Marty hard at work, doesn’t the spatzle look good?
These have been a few very busy weeks for us. We have been in production so much and have been up to our elbows in spatzle. Tomorrow we have to make a bunch of big deliveries all around NY, so we needed to get all the orders filled and make enough product for Marty at the Troy Farmer’s Market on Saturday and for a bunch of curbside pick-up orders.
We had to make spatzle on Sunday this week, you know my Sunday kind of love day? I never get tired of making the product or even packaging it…it’s the dishes that I dreaded doing this morning.
When we got up today I knew it was going to be another big, long production day with a couple of deliveries afterward. While we were having our coffee I kept saying I don’t want to do the dishes today! Ugh!
Dirty dishes with the hard-to-clean raw batter and all the dishes used to drain the spatzle before going into bins to cool.
When you think of dirty dishes in a normal production kitchen they are nothing compared to ours. Hell, I washed a million dishes when I worked in the kitchens at school, even the worst pans in the world weren’t this bad.
After I figured out how to mix our ingredients in a special way then I had to increase my batch sizes. The thing that I didn’t count on was that I had to figure out how the heck to get the dishes clean from the unconventional ingredients we use.
Without exaggerating, it took me six months of experimenting with different cleaning methods, water temperatures, soaps, rags, and scrubbies, etc until I figured it out.
Marty cleans the steam kettle for me! Here are all of my clean dishes!
It takes me as long to wash all the production dishes as it takes to make a couple of hundred pounds of spatzle. After the production dishes are done I have all the bins to wash that hold the spatzle after it has been drained and cooled. Ugh.
Today I just wasn’t feeling it. I needed something to drag me through this production day. Music is always my answer. We listen to music every day in our production kitchen, but today had to be something to kick my ass into motion.
Broadway Music Radio on Pandora was the ticket. A lot of the music was from newer Broadway Musicals with a few oldies thrown in for good measure. Song after song I was singing behind my dust protection mask making the day go quickly. Some songs like one of my favorites “Cellblock Tango” from Chicago came on and I went into a whole dance number.
Our Alexa video speaker that we play music on, we have a smaller just speaker one in the packing room that are paired to play the same thing in both rooms. Technology!
I took tap, ballet, and toe or point throughout my whole childhood starting at the age of two. I love that I can still jump into a tap number at any given moment. I just need a 5,6,7,8 and I am dancing away.
Although it was a long day, we filled all the orders we need for tomorrow’s deliveries and the weekend. Mission accomplished.
I’ve been cooking real lunches and dinners all week, but I needed to lean on some leftovers for the next couple of dinners.
Tonight I took the leftover mashed potatoes from our Porchetta dinner from Marty’s birthday and turned it into loaded potato soup. It was easy, quick, and filling. I also took a container of leftover short ribs and gravy out of the freezer for tomorrow night. We are going to have short rib poutine which is one of our favorites and will be quick and easy after a day of deliveries and getting back late.
My loaded potato soup, tasted much better than it looked.
At the end of the day, or a long week I should say, music yanked me through not only dish washing, but also holding myself accountable in the gym. I worked out on some days that I just wanted to come inside and sit down, but I didn’t I got in there and gave it my all.
As far as leftovers? They are a lifesaver! They are the greatest thing since sliced bread! Look for a blog post down the road that will be called something like The Joy of Leftovers or Lovely Leftovers.I will talk about how to not only use leftovers, but how to plan them into your weekly menu.
***I am planning on taking all of you on our delivery route with us tomorrow. There is snow in the forecast, so that should make things even more interesting. We are planning on hitting the road early, we have a lot of stops to make.
Long before the pandemic, before people actually started caring about toilet paper and hoarding whatever they could literally get their hands on, I noticed how ridiculous the math is on each package of paper products.
Each brand has at least 3 or 4 different types of toilet paper and each of those has different size rolls. Single, super, double, mega, super mega are just to name a few.
Consider that each supermarket chain has at least 40 different choices of toilet paper to choose from is beyond crazy.
Paper towels are the same story. Lots of brands with different types of towels and a huge assortment of sizes. Single, double, select a size sheets, mega…the list goes on and on.
This morning we were getting ourselves organized in the production kitchen and I looked at the packages of Bounty we had on hand. Remember, I only bought one package at a time when I saw them I didn’t hoard a bunch. We need good paper towels in our kitchen. 😜
It actually made me laugh that we had so many different mathematical equations we are supposed to solve!
I remember a YouTube video that went viral during the quarantine lockdown. A dad had a full on rant about toilet paper math. He sat down and actually figured out the math!
The dad calculated how many sheets each size roll had, each package had, how many feet per roll and the best one of all he figured out how many shits (his word) if you used 20 sheets of toilet paper per shit.
A lot of other bored quarantined folks also made videos with their calculations, some even weighed the rolls. I am relieved that other people besides myself thought about this crap….pun was intended.
Each person on the videos ranted about the toilet paper brand companies and how misleading and confusing their advertising and marketing were.
I hit the jackpot when I saw this at the store!
The toilet paper calculators also ranted on about how much toilet paper people hoarded and actually needed for a whole year. They concluded that no family could ever take that many deuces or number twos.
Now that the store shelves are finally restocked with toilet paper and paper towels, just take a gander at the ridiculousness of all the mathematical equations that are being marketed to us.
Jon, my writing mentor told me whenever I write a piece I need to keep the readers in mind and think “why should they give a shit” about what I am writing. In this case, the whole story is about that very thing, giving or should I say taking one, and how much toilet paper everyone needs. 😬
I know we aren’t out of the woods yet with covid, but there are some positive things that have me taking a deep breath of relief. I don’t think I have taken a breath since the shit hit the fan back in March and everyone panic shopped hoarding everything in sight. I keep a well-stocked pantry and freezer in the winter especially and I usually have enough Charmin toilet paper and Bounty paper towels for our home and business.
