What is your favorite kind of pickle to put in a brownie? Do you chop it? Puree it? I know most of you would counsel me to omit it altogether, but you are not married to Carl, the adventurous soul who will try anything once. Somehow, after a family discussion around Carl’s love of Chicago hot dogs, even as a breakfast food, we ended up needing to make pickle brownies. I bought dill pickles and sweet gherkins. The brownie mix itself is not one I would get again, so any fault of the pickle brownies being less than perfect can be attributed to the brownie mix, not the pickles.
Carl’s first bite was the most divine, as the brownies and sweet gherkins placed lovingly by Sarah were still warm. The rest of us tried them, whether we wanted to or not, and found them to be . . . interesting. I love pickles so the only thing I found to be weird was the change in texture. Pickles and brownies have very different textures. Amy was less than enthused. Others would not repeat the experience. Meanwhile, that night, Carl and I laughed to tears discussing different variations of the recipe. I suggested blending the pickles into a slurry, the way people use apple sauce in place of oil. That way the texture wouldn’t suffer. What do you think?
Yesterday we enjoyed the most gorgeous weather for our annual trip with friends to Simmons farm. I had missed going some years, so I was extra surprised yesterday at how little the parents were needed. Basically, we were needed because we could drive the kids to the farm, but after we arrived, Amy and her friends bid us adieu and Sarah didn’t need us either. Sarah made a beeline for the Corn Bus. It’s a school bus that has been converted to hold shallow bins of dried corn, similar to sandboxes. If there was an award for the most hours spent in the corn bus, Sarah would easily win, ears down.
My non-corn bus rides with Sarah this week had tiny moments where I felt more connected and engaged. It is always extremely humbling to be wanting people to buy my book and read our story from the Sarah-Rise years, but to feel like I’m not currently walking my talk. I realized that Sarah’s repetitious conversation is, of course, the same as her opening the closing a lid on a container for a solid thirty minutes. While I found opening and closing my own container easy, peaceful, and straight forward, I do not feel the same peace when saying, “and Granddad loves you” for the millionth time. And yet. It’s the same. It is the way for me to communicate that I love Sarah. I also remember from the Sarah-Rise years that if I wasn’t really present, that was when Sarah more often did her physical repetitive isms (stims). If I was more present, then so was she. So this week I nudged my conversational muscles into action and built more upon Sarah’s repetitions. Using her comment as the lead-in, but then expanding or responding differently or telling her something else after my initial response. Unlike some of the lid moments, Sarah is actually wanting to engage with me, so she is ready for my builds. If she isn’t then it’s easy to tell because she repeats herself with what she said or what she wants me to say. If she is ready for my expansion then she responds to what I have said, sometimes repeating my words as a question or sometimes just listening and taking it in. This takes more presence and effort on my part, but in some ways also feels less effortful because I’m not just trying to get through the moment and feeling uncomfortable or embarrassed about Sarah’s loud vocal volume.
While my bus conversations were getting more on track, I had days where I felt distinctly like a train that was hanging on to just one rail and needed to be realigned. I’m not sure what led to my feeling off, but I had multiple moments of feeling glum and like I wasn’t in my groove. Sometimes I just needed food and water. Other times, a nap or a talk with a friend when I could dump out all of my frustrations. One thing I know doesn’t help is that I have started checking my Amazon book rank again. Over the summer I had stopped cold turkey and that was marvelous. I held off for months! But once I start, then it is an addiction with the occasional rewarding high when my rank zooms up a hundred thousand spots. The flip side of the high is feeling like chopped liver with a book that is failing to garner notice. The reason I started checking again was because I have been working more on advertising, reaching out to book clubs, and offering a book club giveaway on Book Movement. When I do such things then I feel like I need some way of seeing if it was a good idea and had any impact. It is perhaps too soon to tell in terms of the book club giveaway. It is hard to keep tooting my own horn, worrying that I’m overdoing it and underdoing it simultaneously. There are two to four million new books that come out every year, and it is really on the authors to spread the word about their own books. I’m still sorting out what makes sense for my book sales, or lack thereof, and my mental health. It feels good to be proactive and keep believing in my words, but also feels scary and daring. I saw a funny meme recently that said “Your first name + your last name = your struggling writer name.” Exactly. Now that I’ve bared my embarrassing emotional book undergarments, I will go indulge in a brownie. Pickles anyone?
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