Tag: Life

Some of my favorite dishes the leading lady in my life creates

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

As I’ve said, she’s one of the world’s great cooks. Middle-Eastern, Italian, Mexican, French, German, even Vietnamese, Thai, and Indian, she does them all and with flair. Me? Let’s look at some of the more regular things I’ve delighted in.

  1. Anything over charcoal – lamb, peppers, flatbreads, steaks and chops. It never really figured in my life before her. Usually, they were more like sacrificed offerings.
  2. Roast chicken any number of ways – thyme or rosemary lead my list, but Thai and even Indian now come close behind.
  3. Asparagus under a poached egg – ditto for spring dandelion.
  4. Strawberry or blueberry clafoutis. It’s just one of her many creamy desserts that wow me, often with our own berries.
  5. My annual birthday bash of prime rib and Yorkshire pudding, which she says is one of the easiest things ever.
  6. She’s quite fond of pork. One year we even had a whole half-pig to play with, cut up to her specifications. I think I’ve already told that story.
  7. Homemade yogurt. It’s almost like ice cream.
  8. Pho or banh. Vietnamese staples.
  9. Chowders. Sometimes using lobster stock from leftover shells.
  10. Souffles. They taste as heavenly as they look. Even after they deflate.

Now that I’m done bragging, what’s some of your favorite home cooking?

 

How different today’s downtown Eastport looks from even the 1950s

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

Stroll through Eastport’s downtown – rebuilt within a year or two of the disastrous 1886 fire and now in the National Register of Historic Places – and you’d think it was always like this, only with all of the storefronts bustling.

Not so, as I’ve been hearing, and that’s confirmed by a closer look at the undated aerial photograph on the cover of Joe Clabby’s two history books.

So as an idea of how things have changed.

  1. The waterfront is still full of sardine canneries set out on wharfs just behind the storefronts downtown, but many of the operations are now abandoned. There had been 21 at the prime around the turn of the century, but only one is still operating after 1975 and that ceases in the early ‘80s. As one local told me, you could watch the town fall into the water. Only the shell of the American Can factory still stands today.
  2. In fact, you would have a hard time seeing the water. The Waterfront Redevelopment Project, launched in 1978 and completed in 1983, cleaned up much of the scene and installed the popular walkway.
  3. The railway station, successor to the steamboat pier sits, beside the American Can factory. There’s a large apron in front of it, possibly for parking.
  4. A big movie theater occupies the space where the parking lot and the fisherman statue are now. And another big building fills the now-open space of the amphitheater. Today both are big gaps in the row of storefronts but allow more sunlight into the district.
  5. No Breakwater pier. That won’t come until 1961, with extensions later. It’s the focal point today.
  6. And no Fish Pier, which further defines the harbor.
  7. A rail line still runs into town. Service will end in 1978 and the tracks, removed.
  8. The Hotel East sits where the Motel East now is – at a 90-degree angle to the original.
  9. A row of houses is perched at the water’s edge of Shackford Cove. Long gone.
  10. There’s no Coast Guard station.

Here’s how the waterfront looked even earlier, from two photographs taken by Lewis Wickes Hine in August 1911, now in the Library of Congress collection.

There’s nothing “quaint” about the place in these, is there?

Favorite names I haven’t used in a novel

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

I’m waiting to name a character Sorrell. And Hezekiah is what I would have loved to have named a son, not that I would have found support on that one. Maybe as a middle name?

In a story, I try to avoid using names of people I know, or at least know well. Ditto for close family. So they don’t count here. It certainly narrows the range. On top of everything, after multiple revisions, I don’t always remember what I’ve kept in the end.

Besides, a name should be suggestive.

Now for ten or so more.

  1. Lane. Or Blaine. Unisex, very useful.
  2. Perry. Unisex again.
  3. Majik. Was a fisherman around here but could be unisex.
  4. Dana. Well, since we’re on a roll.
  5. Marilyn. Evocative, yet all-American.
  6. Pierce. I see a cutting edge in his glance.
  7. Bonita. Could go by Bonnie, too. From the Spanish, makes an alternative for Linda, which I also haven’t used, or Melinda, even better.
  8. Trent. The family had aspirations and this was the golden boy.
  9. Berry. Back in unisex, along with alternative spellings.
  10. Lark. Even Clark. Or Clifford. Or Larkins.

For children, though, I’ve become very fond of handing down family names. Even using a maternal surname. Guess it’s the genealogist in me at work.

We haven’t even gotten to nicknames, which can really pop a character into focus. Think of “Willy” as one possibility.

How ‘bout some suggestions from you?

Praying the breaking news

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

latest dispatch, the first in nearly a year, tells of her decision to return to wearing a covering  but Mennonite-style rather than her mother’s Quaker so what’s this about more hot wheels, eh, or clicking those heels, ah, to prefer dwelling in New England as I recall our discussion comes back, so I learned last night nothing else new comes to mind to report look forward to the next mailing, of course I’m not always a sterling example of what some embrace as Christian Love with or without the olives, yes, definitely, stay securely on your feet or knees the heartbreaking headlines demand attention regardless of the deadline every small detail adds up

Hunkering down for winter

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

We’re quickly approaching the longest nights of the year, which are truly long here in Eastport. Accompanied by the most truncated days of the year, when the sun barely clears the horizon. We’re just a hair shy of the 45th Parallel, the halfway point between the equator and the North Pole. These days, it can feel even further north than the map shows.

The experience can be especially harsh here, now that the Summer People are long gone and most of the stores and galleries are shut for the season while those that remain open do so largely on limited hours. You might see a stranger or two in town around sunset, looking for a place to eat, and the best you can do is tell them to go to the IGA and get there before the 7 o’clock closing. Pizza slices or deli cuts plus a six-pack lead the list.

Even more, we know big snow, escalating ice, and profound cold are still ahead, as well as a blustery nor’easter or three.

We don’t even have a retail scene to crank up the holiday hoopla. Nor do we have anything resembling a nightlife, apart from a few cultural performances. Bless ‘em, especially after the Covid shutdowns.

Needless to say, social connections are especially important. For me, that includes singing in Quoddy Voices and worshiping with Cobscook Friends Meeting.

Also anticipated is a big stack of reading, both books and magazines, and concerts streamed from the Pine Tree State and beyond.

I’m already looking forward to the invasion of family for the holidays.

How do you adjust to such seasonal change?