Year: 2013

Stumbling. But Learning.

Our roof is in terrible shape. We knew this and got credit for it at closing. And it was at the top of our list of things to do after we moved in. But then we discovered the truth about the trees, the 60-year-old boiler, the lining for the chimney, the leak from the third floor bathroom and the roof got pushed back a bit (along with all the cosmetic changes we wanted to make).

I’ll be blunt: buying this home has been a humbling experience. This experience has made me realize I know absolutely nothing. I haven’t felt this overwhelmed by insecurity and uncertainty since Em was born. I’m a novice, a bit of a fool. I had no idea what came with buying an older home. People warned us, sure. But you can only know so much.

And that’s the thing. I can’t help but compare this experience to becoming a mother for the first time. People warned me while I was pregnant. They offered me (often times, unsolicited) advice and I would let it register, acknowledge it. But I never fully grasped what it meant to be a parent until the doctor handed me the baby. You can spend hours explaining what it’s like; you can warn a person about how hard it’ll be, how much sleep they’ll lose and how they’ll never be an independent human being ever again—not in the true sense of the word, responsible solely for oneself. You can say all these things, and the other person probably understands the words, but to fully grasp it? I think that’s impossible until you’ve actually done it.

We were warned by many about how hard it would be owning an older home. (We were also told how rewarding it would be!) But we didn’t fully get it until we got it.  And now that we’re getting it, holy got, it’s had. (Wait, what?)

And it’s clear to me now that our greenness benefitted the sellers. They needed a novice homebuyer to snatch this one up. They withheld a great deal of information on the disclosure agreement and lied about a few things as well, things that seasoned home owners may have known to look for. The good news is, and what I need to remember, is that the home appraised for a great deal more than we got it for.

I’ve been biting my tongue when it comes to writing about the sellers. It doesn’t seem fair to slam a family I don’t actually know. And slam them I would! I have a great deal of animosity built up toward them. And given what we’ve been told by our neighbors and contractors who have worked with them in the past, it’s solidified; there’s no going back.

But I’m also trying to keep things in perspective. I’m hormonal, after all, and full of an intensity I don’t normally possess. I tend to go from 0 to 60 with no warning whatsoever. Suddenly every injustice and every problem in the world, even those that have nothing to do with me, become a whole hell of a lot more intense. These problems need to be dealt with NOW and HARSHLY if need be.

I was this way with my other pregnancies as well. When someone leaves their cart in the middle of the parking lot because they’re too lazy to return it to its proper vestibule, the one with the GIANT sign that reads: “PLEASE RETURN CARTS HERE”, I let them know. Non-pregnant Michele would probably let’s it slide, maybe bitch about it to Toby Joe. But Pregnant Michele becomes self righteous and wants people to realize how lazy they’re being and how NOT following the rules WILL RUIN THE WORLD.

“WHAT IF EVERYONE DID THAT? THE SOCIAL CONTRACT IS IN PLACE FOR A REASON, YOU LAZY ASSHOLE!”

Most of the time, the other person simply stares at me, like I’m an escaped zoo animal. They know better than to provoke the crazed hyena. I have no idea what I would do if someone actually responded. I’d probably throw up or something. Because when I’m reacting this way? I’m not myself. I’m Pregnant Michele and she’s kind of mean and a lot grumpy.

So, when it comes to the previous owners of this house, I don’t know if non-pregnant Michele would care as much. But Pregnant Michele hates them. Pregnant Michele wants them to know exactly what they’ve done wrong.

During the home inspection, and before we knew anything about the family who lived here before, Toby Joe described it as “a house whose inhabitants suffered from severe and chronic depression.” And I think that sums it up perfectly (and politely). This house was perpetually sighing, shrugging its shoulders in hopes of a little warmth and a huge hug.

So, here we are, 6 weeks in. And we have given it many hugs. We replaced the 60-year-old boiler and the lining that aerates it, literally warming it up. We replaced the damper on the chimney. We got rid of the rust along the bottom of the bathtub, the one that was leaking directly into the boys’ room below it, because instead of FIXING the bloody thing like any functioning member of society might do, the sellers simply let the water sit in the tub (and therefore ceiling) rusting the pipes and an otherwise beautiful claw-foot tub. They simply wrote it off—a family of five simply chose NOT to use that bathroom.

