Buck Skinners' Rendevous at Sawdust Days

Native-American-type dresses made of very soft leather.

On the weekends around the 4th of July here in Oshkosh, we have something called Sawdust Days at Menomonee Park on the shores of Lake Winnebago. They call it Sawdust Days because Oshkosh used to be a huge lumber town back in the day. In the park, there's a Carnival atmosphere on one side of the bridge, and a Buckskinner Rendevous on the other side. I usually go to the buckskinner side, but avoid the carnival side.

The BuckSkinner side is pretty interesting--It's Living History--except it smells better than days of old. People bring old-timey tents (the re-enactors get to camp right by the lake which never happens for anyone else any other time of the year!). They dress up like it's the 1700s, the fur-trapping era--a real part of history for Wisconsin. There are metal smiths smithing, and selling their wares, leather and furs for sale, all sorts of shells and beads, and other things that people would have traded in those days--all laid out on blankets, or hanging as if in a real trading post. For food, they sell kettle corn, and Doc's wild rice soup, and Indian fry bread, Indian tacos, Sasparilla (in addition to the requisite brats, beer, and burgers). There's some Native American representation there, too.


I'm not a big fan of smoking, but this man's pipe tobacco smelled really good! We stayed and talked with him for quite a while. He was doing New York Times crossword puzzles in between customers. He also had the greatest fur mittens -- they would have been GREAT for walking dogs on the coldest of winter nights. No--I didn't buy any. I did buy a scrap of leather from him though :


This year, I'm looking for some leather to make more journal covers. I found a suitable piece of cow hide at a reasonable price. I also found some skull beads for the Baba Yaga quilt I'll make some day. The shiny black beads are hematite, also destined for a quilt. And the African Porcupine quills my Mom asked me to pick up which she uses for quilting. Pretty good haul, I'd say!


Someday, I'll get a sheepskin to cover my rocking chair--but so far, I haven't wanted to spend the $85 that would cost me. I do go over and "pet" them every year.


This very gentle man was selling gemstones and beads. He looks rough, needed some dental work. A real character, but he seemed very kind and gentle-hearted. Oliver and I bought some gemstones from him. In fact, Oliver really wants the amythest I bought ...


One year I bought a beautiful knife--handmade by a real artisan, with a deer antler for a handle. It's just beautiful! I'm glad I got it because that guy has not been back since.



Note : Most of the photos in this entry were taken by Jef Decker on my Olympus digital camera. Thanks Jef for capturing the Rendevous!

Blueberry Scones

They don't look like much, beat up and bruised. But do these scones ever taste delicious!

I used the basic scone recipe previously posted here with the addition of fresh (or frozen) blueberries folded into the dough. It makes the dough much wetter than usual, so you may need some extra flour to compensate for the ensuing stickiness.

Top it with some lemon icing (just lemon juice and powdered sugar).
It's the perfect mix of weet, tender, and tangy!

John Dillinger : Robin Hood or Terrorist?

Last summer, Johnny Depp, Michael Mann, and crew were in my little town of Oshkosh, WI, to film parts of the newly released Public Enemies movie. Now that it's been released, I'm remembering how my Grappa Eddie used to speak of John Dillinger as a great hero.

I never quite understood why Grappa would think of a bank robber and murderer as a hero. To my mind the guy was a brutal terrorist, a criminal--pure and simple. He wasn't classified as a "public enemy" for delivering flowers.

So I asked a couple of friends (who happen to be history professors * at the local University) if they could explain this phenomenon to me ... At present, my Grappa is 98 years old. He lived through the Great Depression. He probably kept his money in his mattress (with a .45 in his night stand). (It's a miracle none of us grandchildren were not hurt at his house while we were growing up!) Banks were failing all over the country during The Great Depression. He saw Dillinger as a modern-day Robin Hood. The guy stole from the rich (banks). But did he ever give it to the poor? Maybe he left a fat tip at a restraunt ... you (not me) just wished you were the one to wait on his table.

The other thing that really stood out for Grappa was Dillinger's connection to The North Woods of Wisconsin, where Grappa Eddie grew up. Grappa was a full-blooded Bohemian (that's a nationality, not a life-style). So for Dillinger to show up at The Little Bohemia Lodge was a big deal--validation for a Bohemian otherwise lost in America. Grappa took tremendous pride in that Bohemians could show Dillinger proper hospitality. (I'll vouch for the bakery!)

I don't remember Grappa speaking so fondly of the other gangsters of the time, but he could have ... Didn't Capone have soup kitchens for Chicago's down-and-out? That certainly helped get the public on his side. At least it made it easier to turn the other cheek when it came to his crime and murder record.

