Coq Au Vin

Yesterday, after coaching Jake’s soccer team, after watching some of Ben’s game, I went to the grocery store to get ready to go to Downeast Maine. Jeanine had given me the green light to go, supporting my efforts to work on my book, and I jumped at the chance.

The grocery store usually means me preparing by wandering around the kitchen, opening cabinet doors, checking the refrigerator, and finding out what we have and don’t have in the house. Then I go through the store, picking up Jake’s favorite olives, Zachary’s beloved Asian pears, Ben cheddar rice cakes, and Jeanine’s limeade. I fill the cart with what I know everyone likes. Broccoli, one of the few vegetables the kids will eat aside from salad, vanilla yogurt, and whole wheat bread without seeds.

Walking through the aisles yesterday, I felt like I had won the lottery. I got to pick out food for me for the next few days. White peaches so ripe it’s like eating flavored sugar. Red leaf lettuce. A giant heirloom tomato. Thick, dense bread with nuts and seeds even on the outside. Country pate, thick and chunky.

And those little tiny really expensive yogurts no one in their right mind would ever buy.

I spent almost an hour, wandering and looking at the same shelves I’ve seen a thousand times before to see what I wanted.

What I liked. Of course I’ll share with Beanie, the dog, but she’s not very picky.

Tonight I’m cooking Coq Au Vin for Donald, who has come to repair a water line. There is no hurry. The fire is roaring and the fog settled just beyond the islands across the cove.

I have a lot to write in the next few days. I had an epiphany yesterday, out on the soccer field. I’m ready to make some changes. Not huge, enormous ones but it is time to evaluate some of the ways in which I find myself trying to achieve flashy, “note worthy” accomplishments instead of living with clarity and simplicity.

More on that later. Right now, it’s time to start searing the chicken, and frying bacon. Just after I put another log on the fire.