Whenever we open the last of something, it goes on a shopping list. This way I rotate my stuff and always have the important stuff on hand. When we did go to the store for the first time I was in utter shock like everyone else.
When I walked up and down the aisles of Hannaford the shelves were empty. I felt afraid, scared to death, worried, what were we going to do? I have ulcerative colitis I need fucking toilet paper dammit! Then every time I went to the store I got angrier and angrier. Why was it taking so long to restock everything even with limits on everything? Did I arrive every single time when everything was sold out again? Seriously WTF?
On one trip to Aldis I almost had a panic attack. There was not one package of meat, chicken, sausage, or fish in the meat section. My shoulders tighten up just thinking about how afraid I was. It was like living in a third world country and there were no food rations left for me.
I am sure we all experienced it. Every time I go into a store, no matter what one, I hold my breath and slowly look down each aisle. Up until a few weeks ago, aisles were still low on inventory. I would start cursing under my breath and get myself into a total tizzy asking why is this taking so long. Me cursing under my breath? 😂
Every time I saw Charmin or Bounty I bought one of each. I left the store feeling like I won a million bucks. I wasn’t hoarding, I was looking out for my own ass, literally.😜
A couple of weeks ago I started noticing things were starting to reappear on the shelves giving me some sense of relief. We went to a big Shop Rite the other day when we were out delivering, the last time we were there the shelves were still almost bare, but this time they were full, full, full! I controlled myself and didn’t buy one package of Charmin or Bounty.
Now that I have enough of the good stuff on hand, I realized that I had to start using up those cheap ass paper towels I was forced to buy. We can’t use them in the production kitchen at all since they are a hazard when they literally fall apart when you are using them. I am happy to report that the last roll of that horrible, thinner than shit, garbage is gone.
Who would have ever thought that in a world where people want vacations, fancy cars, big homes, nice designer clothing we would be satisfied and relieved coming out of a store with some toilet paper, sanitizer, Lysol, and maybe a can of soup or box of pasta?
Marty got to the empty tube of paper towel before I did. We both will either blow into the tube and say, “do do dooooo!” or clunk the other person or the dogs on top of the head with the empty tube like when we kids. That I think maybe the secret to our 32-year marriage.
Since I started this blog journey I’ve mentioned my work and our business The Vermont Spätzle Company, but I never really talked about it. I know that many of you have been on this journey with us since the beginning, but for those who aren’t familiar with our product…here we go.
Marty and I own and operate the Vermont Spatzle Company. We are the whole kit and kaboodle. We make the product, package it, box it up, deliver it, market it and sell it ourselves. It took me over seven years to develop our recipe. We have the world’s only gluten-free, no-boil, ready in less than five minutes pasta. I was trying to develop a gluten-free spätzle because there was not one on the market. There still is not another gluten-free spätzle available commercially besides ours.
When we had to go gluten-free in 2010 due to medical reasons. Marty really started missing spätzle. He’s from Germany and grew up eating it, I used to make it a few times a year. While we could get terrible gluten-free bread, pizza, bagels, and pasta you could not get spätzle. It seems the more you can’t have something, the more you want it.
The actual cast iron pan of spatzle that is in the background of our label.
So what the heck is spätzle anyway? Well, spätzle is a German egg noodle that is like a little dumpling. In Germany, it is served with sauerbraten, different types of wursts and other things with gravy. One of the most popular ways to have it is fried up in a little butter, then topped with caramelized onions and cheese.
On March 11, 2017, I finally nailed down the recipe and we decided we were going to go into business with 150% effort. We had to find the right packaging, design a logo & label, obtain licenses, nutritional labels, and UPC codes for stores. We learned a lot the first year!
Farmer’s Market
We were quite surprised how fast people found out about our spätzle, and how much they loved it. Social media was the driving force behind getting our product in so many stores. People knew who we were whenever we went into a store. They would say, “Oh look, it’s the spätzle people.”
We also started doing farmer’s markets right away, sautéing our spatzle at our tables, giving people samples, and educating them about what spätzle is. Our product is not geared only towards gluten-free customers, 75% of our customers are not gluten-free. Once they try it ,they are hooked. People ask us if we put crack in our spätzle, that’s how addicted to it they are.
Spatzle for breakfast! Sautéed in butter, dusted in cinnamon topped with fresh berries and whipped cream!
Our customers use our spätzle sautéed with butter, pesto, with different types of sauces and stir-fried dishes. Italian dishes, soups, casseroles, and macaroni & cheese. Someone actually replaced a flour tortilla with our spätzle and they called it the spätzle enchilada. It can even be eaten as a sweet dish. It is truly a blank canvas and the possibilities are endless.
Tradition German meal with pork cutlet and a hunters sauce, leftover turkey spatzle soup, chicken parmigiana with spatzle and cold spatzle caprese salad with fresh mozzarella pearls and a balsamic reduction.
Our product is available through the entire state of Vermont, a few locations in New Hampshire, and Pennsylvania. It is also available through a few online farmers’ markets that offer home delivery, or at pick-up locations near their customers.
Our spätzle has been featured in newspaper and magazine articles. We were featured on a television news show in a segment called “Made in Vermont.” After the show aired everyone in Vermont knew who we were. The more people read about it or heard about it they wanted to try it.
Our “Made in Vermont” segment being shot.
When say that our spätzle is made with love, we mean that 100%. At our super busy times, Marty and I can produce around 1500 pounds a week, but we put love in every batch. By the way, 1500 pounds is a lot of spätzle!
I was able to quit my job within two months to be a full-time spatzle maker. Marty worked another full-time job and full-time at The Vermont Spätzle Company for the first year. He was our marketing person who went from store to store, did demos, and was our delivery person. While Marty was working at his “real” job, I made all of the product and packaged it. We both worked farmer’s markets every weekend and sometimes mid-week.