We cut down the trees that were threatening the foundation and creating mold and moss all over the roof and exterior walls. We removed the overgrown poison oak and poison ivy from the backyard. We had the gutters cleaned and the pipes leading to the street cleared of a decade worth of debris. We had the claw-foot sanded and refinished and I hope to have the ceiling fixed and patched over the next couple of weeks.

I’m disappointed we haven’t yet been able to update anything cosmetically. But what good would it do updating a kitchen with new appliances, countertops and cabinetry if the radiators alongside them spits out hot, brown liquid rotting them because the boiler is over 60 years old? And what good would it do updating the attic bedroom and bath if the roof is going to leak directly into it? Why fix the garage if it’s rotting due to the sticks, stones, and dirt they tossed along the backside thereby rotting its wood?

A pretty exterior with a rotting interior will only be pretty for so long.

I’m learning. It’s slow. I am new. I feel a bit overwhelmed and a lot freaked out on some days. Like today, I just want to cry. And drink. And I can’t drink so I usually just eat dark chocolate and cry.

But, just like when I became a mother, I am learning. I’m stumbling a lot, but I’m learning nonetheless. And I think on the other side of this experience, I’ll have a wonderful little home to house and hug my family.

At least that’s my hope.

Introducing Our Horrible Half Bath

We have a very tiny, half bath on the first floor of our new home that I find disturbing in many ways. This could have to do with the fact that I have had issues with plumbing and bathrooms all my life. And I’m not sure why that is. I was joking with Toby Joe recently that I should be hypnotized to try and get to the bottom of my bathroom phobias. Most bathrooms skeeve me out. I know, that’s not saying much. I mean, bathrooms are bathrooms, right? Who likes hanging out in a bathroom? I do! If the bathroom is nice enough. And I have seen some really nice bathrooms over the years. Anything less and you might as well have an outhouse, in my opinion. An outhouse serves one purpose: collecting human waste. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with such a thing. It doesn’t pretend to be anything more than what it is. Plus, it’s often outside!

This bathroom, to me, is worse than an outhouse because it’s pretending to be a modern bathroom and other than being attached to indoor plumbing, it’s so not a nice, modern bathroom. I am so grossed out by it. Granted, this could have something to do with what happened right after we moved in. Elliot (he’s two and a half) told me he didn’t like the bathroom because “it’s dirtee, mommy.”

“What do you mean, baby?” I asked.

“Com ‘ere.” He said, leading me into the bathroom. He lifted the toilet seat and pointed to a row of rust along the bottom rim of the toilet seat.

“Oh, honey!” I said. “That’s nothing! It’s just some rust. See?” I took a washcloth and began wiping it off, thinking it wouldn’t budge. But no! It smeared. It smeared just like dried shit smears. And I gagged. The “rust” wasn’t rust at all. The rust was a build up feces or something horrific that came out of someone else’s asshole, most likely a chorus of foreign assholes.

At that point I realized I had two choices: I could leave and never come back; or, I could scrub the fecal matter off of the bottom of the toilet seat. And since we’d just purchased the home, and moving out wasn’t really an option, I scrubbed the fecal matter from the bottom of the toilet seat. And the toilet turned white again! (At least I think it turned white. I couldn’t really see through all the tears.)

On top of that grossness, whomever built the bathroom made a lot of really stupid decisions. Although, I’m not sure any decisions were actually made because I’m not sure anyone asked any questions or entertained any choices. It’s more like they found some plaster, inherited a few bathroom fixtures, got really drunk (or high) during a power outage and threw something together.

Check out how they mounted the sink to the wall. (If you look really closely, you can see old floral wallpaper below it all.)

The bathroom sink didn’t fit, so they jammed it in, cutting into the door-jam.

The toilet is on an angle because the floor is as well. You can’t really tell in this shot, but the toilet leans away from the window and toward the door. When you sit on it, you’re at an angle.

