Time to Engage!

Have you heard of the "new" motivational trend that encourages people to choose a meaningful word, just one word, for the whole year? The idea behind it is that if you focus on one word and get your life centered around that rather than a bunch of goals, the goals will naturally fall into place and you'll end up more like that word.

Or something.



I've had my "word of the year" for quite a few years, well before the idea became popular.  It's not that I'm innovative or cutting edge or ahead of the trend or anything, it's just that one word every year seemed to be popping up all over the place in my life so I'd embrace it and live it. One year it was "joy", another year "focus" (that was a toughie), last year it was "clean"....to clean up my brain, my life, my house, etc.  (Yes. I'm aware that it didn't work as splendidly as I'd hoped last year...*sigh*)



This year's word is ENGAGE.

Part of the inspiration for my choice was in the video I just shared with you. How many of us just get through the day, dealing with things, doing our tasks, but are not really, thoughtfully engaged with the people around us or what we're doing?  In the video, I wish I was Helen Parr, the mom, but I fear that most of the time I'm Bob, the dad.



"Engage" is a verb.

And verbs mean action.



This year, I want to really be engaged with the kids when they're telling me stories or ideas they have instead of just half listening, thinking of other things besides, say, how many LEGO clones died in the battle with the LEGO syths. (This is HARD. Have you ever listened to a nine year old tell a 20 minute story about LEGOs? And pay attention the whole way through?)

This year, I want to appreciate the feel of the dough I'm kneading instead of just trying to get the bread made and in the pan.

This year I want to spend more time with dirty hands, grass stained knees, and bug spray cologne.

This year I want to shut the cell phone off when my family gets home and not turn it back on until they're on the bus or out the door for work.



It's time to engage!

Resolutions

The new year is fresh and full of promise, isn't it? Pages and pages of calendar, waiting to be filled.

Everyone is broke, so they go on strict budgets in the name of "my financial resolution".

Everyone is chubby from Christmas cookies and prime rib for 20 days, so they go on strict diet and exercise programs in the name of "my fitness resolution".

Everyone has new stuff that doesn't fit where the old stuff already is, so they go through closets and drawers in the name of "my organizational resolution". 

I'd like to think I've got unique goals for 2016 but when I really get down to it, I'm "everyone".  

The first week of January....

man, I'm a MUCH better version of myself. 

For example:

I'm trying to be more efficient with the groceries I have and use everything down to the last crumb. Innovative leftovers. 

Interesting combinations of pieces and parts of the ghost of meals past.

"We don't need to go to the grocery store! Why, I have carrots, and red-beans-n-rice, and some cotto salami lunchmeat right here.  It'll be a CASSEROLE."

(I remember my mom doing this sort of thing. We knew that if dinner was a casserole, it was probably going to be composed of previously "used" food, and we'd frantically do a mental rundown of what all we'd been served for meals the prior two days.) Casseroles are suspect dishes...

Yesterday I saw three pears and half a bag of cranberries languishing in my refrigerator, looking like they might get beyond the point of use-ability, so I thought, "Pear sauce! It'll be like apple sauce!" 

Very efficient.

Waste not, want not.

And I felt quite smart and resourceful.

So, I whipped around, got the breakfast dishes put away, the kids' lunches made, a load of laundry in, and peeled those pears right up to boil with their pals the cranberries. (This all happened before 7:30 a.m. because as you know, in the first week of January anything is possible, even energetic housekeeping at ungodly hours.) 

They bubbled and burbled along in their apple juice bath until the cranberries started popping, indicating the proper amount of "done-ness". 

Now, here's where things got a little ugly.

I thought about pushing them through a strainer to eliminate the cranberry skins but I'm sure I'd just read where the skins of all fruits and vegetables are where the most nutrients are. (Because it's January and I have "healthy resolutions", I'm reading those sorts of articles. I'm sure you are too.) I virtuously decided that we were going to get all the vitamins we could out of this efficient use of aging fruit, so I pulled out the blender. 

(Some of you know how this is going to end. Don't spoil it for the rest of the readers...)

Now, we're getting down to the wire on bus time, but I'm determined to get this project wrapped up so I can do the dishes up from it so I can go on with my list of goals (including reading War and Peace, and taking 20 minutes of French daily). (I'm NOT KIDDING.)

Rather than do a ladle-ful of the boiling hot mixture, I poured the whole dang thing into the glass container, replaced the lid, put it on the base and hit the little "SLOW" button. 

I'm the one who needs a "SLOW" label. (SLOW DOWN. THINK ABOUT IT.)

The blender exploded.

Not the motor, but the steam from the boiling hot pear-berries blew the lid sky high and there was sticky red, grainy fruit slop everywhere. 

You know how there's a point in every project where you say to yourself, "You really should just give this one up, dearie.  Just walk away and call it a day..." 

I think about that point much later in time, wishing I had the courage and intelligence to listen to myself, but no...I never do.

This would have been that point.

But I'm no quitter.

I took the glass container, poured most of the almost boiling fruit back in the saucepan, then started the blending process again.  Except THIS time, just as I hit "SLOW", the Farmer put his head in the door and asked a Very Important and Timely Question which (and this is not his fault...he had no idea of the drama and devastation unfolding in the kitchen) distracted me.  My grip on the top of the lid wasn't tight enough and it blew up again. 

You might think the saga ends here, and oh, how I wish it did...

Now the pears and berries are languishing in my refrigerator in a much needed Tupperware container. It's WORSE than if I'd just let them rot in peace, because I'm double cleaning the sticky which is taking valuable time away from my War and Peace goal, AND we're still not eating the nutrients.

Today I have to take lunch over for the men because they're working cows at a vague time, so I have a ham in the crockpot, twice baked potatoes ready to go in the fridge, a green salad, and....pear berry sauce!

The problem being that the reason we haven't yet eaten the pear berry sauce is because it's too runny. What would make a runny sauce thicker?

Hmmm.....

CORN STARCH. 

Nine a.m. found me again with my saucepan of bubbling, burbling pears and cranberries, trying to salvage the whole mess.  

I added corn syrup and a little salt in addition to the cornstarch.  It needed....something. 

As I stirred, I ran through flavors in my brain. What did it need? What could I add?

Lime zest!

As I was grating the lime zest into the rapidly thickening pear berry sauce, I realized there was no possible way I could explain this dish to my father-in-law who likes his food traditional and straightforward. No surprises. I could just see him getting the bowl of ambiguous pink sauce, frowning a little while trying to figure out what it might be, tasting it and not recognizing any of the flavors as things that normally go together. 

Much like we did with Mom's casseroles.

Now, as much as I'd love to continue with this blog post, I have lunch to deliver and I'm running behind on my French course, so it's "au revoir" for now.  

Happy 2016!