When I say that working for yourself, having so much passion and love for what you do and the product that you make, is the best feeling in the world! Having our customers share with us their spätzle memories telling us of their grandmothers making spätzle or that they included our product in their holiday meals. Wow-what an honor!
When everything shut down with Covid last March, I had a mini conniption and worried about what would happen to our business since our farmer’s markets were nearly extinct. We are a food manufacturer and essential business so we continued working, business as usual.
We have been extremely lucky and blessed the people still have to eat, cook at home, and have supported our business. Our customer wholesale business is thriving, even though our once busy farmer’s markets are not.
From start to finish ending with a delivery to one of our wholesale customers Field Goods an online Farmer’s Market that delivers to parts of NY, NJ, CT and Long Island.
Conventional spätzle is a batter made of wheat flour and eggs. Sometimes it is cut with a knife into little strips on a cutting board or pushed through a press with holes in it into boiling water. It forms little dumplings that are drained. In our country you usually find spätzle in the dry pasta section, you have to cook in boiling water, drain it then sauté with a little butter. While we do make a batter and push our spätzle through a press into boiling water that’s where the similarities end. We have developed a special mixing process when making our batter.
We decided in the very beginning that if we were gonna do this, we were going to do it right. We wanted to use local milk and eggs which are the first and second ingredients. When we were sourcing our special flours it was important for us to find non-GMO products. We finish our spätzle off with a small amount of nutmeg. The nutmeg gives the spätzle a homey familiar flavor that people just can’t put their finger on. It reminds them of their omas or grandmothers in Germany.
Those gorgeous little brown specks…ground nutmeg.
Our product has won numerous awards including Best Artisan Food at the Vermont Cheesemakers Festival, one of the top ten festivals in the country. That was a very big deal for us.
We also did some festivals in which we sold our spätzle as a hot food item we called Spätzle Bowls. It was always a huge hit at different Oktoberfest celebrations and was a crowd favorite. It was so exciting to hear how many people loved our product. We could see it on their faces when they dug into their Spätzle Bowls, instant gratification for us.
Our spätzle is sold in retail stores in 12-ounce packages. We started to offer our 2-pound family packs at our farmer’s markets. Families would come every week and would have to buy several packages. We thought that it was a waste of packaging and came up with the idea of a bigger serving size bag. Most stores still only carry the retail size, however, The online farmer’s markets and a few local stores carry both sizes.
Not many people have seen the inside of our production facility in person. We built the facility ourselves behind our house. We have a 38 step commute to work and I thought that I would share a typical production day with you.
Our 300 square foot production facility. Steam kettle and sink area, refrigeration, packing area, Big Bertha working hard.
While I was working my ass off for other people, I would pray every single night, “Please God, I would like to have a business that no one else has.” When we were starting the business it was like someone slapped me on top of the head saying, “Wake up stupid! This is it!” Right then and there we knew we would be a success, we had the Big Guy helping us out. 😉
Dear God I have got to clean that mirror in our gym!! Yesterday mid workout, no fooling around or smiling.
It’s been 4 months since I had my shit-fit and walked away from belly dance out of complete frustration and anger. At that point, I was at the end of my rope with all of this Covid bullshit affecting my love of dancing and teaching.
I took myself out until I can go back to teaching and dancing without restrictions. I would rather not dance than be dicked around with…you can dance today, then the next day you can’t.
I just passed my four-month mark of, “Operation get back into shape.” It started off as a way to blow off steam and be as angry as I wanted in the gym. I listened to angry music and went back to serious weight lifting. No diet, no pressure, no weighting myself, just get in there and get my strength back. I’m going to come out of this a stronger person.
I am even more determined to keep at it and make this a lifestyle choice like it was for so many years of my life. I do have to admit there are many days I have to talk myself into working out and sticking with it. That’s when I thought of what my Nana would tell me when I was a little girl.
Nana would say that everyone has two little angels on their shoulders. On the right side you had the good angel, and on the left side was the bad angel.
She said that whenever I was about to decide to something or not do something I needed to listen to the angels on my shoulders and make the right choice.
For example, when I was a kid if I wanted to eat a bunch of candy before dinner…The bad angel said, “Go ahead kid you deserve it.” The good angel said, “Your parents will be mad if you don’t finish your dinner.” The bad adds, “Hey shut up, it’s her favorite kind of candy.” The good one said, “Don’t listen you will get a bellyache.” Ok, I won’t eat the candy.
If only I would have listened to Nana’s advice when I was a teenager or as an adult. I forgot all about the good and bad angels. They would have saved me a lot of heartache and trouble over the years.
I spent a lot of time with both of my grandmothers when I was young. I loved both of them and looked forward to visiting them. They were both widowed, but other than that they were so different from one another. I had different relationships with each of them. In one relationship I was the nurturer, in the other one I was nurtured.
Nana was a lot older than my other grandmother that I called Mema. Nana lost her eyesight from cataracts when I was around 7 or 8. I became her helper. I would get dropped off at her apartment on a Saturday mornings after my dance classes.
Best day ever with Nana! I went with her on a senior citizen bus ride to Asbury Park, NJ
I would help Nana with her laundry. I loved wheeling her laundry cart down the long hallway and onto the elevator. I liked loading the laundry into the washer and throwing in some detergent. Nana had a bunch of quarters in her housecoat pocket. She would count out how many I needed to put into the machine.
While the laundry was washing we would sit in the lobby of the senior citizen apartment building. I knew everyone and they would ask me to show them what I learned in dance that morning. I loved performing for them. Nothing has changed in that department.
When the washer was done, we would go and do the same thing with the dryer. Later nana folded her things. She folded some and rolled up some. Since she couldn’t see, that was how she could tell what was what.