The plaster walls are wavy from top to bottom so someone slapped on some wallpaper in hopes of concealing their mistakes. You will see from the picture below that I tried to rip it down before realizing there may be lead paint involved (I’m pregnant), and we gave up and just decided to gut it all.

But the biggest problem I have with the bathroom is the fact that no matter how often I clean it, it never actually looks clean. And that drives me nuts. I clean it constantly and it still looks filthy.

So, last week, I met with a contractor who is going to help us make our half bathroom look awesome, or so I hope!

In the meantime, I’ve been taking my home renovation questions to Facebook. You see, I went to college with a bunch of creative people, some of whom happen to be architects and designers. They’re also incredibly helpful and even entertain stupid questions like this one:

(Incidentally, the responses I received to that particular question were helpful, insightful and hilarious.)

But why keep it all on Facebook when I also have a blog?

Just yesterday, I was thinking about this site and all the different topics I’ve written about over the years—all 12 of them (holy shit). I wrote about falling in love with New York City. I wrote about falling in love with a boy. I wrote about marrying him. I wrote moving from one city to another city to another city then back to the first city. I wrote about getting pregnant. I wrote about having that baby and how hard it was for me to transition from “independent human” to “mother”. I wrote about my miscarriage. I wrote about culinary school. I wrote about the birth of my second son. I wrote and wrote and wrote.

So, why not write about this too? Why not admit I have no idea what I’m doing, but I have the determination to stick with it and the humility to admit I need to pay experts to do most of it? Truth be told, I’m equally as afraid of home ownership as I was with becoming a mother. So, I do hope my insecurities and worries might help someone else in the future. And I do hope you’ll feel comfortable making fun of me and/or giving me suggestions. Because I need all the help I can get.

Introducing: The Heisenberg

Perhaps the only good thing that came out of being sick for 15 weeks was the birth of my new lollipop. You see, while ill and lying in bed at my mom’s house, I watched all 5.5 seasons of Breaking Bad Netflix had to offer. (I’m still not caught up, so shhhhhh.) And behold: The Heisenberg was born.

It’s naturally blueberry flavored. And it’s awesome.

Also! My holiday lollipops are available again! The First Snow, Red Wine, Eggnog Latte and Trick Or Treat are all available. Stop by!

Were You Depressed During Pregnancy?

I’ve been hesitant to write about this because writing about it seems unfair, ungrateful and careless. It’s unfair to my unborn son and to all those who are pregnant or trying to get pregnant. It’s careless because certain thoughts don’t belong online. I know this. I am so aware of this. But I’m going against my better judgment here. And I’m going to write.

For the first several weeks of this pregnancy, I spent hours (and I mean hours!) googling phrases like: “depressed during pregnancy”, “morning sickness and depression”, “pregnant all I want to do sleep all day and night”, and “pregnant can’t take care of my kids”. I found a few personal (and therefore reassuring) stories. But not all that many. I found a great deal of articles about postpartum depression, but not all that many about depression during pregnancy. That’s probably because most women don’t discuss it online (or elsewhere) because it’s not kosher to complain about something that’s supposed to be one of the most joyous times of a woman’s life.

I want to chock it up to hormones, because it just doesn’t make sense otherwise. And this next bit is going to come off sounding crass and ignorant to all those dealing with chemical depression. I understand what chemical depression is, but very rarely have I experienced it firsthand. Most of the time, whenever I’m feeling depressed, I can shake it off. There have only been a couple of times in my life where things have become unmanageable—something I couldn’t work through, shake off, or wait out. And each time I knew this to be the case because whenever I searched for joy, I came up empty. I can almost always find joy.

I assume my funk has a great deal to do with being sick all day long, every day, for weeks on end. I assume that it was made worse because I was taking Unisom for nausea, and Unisom is known to cause depression. I assume it’s also because this pregnancy was unplanned and that I’m terrified of having three kids. (What does one do with three of kids when two kids run them into the ground every day?) I’m going to be 40 in a few months. I will spend my 40th birthday fat, sick, bloated and cranky.

