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Posted on February 18, 2013 by Jessica Dofflemyer

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Sunday morning and I rally the family for an early adventure. The Bohemian is up for anything, and the lure of donuts is enough to get Jeb enthused.

We head to the beach.

“Are we getting donuts here?” Jeb asks.

“You’ll see…”

In the course of our outing, we get rain and hover beneath a kamani tree. Wait while several squalls come in waves.

The Bohemian is covered in goosebumps. Jeb climbs tree limbs and finds a citrine crystal embedded in a knotted hole.

A shoe gets lost, then found. There’s talk of turn-around, then a rainbow. We continue on. Discover two golf balls in the river mouth. Get sunshine as we climb the muddy bluff. Enter the condo-sprawling suburb, where Foodland and sprinkled glazes await.

Post-donut intake, Jeb’s sugared up at the town park, swinging like a wild man as more wind whips another shower our way.

The old-fashioned glaze doesn’t digest well in my stomach. The wind agitates me. This escapade was my idea but I’m bothered. I should be enjoying. Instead, I just want to go home. Be warm and dry. Peaceful.

I know it’s not really the weather. Something about my internal barometer is just a little off.

This feeling will pass, just like the clouds. I know.

And as if to punctuate the point, by the time we hike back down the bluff to the beach, it’s a picturesque day of sun along the sea. Jeb and the Bohemian go swimming.

I seek solace in minutiae. Ground myself in sand grains.

Find some deep sense of satisfaction in simply looking closely.

Posted on February 5, 2013 by Jessica Dofflemyer · 2 Comments

Zelva’s Free

“I don’t think Zelva’s coming back.”

That’s the Bohemian on day three or four since he cracked an opening in the fence to see if our turtle wanted to be free. She’s been gone for days, though I’ll admit, I hadn’t noticed until the Bohemian pointed it out.

Which is how we got here in the first place.

Zelva was always kind of his. One day, the Bohemian had looked down to find this turtle under the puakinikini tree in our backyard. The discovery seemed special. No neighbors were missing a pet turtle. Where did she come from?

We researched online, figured out she was a painted turtle, most likely female, and learned that she needed to be in water in order to eat. Using an old kiddie pool on the property, the Bohemian fashioned a make-shift pond by a stand of banana trees. He sunk it into the earth, making it level with the ground so she could easily get out- something else important for her. She needed to dry off and get sunlight on her shell, daily.

A low, portable fence was set up around her area to both protect her from straying animals and to keep her from wandering away. The Bohemian planted nasturtiums, tarragon, edible hibiscus and cosmos flowers in her zone.

I enjoyed Zelva. There are various posts here in the Archives dedicated to her. I especially loved that when I was with her, I slowed down.

And maybe that was part of the issue. I often didn’t slow down enough to spend time with her. Positioned in the yard a good distance away from the house, she was often out of sight. Usually, if she was in view, sunning on a rock, as soon as she saw me coming, she would plop right back in the water to hide under floating leaves.

Jeb never really got attached. Begging for a dog since he was five, Zelva was hardly a substitute. No puppy play or cuddling with her. It was most often reminders like “Careful, go slowly, don’t scare her.” Or “Now make sure you wash your hands very well – with soap – since you were just picking her up.”

Over the months, Jeb and I interacted with Zelva less and less, sometimes forgetting about her for days. It was the Bohemian that made it a part of his regular routine to check the garden, find slugs under rocks and pots and feed them to the turtle.

The last time I saw Zelva, was on an afternoon when I wasn’t rushing. I had found a huge snail inching across our driveway and come to her with the delivery. She was out of her pool, sitting next to the metal fence, bordering her area. One of her scaled feet was outstretched, her pointed nails poking through the space in the gate to the other side of her barricade.

I slowed way down and spent some time with her. She didn’t recoil, though after a while she left me and made her way back to dip into the water.

That was a couple of weeks ago.

The way the Bohemian tells it, he wanted Zelva to have a choice.

Which is what he was thinking when he made a very small crack of an opening in her fence. It was more narrow than the width of her shell, which would mean that she would have to use some determination if she really wanted to get out.

On day two of no Zelva, I go with the Bohemian to her empty zone, looking for tracks in the dirt at the fence opening. I search for some sort of sign of struggle. Nothing seems disturbed. There seems to be no trail of a dragging shell, no turtle prints. No trace. She has exited our life as mysteriously as she entered.

We take the fence down but leave the pool, thinking that if she’s wandering our acre of land, she’ll have the chance to come back to her water if she wants.

We come back to check for a few more days, but still no Zelva.

Jeb seems unfazed. “Let’s get a dog!”

He seems not to understand that Zelva’s helped to build a case against our readiness for pets. If we don’t have time for a turtle….

