Baking

What is it about baking that fills me with dread?  Is it the exact nature of the ingredients? There's no improvising?   That you need the proper tools:  parchment paper, springform pans, cake flour?  No making due with whatever you have on hand?  The capriciousness  of the oven-the temperature, the time?  It's not like braising/stewing/soups-the longer the better.  How do I know when it's really done?  Why is it too dark yet wet in the middle?  What causes that-too high, not enough time?  No clue.  My kind of cooking:  Seems dry?  Add wine.  Seems bland? Toss in some fresh herbs or more garlic.  There's no last minute save with baking.  Your finished baking product needs to look precise, pretty.  I'm a more rustic kind of girl.  I didn't grow up in a baking family.  There were the occasional cookies, or brownies from a box.  A bundt cake with mix, pudding, sherry, brandy: yummy in a sweet, simple, potlucky sort of way.  I am also, for the most part, not a huge dessert person.  Give me delicious, runny, smelly cheese with a slice of baguette.  I don't speak baking.  It's another language that I know a few, very basic words in.  I could make cookies.  A simple pie.  Basic brownies.  Nothing with frosting.  Nothing that involves layers.  Or pie weights.  Or strips of parchment or water baths.

Her death illustrates so clearly to me that mental illness and depression truly warps your sense of judgement and changes completely who you are as a person.  She was the most nurturing teacher any of my kids have ever had.  She hugged every kid as they left her classroom, she hugged the parents at every meeting.  She was devoted to her daughter-she told a million stories to the kids in her class about Dakota.  She was so anxious to have another baby-I know she must have been thrilled to finally have had a second child.  I cannot reconcile the caring, loving person with what happened.  To not only take her own life-but to do it in such a violent, horrific manner that would surely have traumatized anyone who witnessed it.  And to devastate her family in such manner??  She must have been out of her mind.  There is no way the person she was would ever do anything that would hurt others so deeply.  I truly cannot wrap my head around this.  And I'm guessing B will hear about it at school-and yet I cannot bring myself to tell him.  It is so awful.  Horrible.  Tragic beyond words.  I cannot process it.  Mental illness is as real an illness as cancer.  It changes who you are mentally and emotionally as surely as malignant cells devastate your physical body.

I thought that the spring forward of Daylight Savings was not that bad in the past.  Where have I been? Am I blocking it out?  Is is because it is combined with my icky allergy situation that appears around 1am causing me to snore and hack despite the benadryl?  Also combined with annoying cats? And a husband who is also having sleep issues-including sitting up in bed, flailing about and talking in his sleep?  We also had an incredibly full weekend without 5 things on Sunday alone.  I am slammed with tiredness currently.  I tried my newish trick of a guided meditation.  Usually that revives me.  Not today.   I didn't mindlessly snack which I sometimes do when I'm exhausted.  I really tried to meditate and nap.  Still.so.flipping.tired.  I need to retrieve children from far and wide, supervise homework, feed the natives and send them to bed as soon as is reasonable.  I know that in a few days I will be adjusted.  I usually love that it stays later longer in the evening-especially now that the kids are older (it was tortuous when they were small).  But the dark mornings that seem like the middle of the night are really tough for a bit.  Deep breaths.  More water.  Off to do the child schlepping/supervising/meal making/early bedtime arranging.

What's for dinner?

That could be the name of my blog and my current life's header.  Or, "Where's my blah-blah-blah?"  or the ever popular, "MOM!!!!!! "   "When's dinner?"  "Have you seen the blah-blah-blah?"  Those are what I hear multiple times a day.  So funny.  I just needed quiet today.  I had no music.  I was just enjoying the solitude.  I really needed the quiet.  And today?  I have no idea.  It won't be a quiet day.  Lots going on:  sick kid, doctor's appointment that will not be enjoyable, I already have music going on to perk me up.  And I'm forcing myself to do more writing.  That's what I need to do every day.  I'll feel better and more productive if I have something to work on all the time.  I live in dread of someone actually reading this because it seems so "journal-ish" and private, although I do try and monitor what I say and write deeply personal things only in my diaries.  This does give me renewed appreciation for good bloggers who can be authentic without revealing too much-it's definitely a fine line.  I like being able to work out my thoughts "on paper" but sometimes it's about other people (and shouldn't be shared publicly).  And things about the kids, even if they're not super personal, it's still "their" stories and I have definitely gotten to the point where I know it's not for me to share.  (Especially as they get older.)  So then that leaves my own thoughts-and again, some of them don't exactly reflect positively on me and I don't want to be judged.  Yet I really like this format-so sometimes I just write and then delete.