I was supposed to run a marathon this year—my first one! And I can’t even run a mile right now. I had to give up my spot. And every Saturday, whenever I glance at the family calendar in the kitchen, the one where I planned my mileage all the way up until November, I feel sad. And I know that’s entirely selfish, but it eats me up. I should be training for a marathon, not becoming fat and immobile. I see runners out on their long-distance, weekend runs and I feel nothing but jealousy and envy toward them. (Much like the jealousy I had toward pregnant bellies not three years ago.) I am sincerely jealous of joggers! What the hell is wrong with me? Who have I become? I’m not proud of this person. I am not even sure I like her.

Guys, I’m sad. And I’m not supposed to be and that’s making me even sadder. And I’m having a great deal of trouble digging for joy. I keep trying! Every day, I get up and I try. And I see glimpses of it here and there. I experience glimpses of joy lighting candles at dusk, or buying flowers at Trader Joe’s. I see it occasionally while reading to my kids, when I’m not winded from getting the words out. I feel a bit of joy knowing Homeland starts again tonight.

But I don’t bake anymore, and I love baking. I keep buying the ingredients to bake amazing things, things I once LOVED to share with people. But now I don’t see the point because eating makes me feel terribly sick. I have a nonstop case of metal mouth, which is exasperated by even the tiniest amount of food in my stomach, sugar and carbs being the worst of all. Eating is a chore I have to do to stay alive. Who wants to bake and eat a slice of pumpkin pie if that slice of pie is going to make them sick? What’s the point?

I keep reading that some women start to feel better at 20 weeks. And I’m hoping that since week 14 didn’t bring me much in the way of relief, week 20 will. And maybe by then I’ll start to see joy again. Maybe I’m just exhausted and sick of being sick. I don’t know. But I want to feel normal, not that I’m sure what normal is anymore. It’s been that long.

After I miscarried and went through months and months of fertility treatments, I spent a great deal of time searching for stories like my own. But I did so silently. And I have regretted that ever since. Because I think if I wrote about it many of you could have made me feel better. At the very least, I think you would have made me feel less alone.

So, I’m going to publish my thoughts today, even though I am truly aware of how selfish and careless it is to do so. I need to know that this is temporary and that one day I will be myself again. I used to have so much energy! I spent a great deal of my time creating things. Now? I get tired thinking about it. I am so lazy. I don’t see the point to doing most things I once enjoyed. And that’s so unlike me.

“I’m blue, like Pantone 292.”

I just want to feel normal again.

This Old House

I’m giving myself 20 minutes to update because I only have 20 minutes before another contractor/handyman/plumber shows up to tell us how much money we will have to give him or her in order to fix something. Don’t get me wrong; we knew what we were getting ourselves into when we bought this house. And the house was appraised for a great deal more than what we paid, but still. Throwing tens of thousands of dollars into something, and not yet seeing too much change, well, it’s a bit difficult to stomach. (Actually, it wouldn’t be too hard to stomach if I could drink copious amounts of booze. Booze would make this whole experience a hell of a lot easier.)

Today it occurred to me while on another mad dash to Home Depot in hopes of thwarting another minor emergency, that this home is like an old Volvo. And I have owned a few old Volvos in my time.

Take my 1980, red Volvo station wagon. It had a mind of its own. The wipers worked perfectly fine except for when it rained. And the AC worked in the wintertime, but had issues during the summer. It overheated constantly, so we were often forced to drive it with the windows down, heat on, and in the dead of summer. It leaked from the sunroof. The radio worked sometimes, I started to believe only during full moons. My Volvos were a pain in the ass. But I loved them. I loved their curmudgeon-like personalities. I was proud of them. Anyone else would have junked them.

Anyway, we bought the house version of a Volvo. It’s equally as unpredictable and weird, as if it’s alive and making decisions based on how we react, or whatever it is we’re doing. And sometimes I think, “Oh my goodness? What have we gotten ourselves into?” And I spend a few hours having buyer’s remorse, wondering if we should have bought one of those newer homes. You know, the homes that lack personality, but have right angles, floors that are level to their neighboring walls, and toilets that don’t need to be gently pet and talked to while flushing. Maybe we should have purchased  one of those new homes, the kind that doesn’t spew a diarrhea-like liquid from its radiators at 5 AM to a soundtrack that sounds an awful lot like an industrial rock band.

