SOB Turkey & Poisonface

I realize this post is super long, but if you read it, I promise it won't disappoint.
The makings of one GREAT day:

Saturday was one for the books. I'm super allergic to mother nature & for 3 or 4 out of the last 6 winters, I have gotten some manner of poison ivy or other, unspecified contact dermatitis ON MY FACE. You can imagine my dismay when, during a staff meeting on Friday, my face began to itch. I felt around, and had itchy bumps on my left cheek and temple. Shit. I excused myself from the meeting, dug around in the meds cabinet and work, and slathered my face with cortisone. The itching was briefly satiated, but the angry red bumps spread. By Saturday, they were on my eyelid and jaw as well. Not one to panic, I persisted with home remedies of oatmeal, benadryl, cortisone, and caladryl, toughing it out until I could get in to see the doctor and get some steroids today. On Saturday, though, while my face was inflamed, itching and raw...

You see, every year a kind member of the community gives a 20 pound turkey to each of my coworkers and myself. Most of us 20 somethings have never cooked a whole bird before, and have done things like not so accidentally forgotten to pick it up, or given it to our moms for the family dinner. Well, this year I thought I was doing my friends a favor and picked their turkeys up for them. I had them in my trunk and made my 2 friends take theirs out before they left work, because I didn't want turkey thawing all over my car. One of my coworkers went home and crammed the obligation into her tiny fridge to cook when she feels like it. The other forgot his in the trunk of his car. You can imagine his disappointment the next day when we informed him that he must now cook his turkey, and that re-freezing it would be a small disaster.

"Hey," I said, "You can borrow my roasting pan. Or, for that matter, you could come over and cook the turkey at my house so you're not alone in your apartment cooking and eating a bird for hours and hours all alone."
"OK," he said, "that sounds good."
And we made an event of it. 2 other friends came over, and Jenny and Ben were here, too. The bird wasn't quite totally thawed, so the meat handlers did their best and we got the beast into the oven. We seasoned it well with lots of aromatics, herbs, and garlic injected into the meat. Everyone broke and went about their afternoons engaging in solo activities. I opened the Timothy House and waited and waited and waited for my volunteer, who I eventually had to call at home, to arrive.

I got home a little late at 6:30pm and our friends arrived shortly thereafter. Ben took the internal temperature of the bird, and found it to be a tepid 120 degrees. Hmmm... 60 degrees to go. So I made some dip, we talked and played games and I enlisted Jenny, who has prepared multiple birds to check into things, assuming that, since the temperature had risen 100 degrees in 3 hours, it had surely risen another 60 degrees in the last hour and a half. Jenny takes the temp...still not close. Jenny flips the bird over and takes the temp from the other side. It is now 8pm.

"Oh, this is quite raw," she says with big, distressed eyes. "If we want to eat before 11pm, we're going to have to cut it up and cook it some other way."
Everyone frowns. I suggest eating all the side dishes and just letting the turkey cook all night. Ben points to OUR obligation, now thawed and resting in our sink. "But we have to cook ours, too. It won't keep now, and we said we would bring it to church."
By this point, the owner of the raw obligation has joined us in the kitchen. "I'm fine with throwing it away. I was told this was the 'easiest thing I would do today.' I'm fine with throwing it away."
Jenny's eyes grow bigger and more distressed. The oven door rests open, and she is still holding the roasting pan handles with oven mits, contemplating the albatross. "I can't throw away 20 pound of meat. That doesn't happen in my world." Everyone murmurs agreement and I find the sharpest knife we have.

The struggle was epic. As she hacked into the carcass, I brainstormed ways to cook the bird. We settled on braising some on the stove top in BBQ sauce, George Foreman Grilling some, and letting the rest finish baking. After half an hour of hacking and another half hour of cooking, we had meat to eat. We stood around staring at each other, but finally someone stepped up and served themselves some. I took some of the George Foremaned beast, as the BBQ sauce looked too much like blood for me to cope. I cut off a small slice, popped it in my mouth, and it crunched. Oh...oh no...oh, it's a piece of garlic. Man. My first bite of the hot, cooked obligation was 80 percent crunch garlic. It was gross. But I plugged away and finished my supper, as did my friends and husband.