Later in the day, I would walk Nana around the corner to a little store. She had one of those old fashion grocery wheely things. I remember that the store always had a bad smell. We would get the same thing almost every week. Milk, eggs, bread, and bananas. Thank goodness I never had to ask anyone for help, because no one spoke English. This was the Spanish section of her neighborhood.
As we would walk back to her apartment, and rounded the corner, there a gospel church. We could hear the choir rehearsing for the next day. Nana and I sat on a bench on the apartment grounds and listened to them sing. Church hymns are church hymns so Nana would sing along. I liked these hymns so much better than the ones we sang in our Catholic Church. They were jazzy, fun, and full of life. I never got to go into that church, but I could imagine what it looked like and who was singing.
On our way back into the building, Nana would hand me her keys and I could get her mail. I could reach her mailbox on my tippy toes. I did my best to read her mail to her. She was very organized since she was blind so she would tell me back in her apartment what basket got the mail and what one got the bills. My absolute favorite thing to do of all was to take her little brown bag of trash to the incinerator. It had a handle like a mailbox at the post office. As I dropped the bag down the shoot I would say to the bag of trash, “Goodbye cruel world.” 😂
Nana managed very well for a long time living alone and being blind. She could cook, do dishes, and clean. I started to notice when I came that her cleaning wasn’t as good anymore, so without her knowing I would clean what she missed.
Images of shoulder angels on Pinterest
The idea of the good and bad angels represents your conscience and temptation. Decisions we have to make every day, even if we don’t realize we are doing it. That was what Nana was preparing me for in her way.
Yesterday I really didn’t want to work out. I mean, I really didn’t want to. “Don’t work out today, you deserve a day to relax,” said the bad angel. “Don’t listen to him, you get out there, you will be glad you did,” the good one whispered. I listened to the good one and felt great after my workout.
Nana passed away in 1993, but I feel her around me from time to time. Yesterday, she joined me on my workout journey, and it was a Saturday, our day we used to spent together.
Certain foods that I prepare remind me of specific people. Yesterday, I made corn chowder for lunch. It wasn’t my usual corn chowder I learned how to make more than 25 years ago, it was yesterday’s version.
The longer I cook the more I can branch off the solid core recipes I learned. In the beginning, I wasn’t one of those people who could just open their fridge and make a five-course meal with whatever they found. When the Food Networks show Chopped first came on I remember thinking I could never do that.
Most of the contestants are chefs or professional cooks. They are each given a basket full of random ingredients that they have to make a cohesive meal out of. They can use basic pantry items to help, but the show puts some wacky ingredients in the baskets. They are giving away $10,000, so it should be challenging, especially for chefs.
My boys would say, “ You should go on Chopped.” The thought was scary, here we go…back to me not wanting to look stupid or to be embarrassed if I made something less than perfect or even good. I was sure I would have choked on camera and would be the first one eliminated.
When the contestants would open their baskets, I would pause the tv and say out loud in under 20 seconds what I would make. More times than not one of them would make what I said. I got better and better at it.
Not to toot my own horn, but I’ve come along way. I have no desire to be on Chopped now because it just isn’t challenging to me anymore.
Ok, back to my corn chowder. My usual one is a quick and simple Betty Crocker recipe. I really taught myself how to cook using my Betty Crocker cookbook, then graduated to “The Joy of Cooking.”
The Betty Crocker recipe uses pantry ingredients so it can be prepared any time of the year. “Real” corn chowder recipes use corn on the cob, celery, onions, bacon, stock, potatoes, and lots of heavy cream.
The original Betty Crocker Corn Chowder.
Betty’s recipe uses canned creamed corn, bacon, celery, onions, flour or in my case potato starch, potatoes, and milk.
After my last severe ulcerative colitis flare-up 2 years ago I have been following a strict low residue diet. This type of diet eliminates hard to digest things like nuts, seeds, certain types of raw fruits and vegetables, and certain legumes. I miss popcorn the most.
When I make my chowder I put the creamed corn into the blender and blitz the heck out of it. This makes it not only edible for me, but it is also is a great natural thickener. If I was having company I would take some out of the pot for me, then put either fresh or canned corn kernels into the chowder for texture for everyone else. I love corn so much that I just appreciate having the flavor of it.
Yesterday, I only had maple bacon, which I bought by mistake. As I was making the soup I decided to use sweet potatoes instead of yellow potatoes like I usually use.
I thought the sweet potatoes would go nicely with the maple. I added a dash of cayenne pepper and lots of chopped green onions. It was delicious and a nice change from my usual version. I actually think it was better, I will be making it this way again for sure.
Whenever I start a pot of corn chowder I think of my good friend Patti, Noah, my son’s Godmother. I also think about a couple of her visits to Vermont.
The first time Patti came to visit she brought her younger sister Meg with her. I love Meg and knew we all would have a really fun time. We had just moved to Vermont so hanging out with other Jersey girls was going to be awesome! I missed these guys and was homesick.
The next morning after Meg took her shower she came running into the living room so excited. “Oh my God! I love the water up here in Vermont! My hair never came out so good!” We were crying laughing, not at her, but that we knew exactly what she meant. She got the most height and volume of her “big hair.” Good hair days are a big deal! They still are to me.
The next time Patti visited she came with her husband Ken. As soon as we made plans I immediately started thinking of some things I would cook. I needed some go-to recipes that were quick, easy, and delicious. Noah was not quite two years old yet, so the dishes needed to be recipes I could bang out during his nap time.
My famous tomato tart that I taught all my friends how to make and it became their go to recipe as well!
They came on the Friday of Columbus Day weekend. I wanted to make a couple of seasonal things so I made corn chowder and an apple pie. I also made my famous tomato tart that I made whenever somebody visited. The rest of the food I figured we could wing over the weekend. I cleaned like a madwoman all week during Noah’s nap times, I wanted everything to be perfect. Really now? Imagine that! 😂
On a Friday afternoon, after Noah got up from his nap I put on his favorite show Blue’s Clues, and gave him a snack. “Noah, Aunt Patti, and Uncle Ken will be here soon. “Mommy is going to take a shower and get ready.” I knew I had about 22 minutes to get it all done.