Newer homes don’t even have radiators.

But we bought this home. And much like every Volvo I’ve ever owned, I will grow to love it. I will grow to understand that you simply don’t drive the damned thing when it rains. And if you do manage to get the sunroof closed, you DO NOT open it again ever and you beat the shit out of the passenger who did open it while you were in the store buying beer. And you make damn well sure to bleed the radiators, and then explain to your six-year-old that, contrary to how it sounds, no, it doesn’t actually hurt them. You talk to the toilet, the 100+ year old pipes, the boiler in the basement. You tell the trees, “Sorry, beautiful assholes, but your roots are house cancer and your shade is a petri dish for mold.”

You do these things.

You do these things because you have to. And you bond with your old Volvo or your old house because if you do you’ll have stories to tell about its charming personality set to a soundtrack of laughter, industrial music and creaky floorboards.

News.

First off, I’d like to apologize for using my blog to announce this. Many of you deserve an email or a phone call. But my head hasn’t been in the best place for the last few months. So, please forgive me for doing it the easy way.

Ready?

We are expecting our third baby in March. I know! I was surprised as well. Believe me. This pregnancy wasn’t planned. We were totally done having kids. And given my history with infertility and loss, I didn’t think this was even possible, especially at 39. But. Here we are…

Truth be told, I’ve been worried about telling anyone about this pregnancy. You see, I’ve been unbelievably sick this time around. And the nausea and persistent vomiting has left me horribly depressed. And since I had to stop running, my depression worsened. Running cheers me up. And I can’t do it. I tried for the first two months, but it became too difficult. So, I stopped.

I’ve been feeling very confused about this pregnancy. Being this sick all the time has made me miserable. And because I’ve been so sick, it’s been difficult for me to experience joy, which is insane and makes me very angry with myself. How can I be anything less than ecstatic given everything I went through in the past? Anyway, I’m hoping that some of this is hormonal and will soon pass. Either way, Michele from 2009 would feel a great deal of anger toward this Michele. (And this Michele probably deserves that.)

Given how sick I’ve been, and the fact that Toby works a lot, I haven’t been able to take very good care of our kids. And things were getting worse instead of better. So, about six weeks ago, we decided that I should take the boys and stay with my parents for a while—just until this unrelenting nausea lets up. Thankfully, I have a wonderful family who has been simply amazing. Not sure where we’d be without them.

So, we’re having a baby! And I found out just last week via CVS it’s a little boy. And the last several days I have experienced some much needed calmer waters. The nausea let up a bit. For the first time in 12 weeks, I have felt closer to normal. The excess saliva, the incessant nausea and the metallic taste in my mouth let up a bit and I saw joy again. I saw myself again. And then it finally occurred to me: HOLY SHIT! WE ARE HAVING A BABY!

I’m not dying. I’m not diseased. I an not fat and useless. (Well, I feel that way. All that weight I lost? It’s back. But, I’ll lose it again. I have to.) I will run again. I am NOT going to feel this way forever. Thank goodness.

Things have been better the last couple of days.

On top of welcoming a new human creature into our lives, we’re also leaving Brooklyn. After 14 years (minus the two spent in DC and San Francisco) we are leaving. We need a larger home. We simply can’t afford to stay in Brooklyn. We’ve outgrown our 900 square foot apartment. And Em is six. Moving will become increasingly more difficult for him as he gets older. (I know this firsthand.) But as sad as it makes me to leave Brooklyn, it’s time.

We close on our new (and first!) home in Maplewood, New Jersey next week.

We will have a yard. And FOUR bedrooms.

Lastly, I need to thank many of you. A few weeks ago, I hit an all-time low. I was coming off a two-day bender throwing up and spitting into a bucket full of tissues. I was exhausted and I felt like a failure as a mother. It was bad—really, really bad. I was alone at the time and I took it to Twitter. And so many of you reached out to me that day. And it helped. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you for reaching out to me.

(Thank you: Heather H., Sarah B., Dianne, Lessa, Sara S., Neil, Isabel, Sarah, Amanda, Nicole, Anne, Natalie… and I’m sure I’m forgetting someone here. But thank you too.)