Grappa now lives in a nursing home. His memory moves in and out. Sometimes he recognizes my mom and Aunt Cindy, some days he doesn't. Last I heard, he was sleeping all day and staying up all night to regale the nurses with stories of making moonshine in Garski Flowage with his buddies. He was back in the days of Prohibition, when the only way to get alcohol-for-drinking was to make it yourself with a distillery, or still (remember that contraption Hawkeye and BJ had in the old M*A*S*H episodes?). I think he used to use potatoes most often ... Anyway, he was telling the nurses he had to finish this batch because he'd get beaten if his Dad found out about it. Nevermind the G-Men. He's getting younger as he gets older ...

* Thanks to Dr. Kuhl and her husband Jeff Pickron for explaining this Dillinger hero worship phenomenon in the light Robin Hood. They have the much wider perspective of all historic time!

Kid Logic : Part 3 : Lost in Translation

When I was 6, my mom was pregnant with my younger sister. She would take my brother (then 5 yo) to her doctor's appointments. She wanted us to learn about the growing baby.


Obstetricians always have a poster on their exam room walls with a baby inside it's mother's womb, with parts cut away for visibility.

We knew how the baby was growing, but no one really explained how that critter would come out of Ma's belly. Well, something got lost in translation for me at age 6. I really thought they'd cut away parts of my mom to get the new baby out of her.

It's surprising to me know that that thought didn't disturb me more back then. My mom already had 2 kids (me and my brother), and she still seemed healthy and whole. I just had to assume everything would come out okay.

Kid Logic : Part 1

Someone recently told me that his son wanted to be a garbage collector when he was a kid because he'd get to 1) drive a big truck and 2) go all over town.

At one time, Oliver wanted to be a garbage collector, because (at the time) he thought learning to read was too hard. A garbage man wouldn't have to know how to read--so he thought. I explained that a Garbage Man would indeed need to know how to read street signs, safety manuals, hazardous materials info.

Now that Oliver knows how to read, he has the keys to the world! These days, he talks about becoming a lawyer. That's fine with me, as long as he never works for Monsanto. I'm still kind of hoping he'll run away with the Circus--Cirque du Soleil!

Reflections on a Wedding--10 Years Later

"We really did it?!?"


"Yes!"

CL and I just quietly celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary (seems longer--in a good way). It's been a good partnership. After all this time, we still LIKE each other. What more can you ask for?

I remember my dear friend Caroline telling me she was glad that CL and I had found each other. She thought I was so interesting and "strong" in my own right, she wasn't sure I'd find a suitable mate--someone who would be so much HIS own person, too. We work together well--and I can still say that 12 years later. We're a good match :-)

Every time I hear about someone having to stand up in a formal wedding, I think about what we did different--and we're both still glad we did it our way. Weddings really don't have to cost $100K.

* I made my own wedding dress.
* My "bridesmaids" wore outfits of their own choosing -- NO horrendous pink dresses they couldn't afford and would never wear again
* We had it outside in a park near where we were living

* CL and I walked in together and presented ourselves as a couple to our circle of friends (no aisle, no pomp and circumstance, no white runner)
* My Dad didn't give me away -- If I had been 18 yo, that might have been appropriate, but I was 29 yo at the time. Maybe he felt bad about missing that opportunity, but it just didn't seem fitting for the occasion.
* I kept my maiden name (no regrets there either!)
* We each held out the rings for the other to take. Even on the wedding day, it was a choice to accept and wear the other's ring, not a ball and chain.
* Our guests sat in a circle of folding chairs (not pews) borrowed from a local funeral home


* Drum Circle afterwards, for those who stuck around
* My dog Keba was there for the whole thing
* Pot Luck luncheon
* We'd gone to farmer's market that morning to buy the flowers.

* The cake was a simple poppyseed sheet cake with lemon butter glaze, topped with flowers from my bouquet. The baker apologized for how plain and homely the cake looked. She didn't see it with the fresh flowers. This is eactly what we had in mind!


As my friend Molly sings her song about "Broccoli is His Teeth," I'm smiling with a poppyseed stuck in my teeth from a scone at Farmer's Market that morning. Perfect!

"Perfect love is hard to find
Life ain't no storybook
Elbows in the night
Petty little fights
Oh he smiled at her with the broccoli in his teeth. He said, 'I love you.'
She said, 'I do, too.'"

We put together a comfortable wedding within our means, just the way we wanted it. My parents had a celebration a few weeks later to coincide with our regularly scheduled family reunion. They had the party they wanted, catered with a pig roast, the Dixieland Jazz Band, hay-rides, and all their friends in Northern Wisconsin. In the fall, CL's parents had the party THEY wanted in PA, complete with a catered sit-down dinner and a $300 cake (Eeesh!). All we had to do was show up. That all worked out pretty well. Everyone got the party they wanted.