Noah around the time of The Mero House incident.
When I was toweling off I thought I heard something downstairs. I quickly threw my clothes on and went to investigate what he was getting into.
When I came down the stairs there was an older couple sitting on our couch and Noah was sitting on the lady’s lap eating his snack.
What the actual fuckity was happening here? I was so confused I could barely put words together to form sentences. I think I forgot how to speak English. I was in such shock. “Um can I help you?” was all I could get out.
The woman smiled and said, “We are here to check-in. What a lovely home you have and it smells wonderful in here.” I had no idea what she was talking about. Her husband said, “I hope you don’t mind, but your son showed us where our room was, I put our bags in there.” Huh?
“What an adorable little boy you have, we weren’t expecting children, but he’s darling.” She told me.
With that, I realized they were staying at The Mero House, a seasonal bed and breakfast during foliage across the street from our house.
I explained to them their mistake and pointed diagonally across the street. They were so embarrassed, but I reassured them it was an easy mistake to make and it was totally fine.
The husband went into our guest room and retrieved their bags. As he walked past the now cool pie on the dining room table he told me how disappointed he was that he wouldn’t be eating all the delicious food he smelled, “Especially that pie!” We all laughed.
After they left to check-in across the street I was completely rattled. How in God’s name could I let that happen? How could I be so stupid to leave our front door open for anyone to come in?
Noah asked where those people went. I explained to him what happened and he immediately said, “I’m not a good boy?” Sadly a chip off the old block like me.
I tried to not make a big deal about it, he had no reason to think he did anything wrong. He was just being a “big helper.” I told him he was a good boy, mommy was wrong leaving the front door unlocked. Just for the record, no one locked their doors in Vermont. We did of course at night, but not during the day. Back then everyone left their keys in the ignition of their cars & trucks too. I don’t think we ever did.
I took a second to talk about letting strangers in, next time come and get mommy. I went back upstairs to finish getting ready, Patti and Ken arrived a few minutes later. We had a big laugh over what happened. When Marty got home from work I was no longer feeling like the worst mother in the world.
We had a fun weekend being tourists, eating all the food I made, and drank lots of wine. The next time I saw Patti for an extended time was when my father passed away unexpectantly when we were visiting for Easter. Noah was almost five and I wasn’t in any shape to worry about him and my mother, plus I was 5 months pregnant with Sam.
Noah-guy with his Pop-pop
Patti came to the rescue and took care of Noah for me. She had her own family and life but dropped everything to help. The whole thing is still a complete blur, I don’t think I really ever told her how much I needed her, she just knew. My dad loved her and I know he was happy she was taking care of his “Noah-guy.”
It was a few very long and exhausting days, a really tough time, and Patti made it possible that Marty and I could take care of making all the arrangements with my mother and not worry about him at all.
I texted Patti yesterday and asked if I could write about her and Ken and if she remembers anything else. She quickly typed back, “ I just remember the corn chowder and that tomato tart.” She also reminded me about Meg and her best hair day ever.
I smiled from ear to ear, I was so happy that my food was a good food memory for Patti! Marty and I laughed remembering how excited Meg was that morning and what a good time we had whenever they came up.
Patti and I do keep in touch, she is the type of friend that even if we don’t talk for a year, we can pick up exactly where our last conversation ended. We really need to get together after this pandemic bullshit is over. Life got busy when our kids were growing up and we haven’t seen each other for years and years. This is the reason why Facebook is a great thing. We still got to watch each other’s kids grow up, including Meg’s daughters as well.
I honestly didn’t expect this piece to suddenly turn sad, but the words came out when I started writing about my friendship with Patti and knew they needed to be included.
Writing this piece also made me wonder if that older couple had a nice weekend and if they thought of us when they reminisced about their stay in Arlington. I also wondered if the husband was able to track down some apple pie. Dammit, now I want apple pie.
Noah with his arm tattoo dedicated to his Pop-pop.
Last week my newsfeed on Facebook and Instagram started getting flooded with sexy lingerie ads, gifts and recipes. Every other scroll there is another one. This morning I woke up and saw on our Alexa screen “Top 20 trending recipes for Valentine’s Day.”
Before I really get going on this I want to acknowledge that some people really look forward to Valentine’s Day. Many people get married and celebrate their anniversaries on February 14th. I think that if it’s your thing, you have every reason to enjoy it.
I want to talk about what how I feel about Valentine’s Day. With almost all of our other American holidays, none make many people feel so left out, lonely, depressed and miserable.
On St. Patrick’s Day everyone is Irish and can celebrate it. I hated not knowing my nationalities and my mother made is worse every year by saying, “Don’t worry you can wear green today, everyone is Irish on St. Patrick’s Day.” Well thanks so much!
Next the Christians have Easter and the jewish people have Passover. On Memorial Day & Veteran’s Day we remember those who died for or served/are serving our country.
Halloween is considered a pagan holiday, but anyone can dress up, go trick or treating or give out candy. The people who feel like its the devils holiday have All Saints Day the following day.
Thanksgiving, everyone can be thankful for something, no matter how small it may be.
Finally the Christians have Christmas and the jewish people have Hanukah.
New Years is celebrated by the world, hoping for a wonderful new year. I know I left out other nationalities and what they celebrate, but they celebrate! That’s my point.
I noticed how Valentine’s Day made me feel early on. I hated that Charlie Brown didn’t get many Valentine’s like everyone else. I hated even more that in my own classrooms some kids didn’t get as many cards as others. I knew they were disappointed. I gave everyone a card, even if I didn’t like them. 😉
Valentine’s Day is a commercial holiday that retail stores, florists, card manufacturers, restaurants, and jewelry stores cash in on big time. There is so much pressure on people to give nice gifts to show how much they love someone.