So, Internet. We are having a baby! Our third baby boy. And I’m terrified. Excited! But also terrified. Three kids? I’m not even sure I knew what I was doing with two. :] Anyway, I hope the second trimester will prove better for me, because the first one? It was a doozy.

Feel free to ask me questions. Feel free to tell me this will get easier, this nausea. Or tell me it won’t. And for those of you with three kids, lay it on me. What do I need to know going from two to three? How do I keep the middle child from becoming crazy?

(Lastly, for those of you reading this who are suffering from infertility and loss, I think about you every day. I know this doesn’t help. And I understand how difficult it is, but I want you to know how much I care and understand. And… well, words fail me. But I think about you and you’re not alone even when you feel that way.)

Digging For Clay

The first time I saw him he was being wheeled out on a stretcher and lifted into a van by two medical examiners. Eric was there as well—tall, well-dressed Eric. Eric is my favorite doorman. The sky was a dull gray, absent of any real emotion, leaving that to us. It was raining. But not enough to make you care, not enough to mean anything. Eric had just opened the back door of the apartment building as I rounded the corner. He made a hand gesture, pursed his lips and shook his head.

No. Not yet. Wait there. You don’t want to see this.

I froze. I couldn’t breath. A wave of dread and nausea washed over me as I fought back vomiting. I knew what I was about to see.

Earlier that day, while chaperoning a field-trip with my older son, the sitter watching my 2-year-old sent me flurry of texts. The texts included words like “FBI”, and “murder”. There were the words “medical examiner” and “crime scene investigators”. She wrote about a distraught man sitting outside, weeping. She wrote that something terrible had happened.

I read all these things while standing on the banks of the Long Island Sound, digging for clay.

He’d been dead for days.

They shut the doors to the van, thanked Eric for his help and drove away. Eric and I stood alone in the rain, watching the van become smaller and smaller. And then he was gone. Just like that. The dead man was gone.

“I spoke to him almost every morning. He was a nice guy…” Eric looked down at the ground, kicked a pebble and shook his head again.

I gave him a hug.

That whole tiny moment—the bleak sky, its hesitant rain; the look on Eric’s face; the hand gesture he’d given me; the van and the man’s corpse—would continue to haunt me for the remainder of the day and well into the next. When I shut my eyes, it was there. When I went to bed, it was there. When I took a shower, it was there. It was a picture—an image—filled with everything and nothing. I simply couldn’t shake it. I couldn’t unsee it. And I wanted to.

Is this what painters do? They have an image that they can’t unsee, so they create it in hopes that it will stop haunting them? The day had dropped this moment into my life and my memory kept repainting it, looking for something new, something different, something less final and horribly sad.

But I am no painter.

I kept looking for color.

I have no memory of there being any color.

If only the sun had been shining.

What I’m about to admit isn’t something I am proud of. And it’s probably not something most people would choose to admit in writing. Perhaps, if you were reading this in a book, you might forgive a character for doing what I did. Because we forgive fictional characters. Fictional characters can do irresponsible things. They can make poor, cringeworthy decisions and we forgive them for it. Even when fictional characters are based on real people, and actual events, we forgive them. It’s comforting to be able to say, “Yeah, but it’s not real. She didn’t really do that because that would just be crazy.”

But I am not fictional. I am me. And so.

I’m going to try something different. I’m going to write this next part in the third person. I’m going to refer to myself in the third person in hopes that maybe you won’t judge me as harshly for everything I’m about to tell you.

Also: every time I try and finish this post in the first person, I cringe and give up.

Ready?

After seeing his body, she became obsessed. She decided she needed to know as much as possible about the dead man. She couldn’t let her last and only bit of knowledge about the dead stranger be that of a receding medical examiner’s van on the grayest of all days beneath a rainfall that didn’t matter.

Who was he? How had he died? How old was he? Was he lonely? Did he love someone? Did they love him? Where was his family? Did he have one? Do they know? Did he kill himself? Was he murdered?

Was he lonely?

