Food for the Soul

The tradition of family recipes and methods of food preparation often tell the story of  a family. Grandparents,  mothers, daughters, fathers and sons of every culture have apprenticed  through the years in kitchens of every size and style from the very modest to the most elaborate.
From cookies to tamales, the story of a family is very often told through the particularities of secret ingredients passed on with an intimacy that spans generations.  Identity resides in the flavorful results - timeless and certain. Like all traditions, the familiar provides a sense of comfort and security.

I remember the smell of date nut loaf and chocolate chip cookies wafting through my childhood friend's house. My mother didn't bake so the treat of gooey, warm cookies straight out of the oven was something extra special if I timed my visits down the street just right.

I do remember the aroma of turkey roasting in my mother's oven. It fills my home each year as
I prepare my mother's Thanksgiving dinner with boxes of Mrs. Cubbison's cornbread stuffing drenched in artery -clogging butter out of a Good House Keeping cook book that is falling apart. I have the recipe memorized but still pull the tattered and broken book out each year. There I stand in my kitchen, chopping the onion and celery with the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade playing on the TV in the background, each turn of the cookbook page a connection to my mother.

Far from a "foodie," my mother was of the post World War II convenience generation. Fast food was a novelty. Nutrition nary a thought.  Pudding cups, coke, and white bread filled her fridge.  As children, my friends and I snacked on potato chips, hot dogs, and Chips Ahoy. My mother was all practical and the convenience foods were made to order for her!

It was my father who dove into the art of cooking. Sunday breakfast with cream cheese omelettes or sheared eggs, English muffins, bacon, sausage and coffee cake on our patio by the pool were a regular occurrence.  Elaborate dinners included caesar salad with anchovies or wilted spinach salad tossed with flair table -side and cherries jubilee set a flame on a rolling cart fit for the most lavish restaurant.  My father's enthusiasm for cooking came later in his life and became a hobby that fit his personality.
He referred to his caesar salad as "an artistic chore."

But the most enduring of all family recipes passed on by my mother is actually not a recipe at all. It is simply, egg on toast.
My daughter, who is an egg on toast aficionado, has explored the many nuances of making this delectable of all breakfasts from the exact timing of the boiled egg to the method of cracking it and cutting the toast.  Recently, I became aware of one additional requirement for the perfect egg on toast:
a one quart copper bottom Revere Ware pot.

Solid, heavy, and the ideal size for two boiled eggs, the copper bottom pot is the perfect container for this comfort-inducing meal.
I recently rescued one of these from a box bound for rummage as a friend helped clear the garage of an elderly woman preparing to rent her home.  Drawn to it  because it sparked a memory of my  mother having one just like it,  I tucked the pot into the back of my car.

This morning,  I reflected on its pleasing weight, shape, and the black handle with its comfortable grip and handy hook on the end for hanging.
Far from sexy, this pot is a practical wonder.
As I explored its features I turned it over to discover that it is a patented brand. Handsomely engraved on the bottom is the Revere Ware insignia in a beautiful font encircled like a monogram, stamped with the words - Copper Clad Stainless Steel in Riverside, Cal.
Who knew?  I fixed egg on toast this morning and delighted in the reclamation of this tiny pot to a useful purpose.

The lid to the pot is equally pleasing with a solid fit and sturdy round black nob for a handle. This little treasure is now one of my favorite kitchen tools.  It, like egg on toast, like butter drenched muffins and roast turkey, connect me to my family.   Perhaps not as richly steeped in tradition as the authentic masa in Christmas tamales, the story of my family is a combination of my mother's practicality and my father's flair for the dramatic both in and out of the kitchen.
As basic as a copper bottom pot, the stamp of quality stands the test of time.

The Quilt

There is no panel in the great AIDS quilt with your name on it.
Your life did not fit neatly into a 3-by-6 foot shape.
When you took your last breath on June 10th, 1994, I did not believe  then and do not believe now that you would have wanted your legacy forever stitched with the 48,000.
It would have been a forced, symbolic gesture incompatible with how you lived your life.
I could not bring myself to weave your story into the fabric of the AIDS pandemic.
Instead, I have pieced  your life together for my own comfort
working backwards from a diagnosis you were unable to name.
The massive memorial to victims of AIDS does not include you because I could not pretend that you saw yourself as one of them.
That would have been my own invention.
A sister seeking an imagined brother to fill her own needs.
Twenty-two years later, I do not regret the decision.
I believe I honored you by embracing the truth of your life.
To have done otherwise would have been to deny your denial.
 I do not  even visit the cemetery where you and our parents are buried.
You are not there.
You are alive to me each time I listen to the opera,
recall your laugh,
remember your grace,
or look at one of your six grandchildren.
That  is your legacy.
The Names Project is a beautiful and significant memorial.
But your name is not a part of it by choice.
Your name,  Bob,  is forever on the tip of my tongue
and in the ache of my heart.
I wrap myself in your memory, warmed by the history of our family
and the complexity of its pattern.

