Holy dinner, Batman!

Y'all, if I did not make a fabulous dinner tonight, I simply knew I would perish. I was hellbent, HELLBENT!, on cooking for my T and then eating well together. He has been working awfully hard during the busy season. As an aside, the "busy season" appears, to my novice eyes, to span approximately 49 of each year's 52 weeks, but I am not in finance, so how am I to know.

#wifealwaysknows

Anyway, dinner. Because of a recent sale on Brussels sprouts, aka a direct-line siren song to my heartgutmind, I realized tonight that I was slightly inundated by them. Like, they were overflowing the crisper drawers and trying to free themselves from the too-full fridge. I roasted some last night but those didn't totally do it for me.

So tonight? My pasta with caramelized shallots, Brussels sprouts and speck. Do y'all know of the magnificence that is speck (pron: spaik)? It is similar to prosciutto but, in my humble opinion, infinitely better. I have never cottoned to prosciutto, but speck? It's like shaved, perfectly cooked bacon. 

Hailing from the sudtirol, aka South Tyrol or Alto Adige, region of northern Italy, speck was created as a means of preserving pork; making it incorporates smoking and curing techniques. I first tasted it in Tuscany and have bought it regularly in the States since, at Whole Foods or farmers markets.

Because just yesterday I'd made some fresh pumpkin puree and today thought I'd perish not only if I didn't make dinner but also if said dinner didn't include a spice cake of some sort, a spiced pumpkin cake with cream cheese icing.

I cannot even tell you how delicious dinner was. And, frankly, continues to be as I cannot stop eating this cake.

The same smooth path

Today, all day, I felt like a good mom. The boys listened. We laughed. No one lost it. Homework was a breeze. Dinner was easy.

The machine was well-oiled and ran thus.

I believe that I am a good mother, but that conviction is sometimes harder to both feel and experience than it is to know. Take, for instance, the times another person praises your child for his manners, her leadership, his kindness, her creative spirit. In those moments, you see your child as others do rather than through the many possible lenses that day or week has placed in front of your eyes: ungrateful or authoritarian behavior, obstinance, yet another unapproved "science experiment" that's laid waste to your kitchen.

When you're battling over inane crap like toothpaste and pancakes and mediating sibling bicker fests about the number of raspberries per plate or the correct name of the Plus Plus toy; when you scream despite your best efforts or because you simply need to be heard...it can be hard to pat yourself on the back and believe in your maternal goodness. 

But on some days, the stars align and you find yourselves all walking the same smooth path together, hand in hand. 

And it's as lovely and simple and satisfying as you imagine it could be. Should be. Perhaps wish it were more often. Maybe will be tomorrow too.

For now, I'm staying present, stewing in the thick deliciousness of watching their crawls come along at swimming lessons and them dance their way to the parking lot afterwards. Of treating them to a surprise trip to the bookstore and beaming as they picked out one small book each, thoughtfully and gratefully. Of hugging them close when they thanked me so sincerely for the new books and being their mom.

Days like today can seem like sparkling bits of heavenly ephemera, but boy can they fill a mom's bucket.

Tuesday, Tuesday

Tonight I'm feeling manageably frazzled. Like, busy but productive, tired but accomplished, overwhelmed by the children but fully amused by them. Which is a preferable state to some of the grayer days I've had of late. Those days that feel like someone shut your storm window and nailed a dirty screen in front of it for good measure. You want to see the horizon, you want to feel the fresh air, but you can't quite do either. 

I'm drinking a lovely glass of Italian red wine. The bottle is nearing the ten year mark, and the wine's woody tannins hug my tongue like a corset you willingly wear. A salad of roasted butternut squash with allspice, lentils cooked with a bay leaf, and crunchy-bitter dandelion greens stands at attention on the sidelines, waiting to be called up for dinner. It's studded with chunks of young chèvre and has yet to be dressed. I'm thinking about that and what best suits it.

Jack is reading, Ol is tucked in bed. It's early but they are still so tired from the Halloween-Daylight Savings weekend. You'd think a zombie apocalypse struck our home. I don't know why they're so sensitive and susceptible to minute time differentials, but they are. 

They have, this afternoon, vacillated between hyenic laughter and snotting tears. They adore and despise each other. They chase and pants each other and think that's both hilarious and worthy of the rack. Jack suggested that Oliver was a "premium anus." Oliver demurred but then seemed to cotton to it. 

You just never know.

I finished planting all my spring bulbs, saw some good friends, and thought about how much I'm enjoying tennis. Mostly, though, I thought about how grateful I am for the blue days on which the sun shines bright, for the strength and sense of self I've secured after years of devoted spelunking, and for the people I've encountered along the way who like that unearthed self just fine.