She needed to know more. She dug around on Twitter, searched the “nearby” option. She keyed in and searched their shared address. Twitter made her amateur sleuthing way too easy. Before long, she’d found an article written by The New York Post about a “mysterious death” in a “high rise” (not true) “luxury apartment building” (debatable). They stated that he had been found bloodied, with cuts to his face. They reported that his apartment had been trashed, but there had been no sign of forced entry.

“Was this all true?” She wondered. “Had a murderer been in their apartment building?” (Spoiler alert: No.)

But the most useful (and incidentally the only factual) bit of information The Post gave her was the dead man’s age and name.

She had his name.

She came up with scenarios: He was a jock and got too aggressive while drinking with a girlfriend. She had scratched his face and hit him and he later died from an accidental drug overdose; He was a gay man who died at the hands of an angry lover; He committed suicide because, at 46, he was still single and alone; He had gotten into a fight earlier that night, stumbled home drunk, and not knowing the extent of his head injuries, never woke up; He died of a heart attack due to excessive drug use.

(This is what happens when a person relies on The New York Post for information.)

Truth be told, she wasn’t sure why she’d become so invested in knowing more about the dead man. Perhaps it’s because she had seen a very intimate detail of this man’s life—his death. This was something most people wouldn’t and probably shouldn’t see. But she couldn’t let him go, not yet and not in that manner.

The first encounter with the man simply couldn’t be one of his very last.

She had been to many funerals over the years. She had lost friends and family. She knew what it was like to lose someone unexpectedly and tragically. But funerals were staged events. She had time to prepare for them. The funerals she’d been to were designed as a way to say goodbye to people she had known. She shared memories with them, memories of them being alive. She’d seen them smile.

But she hadn’t prepared for this. She didn’t have any memories of this man. The only memory she had of this man was that of his death. She felt a certain amount of intimacy for the man.

The strange thing about being alive today, during the age of social media, Facebook and an exhaustive amount of connectivity, is the ease of which we can dig around and find out way too much information about a person. Because before long, she knew the name of his mother, his stepmother, father, brother, sister, and many of his aunts and uncles. She even knew the name of his pastor. She knew where he’d gone to college. She knew what his favorite sports teams were. She flipped through the snapshots he’d taken while vacationing in Italy back in 2009. She got glimpses of his life through the eyes of countless friends and family who loved him deeply. Their mourning poured out onto Facebook for anyone to bear witness to. Even her. Their tributes and memories of the man left her weeping.

He was loved, so very loved. And he wasn’t alone.

What she came to know about the dead man was that he came from a huge, loving family. He came from a family who believes wholeheartedly that he is in the hands of God now. She learned that he loved living in New York City even though his family and friends lived far away. She now knows about his amazing smile and how it lit up a room. She learned that he looked sharp in a suit and was very successful at his job. She learned that he was unbelievably kind, a quality apparent in the wrinkles that framed his eyes.

She learned that he would be missed by so many people, so very many people.

Even her. Even though she’d never seen him alive. Even though she never would.

She is no longer haunted by the image of the dead man and the van and the lack of color on the grayest of all days. She has set the image free.

Mom It Down! Homemade Peppercorn Dressing

Forgive me for the long-winded lead-in, feel free to skip this and head straight for the recipe.

Cooking has always mystified me. I understand baking. I started baking when I was a kid. Nothing about baking makes me nervous, even making mistakes. But cooking? It’s just hard. I don’t know how people do it well (or at all up until recently). I remember trying to cook dinner right after Em was born. I was like the Swedish Chef. By the time Toby got home, I was stressed out, filthy and the dish wasn’t even all that great. So, I stopped trying.

Then I went to pastry school and things changed. I began to feel a great deal more confident and comfortable simply being in a kitchen. My knife skills improved. I understood flavor profiles a bit more. And then things really solidified while working for Mast Brothers. Every day someone had to make lunch for the entire staff. I was TERRIFIED when I learned this. I literally got the shakes whenever they nominated me for the first time. And while my meal didn’t end up being all that great, I did it. I did it and I felt pretty damn proud of myself for overcoming a huge fear and actually producing something edible. From that point on, I volunteered to help out as much as possible.