I understand there may be some readers that think opening the fence was irresponsible, maybe even cruel. Shouldn’t we have relocated her instead of just opening the gate to leave her to find her way to who-knows-where in a wild world of who-knows-what?

I reflect on this myself.

The Bohemian explains that he didn’t think she would stray far, if at all. And when he had come to check on her, it was with the expectation that she’d still be nearby. He was thinking he’d scoop her up at that point and we’d drive her to a river down the road.

Maybe he should have done that first. Or maybe on that first day the Bohemian discovered her, we should have left her under the tree to her own fate. Maybe we should have run an ad on Craigslist seeking a new home for her. The maybe’s and the things we could have done are endless.

But now it is day five. The pool still sits with water, though we do not think Zelva will return.

Perhaps I’m just trying to make myself feel better, but I’m trusting her resilience. She made her way to us, somehow, and she deftly made her way out of the cage we crafted for her, too.

There’s plenty in this world that can endanger her, I’m sure. But at least she’s free. And it seems, that’s what she wanted.

Thank you, Zelva. May you live long, be free and happy.

Posted on February 1, 2013February 8, 2013 by Jessica Dofflemyer

Loving Spoonful

They say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.

I guess after all of my Women’s Studies classes in college, I concluded that men need to feed themselves. In fact, my fantasy involved a man who expertly executed a delicious meal for me.

Hence, my culinary skills were never fully honed, and I skated through the feeding of my finicky son for his first five years with tofu dogs and bean burritos.

My brother gently commented once, during a visit with his single-mother-of-a-sister, “You know, Jess, you might want to brush up on your cooking skills. It’s a pretty nice thing to be able to do.”

I knew what he meant. He wasn’t being, exactly, 1950’s about a woman’s place in the kitchen, but he was suggesting that it doesn’t hurt to woo a man with a decent meal.

Though I bristled, his words lingered.

Over the years, I’ve observed the most independent of women, in relationship with kind and progressive-thinking men, consistently being the primary cook in the kitchen. Some spend their days as a joined force with their beloveds – digging in the dirt, working heavy equipment, managing livestock – and when the day is through, they wash the dirt from their hands and dig right in to meal preparation.

Seems to me she’s got double the workload and responsibility – often, unquestioned. An act I’ve both admired for its selflessness and doubted in its ‘fair’ness. How is it, that when it comes to feeding time, so often all eyes are on Her?

This issue of fairness, assumption and antiquated mores, has actually had me rebelling from the kitchen…until now.

“When people have food, they’re happy.” That’s what the Bohemian says.

And I know he’s right. As soon as Jeb comes home from school, I arrange a bevy of snacks for him, knowing that his caloric intake will strongly influence the afternoon’s mood. When the Bohemian comes home at the end of a day on the land, I know what he needs is nourishment.

One could argue I don’t always have to be the one to provide it. Early on in our relationship I made this case. I had worked all day, too. Why was I the one that was thinking about what was for dinner and how much time I had to make it?

The Bohemian’s response was genuinely simple, as usual. “Do what you like. If you don’t want to cook, don’t.”

And he means it. Though he reminds me that “When I’m cooking, no one’s eating.”

This is true. I’ve always remembered the time he added left over oatmeal to a smoothie (I turned up my nose and wouldn’t even try it).

I appreciate his willingness to experiment (results, sometimes, are golden) but I’ll admit I’d rather eat my own creations. Not to mention, the snail’s pace at which he works in the kitchen. He may have the presence of a saint, slicing a carrot to beautiful perfection, but dinner won’t be ready for hours!

Over the time we’ve been together, I guess I’ve softened my stance. Watched myself fall into old-fashioned customs that both satisfy and mystify me.

I’ve discovered that I take great pleasure in ladling steaming soup into their bowls, or pulling warm bread from the oven. I enjoy conjuring the scents that drift through the house and watching smiles spread over their faces.

It does feel good to feed them.

So what’s this pleasure I feel with housewifedom? Seems I’m happy to situate myself inside Her time-worn box…but, hey…only of my own accord, mind you.

Let no assumptions corner me in those housewife quarters!I’ll step out whenever I want to.

Or something like that.

I can see the Bohemian watching me with a puzzled smile. I can make things so complicated. It’s just food. But I’m still figuring it out.

I’ll take his cue and try to keep it simple.

Food makes people happy. Eat well, enjoy and be grateful. Find the art in food creation. Make it with love.

So after, what I know, has been a long week of heavy work for the Bohemian, I try to offer up a little sweetness. Bake a chocolate cake. Serve something hearty, like steak and potatoes. Let the house fill with the smell of roasting garlic and warm chocolate.

I’m cooking up fresh recipes. Finding a new way to my own heart. Feeding my family.

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