Whisk on a High Wire: entry FOUR

Part 4

The car starts pulling itself right as if reaching out to massive cliffs looming just off the freeway. I counter by pulling us left but am countered by a more determined veer. Giving in, I slow onto the shoulder to a stop. Suspicions confirmed I head to the back of the car to get the jack. No time to whine, fret, throw a tantrum or cry lest I be late for the fair I open the hatch to get to work. Before the hatch is fully opened, though, two pair of fuzzy pointy ears rise up between the junk ahead of me and the backs of the front seats. The cats, whom I almost forgot were with me, smell freedom and from their hiding places on the backseat floor where for the entire trip they have been perfect huddled passengers they indicate they’ve had enough; enough road noise and vibration, enough cramped in one position, enough time without food or water, enough disturbance in their normal cat lives.

There also just happens to be 2 trays of soft chocolate tarts and the delicate Angel Kiss meringues directly between them and me and they are about to leave mushy paw prints in dozens of triple chocolate pies not to mention destroy untold numbers of airy meringue mounds. Extending my arm with a raised hand as if my halting authority means beans to them I calmly say “It’s okaaaaaaaaaay, stay, nice kitties….” as I gently lower the back hatch and move around to the front seat. There I start crooning to them getting them to turn around and face me. “Hi kitties” I plea having no idea what to do next to keep them from wandering into the back of the car before I can get the food out of there. Just under the white cat, Humphrey, I see packets of treats I’ve brought for them. I grab one and tear it open with my teeth. I dump about half the bag onto the front seat and they take the bait. Practically leaping out of the car I run to the back, throw open the hatch and start pulling all of the trays and containers of food onto the ground. Running back to the front I see they’ve eaten more than half the pile of food so I dash back and throw the buckets, mops, brooms, boxes of kitchen stuff and garbage out. Both cats are now headed straight for the opening and just as I lower the hatch Humphrey has just about gotten out. As a matter of fact, his head is caught in the door sticking out over the back bumper. In what could have been one less of his nine lives he is spared by some maternal instinct of mine not to press the latch all the way down. His tail, still inside the car, is flapping like a flag in a hurricane and Lily the other cat looks like she’s about to jump out of her skin with nowhere to run. Pressing my hand into Humphrey’s face I simultaneously lift the hatch just enough to push him back into the car before Lily can give it a try. Back to the front seat I dash, jump into the car before they can detect another exit and climb into the now junk free back to join the cats. It could have been a reconciling moment but I’ve got a flat to fix and need that jack. I pull the cover to the tire well up toward me and have to reach over to retrieve the equipment since the lid only lifts half way. Moving the cats aside I contort myself back to the front seat and out the driver’s side door where I’m immediately anointed by a wave of water from some sadistic semi but at least it discourages the cats from even thinking of heading out this way.

Even though it isn’t raining now, there’s plenty of water standing on the highway and as each vehicle zooms by on this major thorough fare, I’m once again baptized by total immersion.

Of course the last person replacing the lugs on the wheel was using a machine so my mere mortal muscles can’t make the nuts budge. I stand on the jack, I stomp on it, I scream at it but not even a hint at movement. Finally, out of pure fury, something wells up in me for all injustices I’ve endured in my fairly long lifetime and those lug nuts start flying off the flat’s wheel. I yank off the hubcap and hope no- one stops to help for I’m kind of enjoying this angry power but wouldn’t want to subject some poor good Samaritan to this right now. Not only would it be dangerous for them but it would ruin the moment for me. Off goes the flat tire, on goes the spare, the hub cap, the lug nuts and I fall back dazed. After a couple of deep breaths I open the back hatch, tell the cats to stay put or I’ll throw them out to the wild dogs I’m just sure roam roadways looking for abandoned housecats (which, by the way, both cats definitely seem to understand for they are frozen in place looking at me each with both irises fully dilated) and I start tossing all my belongings back into the car driving Humphrey and Lily back into hiding. Lastly, the trays and containers of food are slightly more gingerly put into place as securely as the situation allows. Shoes squishing from road water I sit my wet buns down into the driver’s seat and head for my new residence.

Even though I’ve had to limp along on a dwarfed spare tire I’ve managed to make it in time for the fair. Entering the town that is now home, the past few hours shed away. Ahead of me dozens of little booths, tables, stages and very happy people make up the Fall Festival. I find a space right in the center of the action and set up a simple card table and a crude handmade sign. Without concern for the cats, who may not immerge for days, I pull out all the food and begin arranging it next to 200 surveys I printed what seems like weeks ago even though it was just this morning. Hundreds of people come to see what I’m up to and I invite them to have a bite if they’ll help me out by filling out a questionnaire related to the café that will soon be part of their community.

