The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

I love holiday traditions.

Every Thanksgiving, I cook up a storm on Tuesday evening, Wednesday afternoon/evening, and Thanksgiving Day morning/early afternoon.

Rebecca always decorates and sets the table. She takes pride in making it look special.

Then we all enjoy the same exact dinner every year: appetizers of fresh veggies and dips, my cheese ball and crackers, roasted turkey, herbed stuffing, mashed potatoes, turkey gravy, baked whole sweet potatoes, lemon-pepper green beans, cranberry-orange relish, fresh hot rolls, pumpkin pie, rhubarb pie, cranberry spritzer, and big glasses of milk. For the past couple of years, a really good white wine also graces the table. (One of the many perks of having adult children!)

Mark and Sam take care of all the clean up.

Then, for the rest of the weekend, Mama don't cook no more. It's everyone help yourself to all the bounty in the fridge whenever hunger strikes. Just remember to seal the lids on all that tupperware, and put your dirty dishes in the sink. Someone will load the dishwasher later.

Then, on Saturday night, we choose a first-run movie to go see. This is a treat because all year we patiently wait for those great movies to hit the dollar theatres, or to be among the offerings at the Red Box rental kiosk.

This year, it was The Boy in the Striped Pajamas. Rebecca and I had both read the book last summer.

(We also both read Twilight, but there was no way we would even think to ask the men to sit through all that teen-aged hype and hysteria. Besides, we knew their comments would probably ruin our perfectly good fantasies of being bitten by Edward.)

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is a must-see. Be warned: it's not a "feel-good" movie. Rather, it so painfully displays the horror of a Nazi "work camp" through the eyes of innocent childhood.

Bruno, a fun and imaginative 8-year-old who reads adventure books and loves to go exploring, is the son of a recently-promoted soldier. "The Fury" comes to dinner at his house, and all of a sudden Bruno's dad is a big shot and the family must move to some place called "Out-With" where his dad will be called Herr Comandant.

Bruno is not happy, but tries to make the best of things. From his new bedroom window, out in the distance he sees what he thinks is a farm, and all the farmers get to wear their pajamas all day. The children, too. He sees lots of children, and wishes he could go over to play with them. He has no one to play with at this new house in Out-With, and he misses his friends back in Berlin.

One afternoon, Bruno sneaks through a garden gate that was mistakenly left open and goes exploring.

I won't spoil the rest of the story by giving any more details. Just know that it's the kind of movie which causes the audience to sit absolutely silent while the end credits roll.

Vegetarian Chili, With Meat

Last Sunday, I busied myself with the bittersweet task of preparing food for Sam's cross-country team dinner. Bittersweet, because I love doing this every Fall, but this was for the last time. He's graduating next May, and his competitive cross-country days are over.

Yeah, I'm a complete sap when it comes to my kids, and their first-time / last-time milestones.

You should have seen me on his first day of Kindergarten. And wasn't that "just" a few years ago? I remember it like it was the proverbial yesterday.

Anyway, my contribution to the team dinner was to make a big pot of chili, two pans of cornbread, and his favorite "made from scratch" chocolate brownies.

Inspired by my dear friends Maven and Angenina, I grabbed my digital camera to record my chili-making progress. Let's see if I can get photos to upload to my blog. This oughta be interesting!

VEGETARIAN CHILI

2 T olive oil

1 cup chopped onion

1 green bell pepper, coarsely chopped

1/2 cup dry red wine

1 can (14.5 oz) diced tomatoes

1 can each of black beans, red kidney beans, and white northern beans, drained and rinsed

Spice blend:

4 t chili powder

1 t each of garlic powder, ground cumin, oregano, and basil

2 t sugar

1/2 t salt

1/2 t freshly ground black pepper

WITH MEAT

1/2 lb. lean ground beef

(I double or triple this recipe for a large group)

1. Assemble everything, and blend the spices in a small bowl.

OK, now I'm laughing because I tried to upload multiple photos at once, the result of which you see here. They "appeared" in the wrong order, at the beginning of my post, and will not be moved to their intended location no matter what I try!!!

Oh, well, you get the idea.

Here's what the chili looks like completely finished and ready to serve:

OH NO!! My picture appeared at the beginning! Aarrrgggg.............

I give up.

So much for my big dream of creating a blog like Mave's and A's. The chili was good, though. Those kids ate every last bit.

Bambi's Revenge

It was the weirdest thing.

Mark and I were driving back yesterday from a long weekend, which included watching Sam's last cross-country race of his college career as well as visiting Mark's nearly-100-year-old Aunt Trudy.

The drive home was long. Really long. Hours and hours long.

There are spots on the map where it's quite remote. No cell phone service. The radio plays neither NPR nor good oldies stations, just garbled static. Except, of course, for the ones put on the air by the "Christian" religious right.

We're both too spiritual to listen to those.