Over the last ten years on social media people post their gifts. I am shocked and blown away by what people gave and received. I am not jealous, I am dumbfounded!
I am also amazed how many people want to go out for a romantic dinner. Remember this is me talking here…why would you want to go to an overcrowded restaurant that is serving a limited price gouged menu? Why would you want to be eat a meal that is being hurried along so they can turn over your table. It’s amateur night, just like going out for an expensive New Year’s Eve dinner.
Looking at so many of my friends on Facebook who post such sad posts on Valentine’s Day makes me feel like I am in the third grade again and watching everyone look in their paper mailboxes and pull out their Valentine’s Day cards.
This year especially Valentine’s Day will be extra tough for all the folks that have lost someone. I am dreading the day for my friend who lost his wife last year. It will be the last “first” since her death in March. The four of us ate together twice a week, every week. On Valentine’s Day, we ate together and enjoyed some wine and a lot of laughs, but nothing more special than all our other dinners together.
I have had a “valentine” since 1985. To us, we love each other every day. We show our love by the way we treat each other all year. I make beautiful dinners all year, I don’t have to be guilted into making a lobster or fillet mignon just because it’s Valentine’s Day.
Photo from Cafe Press
The commercial push of products and that so may people get sucked into makes me want to scream. I am not condemning people who want to give their love some flowers, take them to dinner or just get them a nice card. I am condemning how people get taken advantage of and pressured into doing things they don’t want to do or more importantly can’t afford to do.
Happy Valentine’s Day. Don’t get sucked in. Wait to go out for a delicious dinner another night where you will get better food and service. Surprise you partner with a bouquet of flowers on another day, just out of the blue. If you want to be romantic, be romantic whenever you feel like it. Call or check in with someone alone and have a little compassion for your single friends that are reminded how alone they are and sick of everyone’s drippy, rub it in photos and gifts.
One thing you will learn about me is that I think about things long after they have happened. I often revisit things. I could have, would have , should have…bla, bla, bla.
After writing my piece about driving in the snow today, I realize that I left out the most important part of that story. I danced around the truth. Why? Why am I so afraid of driving in the snow. When did this happen? Why did it happen? I thought about it and can I share some honest reason why I think I am afraid of driving in the snow?
Why am I afraid? I am sure that this question has many answers. I am sure this fear thing has happened in other situations. Why am I thinking about it? Because it’s high time I face the truth.
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Famous words from JFK. Truthful words. Words to be afraid of, or not.
When I sat down and started thinking about why I am afraid of driving in the snow the first thing that came to mind was what was the worst thing that could happen to me if I drove in the snow and got into an accident?
Getting hurt or injured came to mind, but I don’t think that’s really it. Driving on a beautiful day is when many horrific, deadly accidents happen. This I know from rescue squad calls.
Wrecking my car. Yes, it would be a total ass-ache to have my car towed, making an accident report, contacting my insurance company, renting a car while mine is being repaired. While these are things that would make being in an accident inconvenient, I am not sure that is it either.
Was I ever in a snow driving incident? Yes, the first-year winter we lived here in VT. One of the first snowy days I slid off the road close to where we lived. I was on my way to my new job in Rutland, VT.
We lived in South Londonderry and the commute was beautiful in the summer when I interviewed for the job. The ride was gorgeous during foliage. The ride was on a road that had no traffic, no lights, no anything. It was one of the last roads to be plowed. I found out the hard way.
I slid off the road and my Jersey car couldn’t get out. I felt like a typical idiot Jersey person that just moved here. A total flatlander as we are called. Marty and our landlord were both at work. There were no telephone booths, stores, or anywhere I could get help. I was dressed to work in an office with totally inappropriate shoes and clothing.
Within moments of my slide off a big pickup truck showed up. A guy jumped out and immediately got under my car checking out the situation. He got a tow rope out of the bed of his truck and started pulling my car back onto the road.
While I was watching him I knew I didn’t have any cash on me. How was I going to pay him? Was he going to be mad if I couldn’t pay him, will he kill me, yell at me, beat me to a pulp? Remember I just came from previously working in NYC and living in NJ.
I thanked him and started to tell him I didn’t have any money on me but I would…he stopped me mid-sentence. He said, “If my wife slid off the road I would want someone to help her. All I ask is to pay it forward.” He got into his truck and that was that.
When Marty and I saw each other after work I told him what happened. I told him what the guy said. He took what the man said about paying it forward more seriously than I could have imagined. Marty has helped hundreds of people both on his personal time and responding with an ambulance.
One idea that popped into my head while I was thinking about this fear was deep-rooted. I know that you can’t blame stuff on your childhood for everything, but was I on to something?
As I mentioned at the beginning of my blogging journey I wrote that I always felt like I had to do everything well. I was adopted and always felt like I had a debt to repay. I needed to show how much I appreciated my parents. I was God’s gift to my parents who wanted a baby, I better act like a gift. A perfect gift, the start of my perfectionism.
Of course, I learned through therapy that my need for perfectionism was real, but that I was being manipulated with it. I felt guilty if I made a mistake or didn’t do my best. No wonder I have been dealing with severe ulcerative colitis since my early teens.
My parents would praise me if I did good, but was it ever good enough? I only found out a couple of years ago that nothing that I ever did was good enough. That’s where the manipulation comes into play along with perfectionism and guilt trips.
What the hell does this have to do with me being afraid the drive in the snow? Could it be that I would feel embarrassed again if I had an accident? What if it was my fault? What if I killed someone? What if I made someone’s life harder because I damaged their car? What if they couldn’t get to their job? Pay their rent if they couldn’t work, left their children an orphan? Wow! Reading it back I am thinking…this is some fucked up shit. No wonder I’ve been in therapy!
