Orange & Dark Chocolate Olive Oil Cookies

'I just want you to know,' said the girl coldly, 'that whoever you are and whatever you intend with me, I shall give you no aid of any kind, nor shall I assist you, and I shall do whatever is in my power to frustrate your plans and devices.' And then she added, with feeling, 'Idiot.' 

~ Neil Gaiman, Stardust

I have had a tiny (envious) rapport with these cookies. Like me, they're contrary, idiosyncratic and slightly wicked; yet beneath a poised nonchalance they are heartbreakly tender - longing only to be harbingers of unexpected pleasure and quicksilver pearls of laughter. Our similarities end with a sigh. Unlike me and my pale-skinny arms, struggling to haul background boards from room to room, these cookies are sexy and stacked (I'm *almost* jealous!).

My methods are fragile; blown glass in midwinter, intentions that begin their journey with the surety of an arrow shot from Robin Hood's bow, slip through abandoned branches and land soundlessly on dandelions. These cookies, however, are intrepid. Their aim always true, ever sure, never second guessing. Had I the same amount of reckless abandon...Perhaps...possibly...maybe...?

Raspberry & Almond Coconut Crumble Cake

"This is June, the month of grass and leaves...already the aspens are trembling again and a
new summer is offered to me."

               ~ Henry David Thoreau, Journal, June 6, 1857

Thanks to a jeweled trove of strawberries, raspberries and blueberries, my sluggish refrigerator is frisky and full. Milk and cream and olives have taken an apprehensively stoic stance behind the flourish of red & purple madness. Berries have tumbled and bounced their way into just about every meal and (floor!). Wintery neurosis has fled, finally, and I'm constantly falling in love with the tousled nature of June - even as I feel the soft, red stained crush beneath my careless left slipper.


If only I could press these untroubled days between the pages of an earthy tome; one that is rugged enough to hold onto a galaxy of feelings yet laced with a leafy gentleness capable of retaining the scent of grass and mint and raspberry-tinged cereal milk.

Lemon Lavender Olive Oil Cake

It's a memory I've hoarded for twenty-odd years
and still claim in moments of déjà vu when time stops, 
its seed case cracks open, as a storm cracks open,

a whole summer happens in one hour, and I know again
what Plato's paradise of souls awaiting rebirth is made of:
birdsong, thunder, green, cicadas, and heat.

~ Margaret Holley, from "Walking Through the Horizon"

This morning I awoke to the fading aroma of rain, ozone and bluebells; remnants of another empyrean dream. With a lethargic breeze drifting through open windows and shower-fresh skin sliding against crisp cotton sheets, I have been falling, blissfully, into dreams that leave me feeling tranquil and wistfully nostalgic. I wish I could hold onto that serenity, or slip into its ambiance like a linen summer dress.

Spring and summer summon the best night dreams. I can recall a handful of tweedy details that are raised higher on the fabric; a man's deep green-velvet voice in the misty outer-lining, offering words of comfort in the form of poetry and T.S.Eliot. I remember wry humor; an elegantly arched brow looking at me through overgrown blades of grass on a too-small picnic blanket - a wordless 'Oh really now, Valerie?' half-smile. I know I'm safe and loved and free (for once) from my own peace-ravaging thoughts. (Thank you, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Captain James Nicholls...and yes, you too, Loki.)

Currently I'm basking in the retelling of my latest vanishing dream, and I am savoring the last slice of this equally ethereal cake.

Raspberry Pecan Linzer Torte

"We write for the same reason that we walk, talk, climb mountains or swim the oceans - because we can. We have some impulse that makes us want to explain ourselves to other human beings. That's why we paint, that's why we dare to love someone - because we have the impulse to explain who we are."
     ~ Maya Angelou

My once-everlasting writing flask has been bone dry for almost a month. I'm thirsty. I feel the need to express myself pulsating beneath a well that's succumbed (overnight!) to choking tendrils of kudzu & dilapidated terracotta bricks. How do writers & poets recapture a muse when it drifts through keyholes at night or suddenly takes refuge in some distant boreal forest on a random Wednesday afternoon? I wish I knew. I wish the longings and feelings and repressed emotions would simply fall through my fingertips like tumbling blueberries. Maybe someday I'll shake off the repressive, invisible blanket...for as much as I relish writing these posts, I'm holding back an avalanche of me.

Sometimes all I think I need is an accented muse & a strong, velvet-gloved hand to rub my calla lily shoulders. A slivered slice (or two) of linzer torte is also quite enchanting.