The highlight of the day, by far, was the bananas foster Ben made for desert--way to save the day, babe. After desert, we left the picked carcass cooking and watched The Big Lebowski. Near midnight, as the plot was wrapping up, I remembered the carcass. Ben, who feels the most obligated to follow through with any obligation, ran up to check on it. We all heard laughing. He had tried to pull of a drumstick and the whole femur had fallen off in his hand. "It kind of looks like that bird from Christmas vacation," was his report.

Upon inspection, we discovered that the carcass was, well, not food anymore. Our trash was overfull from some home construction projects earlier in the week, so I asked the owner of the obligation to kindly dispose of it in whatever way he saw fit, provided we had our roasting pan back so we could prepare our obligation, which was still staring at us from the sink. Recalling the Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner, I half jokingly suggested he heave the cursed albatross into the sea, or, as we call it here, the Hocking river. He laughed, hesitated, then buoyed and left with the bird. I wanted to go along really badly, but didn't want a $500 littering fine. He didn't make it all the way to the river, but settled for a creek that was closer by and much more out of sight. I've protected his anonymity in this post b/c I don't think he's a criminal--desperation will make you do things out of character.

Once the pan was returned, Ben had a mild existential crisis. He contemplated ditching our bird, too, but his deep sense of duty came through and we got our albatross in the oven by 2am. The people at our church said it was delicious. I wouldn't know. I don't like turkey--I choke it down, but in the end, I always think it tastes like dark meat on chicken.

Arghh!

Hasn't been the best couple of days.

Christmas was AWESOME and my family is adorable and loving, generous, and all of those other things...work however, is stressing me out more severly than I normally permit. It's stressing me out enough that I'm blogging from work rather than working because I can't take it. I think part of the problem is that I haven't been engagin 2 of my 3 normal coping mechanisms. Out of my triumverate of prayer and meditation, art, and excercise, I've only been employing exercise for the last 2 weeks or so...I think I'm accidentally ruining my own life a little bit. I'm planning on spending my evening remedying this problem. I need some time alone, man.

A resident said something great to me today, though. We have an older wirery guy at the shelter right now with a great big, bushy, gray beard, and I was commenting to him that a stocky, younger guy with an even bushier red beard (whom I've named "Small Bunyan") was giving him a run for his money. The older guy said, "Yeah, but I've got the gray advantage; Old age and treachery trumps youth and whatever else."

You made my day old wirery guy with a great big, bushy, gray beard. Totally made my day.

Xmas in Maryland

My father-in-law is making bacon and eggs right now. Awesome.

We drove to Maryland--my husband's hinterland--yesterday morning for the Horsch family Christmas. It was good for several reasons that mostly stem from my inlaws not being wrapped up spending tons of money or particular traditions. So, we had terrific spaghetti for Christmas dinner and every couple brought 2 gifts for an exchange. I won (I do feel like I win or earn presents) the book Into the Wild and a bunch of Napoleon Dynamite posters. Ben won a box of different soup mixes. We gave (which I hear is the best part of presents) 2 pounds of coffee from a local fair trade coffee shop, and one of those I-gave-a-gift-in-your-name Heifer International gift of chickens to an impoverished 3rd world family. It felt a little like cheating.

Time for bacon.

Christmas Parties

Christmas parties make me nervous. They are inevitably held at some stranger's home where toilets break and there are inside jokes from 30 years ago that no one gets anymore. There are cats that I'm allergic to and dogs that I'm allergic to sleeping on my coat in the guest bedroom, and those delicious looking cookies are full of nuts that I can't eat. Someone is drunk, and no one is cutting him off, and then there are gift exchanges for people you don't know who don't want to know you...not how I want to celebrate the incarnation.