To my delight Elmer stops by, takes a survey, a Devil’s Tongue AND an Angel’s Kiss welcoming me to town. I promise to stop by his place later for a chat that gives me the best thing to look forward to that day. He can become the lucky recipient of the leftovers. Before long, all 200 pieces of paper have been handed out, some already filled in and returned and I sit back handing out most of the rest of the food reserving a good amount for Elmer.

Old time music fills the air as an entire family of 10 takes the stage. The females are dressed in gingham and bonnets, the males in white shirts, vests and string ties. Out of tune and just a little too eager they still provide the ambience necessary to complete the day. I still have enough adrenaline to take down the table, re-pack the goods and head over to Elmer’s so I head out as everyone else is also winding down. I’ve met more locals than I can remember all of which expressed enthusiasm for having an eating establishment in town. The surveys will tell me if the menu is on target for them. My new house awaits me after I see Elmer and the cats will need some decompression and gentle introduction to a completely new environ. This is the land of eagles, something I expect they will catch onto very quickly. I just hope they are smart enough to dodge the talons.

Whisk on a High Wire: entry three

As I open the back hatch of the car a wave of nausea creeps through my chest then slides down into my stomach. Every nerve ending in my body feels as if it has sparked triggering a mist of perspiration that coats my skin evaporating into the cool, damp air. In a flash it's all over, another change is upon me. In this natural chemically induced rush an emergence of sorts occurs, a clarity that reveals the mess before me in a new light. Forked pecans or "Devil's Tongues", at once sweet, spicy and hot have co-mingled with the pure, airy "Angel Kiss" meringues and it occurs to me that any resulting offspring could be called "Evil Cherubs". Ah if only food could reproduce thusly. For now, they will remain together for I have no idea how many more shifts and bumps are ahead on this trip.

Food, once a hard earned necessity has evolved into a cultural phenomenon on one hand and a completely fabricated artifice on the other. Over the past 50 years science has genetically altered fresh produce to the sacrifice of half (or worse) of its vitamins and minerals. It takes more than twice the amount of vegetables to equal the nutritional value of the 1950's. Going to the grocery store to purchase today's bland, stale, wilting and often colorless produce is a chore and we can't wait to get out of the over lit maze like warehouses. Because we consumers naturally gravitate to the right when we enter the market, fresh produce is deliberately placed at the left of the store while the aisles of junk food and unnecessary plastic items are placed to the right. Often dairy is at the farthest back of the store so we have to pass candy, chips, packaged goods to get to the eggs and milk. This is well calculated placement.

We don't talk to strangers in the super markets nor do clerks interact with us except in rare self conscious greetings or inquiries about our needing assistance. Just once I'd welcome someone walking up to me and asking me if I'd like to try a new apple the store just got in but even then I might not trust the intent.

Switch the scene to a European market and you'll find people spending half of their Saturday strolling from stall to stall happy to taste, sample and smell fare being offered by individual vendors. These vendors offer an extra ounce or a large sample because they are proud of their produce and want to share it with their customers. Children love accompanying their parents because vendors are happy to see them. This experience in shopping for food is immersion into the culture. We are just beginning to get back to this kind of experience through our local farmer's markets and with luck the trend will grow and change our relationship to food.

I don't know if I will be able to manifest this kind of purchasing where I am going. Much of my food by necessity will be delivered from giant warehouses 90 miles from my restaurant because the area I'm moving to has yet to discover any consistent, year round fresh produce. I won't live in Alice Waters' world. I don't know if I'll even have time for such luxurious shopping even if I do find the opportunity. My challenge will be to make the best dishes I can from what I am able to get. Fish once a week must be sold within a couple of days then it will be off the menu. Meat, delivered once a week must be kept very cold at all times to last the week and even then may be a scarcity the day before the new delivery. These are just a few of the challenges I face in the venture I am about to take on.

I have passed the dense rainy zone of this journey. Each mile brings dryer landscape but the river remains large and smooth. Reflected in its surface are craggy hills with evidence of giant slides of broken up basalt. Perfect mirrored images of columnar cliffs rest on the river's surface undisturbed by any evidence of movement. The river may as well be a lake it is so tame today. Tomorrow, it could be chopped up by waves as wind skims its surface from east to west. This is harsh country and getting harsher with each mile eastward. This is the stuff of pioneers and in a way in these modern times I feel like a pioneer to take this road less traveled. To establish a place far from convenient crowds to serve a smaller perhaps more appreciative population hungry for more than just food.