Was this the reason? I think it could be. Will I always be afraid to drive in the snow? Yes. What can I do about it? Well, I will tell you this, I won’t be driving in the snow tomorrow just to prove a point to myself.
Is it ok to be afraid of things? To fear things? Is it a sign of weakness? I have spent years building up a tough layer of protection. A defense if you will. How can I admit I am not good at something? What if I let someone down? What if I let myself down? Will this fear be used against me? Can I be manipulated with this fear?
I don’t have the answers to those questions. I’ve always thought of myself as a somewhat fearless, confident person. Since writing this blog I have admitted a few very honest things that were hard to say, let alone tell the world. It seems like my fear of failure could be the root of it. Maybe if I keep acknowledging my fears and failures I can heal and move forward.
Was I really fine today? No. Definitely not!
I love what one of my readers commented, “It’s fine until it isn’t, driving and the rest of life.”
Ice beneath the dusting of snow on our driveway this morning.
The definition of the word fine according to Merriam-Webster means several things.
Alright – That’s fine with me. Well or healthy: not sick or injured – I feel fine. Superior in kind, quality, or appearance – A fine job, a fine day, fine wines. Very thin in gauge or texture – Fine thread, fine sand, fine print, fine edge of a knife, fine judgment. Delicate, subtle, or sensitive in quality, perception, or discrimination – Fine distinction, fine writing, fine manners.
This one I added on my own. If you ever have an argument with a woman and she says, “fine” you should worry. It means the total opposite of fine. “Whatever” is an even bigger one to worry about. Whatever is a nice way of saying “fuck it I am done!” 🤬. That is a whole separate blog post though.
I must have heard the word “fine” 10 times already this morning. I wanted to head over to Cambridge, NY to pick up a few necessary things at Walgreens and drop off a thank you gift I made for my friends Maria & Jon for all their help with my blog.
Just as I was getting ready to leave, I looked outside and it was snowing, again. The roads were just slightly covered and I said, “Dammit! It’s snowing!” Marty replied, “You’ll be fine.”
My fear of driving in the snow goes back at least 25 years. I hate driving in the first place but put snow, sleet, or freezing rain into the mix and it is almost paralyzing to me. It’s not so much that I am worried about myself since we’ve had always had vehicles or tires that are good in the snow. It’s those overconfident assholes that are going way too fast. They are either passing cars, fishtailing, or up my ass.
Many people don’t know that just a dusting of snow can be more slippery than a couple of inches. In addition, you can’t see what’s lurking under the snow. Our driveway is a sheet of ice under the dusting of snow. I almost went down coming out our back door.
Then there is this little gem out there that is supposed to help people remember how to drive in snowy conditions, “White you are alright, brown slow down.” They are referring to packed white snow as opposed to a brown slushy mess.
“Why the hell do you live in VT if you don’t like snow?” “It’s the other three seasons that I love, thank you very much.” Everyone who chooses to live in the Green Mountain State doesn’t have to like winter or cold weather outdoor activities. Ca-peech? Being said in my best Jersey accent.
Capisce?” is American pseudo-Italian slang for “understand?” and functions rather like “know what I mean?” In Italian this form would be used only in a formal setting; the typically casual American-style contexts would require capischi.
Back to my trip to Cambridge. “Your vehicle is great in the snow,” Marty told me. He would know because he used our delivery van with studded snow tires for 500-mile delivery loops in the winter for the first two years of our business.
Keeping that in mind I got to Walgreens, which is a 20-minute ride on main roads. The NY roads were better than the Vermont ones, hardly covered at all.
I did my shopping and when I was checking out, it was snowing like a bastard and even Route 22 was covered. Well, Jon and Maria only live a few miles up Route 22, I would be “fine” I told myself.
Maria was surprised that I drove in the snow. I told her that our van is “fine” in the snow since we have studded tires. I did share with her that I was out of my comfort zone.
I asked Maria how Jon was doing, he had an accident on Friday. Oh, he’s “fine.” I asked, “Is he really “fine,” or is that what he is saying?” She said no he wasn’t injured at all even though the accident was terrifying almost rolling his car into a water-filled ravine. Only one tire and some rocks saved the car from rolling over. Thank God he is ok and had so many community members come to his immediate aid. Small town living perk for sure.
We only chatted for a few minutes because I was getting more and more anxious about my ride back to Arlington.
As I made my way home I didn’t take any of my usual shortcuts to Route 313, I stayed on Route 22. Right at the intersection of 22 & 313, there was an accident. There were lots of cars and emergency vehicles. I was able to turn left onto 313 and continue my way home.
The rescue squad radio in the van kept reporting of cars off the roads and accidents galore. Marty has been an EMT on Arlington Rescue since 2000, along with our son Sam who joined when he was 14. There are radios in all our vehicles and rooms of our house.
I could feel myself begin to tighten up and I was getting more and more nervous. “Dammit, Julz you are fine!” Then this piece started writing itself in my head. I realized as I was almost home that getting my mind off of driving in the snow and writing instead made the ride “fine.”
When I got home I told Marty the roads were bad. “No, they weren’t, they were fine and so were you,” “Oh really you don’t say,” I asked him if he heard all the accidents on the rescue squad radios. He said he didn’t. We have a hundred radios all over the place, and he didn’t have one to listen to? “Fine,” I thought.
So what I realized is one person’s fine is completely different from another person’s, even in the same situation. This is especially when someone is drunk off their ass and they say, “I’m fine!” The more they try to convince others, the drunker they are.
The roads may be fine if you have the proper vehicle and tires, but not to someone cruising around in bald tires, the worse part is they don’t even realize it and think they are “fine.”
Barely put my bags down before I wanted to start writing. I was starving, so I had some leftover stuffed cabbage for lunch while I wrote. I am not nice or good at anything when I am hungry. My kitchen island or workbench as I like to call it is one of my favorite places to write.