About six months ago, I started cooking a lot. Every day, first thing, I would plan a meal for that evening. I would hit the market, bringing Elliot along with me (Em was in school), and we’d shop together. I would then spend the rest of the day, here and there, prepping. And I’ve been having a blast. And since I like to try and use fresh, whole foods, I’ve been attempting to make the sauces and dressings from scratch as well.

I tend to be very conservative when it comes to baking. I don’t like to waste anything. When I make a swiss meringue buttercream, I’ll make a shortbread cookie dough (that freezes well) using the egg yolks. I don’t like waste. I think Americans waste far too much food.

Similarly, I like to know what goes into making the foods we consume. How much work is involved? What type of waste is produced by commercial foods? Is it possible for me to make almond milk from scratch AND use the almond pulp left behind?

These are two, HUGE sticking points for me: what goes into the things we consume; and what does one do with what’s leftover.

So, this philosophy (for lack of a better word) has led me to occasionally deconstruct the things I love to eat—such as peppercorn dressing. How hard could it actually be? Would it taste as good?

Yes!

What you will need

  • Blender

Ingredients

  • 1/2 cup reduced fat sour cream
  • 1/3 cup olive oil
  • 1/3 – 1/2 cup parmesan cheese
  • at least 1 tablespoon of peppercorns
  • 2 teaspoons vinegar
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt (or to taste)
  • 2 tablespoons milk
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • 2 cloves of garlic

Mom It Down!

Add everything to your blender.

Mix it up. You’re done! I KNOW!

Mom It Down! Homemade Almond Milk

I drink a lot of smoothies and I usually add a 1/2 cup of “milk” to each one. I use either soy or almond milk, but I much prefer the benefits of almond milk, especially for my post long runs.

As with most things I regularly consume, I started to wonder what went into making almond milk. More importantly, could I make it myself. Is the process horribly wasteful? How hard could it be to make almond milk from scratch? It is so not hard. In fact, it’s so easy, I’m kind of surprised it took me as long as it did.

What you will need

Ingredients

  • 1 cup almonds
  • 1 cup water (for soaking)
  • 2-3 dates (optional!)
  • 2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract (optional!)
  • 3 cups water

Mom It Down!

Pour a cup of almonds into a bowl. Add one cup of water and set it aside for at least 6 hours, or overnight.

After the almond soak, strain the excess water and add the almonds to a blender. Add your dates (if using).

Add the vanilla extract (if using).

Add 3 cups of water. And turn that puppy on. I use a combination of the “purée” function and the “liquify” function.

Strain your mixture. I do at least three strains. For the first one I use a pasta strainer, as the finer one takes a bit longer to drain. Below, is the pasta strainer. You will notice its holes are a lot larger than the the finer ones you’ll see later.

After I pass it through the pasta strainer once, I change to a finer one. I use a flour sifter to do this. You can use something similar, or, if you have one, use a cheesecloth. I do this step at least twice. Feel free to use your hand to gently push the moisture through. You want to get as much milk out of the pulp as possible.

You’re done!

It will last for 3 or 4 days in the refrigerator. Although I wouldn’t recommend it, I have used mine after that.

Lastly, I loathe wasting food. I have a tendency to make whatever I can with leftovers. If I make a swiss merengue icing, I use the yolks to make shortbread cookies. If I make a key-lime pie, I will use my egg whites to make an angel food cake. All that to say, I save my pulp. I have made gluten-free, chocolate chip almond cookies using the pulp, which I will share with you at a later date. You can also use it for breads, rolls, and possibly even crust, although I haven’t tried that just yet. I will in time!

Overcoming Obstacles

This is so super easy, there really aren’t any. I think the only thing I can say is that if you don’t have a blender you can try using a food processor, although, I always have way too much leakage whenever I do. So, be aware of the food processor.

Variations

Flavor this as you wish. When I first started making it, I only added vanilla extract. I started adding dates whenever I realized I had a ton of dates on-hand and didn’t want to waste them. Since then, I’ve been adding dates to my milk. They so aren’t necessary. If you like sweater milk, add some sugar! I reckon a bit of maple syrup might taste good as well. Sky’s the limit, folks! Flavor it up.