Moving

Here I go, moving again. Has it really been just 4 months since my last move? I seem to remember commenting then that I was sick and tired of moving. It’s not necessarily the physical act of packing up and moving to a new place that gets to me (although that does play a part), it’s more the emotional uprooting and necessity of reestablishing oneself in a new place and building new friendships. What was wrong with the old friendships? Why must I get new ones?

The whole moving process is stressful. Although, I will say I am getting much better at it. I have a tendency to overestimate my time and abilities and wind up stressing myself out much more than is necessary. This time around, however, I took 4 days off before my move. A new record. This is not to say that I haven’t been under stress, though. While I’m not very good about mentally acknowledging or dealing with stress, my body forces me to recognize it. It’s a bit funny, really, I’ve discovered that when I get stressed out, my eyes twitch. I picked up on this last spring when I was writing my senior thesis. My eyes twitched so often, I was beginning to wonder if something was seriously wrong with them.

It seems to me that the most obvious way of dealing with stress is to relax. Makes sense, right? For instance, someone in my situation might try to get a lot of packing done, then get a lot of rest. That way, they are neither stressing because they have a lot left to do nor because they haven’t had a chance to rest.

But that’s not me. My eye was twitching like nobody’s business last night. So I opted to get a lot of packing done, and then bake a couple of loaves of apple bread. My dad gave me a big sack of apples* (in hopes that they would be returned in some other form - apple pie, for example) that one of his clients had given him. But I only used about 4 apples for the bread. So tonight I made an apple cheesecake, and an apple honey bundt cake. I realize that this may seem like an odd thing to do in the midst of a move. However, my eye hasn’t twitched at all today - so it must be working. I’ve got just about everything packed up, so I’ll probably bake some apple pie or an apple crisp tomorrow - I’ve still got half a bag of apples left.

I suppose the good thing here is that I know I’ll be in one place for at least a year and a half. I’ve moved about 4 times in the last year and a half - so this is definitely an improvement. But it’s nearly 4 in the morning right now, so I’m going to end this blog without actually closing it. I’m 26 years old - nobody tells me what to do. What?

* There ain’t nothing like Washington Apples

Baking a pie

I baked a pie last night. After working approximately 55-60 hours this week, the fact that I felt like making a pie when I got off work at 9:30 pm last night came as a bit of a surprise. In my family, we all eat lunch together on Sundays. As my siblings and I reached our teen years and family dinners where everyone was present became less frequent due to scheduling conflicts, my mother decided it was time to begin a new tradition. We all eat lunch together on Sundays. Period. You may bring a friend to lunch if you like, but if you aren’t there, you’d better have a doctor’s note. And if you don’t have a doctor’s note, you might as well just leave the country. So now you know the real reason why my brother and I both spent a year in Spain. We missed Sunday lunch and had to flee the country. Anyway, in times past, we have all pitched in with lunch. A couple of us would cook; those who didn’t would set the table, put the food away, wash the dishes, etc. But recently it seems that the oneness has fallen upon my mother and she is doing all the work (unless we’re barbecuing- then my dad cooks). So I’ve decided that I could at least bring dessert. I came to this conclusion several weeks ago, but if I recall correctly, I have only brought dessert once… I’m trying, though.

This is why I baked a pie last night. I’m really glad I did, too. I enjoy cooking. There is something comforting about making a pie. Rolling out the crust, carefully transferring it to the pie tin, mounding up the layers of slivered apples, cinnamon, and sugar, and topping it all with another crust. I have often said that cooking is the only artistic outlet through which I express myself. In fact, cutting a design in the top of the crust in order to allow the pie to vent is essentially the height of my artistic ability… Oh, wait. I take that back. I can draw a pretty cool-looking stick man.

When people ask me how I learned to cook, I usually say that it was a combination of my mother, cookbooks, and a lot of practice. My mom doesn't like to cook, but I always have. So I taught myself a lot. I think that one of the reasons that baking pie is comforting to me is that it is something I remember doing with my mother. I always use her recipe for pie dough (it's the best). Even last night, as I was rolling out the crust, I could remember my mom telling me not to work with the pie dough more than necessary or it would make the crust tough, and showing me how to neatly remove the excess dough from the edges of the crust.