Musings at Christmas

this time of year sometimes ushers in nostalgia…that lamppost with the flickering light bulb…while we are stuck inside in the midst of a snowstorm lasting days. the last wild wind whirled in about six inches of the fine, fluffy stuff, outside my foggy door, while i was sleeping off a Christmas Eve feast of Hershey’s finest.

in the evening of the blessed day, in the fine tradition of my economically depressed descendants, I whipped up a feast of potatoes and baked fish for the fete of the holy night…and sat down to enjoy the sounds of silence, and the occasional settling of the old arthritic house.

it must have been the same in years prior….though their potatoes knew the pungent turf fire, and mine were a mere mixture of the boiled spud and a slathering of butter. fish would have been fresh, while mine were as frozen as a chunk of Antarctica before the scorching heat of an oven made them palatable.

still, a kindred fire burned within my heart. i had walked some of the same earth, through some of the same space, though today i was far from them, and farther from that space.

so…as it was that i was pondering upon these things, the world outside my window settled more softly in my mind. three days stuck inside a house with two bags of frozen fish, several potatoes, and enough orange juice for a shipload of scurvy-mad sailors, is certainly not a disappointment. i had three lights, a row of good books to read, and heat- though not a warm turf fire- in my living room, and a comfortable chair to settle into while waiting for the sun to melt the snows.

sure, i still might prefer the turf fire over my shiny oven. i still might prefer the wait, as i was telling stories of tales of long ago to my loved ones gathered around the fire. i still might prefer the aroma of the iron kettle baking, the peat smoke rising. and i still might even prefer the old wooden chair by the fire…for awhile.

but after a time i would long for the comfortable…for the present, because wherever i am, wherever you are, is always the present, and we belonged to that, no matter how much we think of the past.

a bad day to be a fish

imagine…if you will…that you have the intelligence of a fish. why? because, my dear friend, that is your brain on public education.

now, imagine, if you will, that you have spent a long futile day attempting to cross the lip of a pond edge to another inlet where the water appears….appears…to be more pleasant, more tasty…with tasty things floating around in it.

you squirm your way to the edge and hit dry land…and find the pebbles irritating your scales as you try to push across the small piece of land and into the most glorious looking bright shiny water you have ever seen…since you last had a conscious thought about geographic locations.

but…you have no hands, you have no feet, you are a fish. and it is a really bad day to be a fish.

so bad, you have decided not to be a fish.

you would rather be a seal. or a porpoise. or a proctologist. you would prefer to be a creature with legs…to go anywhere you want…to do anything you want…even if they had to be hairy.

but as you lie there imagining…some wise guy will come along, pick you up, and throw you in the trash can…

so thank God you are not a fish. worse yet, you could have been created a weasel…and had weasel breath. isn’t it good to know that your chances of amounting to anything here on this blue-brown-green spinning ball are infinitesimally more likely than that of your standard blue whale, your average red snapper, and even you most delicious sea bass?

sure, you may have a bad day…or two.. or several thousand. that never entitles you to become an ugly, loathing, ten-toed sloth, moping your life away because you think No One on planet Earth seems to care if you live, die, or play Ultimate Pokémon. things could be worse…oh yes, they could be worse. you could be married to the Cat From Hell, live alone in a hammock tent all winter and have icy butt syndrome, or be married to someone who has all the warmth of an Angela Merkel. you are infinitely more valuable to the Universe than you can imagine.

you are too complex to be an accident.

who me?

are you breathing? are you alive?

you know there is no one else in this world who looks like you, who sounds like you, who even smells like you. how could you be an accident? you were no surprise to your creator – you were planned by forces higher than hormones and the wrong time of the month.

it is a good day to be a human…even if it is a bad day to be a fish.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Goodbye Mister Fritter

this clip is from my college days… 

if you’re on a quest for the worst chicken sandwich this side of Sochi, I believe I may have found it for you. I don’t want to give away the exact location, but it is residing…and deteriorating…in that oasis of fine cuisine known as “Ohio.” The said speciman was inedible following a major mastication exercise, which failed to extract a core sample.

The distinction for worst chicken sandwich ever is reserved for the infamous “Mister Fritter,” a now extinct prepared pre-frozen patty that resembled a country fried hockey puck with a sledgehammer-like hint of fish.

Mister Fritter shared the shelf with Mrs Paul’s Fish Sticks. One of my colleagues grabbed the other box to bring home to cook- hence, my introduction to Mister Fritter.

While baking, the fritter emitted an odoriferous fog of stench from the cavern-oven, warning all who gathered their patties to “bite with care.” And that is just what I did while burning the roof of my mouth.

On the second attempt, I discovered a spoiled-fish-like coating with a hint of aluminum pan. After painfully retching…I ordered the items dispersed in the back yard in order to keep the cockroaches, mice, and other vermin away from the house. After several days, they remained untouched by weather or critter; the potent breaded grease pucks remained unchanged.

When the chicken patties refused to deteriorate, we hid them deep within a trash bag and sent them to patty hell, otherwise known as the county dump. If I were a betting man, I would bet that they are still there, years after disposal, unchanged and unfettered. Long live Mister Fritter!

 

 

Ye Olde Fishe Breath

Tartar Sauce is a strange concoction; it looks like some sort of glue, tastes like some sort of fancy cream, and accentuates some sort of smelly critter baked in an oven or deep fried to bits. It is a traditional kind of sauce, something stocked in a traditional condiment aisle in your traditional grocery or on your traditional plate of traditional Scottish fish and chips…

I say “Scottish” because I recall seeing a little dab on a plate beside a dubious lemon wedge in a Scottish Restaurant in Jersey (as in “New,” not Olde) years ago. I was treating a Scottish companion to lunch, hoping the environment satisfied her more savage side…at 2 pm in the afternoon when one is ravenous after a little-bitty breakfast.

Well, we were visiting the Irish imports shop, where I bought a very nice cap, and where I lingered smelling Irish wool- hoping to smell “the homeland”- when she, le femme de Scotland, mentioned the fish and chips place across the street.

Ah yes, fish and chips! What could be more Scottish? So, we ambled across the street and into a nondescript restaurant with a bagpipe shop attached. Oh, and I glanced at a few kilts…nothing in my size…and then we encountered a strange looking interior. I say “strange” because I pictured a Scottish restaurant looking like…a Scottish restaurant.

I never knew that red and white checkerboard tablecloths were so popular in Scotland, yet they graced every table in this Scottish place with all the trappings of an American family restaurant circa 1960. We chatted awhile, counted red squares and waited…

Now when you are hungry, you might eat gargantuan sized meals, but nothing prepared me for the monster fish and never ending chip plate. I don’t know who caught the fish in this seaside port, but a small Gabonese family could survive a month on one piece. Trouble is, the ye olde fashioned tartar sauce sat forlornly in a corner of the plate, dwarfed by even the salt and pepper packets.

Now I’m a sauce man, truly I am, so I wasn’t amused at the size of the accompaniment. I called our waiter explaining my displeasure. He returned with another dab, fit for an amoeba. Then I called for honey mustard sauce, which flowed freely like a river on my plate. While I ate all our chips, my companion ate massive fish hunks and the two of us were happy enough- the Irishman with his pratai, the Scots girl with her fish. But later, as we climbed back into the car and I stole a kiss, I remembered the lack of tartar…and offered several mints. After all, ye olde fishe breath has killed many tender moments throughout history…