the birth­day girl

It’s Tues­day of our last week in Amer­ica, and all is quiet at Red Gate Farm.  The aviary that is John’s bird­feeder camp is sim­ply fly­ing with finches, car­di­nals, and other winged things I’m too much of a city girl to be able to name.  The chip­munks run to and fro, fill­ing their cheeks with sun­flower seeds and peanuts (but turn­ing up their lit­tle black noses at the unripe peach I first offered to Avery).  Squir­rels rus­tle around in the maple branches over­head, rac­ing from their enor­mous nest to leap into the adjoin­ing tree, dan­gle pre­car­i­ously from its branches, and finally leap to the wood­shed roof.

Actu­ally, amidst all this bucolic charm is the inter­mit­tent whine and chok­ing of John’s weed-whacker, and a slow, cum­ber­some trac­tor dri­ven by Rol­lie up the dusty road.  I can hear Young Rol­lie up in the meadow, hay­ing busily.  Coun­try noises, really.

It’s the begin­ning of the end.  The tem­per­a­ture has dropped a bit so you want a sweater in the morn­ings.  I’m start­ing to think about what I buy at the gro­cery so I use up all the bits and pieces in the fridge before we fly away on Sun­day.  But I’ve got the pantry well-stocked, just in case there’s a last minute hur­ri­cane.  (But that would be crazy, wouldn’t it?)

As much as I adore all our busy social but­ter­fly life every sum­mer, I am con­tent right now to be fac­ing five days of just the three of us.  There will be time for some lazy pool after­noons, another trip to the library, devo­tion to “Days of Our Lives,” even a cou­ple of naps.  The ten­nis court beckons.

Every­one can fend for him­self or her­self for lunch: a big pot of vichys­soise, a three-cheese panini, a bowl of red cab­bage slaw.  It will be quiet, and even per­haps a lit­tle bor­ing.  Just the ticket to get us in the mood for Lon­don life once more.

Last night saw us in New York for din­ner with Avery’s old­est friend, Cici, and her fam­ily.  These two girls met as babes in arms and were insep­a­ra­ble until we moved to Lon­don when they were nine.  They still have a mar­vel­lous time together, now grown up.

We met at their work-in-progress loft, which is always a bit­ter­sweet expe­ri­ence for me, as it is where we spent Sep­tem­ber 11, 2001, watch­ing events unfold.  We stood in the bloomy evening last night, on the roof where we watched it all hap­pen.  The mem­o­ries never quite go away, but it is excit­ing to see the future unfold­ing, way downtown.

We tucked into deep-fried cala­mari with a spicy mayo at Estancia 460, a cute lit­tle Argen­tin­ian bistro in dear old Tribeca.  Such fun to catch up on real estate projects, art ambi­tions, new schools, to rem­i­nisce about gallery days and little-girl days.

But of course the most recent excite­ment was my mother’s birth­day week­end!  She opted to keep it quiet and sim­ple this year, just the fam­ily, and while we have always loved the big bashes of past sum­mers, it was vastly relax­ing to know I would have just the tribe around.  Great tim­ing, because I’d been bell­ring­ing at the Kent School in the morn­ing (tak­ing dear Judy with me as a curi­ous vis­i­tor!), which was as always — with ten bells! — hugely intim­i­dat­ing and yet wonderful.

Drop­ping Judy off at their farm after­ward, I could not help but admire the corn crop, espe­cially given the dev­as­ta­tion and sad waste of the mid­west­ern efforts this droughty summer.

It was a relief to mosey slowly up our road know­ing there were not 30–40 peo­ple to be fed that evening!  Just the fam­ily.  There was time to tie yel­low bal­loons every­where in the late-afternoon light.

This must have been the time of day when bees gather pollen, because as I tied, I real­ized the hydrangea was sim­ply ALIVE with bees.  Sev­eral stings!  No matter.

I know I can be tire­some on the sub­ject of “the blue of the sky, the red of the barns, the green of the grass…” but there really was some­thing mag­i­cal about the col­ors, the still­ness of the after­noon, the antic­i­pa­tion of a family-filled day.

Even the tram­po­line, old and dusty, got into the act.

And the tram­po­line got a work­out!  Molly arrived ready for her usual craziness.

And what a feast!  All Mom’s favorite foods: dev­illed eggs, of course, of which I can never seem to make enough!

I had not remem­bered how much Jill’s girls love them!  Noth­ing says “Happy Birth­day” like an eggy moustache.

We had home­made chicken ten­ders (the hit of the sum­mer, I think, so ten­der and juicy).

Home-Fried Chicken Tenders

(serves 6)

6 chicken breast fillets

1/2 cup flour

1/2 cup Old Bay Sea­son­ing (or any spice blend you like)

2 eggs

1/4 cup light cream

2 cups fresh bread­crumbs, sea­soned if you like (I like Fox Point)

enough oil/lard to fill your deep fat fryer

Trim the chicken com­pletely of any fat or mem­branes.  Cut against the grain in three long slices.  Shake up the chicken in the mix­ture of flour and Old Bay.  At this point you can leave the ten­ders in the fridge while you pre­pare other dishes.

When you are ready to cook, heat up your oil and at the last minute, shake the ten­ders one more time to coat thor­oughly, then beat the egg and cream in a shal­low bowl and dip the ten­ders in it.  Quickly trans­fer the ten­ders to the bread­crumbs (also in a shal­low bowl) and coat them.  Fry for about three minutes.

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I served these with a mix­ture of may­on­naise, Key Lime juice and chilli sauce.  Even the kids ate it all!

Of course, it wouldn’t be Mom’s birth­day with­out scal­lops in bacon.

Angels on Horseback

(serves 6)

2 tbsps olive oil

juice of 1/2 lemon

18 large sea scallops

9 pieces streaky (Amer­i­can) bacon, cut in half

36 tooth­picks

Cook the bacon at 350F/180C until some fat has been ren­dered but bacon is still pli­able.  Drain on paper towel.

Mix olive oil and lemon juice and toss the scal­lops in it.  Shake dry, then wrap each scal­lop in 1/2 piece of bacon and secure with two tooth­picks.  Grill over medium heat for four min­utes, then turn over and grill for four fur­ther minutes.

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There were baked mush­rooms stuffed with a mix­ture of white crab­meat and Boursin (oo0h, crisp and savoury), and another dish I can never make enough of: tomato and moz­zarella salad with fresh pesto.

No party for my mother would be com­plete with the tra­di­tional cake brought by Jill and Joel.  “Happy Birth­day, Mona.”  A beau­ti­ful evening.

How we all missed Dad dur­ing the fes­tiv­i­ties, this sec­ond year when he could not be with us.  It takes a spe­cial brand of courage for my mother to carry on hav­ing fun, look­ing for­ward to her party, trav­el­ling all the way to Con­necti­cut to be with us all, laugh­ing with her grand­daugh­ters, blow­ing out her can­dles.  She came with a stack of pho­tos she had found of lit­tle Dad, cher­ished by his par­ents, now long dead.  It was a com­fort to think of the cycle of life.

Don’t you love Grandma’s shoes!  And Grandpa’s hat.

I know noth­ing in the world would please our father more than know­ing that in his absence, his three chil­dren are look­ing out for Mom.  There was never any­one who could make life feel safer than my father could, much as John’s father could.  How lucky we all were to have their pro­tec­tive arms around us for as long as we did.

And that was our party.  Quiet, peace­ful (well, there WAS Molly’s car­toon voice float­ing on the breeze).

All together, one of those deli­cious days you wish could go on for­ever.  All over for another year.  We love you, Mom.