March Winds are Back with a Vengeance

Grumpy, grumpy, grumpy.  That's what I become as March winds make an appearance in my home town.  I wrote the following piece about the wind quite a few years ago, and, sadly, it is still relevant today. If the howling winds are driving you to distraction where you live, perhaps I can get a little sympathy from you!

The phrase ‘spring winds’ may conjure up feelings of a soft breeze against your face on a warm day-but not in El Paso, Texas.  For most of the year, our weather is enviable.  We laugh as we walk out the door in January, tennis rackets in hand, while the Weather Channel is announcing another cold front from Canada moving down into Michigan.  We speculate as to how our friends who recently moved to West Virginia are affording their heating bills this winter.  We plan intimate outdoor suppers in front of the kiva fireplace in the patio in mid-December.  But when March blows in like a lion, El Pasoans begin fearing the worst.

Maybe the winds won’t be as bad this year.  Or maybe they won’t last as long.  Or maybe we are just imagining how awful they were last year.  “My parents told me they remember the winds being around until June one year,” moans a pessimistic friend of mine.  The morning weather caster skips over the current prediction of a 75 degree day to warn us, almost gleefully, that 50 mile per hour winds are on the way, and will probably last a week.  The city hunkers down.

I decide I had better get my errands done quickly.  The receptionist at the veterinary office makes the usual small talk while ringing up the charge for the dogs’ medicine and then asks if I have heard today’s weather report.  I have, and we exchange ideas about how soon the winds will arrive.  The older lady at the feed store hands me my sack of dog food and asks if it is getting windy outside yet.  I tell her no, but that I am sure the wind is coming.  We both shake our heads at the futility of trying to control the weather, and, I suspect, our advancing ages as well.  The young, efficient cable TV installer gets his job done at our house without much chit-chat, but he can’t resist a parting comment.  “Guess those winds are going to kick up pretty soon, huh?”  Yes, I guess they are.

The spring winds in El Paso are inescapable.  They howl relentlessly for what seems to be an eternity.  Dust is everywhere-on the furniture, on the desks at school, on the dashboard, and in your eyes, nose, and ears.  Contact lens wearers switch over to coke bottle lens eye glasses.  

And El Pasoans get testy.  Grocery checkers hand over sacks without even bothering to wish you a good day.  School teachers contemplate early retirement as students stare out the window at the flailing branches.  And the winds are incredibly loud.  TV sets have to be turned up even louder, and cell phone users on the street search for a protected corner to answer their innumerable calls.

Life is put on hold.  Everything except the bare necessities of life must wait until the wind stops.  Vegetables for the garden have to be started inside in small containers and left there, getting leggy, until the winds stop.  My husband Wayne and I often remind each other of the spring we flaunted Mother Nature and planted the garden early.  The winds blew so hard the next day that they snapped the tiny seedlings off at ground level.  The garden just disappeared overnight.  No use cleaning the swimming pool either.  It’s full of black mud and debris. 

Ugly scene, huh?

See the bag on the fence?

Plastic bags fly around the city until they impale themselves on tall ocotillo plants or thorny mesquite trees.  Homeowners hope the trash will just keep blowing into someone else’s yard.

           

I asked one of my college students from New Jersey how he was enjoying life in the desert southwest.  He said he loves the weather.  “But how about our winds?” I inquired, expecting to draw out his true feelings.  He said they were no problem, because El Paso is the only city in which he has lived where he can wear sandals all year long.   “You could never do that in New Jersey,” he assured me, sticking out both feet to show off his comfortable footwear.

I’ll have to keep that in mind when the 50 mile per hour winds wake me before the alarm sounds in the morning.  Maybe I’ll put on a pair of sandals before I head out the door to face the elements. 

A Magical Evening in San Elizario, Texas

Last Sunday, a friend and I drove to San Elizario, Texas for an afternoon visit to an art studio. San Elizario (San Eli) is a small historic town about ten miles southeast of El Paso, Texas. The visit brought to mind an unusual evening that my husband Wayne and I spent in San Eli several years ago.  Here is a description of that evening (the names and places have been changed to protect the innocent, or maybe me from a lawsuit!)

