Simple pleasures for unpleasurable times

If you’ve been here a while, you know I’m not much of a cook. But I have my little specialties. Simple things. One is a stir-fry I concocted about a year ago.

You begin with coconut oil if you have it; olive oil and butter if you don’t. Then in go chicken and veggies. The sauce is a few generous shakes of rice vinegar flavored with oregano and basil and a few slightly less generous shakes of Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce (accept no substitutes).

The final step is a judicious grinding of Trader Joe’s Everyday Seasoning.

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Now, Trader Joe’s is an amazing place and if I lived near one, I’d be in grocery-hog heaven. Gourmet and organic foods, but for awesome prices. A tolerable wine (their famous Two Buck Chuck) for under $3. I even know an 18-year-old boy who shops at Trader Joe’s for fun. Alas I do not live within reality of a Trader Joe’s.

But a couple years back, a friend included in a food package a self-grinder bottle of TJ’s Everyday Seasoning. I’d never tried it before.

If you read online reviews of this stuff, you’d think it was the most versatile food since lettuce. People claim they put it on their pizzas, their fried eggs, in their soups and sauces, on steaks, on chicken, on fish, on top of casseroles, in salads, for all I know in smoothies. There are hordes of TJ Everyday Seasoning fans. Or addicts. How can one spice rule them all?

But you know, it does. It took me a while to try it, but then I found myself grinding it into all things edible. Lentil soup. Hash brown potatoes. Scrambled eggs. Steamed veggies, veggies & cheese, potatoes and sour cream. And this stir-fry.

The completed dish doesn’t taste like it belongs in any particular ethnic group. It’s just pungent. I like pungent. And tasty. The TJ’s seasoning has a lot of vivid tastes in it, primarily black pepper, but a few more exotic bits, as well. A very definite taste. A very definite spiciness. But never, ever too much.

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Today, finishing the stir-frying, I used up the last of that first container. No problem! My friend (who’s been amazing over the years) had already sent two more when I mentioned how much I liked it.

My mouth was watering for this finish step … but when I opened the new grinder, the whole top came off, spilling 100 or more whole peppercorns and whole whatever-elses into the skillet.

I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to eat most of those things whole.

Oh no. Do I have to throw it out? I’ll never be able to dig all those seeds and pods and what-nots out of it.

Then I looked down and they were just so pretty, those big round, oblong, multi-colored ornaments among the broccoli, cauliflower, and browned chicken. Just gorgeous. And the sauce was so fragrant. How could that possibly not be good to eat?

So I ate the whole thing. It was terrific. Not everybody would favor that vinegar-and-worcestershire taste. But it suited me to a T. I just had to be a little careful.

And I ate the whole thing outside. Sitting in a warm sun, reading a good book, and listening to pleasant project noises as The Wandering Monk and Neighbor J. got some sunny-day work done on her place. And Ava was at my feet. And my house looked like a house.

And I have the most amazing blessings from friends. Far more than I could ever say here.

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So. This is a blog I have to blog periodically. This is a sermon I have to preach, both to the choir and to that smallest choir of one, myself.

No matter how bad it gets. No matter how much the news weighs down on us. No matter who hates us, who lies to us, who died for others’ glee. And no matter what may or may not be made of it. We. Must. Live.

And enjoy. We must not just survive, but thrive.

I know most of you know it. I know it, too. Which doesn’t mean it won’t always need saying again.

We must not become the thick-ankled drones of The Cause, whatever the cause may be.

We must not become twitching paranoids, broadcasting from our bunkers that alien mafiosi (and don’t forget the lizard brains!) sent Barack Obama back in time to kill John F. Kennedy.

We must never take it so hard that we one day do the proverbial “snap.”

I know none of us here at Living Freedom would do that. Only a tiny minority do. But the key to the amazing way we have of keeping ourselves together is: perspective.

This week 59 or more people will never come home and thousands more will never be the same, some physically, some mentally, some both. And we probably wish there was something we could do.

Something, that is, beyond stand in the foul shower of lies, idiocies, and accusations — and contemplate a dark future. A future we hope is more hopeful because of some wobbly Republicans and a few red-state Dems too terrified to v*te the Feinstein Line.

Maybe there is something to do. Maybe there isn’t. Maybe you’ll find it. Maybe you won’t. It may be different for you than for anybody else.

But our real solutions are most likely to come, as creative insights, after we stop a while, breathe, let go, and find something to enjoy. In. Joy.

This afternoon, the choir-of-one listened. May beauty and light — and more — come to you as well.