Purple Sage Workshops

                                                             PURPLE SAGE ARTS

A pastoral counseling service promoting healing through the integration of psychology, spirituality and the arts.

Focused on using journal writing, storytelling and other creative methods, Purple Sage Arts workshops create a safe and nurturing environment for those who are seeking to find meaning in their journey of grief, loss, or life transition.

                                                   WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS

The Art of Remembering: A Memoir and Guided Autobiography Workshop

Your life is your journey. Your journey is your story. Your story is your legacy.

It only takes one generation to forget.

Through a facilitated process of creative journaling exercises, participants discover their life stories in a supportive and nurturing environment.

This workshop may be customized for organizations, churches, or support groups.  All levels of writing experience accommodated.

Conscious Living – Conscious Dying

 A workshop on life, death, meaning, and stewardship.

“When you start using death as a means of focusing on life, then everything becomes just as it is, just this moment, an extraordinary opportunity to be really alive.”

Stephen Levine

Once we accept the truth that our breaths are numbered, we begin to live our lives differently. Through a variety of creative exercises this workshop allows participants to face their own mortality, fear and grief and to find the courage to live their lives with a sense of purpose and calling.

Topics include: Society’s view of death, understanding the grief journey, types of losses, disenfranchised and complicated grief, unfinished business, meaning making, planning for the eventuality of our own death, and living life with intention.

Common Journeys – Continuing Bonds

              

This workshop is designed for people who are walking the path of grief. Guided in a gently supportive environment, participants have the opportunity to remember their loved ones and to process their lives in light of their loss. We never get over our loss, we learn to live with it. Journal writing helps to facilitate this process.

Story Weaving – A Life Quilt Cancer Survivor Workshop

This workshop is designed to help people process the illness experience and the gifts that come from that particularly challenging and hope-filled journey.

The Power of Oral History Storytelling for Organizations

“The systematic collection of living people’s testimony about their experience.” Judith Moyer

Organizations such as the Order of Friars Servants of Mary, Rosary High School and The Sisters of St. Joseph of Orange have developed and recorded their oral histories.  The oral history storytelling process conducted by Amy Luskey-Barth was profiled in an article published in Momentum Magazine followed by a workshop presented at the NCEA Conference in Anaheim.  Oral History Storytelling is a powerful way to celebrate anniversaries and other organizational milestones.

ALL PURPLE SAGE ARTS WORKSHOPS CAN BE FORMATTED AND CUSTOMIZED TO MEET YOUR ORGANIZATION’S NEEDS AND SCHEDULE INCLUDING WEEKEND, ONE DAY, MULTI-WEEK, OR 5 DAY FORMAT.

For more information about sponsoring or registering for a Purple Sage Arts Workshop email: purplesagearts@gmail.com

The Message and the Messenger

I, like so many others, have been caught up in the excitement of Pope Francis' visit to the US. The media frenzy surrounding him has provided a rare opportunity for a moral compass and voice of conscience to take center stage where these values generally take a back seat to politics, rhetoric, and division. The Francis effect is more than religious zealotry. The mostly universal respect felt by the crowds of Catholics and non-Catholics for the Pontiff is rooted in the recognition that he is an authentic spiritual leader who is in touch with the people and the times. Pope Francis is the real thing. His message on the environment, immigration, and the poor call us all to consciousness. His example is as Christ-like as I have ever seen in my lifetime.  He is radical and revolutionary.  The complexity of modern society and the divide between the haves and have nots has cast many adrift without a lifeline.  Francis is making it cool to care. He is reminding us that we have a responsibility to each other and to the planet. He is calling us to be better human beings.
He is challenging us to take a moral gut check.
Forgiveness, Charity, Humility, Compassion, and the "Golden Rule" are points on his compass.  Francis is giving us the vocabulary once again to speak from a deeper place in a spiritual language that is grounded in the human experience.
While I yearn for women to have a greater role in the Church and am constantly frustrated by my own second-class status in a patriarchal system, I am also encouraged by the shift in tone on many other issues affecting the Church.  This is a refreshing change.
It feels so good to love this Pope. It was utterly thrilling to hear him speak of Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton while addressing the Congress. In Catholic circles, these names are familiar. To hear them being discussed on CNN was stunning. This week, mysticism and sainthood became newsworthy and relevant.
The conversation has changed. Words like dialogue and encounter are once again in our vocabulary thanks to Pope Francis.
His down to earth and direct style is reaching people in a way that makes the Papacy relatable. Perhaps we have Benedict to thank for this. By contrast, he seemed authoritarian, removed, and privileged. in his Prada slippers.  Pope Francis is the opposite.  His Jesuit training and spirituality inform his every action.
Earlier in the summer, I read the Pope's Encyclical, "On Care For Our Common Home."
I will admit, it is the first Encyclical I have ever read.  It is extremely readable and full of thought provoking ideas particularly on the impact of technology.
I highly recommend it.
We have in Pope Francis, a scholar and teacher whose wisdom and spirituality are a gift to us.
I am grateful to have lived to experience his message and I continue to process what this means to me in my own life.  Francis has awakened me from a dullness of heart and stirred my inner spiritual calling which has been dormant for some time.  He walks his talk.  I am reminded of the quote by St. Francis of Assisi, "Preach the Gospel, if necessary, use words." A mighty challenge for us all.