So, what's to do while we're driving along looking at scenery until it's too dark to do even that?

Well, I like to play 20 questions, and Mark good-naturedly humors me.

I make him ask enough thoughtful questions to be able to come up with "wedding ring" (mineral) or "King Kong" (animal).

His ultimate answers to my almost-always-fewer-than-20 questions?

The grass in Yankee Stadium (vegetable).

Hemorroids (animal?).

Yeah.

Which brings me back to my first sentence in this blog. It was the weirdest thing.

It was my turn, and he was choking. My answer was "Bambi" and he could not get it. He was down to knowing it was an animated Disney forest animal, title character of a film.

He could not come up with Bambi! I was simultaneously laughing, gloating, and feeling sad for the childhood he surely must have missed.

He finally gave up and I had to tell him. He wouldn't admit it, but I know he felt sheepish. And of course I made it worse by betting him that both of our kids would get it immediately if I sent them a text message when we were next within range of a tower, giving them only the information that the answer was a Disney forest animal, title character of a film.

My phone buzzed back twice within 1 minute of sending that text. "Bambi" on the screen from both offspring.

Whew! I'm relieved they at least had a normal childhood!

Now, here's the weirdest thing:

Just a couple of hours later, going on midnight, when we were within three miles of home, a big-antlered buck jumped into the road out of nowhere, right in front of us. Mark swerved hard to miss it, but still struck it a glancing blow. I, of course, was screaming.

We stopped and got out. Our dog was shaking, but unhurt in the back seat. Mark and I were both fine, just shaken up as well. The buck got up and continued walking to the other side of the road, didn't appear to be limping. But it was dark and we really couldn't see. It disappeared into the brush.

Mark's quick reaction and hard swerve probably saved it's life, and maybe even our own.

Our 12-year-old car is probably totaled. Lots of front end damage, and the passenger-side door doesn't open right. So now we'll be on the getting-estimates trail, and then most likely watching the classifieds for another reliable vehicle.

But I'll bet he'll never forget about Bambi again.

A Perfect Autumn Weekend

I missed my weekly visit to Auntie Em's kitchen last Sunday.

Instead, I found myself in the northern part of the state, six hours from home. Mark and I drove those six hours on Friday afternoon, and arrived at the front door of our daughter Rebecca's sorority house around dinner time. It was so GREAT to see her, as I hadn't since the first week of August. Could not hug her tightly enough.

We had plans to take her to dinner, along with her boyfriend Scott, who we had yet to meet. His frat house is right across the street (how convenient) so it didn't take long for him to appear. It was nice to meet him, but the initial hand-shaking perhaps would have been less awkward if Mark had not called him Pat. Pat was last year. Oops!

To be fair, both young men are tall, dark, and relatively handsome. So it was an honest mistake.

The rest of the evening went well. Dinner at Sangria's was fabulous as always, and there were no lags in the conversation. Scott's already-OK approval rating climbed even higher when the topic somehow turned to books (I swear I didn't start it!) and he had interesting opinions on a couple I have read. Any man who can discuss books passes any test I may be secretly administering.

We dropped "the kids" off back at Greek Row around 10:00 (early for them, close to bedtime for us) and headed to our motel room for the night.

Early Saturday morning, we picked Rebecca up and drove 45 minutes to the location of her brother Sam's cross-country meet. He attends a different college, and the two hadn't seen each other since the last week of May. It just so happened that last weekend, his team travelled for a race near enough to her college that we could get to see both of them in the same weekend.

I know she was excited to get to see him, because 1) she was awake, dressed, willing and ready to go before 9 AM on a Saturday, and 2) it was her college's Homecoming and she was skipping the parade, tailgate party, football game, and other activities with her boyfriend to be with us.

That's no small thing for a college sophomore.

The race itself was exciting.

Sam's team finished second overall, although he himself did not finish in his usual spot in the front pack due to the deep-tissue injury he's been suffering all season. He went off to sit by himself after the race. After a few minutes, Rebecca walked over to sit with him. I have no idea what they said to each other, but as their mother, it gave me feelings I can't describe to see them, heads together, away from the crowd, brother and sister.

****And I've been trying to add a photo, but my computer isn't cooperating. So I'd better finish this quick and publish before losing it all. ****

After the race, we got in a caravan line behind the team bus with other parent vehicles and followed them to their lunch destination.

We all sort of took over the restaurant, pushing tables together to make room for everyone. Sam and Rebecca made sure they got to sit right beside each other, extrending the visit as long as possible.

When it was time for the team to get back on the bus, we said our goodbyes and drove Rebecca back to her college, then turned the car towards home.

Total time spent in the car to watch a 25 minute cross-country race?

Nearly 14 hours.

Money spent on gasoline, motel, food?

Don't ask. But what's a week's pay, anyway?

Memories?

More than priceless.