So, I host Christmas parties when possible. In part because I love to host things, and also in part because because I have created for myself an allergy free bubble of a home in which I am perfectly comfortable. So, I hosted the Good Works Christmas party yesterday morning. I love the Good Works Christmas party. We draw names and exchange words of encouragement with one another. And my coworkers are for the most part, incredible cooks. For example, I ate cheese grits yesterday and breakfast casserole that was full of crab meat. The Christmas party is 3 of my favorite hours of the year.

I like drawing names and writing words of encouragement. I like it SO MUCH. We did this last year, too, and an older (maybe 75) woman that I work with complained. There are only 15 or 16 staff members, but she wanted to do something else because she didn't want to get someone she didn't know. Someone she didn't know?? I insisted. "Then that's a great reason to get to know them! How do you not know people you see for at least 2 hours every week?" I was especially fired up because we work for a ministry of hospitality.

So, last years Christmas party rolls around, and my 75 year-old coworkers has drawn my name. She wrote me some encouraging things and I thought, "Oh good, I'm glad she got someone she knows."

Pre Christmas party this year, she says to me, clearly having no recollection of last year, "I'm glad I got someone I know this year. Last year I got someone I didn't know at all, but I'm glad that didn't happen this year."

Wow.

I wasn't offended, just surprised and entertained.

Merry Christmas Party.

What's in a name?

Last night, my friend Heidi invited Ben and I over to her house to hang out with 4 Chinese students. Their names (phonetically) are Shwen-shwen, Shwen-shwen, Tsai, and Ginny. Shwen-shwen and Shwen-shwen were discussing what their names meant, as they are from different regions of China. One Shwen-shwen meant "beautiful girl" and the other meant something like "lovely pond."

I knew, from taking ancient greek in college that Andrea comes from the root greek word andros, or "man." So, my name means "manly" in Italian or any other romance language. Lynn means "from the lake." And I'm assuming that my new last name, Horsch likely means "horse," as english is a germanic language and these cognates are frequently correct. In short, my name is Mandrea Sea-Horsch.

So, I explained, "my name is Andrea. It's Italian for 'manly.' Americans don't think much about what names mean. My husband is Benjamin, which means, 'son of my right hand.'" They all laughed and we played some games. An hour goes by.

Later, Shwen-shwen asked me, "So, do you think you grew up according to the meaning of your name?" I shrug my shoulders, about to half agree, but am interrupted by the other Chinese girls agreeing vigorously. Wow. They really, really think I'm manly.

It was a little bit of a downer.

Untitled

Um, this is the 3rd in the series of oil pastels I'm working on now. It's based on our friend, but I wussed out and made the face in the pastel a lot more gentle. I think I'll do a different pastel some time that shows all the gory details of life, but for now, here it is. Not sure how I feel about it yet.

Ornaments

Our super-duper fake tree has no tree topper. Last year, our friend Dr. Janet gave us a starship Enterprise that is about 3 and a half inches long that lights up. I hung it at the top of the tree, but really just as a gag. I think I might try now, before I go to bed, to make a new, better, prettier tree topper. Yeah. I'd feel good about that. Something that says, "Hooray! Jesus was born." Not, "sometimes I watch Star Trek marathons when I have the day off."

Also, for the record, grown ups still like it when other grown ups make them Christmas tree ornaments...

Preachin'/False alarm #3

I gave the message at my church today. Before you are too impressed, I should say that my church is 20 or 30 people who meet in the basement of an old church building that is now an arts building for the city. We sit on metal folding chairs and there are frequently art exhibits involving naked ladies on the walls. Today, there was a crochet circle in an adjoining room. Let me tell you, though, this is one awesome group of 30 people.

I spoke on Isaiah 9:1-7, a prophetic hymn about Jesus that's quoted in Matthew 4:12-17. I really, really like Isaiah 9. It's SO hopeful. I want so much to take people beyond their understanding of Christmas being a bout baby Jesus in a manger, to the beginning of a revolution. The life of Christ is a life of revolutionary hope, so I spoke a lot about hope.