Hobie and Lido - In Memoriam

You came to us in 2007
Two furry, white bundles of joy.
Too tiny to make it up or down the stairs on your own
You won our hearts and became ambassadors of the neighborhood.
Greeters - flopping on your back on the sidewalk and curling up
on our laps  -
Snuggling and spooning in bed- you instantly became  part of our family.

You were from a litter of 13 pure white kitties
so tiny you sucked on each other's ears for comfort.
We adopted you together because you were
inseparable
until
Lido's shocking, violent death
by a speeding, careless driver two years ago.
Heart breaking and horrifying
there on the side of the road a loyal sentinel sat by the side of his brother.
 Hobie, left alone for the first time, mourned and adapted to his strange, solo life.

As you floated off today in my arms
I stroked you behind your ears
and thanked you
for bringing us so much happiness.
A far gentler death than your brother's
you passed peacefully, released from your misery.
Lido and Hobie together in "Kitty Heaven."

Savona will never be the same without you.

It is an empty house tonight.

Rest in Peace, Hobie.

Heartbreak

There are some dates that pierce the soul. August 17th is one of those for me. On August 17th, 1981 I had just gotten out of the shower.  I heard the front door open. I heard hushed voices. It was eight o'clock Monday morning.
There at the end of the hall were my brother and  Peggy.
Peggy lunged toward me. Arms open.
"Oh Amy, your father...."
With those words, everything changed forever.
I was twenty-two. He was sixty-four.

Today, thirty-four years later, the memory of that shocking day still has the power to pierce me. Every detail as vivid as if it were yesterday.

August 17th has hung over me today like a shroud.
I am not sure why I felt grief again so many years later except for the fact that so many people I know and love are facing terrible health challenges and loss. The specter of death is all around me.
Breast Cancer.
ALS.
Pancreatic Cancer.
Alzheimer's.

Terrible suffering.

My father's sudden death thirty-four years ago seems like a blessing.
No suffering. No hospital bed. No chemo. No radiation. No dementia.
Just a tanned, trim, sixty-four year-old body with clogged arteries that dropped dead after jogging to work that Monday morning.
 What a way to go.
On August 17th, 1981, my father's heart stopped.
And mine broke.

Perhaps my grief today was not really about my father.
August 17th simply reminded me of my friends and family whose hearts will break like mine did thirty-four years ago on a date that will pierce their soul.

My friend who tragically lost her fifteen-year-old son when he was struck in a crosswalk on his scooter on the way to gym said it best when she said,
"You never know what you're gonna get."

For all the cancer patients
For all the wheel-chair bound
For all those with memory loss
For all those confined to a bed
For all the hospice workers
For all the caregivers
For all who suffer
For all the broken hearted

I bind my heart to yours on August 17th.

The Art Lesson

The other night, the sunset was magnificent. With each passing moment, the color of the sky changed as I  stood transfixed watching an invisible artist's brush sweep across a vast canvas. The palette transformed from a bluish, shimmering gray with a bright shining sun sinking behind the silhouette of the rolling hills to a solid orange popsicle sky. Then, with swirling strokes, a  pattern of clouds appeared. The sunlight, reflecting the bottom edge of the clouds, highlighted them against a darkening backdrop.  As the painted sky continued to transform, patches of bright blue appeared looking like deep pools of clear water. The picture was disorienting at times. I was gazing heavenward but  I felt as if I was looking out across a landscape of mountains or prairie. The sky, the land, the water merged into one endless and dazzling masterpiece. Suddenly, I felt as if I understood the elements of design.  Color, light, contrast, line, pattern, composition, form were all visible and I imagined the earliest painters using nature as the ultimate art teacher, imitating the sun's varying degrees of intensity with the passing moments - painting the sky, the ocean, the mountains, the trees, the desert in awe of their beauty with each stroke.

 In order to create, one must pause long enough to look up and see.  It requires a patient stillness.  I was captivated, watching, waiting, studying  the sky in prayerful meditation. It enveloped me and I was in union with God and nature and mankind. I was connected through all of time before books were written or classes were taught on color or light or theory. I was part of the painting. In those moments of splendor, everything, everything had meaning. I touched eternity.