“Come down to San Eli this evening with me.  I’m setting up the chuck wagon at the Billy the Kid Cafe,” my husband Wayne said to me one summer morning.  

Several months earlier, we had discovered a new restaurant in San Eli  The owners, Juan and Gloria Bustamante, soon became our personal friends, and we had enjoyed many home style Mexican dishes in their small diner. Now Wayne wanted to help the restaurant attract customers by displaying his chuck wagon there.  

photo courtesy of Steven Woods

It was to be a festive evening in San Eli.  A Hollywood film company was screening a film in the nearby historic plaza outdoors at sunset.  Wayne’s plan was for visitors to San Elizario to be intrigued enough by the chuck wagon to stop for a closer look and then visit the cafe.

San Eli chapel and plaza

Charles Dicken’s Ghost of Christmas Present must have been with us that evening, sprinkling his dust over the village of San Eli, because the evening that ensued was magical.  When I arrived at the cafe in  late afternoon, Wayne had set up his chuck wagon in the parking lot of the Bustamante restaurant and was now part of an outdoor gathering in front of the restaurant.  Several metal tables advertising Mexican beer labels were joined together to make room for a small group in folding chairs.  I looked around the table for a familiar face, but only my husband’s registered any recognition.  

The drink of choice was horchata, a refreshing sweet, rice-based drink, often served in the summer in Mexico.  There were small bowls of tostadas and homemade salsa on the tables.  As was my custom at social events, I quietly drank my horchata and observed my fellow tablemates.  Who were these new acquaintances of my husband’s?  And what might we have in common?

Juan, the restaurant owner, appeared and gave me a big abrazo.  He and Gloria served plates of beef brisket and corn tortillas.  Everyone ate heartily, and the conversation became even more convivial.  Long shadows were starting to form as the sun went down.  When night fell, San Elizario became transformed into a small Mexican village.  Lights went on in adobe houses, and as a light breeze came up, laughter and music drifted from the plaza.

My fellow revelers were an unlikely group, thrown together by special circumstances.  The common thread was that everyone knew the restaurant owners.  There was my husband, Wayne, dressed in full cowboy regalia and joking and telling stories.  There was Sam, a veteran and the owner of the restaurant property, with his three grown children.  There was Juan’s brother-in-law who left the table from time to time to water down the pavement in front of the restaurant with a garden hose.  His wife was helping Gloria cook inside. 

Our Lady of Guadalupe

And then there was the most unusual guest of all – Indio.  He was dressed in a combination of Indian and biker attire.  His headband held an image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patron Saint of Mexico.  Indio was a man well passed middle age with a profile that could have won him film roles as a character actor.  It was his conversation, however, that held the table’s attention.  Indio claimed to be 95 years old and spouted dates and events to support his claim.  As the other guests, including myself, became more inquisitive, trying to catch him in an outright falsehood, he answered all questions calmly and displayed an amazing knowledge of many topics.  He knew everyone in the San Elizario area; he made frequent references to the Indian spirit world; and he was a self-proclaimed expert in healing people and animals. Even the brief appearance of Indio’s very normal wife and teenage son at the table, perhaps checking to see why he hadn’t come home for supper, failed to dispel the aura that  he had created that he was an unusual person with special powers. 

Screening of the film in the plaza ended.  A few people drifted over to the restaurant, Hollywood types, conspicuous by their clothes and their haircuts.  A husband, wife, and small child, obviously from a more affluent part of El Paso, were sitting at another table.  But our table was oblivious to all of these outsiders who weren’t part of our magic.  My husband, Wayne, lifted his horchata glass high and proclaimed, “Here’s to friendship!” 

Horchata

We all responded with “Cheers” or “Salud.”  Somewhat later, when all the customers had left, we helped Juan and Gloria clear the tables.  Wayne and I left Indio and Juan having a heart-to-heart talk at a table.  A feeling of fellowship, a calm summer evening, and a little mystery had created a memory.

Since that evening, Wayne and I have run into our new acquaintances several times, entering or leaving the Billy the Kid Restaurant.  Sadly, the Ghost of Christmas Present has moved on to sprinkle another gathering with the magic granules of goodwill.  We say hello, shake hands, and rush on, almost embarrassed to remember that for one evening, in a small village, we were, as Dickens so eloquently put it, “Fellow travelers to the grave.”

