Canning Continued

My canning curiosity began with the Better Homes and Gardens Home Canning Cook Book. My sister got it for me at a thrift sale or a library book sale--I can't remember which--cast out among all the ancient, abandoned books that nobody wants anymore. Although I fancied it a treasure, I didn't look at it for years. But I kept it anyway. Sometimes you're given all the tools you need for something, before you even know you need them.

Yes, the sticker on the cover says $2.49! Copyright 1973. I envision this book being used by a quiet, passive, perfectionist, born-to-please housewive like Betty Draper from the early seasons of MadMen. But who cares if the book is older than I am?! After all, how much could have changed about canning in the last 36 years or so? In this age of quick, fast, and easy, I don't really see canning as an evolving discipline or a fashionable, high-in-demand hobby.

Or is it more popular than I thought? It sure does fit with our current interest in sustainability. BHG gave me some basic recipes and enough information to start (I began with the spaghetti sauce I pictured in a previous post), like acidity levels of foods, when to use a hot water bath versus a pressure cooker, how to sterilize jars, etc. Then I decided to try salsa. A quick Google search for "salsa canning recipes" returned numerous resources on canning, among them this guide to preserving various salsas.

But it was Barbara Kingsolver who especially inspired me. Ever since I read Kingsolver's book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, I wanted to do the three sauces in one canning project:relish, sauce, and chutney, all in one day, by adding a series of different ingredients into a stock pot and canning and three different points in the process. (All the AVM recipes are online at http://www.animalvegetablemiracle.com/ )

Then I noticed that Kingsolver credited Janet Chadwick for the recipe, from Chadwick's book The Busy Person's Guide to Preserving Food. So I ordered Chadwick's book too! Chadwick's book includes recipes, tips, and how-to's, for various types of food preservation (not just canning). In addition, she provides detailed information about different kinds of kitchen gadgets that may be helpful in your food preservation adventures.

So for the last few days I have been planning for the three-in-one canning project. And trying to carve nonexistent time out of my day to do it. Yesterday I bought 30+ pounds of tomatoes from a local farm. I researched where I can buy fresh peaches (straight from Michigan, it turns out), and will purchase them tomorrow...even though I will have to sneak away from work to do it.

I've practiced blanching peaches and tomatoes, and removing their skins. Last night I prepped the fresh peaches I already had, purchased from a Sunday afternoon farmer's market in Central Wisconsin. Tonight I will make at least four quarts of tomato puree. Then I will be almost completely prepped to attack my canning project tomorrow night after work.

It has been a long time since I've been excited enough to plan how much I could get done after work. For the longest time, I got through the day by counting how many hours until I could go home and sleep on the couch (especially in Winter). I have found something that energizes me, excites me. Sort of like blogging. Every day I try to learn something new about blogging. For example, how to include pictures of book covers in this blog post (without having to physically locate the image on the web, save it and upload it to your blog). On that note, which book cover image format do you like better--the plain image or the image that includes the purchase info from Amazon? Obviously I'm not trying to sell anything, but I like to share where I found things.
I don't know if finding things I like to do has re-energized me, or if I was getting re-energized enough on my own to be open to finding these things, or maybe a combination of both, but I have found tremendous peace and healing in such simple things as canning foods.

Try Something New

Find the thing(s) that calm you, replenish you, allow you to focus completely, and do them. Find the thing that quiets that relentless voice in your head, also known as your thinking mind. Think about things you’ve always wanted to try and things that you look forward to doing. Things that make you feel peaceful and inspired and whatever adjectives you have to describe yourself feeling good (if you don’t know what makes you feel good, then you should practice being aware of how you’re feeling throughout each day and write it down!).

In the years following my mom’s stroke, I developed different ways of coping with my feelings (some good, some not so good). I began watching the Food Network cooking shows with my mom, and I began to try different recipes. I realized that I got a lot of satisfaction out of preparing different foods. I could come home from work and from being at the hospital during my mom’s rehabilitation, and be overwhelmed with the polarity of emotions I was feeling at the time—hope and despair, gratitude and grief, faith and fear—and ten minutes into chopping up peppers or sautéing zucchini all was quiet and peaceful inside.

I found the same healing power with plants. Somehow while rutting up the earth and sticking my fingers in the dirt to nurture life in perennial and vegetable gardens, I felt peaceful and alive.

And so it was that I recently rummaged through my parent’s basement to find my mom’s old canner and pressure cooker, stuck back in a corner of the cellar, covered in cob webs and dust. And I raided her collection of mason jars lining the shelves of the basement, darkened by dust, standing untouched for at least four years—back to the date my mom suffered a stroke—a day that we will never forget, the dividing line between our “old life” and our “new life.”

So as I canned (for the first time) tomato sauce and tomatillo salsa I realized that so many of mom’s things from her “old life” stand untouched now…her canning supplies, her sewing machine. For a long time we mourned our loss of our “old life.” But many things that were nonexistent in her “old life” are now a staple of her “new life”—reading more than 50 books a year, wintering on the Florida beaches...

At some point we have to quit hanging on to the old, and make room for the new. Life happens and things change. Adapt and move on. Find your thing and do it. And if the time comes when you can’t do it anymore, I hope that you can be as courageous as my mother has been. The universe may be stretching you to find something new.

Hiking for the Soul

This weekend we purchased the book 50 Hikes in Wisconsin by John & Ellen Morgan.

Our first pick was Hike #8, Hoffman Hills State Recreation Area, in West-central Wisconsin.

The Tower Nature Trail at Hoffman Hills is about 2.7 miles and takes about 1 hour and 15 minutes. It has lots of hills and, as the book says, provides a challenging yet peaceful workout.

