to live my life by that principle, but so far I have lacked the discipline to do so.