I came home, ate chili, put on the movie "The Life Aquatic" and took a nap. Ben went out to the garage to engage further in his epic struggle with our '81 Volkswagen Rabbit. An hour and a half into my nap I hear a big "KABOOM" coming from the garage. I ran out, picturing Ben crushed a bleeding, but the car was still on it's jacks and he wasn't there. Ben was on the computer, upstairs. The kaboom was in the movie.

We have the best sound system ever in our living room.

False Alarms.

So, my mom coughed up a big blob of blood two times in the last month or so. Mom's a nurse, which means two things. 1. She gets regular TB tests, and knew she didn't have TB, and 2. She doesn't feel the need to go to the doctor unless she is certain she will die.

So, when mom used words like "blood clot, bronchial scope, CAT scan, and chest x-ray," in a conversation with me last week, I, naturally, pictured a giant throbbing tumor. Today, though, she called me with the news that she, basically, has a scar from a severe childhood sickness, and should treat this by going to the doctor before death is immanent. No big deal. Thank God, false alarm.

Onto the next story. Did you know that Athens County, with a poverty rate of around 27% is the poorest county in the state? Consequently, we, at Good Works, were not surprised to get a call from the Red Cross/FEMA today asking us to feed an additional 40 people who had been flooded out of their homes at our community dinner tonight. (See actual photo of Chauncey when flooded, left.)

We scrambled a little bit, given this would be a 30% increase in the crowd we usually have, but we're pros. This is what we do. By 4pm, when our Friday Night Supper staff left our afternoon meeting for the dinner, we were ready. Ready to feed 40 more people. Ready, even, to distribute non-perishable food to them.

At about 4:15pm, when our staff had already gone to work at the supper, our Director of Operations, Paul, made one last call to the Red Cross/FEMA to make sure we were prepared. The response he got went something like, "Oh, this was just a drill. I told the pastor of the church where you have the dinners. No one is coming."

And the incompetency of FEMA hits home. If you run a disaster organization and want to condition the helping community in areas prone to natural disasters to NOT respond when there's a crises, might I recommend holding drills and not letting anyone know it's a drill? I know I won't jump so quickly the next time I hear from FEMA. That is one hell of a false alarm.

"Crushing Sadness"

I'm having coffee with cardamon. It's terrific. YOU can buy this as well as other spices, herbs, cheeses, and dried fruits at the Bulk Food Store on West 40 in Zanesville. Can and should.

About a month ago, I dried about 50 peppers of different varieties and pulverized them in my food processor. I cleverly named my smokin' hot home made chili powder "mace." As, when pulverizing, it made tears run from my eyes, and made me choke. Well, you can immagine
my surprise when I found a spice already named "mace" at the Bulk Food Store. What a bummer. Does anyone know what this other, surely inferior "mace" is?

Anyway, "crushing sadness" is a quote from my coworker, Chris. The phrase describes the state of being at work right now...at least to some degree. We've seen some successes over the past few months, but the theme that stands out is neglectful parenting. I can't handle it. Seeing kids suffer for their parents' incompetencies is the reason I hated the internship I did at a domestic violence shelter. At the DV shelter, I was running a therapeutic art group with the kids. Every week was heart wrenching. At the Timothy House, I'm working with the parents, and it's enraging. We see moms drag their kids back and forth between the Timothy House and their skanky, criminal boyfriend's apartments, with children's services on the trail. Anne and I have to meet with one such mom in two and a half hours. This woman has such blinders on. She can't see anything that isn't right in front of her face, and clearly can't think about the future. It's so sad. So, our job becomes to first empathize and seek to understand, and then to attempt to persuade. To persuade her to look for steady housing (not live in her car), to get help for her kid, to stay put, to be patient, and to listen. It's a monumental task.

We have hope, though. Jesus not only makes people right with God, but he fixes their relationships with other people. He rescues the wounded, and transforms people who hurt others into healers. We get to see that happen, too...sometimes.