Here are two views from the top of the tower that is located at the highest point (about 110 feet) on the trail.

My goal is to complete all the hikes in the book, and then possibly buy the Minnesota version of this hiking series.

I have long anticipated finding a hobby that c and I can do together, which combines exercise with meditation and relaxation for the soul.

If there's anything I've learned in the last few years it's the connection between stress and illness.

Take care of yourself.

Truck

I was filled with gratitude after reading Truck, by Michael Perry. I loved all these things…the cultivation of seedlings in the middle of winter, the preparation of whole foods, straight from the garden in the summer, the restoration of a 1951 International Harvester, falling in love with a woman and her child, the wedding and Perry finally coming to terms with what marriage and commitment mean to him. It is beautiful and real and I am warm and glowing with the simple abundance of what it means to make your way in this life.

I have read all of his other books, and I think what I like most about Perry is that he forces me to challenge my own stereotypes about things like hunting, gun ownership, small town folks, big city folks, and more. One moment my red flags are going off, saying, oh boy, this rant about gun rights is starting to betray you as a social conservative, and the next minute he is describing, in the same beautiful terms used for heterosexual couples, the love between gay couples he knows, and denouncing that anyone be deprived of their partner’s health insurance or rights to hospital visits.

And it is here where Perry works most strongly on me, in a theme that runs throughout his work: Be careful! We are human and complicated and our tendency to label and categorize each other into one camp or another is at best oversimplification, and at worst, just plain dangerous. And if you fall prey to stereotypes and rigid beliefs about people, you are really missing the mark in this life.

Ring the Bells That Still Can Ring

The June 2009 issue of Oprah has an inspiring interview with Elizabeth Edwards.

I found Elizabeth’s strength and positive attitude particularly inspiring, especially given the death of her 16-year-old son in 1992, her ongoing struggle with terminal cancer, and the public infidelity of her husband John Edwards.

Here are some parts of the interview I really liked:

Painted above a doorway leading into the home’s master suite is a verse from the 1992 song “Anthem,” by Leonard Cohen. Befitting this moment in Elizabeth’s life, the lyrics are an ode to human frailty and transcendence:

Ring the bells that still can ring. Forget your perfect offering. There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.

AND this excerpt from Elizabeth’s new book, Resilience:

This is the life we have now, and the only way to find peace, the only way to be resilient when these land mines explode beneath your foundation, is first to accept that there is a new reality.

I haven’t read her book, but I believe she is talking about accepting the present moment, instead of struggling against what is…dwelling on what could have been or what should have been. Resisting what is will drain you of all your strength. I began my practice of trying to remain in the present moment after reading Eckhart Tolle, especially in the years right after my mom had a stroke, and I was overcome by grief.

Elizabeth is a wonderful example of how your grief and your struggles can make you stronger, if you’re willing to learn and to forgive.

Father's Day Tribute

I absolutely love this father's day tribute. It's beautifully written, and inspiring. I've been looking for inspiring models for how to tell some stories about my own family.

Can you tell I like quotes?

I got these once at a leadership seminar I went to...some of them are kind of cheesy but still insightful and inspirational...the main thing I learned at this seminar, which is also reflected in these quotes, is that everything starts with ourselves. It's so easy to blame other people for our problems or conflicts, but the reality is we always play an equal role. No matter who we are or what kind of environment we're in, we are responsible for ourselves and how we react in any given situation.

Leadership:
The right & responsibilityto be talking about how to keep the organization moving forward.

More than 75% of people at work today will not tell their boss the truth because they don’t believe it is safe to do so.

You must make certain everyone understands what you are trying to do.

Never mistake lack of awareness for what is happening as resistance to change.

Diplomacy is the Art of Letting Someone Else Get Your Way.

Leadership is not about managing our environment.
It’s about managing ourselves in the midst of our environment.

To change the culture we must conform to the prevailing management culture enough to be seen as credible and non-threatening.

For every complex problem there is asolution that is simple, neat and wrong.
H.L. Mencken

Real past threats can turn into present imagined ones.

Never let your perception about what was said keep you from determining what was meant.

Are you willing to hear the problems people perceive you to be a part of?

Calm creates order and order allows us to solve problems.

People will forget what you said and what you did, but they will never forget how you made them feel.
~Maya Angelou

If we try to solve a problem without first overcoming the confusion and aggression in our own states of mind, then our efforts will only add to the problem.

Actions that neither encourage wanted behavior, nor discourage unwanted behavior:
Hinting at the truth
Beating around the bush
Hoping they will figure it out themselves
Assuming they already know

The real art of conversation is not only to say theright things in the right place, but to leave unsaid the wrong things at the tempting moment.

There is nothing so wasteful as doing with great efficiency that which doesn’t have to be done at all.

Life shrinks or expands inproportion to one’s courage.
~Anais Nin

No problem is solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.
~Albert Einstein

No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
~Eleanor Roosevelt

He who travels fastest goes alone.

Stress is your reaction to an event, not the event itself.

It is the set of the sail, not the direction of the wind, that determines the way we go.

People don’t care how much we know until they know how much we care.

Empowerment is threatening and foreign to people who have learned through experience not to exercise personal discretion and judgment in their jobs.
~Peter Senge

Argue for your limitations and they’re yours.
~Henry Ford

We’re entitled to brood in our offices, but in groups we have a responsibility to be energetic.

When an archer misses the mark he turns to look for fault within himself.
Failure to hit the bullseye is never the fault of the target.
To improve your aim, improve yourself.
~Gilbert Arland