Death Valley is a spot in Arlington that is named that for that very reason. It is always in the shade so nothing melts, it is curvy and hilly. We all know to take it easy when going through the area, but out of state drivers don’t slow down, think about black ice, or braking. They usually end up in an accident. The roads weren’t “fine” for them in those conditions since they didn’t know about them, but was”fine” for the locals.
I still hate driving in the snow. I still hate when someone says the roads are fine. That being said Marty was right, I was “fine”. My trip back to VT did get me thinking that it could just be mind over matter. That’s “fine!”
Is this the 80s or what? I was working in Manhattan at the time and Marty was a club DJ
We have been addicted to the broadway sensation Hamilton for a couple of years and have watched it dozens of times since it came out on Disney Plus on July 3, 2020. Currently, we are watching a Netflix series called Bridgeton.
Hamilton takes place during the Revolutionary War era through the early 1800s. Bridgerton takes place in the early 1800s, almost picking up where Hamilton left off, but in England.
We were listening to the original Broadway soundtrack of Hamilton for a long time, not knowing how they actually did the scenes in the play. It was hard to imagine how they did battles and flashbacks, but after seeing it, everything made sense and fell into place.
The courtship of Alexander Hamilton and Eliza Schuyler was very fast. It seemed like they were only courting for 2 weeks and they were married. This confused me for sure since I knew nothing about courting in the 1700s.
When we watched Bridgeton, the courtship between two people was rather short as well. The point was to get married. The couple wasn’t allowed any hankie pankie at all or it would disgrace the woman and her family.
Courtship or calling was a family affair, callers meant heirs, property, and happiness, and ultimately marriage. Prospective men, callers were determined by land, status, and wealth. Marriages had to be approved by the family. Not very romantic that’s for sure. It was more of a business transaction for two families instead of two people becoming man and wife.
Opening day at Shea Stadium with Marty and his friends. This was only 3 months into our relationship. I had short hair and he had a perm! 😜
Dating came about in the 1900s. Women were free to choose with whom they wanted to spend time with. The word dating refers to filling one’s datebook. Makes sense right? The mid-century term, “going steady”meant the couple who had been dating are now dating exclusively.
Speaking of mid-century a couple of my favorite tv shows when I was a kid were Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley which took place in the 1950s, along with the movie Grease.
I never really knew when I was 10 or eleven why all the guys wanted to do was neck and go to inspiration point. Laverne & Shirley were two friends that were also roommates living on their own without men. Shirley had a boyfriend The Big Ragu, but I don’t think they ever married.
In Grease I knew there was more of that necking stuff, and could recite “A hickey from Kenickie is like a Hallmark card when you care enough to send the very best.” I didn’t know what a hickey really was, but if it was coming from Kenickie it must have been good because I thought he was cute.
When I was in grammar school I remember we would write notes to boys and asking them if they liked so and so. Please check the following box the note would say. Check yes or no. Crystal clear directions just in case they couldn’t figure it out.
In high school, dating was called going out with someone. My father couldn’t grasp the concept that I was going out with someone, but we didn’t go anywhere. I explained it to him a hundred times. “Daddy, I was just seeing so and so, but now we are going out.” This was dating and going steady in his era the 50s.
Men and women started off calling each other beautiful, handsome, cute, pretty, gorgeous, a hottie, a fox. In our high school JFK we called people we found attractive a “burger!” I think that our town of Iselin and maybe Colonia was the only place on earth to call someone a burger. “Oh check him out, he’s a total burger.” You just can’t make this shit up! I have no idea who started it, but it stayed around for a couple of years.
At our rehearsal dinner 10/20/89. Gosh that was some real Jersey hair!
I met Marty and we dated, went out, were seeing each other, going steady for 4 years before we got married. He indeed asked my father for permission. Marty was probably one of the only guys my father ever liked. I knew he liked him when he started calling him Mart.
I wasn’t allowed to go out if someone just honked the horn. They had to come in and meet my dad. It was torturous for me, especially when I wasn’t allowed to go because my father didn’t approve.
He had many reasons why he didn’t approve of someone. His shoelace was untied, he was chewing gum, he had some stupid thing on his head. “Daddy, it’s a bandana!” “I don’t give a shit what it is, you aren’t going with him.” Didn’t he know the lead singer from the band Loverboy wore one just like it? Dating was tough business in our house.
Since then dating has changed a lot. You don’t even have to go on actual dates anymore.
You know someone is dating these days because they change their Facebook status to “in a relationship.” When people break up, everyone once again knows, because their status goes back to “single.” I think they took away the optional status “it’s complicated.”
“Friends with benefits” was a friend that you could have an occasional and casual sexual relationship with. This is different from “hooking up” which is a one-time-only thing with someone new.
“Netflix & chill” is a slang term for two people going to each other’s houses and having straight-up sex or just some sexual related acts. It took parents a long time to figure out what the code word was for.
Photo credit Jen A This summer at Sandy Hook Beach
These days guys and girls are talking. I have a younger friend at my farmer’s markets and thought it was amusing when my buddy said to me right out of the blue, “Yea, I’m talking to this girl.” I was like that’s cool. ” I want a girl to date, a girl that wants a man around, a girl to fall in love with like you and your husband.” “I really want to date and go places. I don’t want to hook up even though that’s what most of them want.”
I am smiling while I am typing this because my buddy is the nicest guy, handsome, great personality, caring, spiritual and funny. I told him that she was out there, he will find that special someone when the time was right. He is only 27, he still had plenty of time. And this girl? She will be one lucky girl…but for now, they are just talking. I haven’t seen him for a few weeks I wonder if they are still talking?
My father never would have been able to figure that one out, he would say “how the hell much stuff can you talk about?” 😂