Whisk on a High Wire: entry two

PART 2

My eyes dart all around at the sudden change of scenery. Peripherally, I can see swirling wisps of clouds overhead, dozens of waterfalls cascading to my right and a mirror of water a mile wide to my left that is the dam tamed river, this area’s pride and joy. Absorption is not an option at 70 miles per hour with semi trucks to navigate. The sky changes every ten miles until finally the clouds are dense and starting to leak droplets. By the time I am halfway to my destination the sky has lost all control and I’m in a deluge. Behind the front tires of each dinosaur on wheels is a wave of road water that renders a wall of invisibility. Squeezed between the concrete guard rail to the left and the truck’s underbelly to the right feels like tempting the inferno so I drop behind the truck and cruise at a slower pace knowing this won’t last the entire trip.

Just as I settle into the road groove a hit of reality rushes over me. I am actually doing this. I think of Elmer, the man willing to take my offer under his asking price for the property. He wants a café in town. He somehow understands the importance of a place that’s local. People take ownership of their local joints, for better or worse and I think Elmer truly understands this. To have to drive 10 miles round trip just to get a good egg breakfast is a burden so people tend to stay home and day after day sit alone when they’d rather be out among their community. I think Elmer is tired of being alone but knowing him, it is about a much larger picture. He understands the value of a restaurant to a small town.

Like having a school, a town with a good eating establishment attracts families and residents, helps the town to grow. Residents of a community need a place to bring visiting relatives whether before or after a joyful or sad event. Or, to bring friends who drop in for a day or more. Local news and gossip get exchanged, new friends are met, engagements take place, birthdays celebrated, loneliness abated, babies introduced, children shared, break ups softened, mourning soothed, observers entertained, entertainers satiated and more than a few bellies filled. Elmer knows this, he is my partner in spirit on this ride and I am grateful he has entrusted his lots to my ambition.

My mind snaps out of its thoughts as a ghost-like figure of an old man appears at the side of the road. I jerk the wheel but can’t see him in my rear view mirror. Fog, gray water and road provide no contrast for seeing such details. In my mind he was old, feeble yet earnest looking, certainly not an image of Elmer but who he was and what he was doing out here I may never know if, indeed, he was here to begin with. In the back of my car, the food for today’s fair has once again flown to the other side of the car. As the rain seems to be abating, I pull of at a local tourist attraction, a 120ft. waterfall to inspect the damage.

Whisk on a High Wire: entry one

Whisk oct. 09

Dust motes sift through sun streaked windows illuminating the last items I’m removing from my kitchen. My feet move slightly to echoes of Kat Einhorn’s “Dance in the Kitchen with Me” as a thousand memories flash through my mind’s eye. Life is lived largely in the kitchen. Life changes often begin here and it is generally the last place spent in the house.

In the final moments in my darling little Portland Bungalow I am readying hundreds of little treats for a fair far away in a little town that is about to become my new home. As much as I love this, my first home of my own, I long for the adventure I’m about to take on. I will soon own my very own café. I know what I want to serve people there but first I must know what they want to have so today in addition to a couple hundred Angel’s Kisses, Devil’s Tongues and Espresso Shortbread Bars I have 200 surveys I hope people will fill out as fair exchange for a free pastry. The Angel’s kisses are small mounds of meringues flavored with vanilla with finely chopped toasted hazelnuts folded into them. The Devil’s Tongues are sweet and hot whole pecans that reminded me of forked tongues and the shortbread bars are loaded with instant espresso and have a coffee bean pressed into the center for extra kick. Packing them into the car is bittersweet. On one hand the gesture represents a giant step forward in my life; other than marriage, it is the biggest leap by far but I have to harden my heart before getting the car into reverse or I’ll never be able to leave my little house surrounded by a thousand hours of plantings that colorfully surround the house’s foundation and grounds. How I manage I do not know but I am distracted as I pull into the street and my precariously balanced fare shifts.

The car is halfway into the street with the front tires still grasping the last foot of my driveway. The cats that had been settled while waiting for me to leave the house are starting to shift and if they get into the back they’ll walk all over the food. I hate transporting food. I never have the right containers and today I have no space. The trays are all sliding off of the last items I packed into the car and there isn’t anything holding the food onto the trays so it’s total chaos. If not for a flimsy layer of plastic wrap holding tight, I’d have hundreds of delicate little morsels flung into ever nook and cranny of this car. I don’t even have the heart to straighten up the mess here, I need some distance from my house first. I’ll fix it all when I stop for gas.

Exiting the city is usually such a relief. I long for the quiet of the country, for less chaos and stimulus and this is the last time I will leave the city as a resident here. This exit is to find a new home so my anticipation blocks the usual relief. Today, I will be handing out my now rumpled treats to anyone willing to fill out my survey. The surveys will tell me if my plan for the café is a good fit for my new community.