Ghost of Christmas Present

A loaf of Irish Soda Bread ushers in springtime!

It's mid-March in the Southwest.  Mother Nature has tantalized us with a few days of highs in the 70's. Enthusiastic gardeners are showing up at home improvement stores around town.  We can hardly wait to pack up our coats, break out our garden tools and make our dream landscapes come true. However, a few days with highs in the 50's and 30 mph plus winds have driven me back inside. Now I'm thinking of puttering around the kitchen and cooking something delicious for St. Patrick's Day on March 17th.

St. Patrick's Day celebrations come just at the right time.  Tired of winter activities and longing for sunshine, we welcome any opportunity for fun as we wait for a true springtime.  Green beer doesn't appeal to me much these days, but Irish Soda Bread does.  More specifically, I'm planning to bake Irish-American Soda Bread.

I don't know how long ago I first discovered the recipe in my 1997 edition of Joy of Cooking by Irma S. Rombauer et al. This classic cookbook is a real treat, especially for people like me who would just as soon read about cooking as get busy in the kitchen and do it.

Another reason I feel enthusiastic about baking is the new Kitchen Aid stand mixer our son gave us for Christmas.  Why didn't someone tell me earlier in my life how much better and easier a stand mixer can perform than my old hand mixer?  It makes baking a breeze!








Here is Joy of Cooking's description of Irish American Soda Bread (pp. 772-773).  "The American idea of Irish soda bread looks like a giant golden brown scone studded with raisins and caraway seeds." Yum. Mix together one and two-thirds cups all-purpose flour, five tablespoons sugar, one teaspoon baking powder, one teaspoon baking soda, and one-half teaspoon salt.  Stir in one cup raisins and two teaspoons caraway seeds. In another bowl, whisk together one large egg, one cup buttermilk, and a half-stick warm melted unsalted butter.  Stir all ingredients just until moistened. Bake in a greased, six cup loaf pan at 350 degrees for 45 to 50 minutes.

I've given you the "leaded" version.  If you are trying to eat healthy or have certain dietary restrictions, you may lower the amount of sugar (or use Splenda) and substitute half of the butter for applesauce.  I have made these substitutions at various times.  They may produce a loaf that doesn't stay quite as moist as the original, but since it is generally gobbled up immediately in our household, this has never been an issue.

If we run out of the loaf too quickly, though, I may try a new recipe that appeared several days ago in the El Paso Times for Irish Soda Bread Muffins by Ruth Taber.  The ingredients look very similar, and muffins rather than a loaf might be a nice twist.

Come on springtime!

Sláinte! (Cheers!, Salud!, Saúde!, Santé!)

A Quiet Night in the Bunkhouse

What a panicky feeling!  Our Internet and land line service went down yesterday morning.  My husband Wayne and I entertained ourselves fairly well during the day, but as night rolled around, we truly wanted to click on those electronic devices – laptops, desktop computer,  iPad, even a voice on the telephone – anything to connect with the outside world.

But we are adults.  Surely we could have a nice evening by ourselves. We ended up spending several enjoyable hours in an outside room on our property that we have dubbed “The Bunkhouse.”

Armed with a Kindle Reader and various books and magazines, we settled in for the evening.  Wayne built a fire in the old wood burning stove and put George Strait on the CD player.

Rocking in an old cane chair that had belonged to my grandfather, I realized I had forgotten how much I loved the Bunkhouse. 

The concept for this 150 square foot room came from a picture in a Southwest decorating book of a very fancy tool shed.  By the time Wayne was through enhancing the plans, it was a modern recreation of an old-fashioned bunkhouse.

There was a place to eat or play games,

chat or listen to music,

 or even take an afternoon siesta.

.

And of course, being a bunkhouse, it had to be decorated in Southwest style.  A plaque at the doorway, "Mi casa es Su Casa" (My house is your house) welcomes visitors.

A ceiling made of vigas and cedar latillas and a metal cow's skull above the stove complete the look.

The evening spent in the bunkhouse took me back to an earlier time.  It was one of the most relaxing times that I have had in a while.  Now what time is that Time-Warner repairman arriving? I'm ready to jump back into the modern world.