A Meditation on the Color Black

I'm re-reading one of my all-time favorite books : Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison. I first read it 20 years ago in college, perfect for a young person journeying into adulthood.

Now that I'm 20 years older, I'm doubly delighted to find that it's still a wonderful novel. It stands the test of time. ;-)

In college, I studied African languages, Linguistics, & Literature at UW-Madison. In Yoruba (a West African language), they had words for only 3 colors : light, dark, and red. As a native American English speaker, I thought this was very odd--until I learned this system was actually MORE descriptive than our own American English. If you wanted to say green, you'd say, "dark like leaves." If you wanted to say blue, you'd say "light (or dark) like sky." If you wanted to say yellow, you'd say, "Light like the sun." You can actually get much more precision in color this way. This is something I picked up on in my second reading of Song of Solomon. Near the beginning, Pilate Dead (great name!) is talking about colors, the blue ribbons on her mother's bonnet, and the many variations on the color black :

"You think dark is just one color, but it ain't. There's five or six kinds of black. Some silky, some woolly. Some just empty. Some like fingers. And it don't stay still. It moves and changes from one kind of black to another. Saying something is pitch black is like saying something is green. What kind of green? Green like my bottles? Green like a grasshopper? Green like a cucumber, lettuce, or green like the sky is just before it breaks loose to storm? Well, night black is the same way. May as well be a rainbow." (p. 40 Song of Solomon).

To see what I mean, take a look at the variety of black fabrics at this online quilt shop.

Pilate's Perfect Soft-Boiled Egg

I've been re-reading one of my all-time favorite books : Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon. What a blessing to find that it's still a wonderful book 20 years later, with me 20 years older.

Pilate Dead is one of my all-time favorite characters in literature. In Song of Solomon, she gives Milkman and Guitar the important life lesson of how to make the perfect soft-boiled egg. So I thought I'd try it out ...


Here's my room-temperature egg.


Is this a yolk like velvet? In any case, it's pretty tastey!

"You all want a soft-boiled egg," [Pilate] asked?
The boys looked at each other. She'd changed rhythm on them. They didn't want an egg, but they did want to be with her, to go inside the wine house of this lady who had one earing, no navel, and looked like a tall black tree.
"No thanks, but we'd like a drink of water." Guitar smiled back at her.
"Well. Step right in." She opened the door and they followed her into a large sunny room ... "You ought to try one. I know how to do them just right. I don't like my whites to move, you know. The yolk I want soft, but not runny. Want it like wet velvet. How come you don't just try one?"
... Now she stood before the dry sink, pumping water into a blue and white wash basin which she used for a saucepan.
"Now, the water and the egg have to meet each other on a kind of equal standing. One can't get the upper hand over the other. So the temperature has to be the same for both. I knock the chill off the water first. Just the chill. I don't let it get warm because the egg is room temperature, you see. Now then, the real secret is right here in the boiling. When the tiny bubbles come to the surface, when they as big as peas and just before they get big as marbles. Well, right then you take the pot off the fire. You don't just put the fire out; you take the pot off. Then you put a folded newspaper over the pot and do one small obligation. Like answering the door or emptying the bucket and bringing it in off the front porch. I generally go to the toilet. Not for a long stay, mind you. Just a short one. If you do all that, you got yourself a perfect soft-boiled egg." (p. 38-39, Song of Solomon)

Bounty of the First CSA Box

Here's what we got in the (Community-Supported Agriculture) CSA box last week :
Potting Soil
Red Lettuce
Sunflower Sprouts
Kolrabi
Rhubarb
Radishes
Green Onions
Lavender Plant
Asparagus

Pretty good for one week!

For those of you who are not familiar with CSAs, it's a way to boost your local economy by buying produce from a local farmer. You get the opportunity to KNOW the person who grows your food. If it's a bad season, you also share in that. Best of all, it greatly cuts down on the travel time for this food. This organic farm is only about 40 miles from my house, not 2,000 miles to California, or more to Chile. It does make a difference.

CSAs : Think globally ; Act locally.

Little Gardener

Oliver wanted to get some flowers at the greenhouse this weekend. I said ok, but he had to plant what he picked out. A Master Gardener in the neighborhood has been sponsoring a Children's Garden with a lesson/activity most Wednesday evenings. It's been rubbing off. Now he says he wants to have a garden when he's older so that he'll be able to eat when the economy goes sour (We don't talk about doomsday, so I'm not sure where this idea came from ...)