When Anne and I first married, we lived in a large house with many windows that overlooked a small body of water called Ski Island Lake. My Cousin Skip worked for Capitol Records, recently transferred to OKC from Austin, Texas. Since he was new to the City, he spent lots of time with us and we enjoyed him immensely.
Skip would usually ride a bike from his apartment to our house. He was slender and had a goatee and thinning hair he usually covered with a jaunty Panama hat. Skip knows more about the recording industry than almost anyone on earth, and he and his wife Connie recently retired to Austin after years in New York City and Los Angeles.
Whenever Skip visited Anne and me during his short stay in Oklahoma City, he always brought us LP’s or tapes, mostly of new and rising artists that we had never heard of before, but soon would. He could make salsa and guacamole dip like no other person I have known, before or since and here is his simple recipe.
5 green onions
1 clove garlic
¼ cup fresh cilantro
1 half lemon or lime, squeezed
3 or 4 jalapeno peppers, seeded (How hot do you want it?)
3 ripe tomatoes
salt and pepper
1 Tbsp olive oil
After making sure all the ingredients are crisp and ripe, uniformly dice on a chopping block with a sharp knife and then blend very gently in a food processor. After transferring the ingredients to a large serving bowl add the lemon juice (or lime if that’s what floats your boat) and salt and pepper to taste.
Chill for an hour or so in the refrigerator while you slug a few Coronas or Tecates, or just grab a bag of your favorite tortilla chips and indulge yourself immediately. Either way you will be in Heaven.
Gondwana
Showing posts with label east texas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label east texas. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Monday, September 14, 2009
Houses of Your Mind
I lay in bed this morning, unable to return to sleep after awakening with a full bladder and going to the bathroom. Like everyone else during times like this, once back in bed my mind began scanning data lodged for decades in my brain, dredging up memories and replaying what seemed like megabytes of useless information.
Mostly, during times like these, I want to locate a key in my brain and turn it off, at least for a few hours. This morning, it was not to be and proved somehow different. While raking through the trash piles of my brain, I discovered something that blew me away. I want say remembered, because this snippet of information is something that I have always inherently known, but have never put together in a logical thought process. What did I discover? Well, this may not sound so unusual to you fair readers out there, but the more I think of it, the stranger it seems to me.
For whatever reason, I was thinking about my grandparents. My dad’s mother, Dale and her husband Oscar lived on a farm outside of Atlanta in east Texas. My mom’s mother, Lela and her husband Jim lived about a mile from us in Vivian, Louisiana. As random thoughts raced through my brain like water through an empty pipe, I gradually became aware of an apparent truth that had somehow escaped me my entire life.
The houses of both my grandparents were identical. They were exactly the same size and all the specific rooms – bathroom, kitchen, bedrooms, dining room, and living room – occupied exactly the same place. They even had the same directional orientation.
Strange, I grant you, but not beyond the realm of simple coincidence considering they were all built about the same time, and not more than fifty miles from one another. Then it dawned on me. The house were I grew up was the same as my grandparents, right down to each individual room. The only difference was the directional orientation. My house was situated perpendicular to that of my grandparent’s.
Wide-awake at four in the morning, I began trying to remember my neighbor’s houses and those of my friends. My friend Clay’s house, I realized, was exactly like mine except it was oriented differently. I could not quite remember the interior of Rod, Wiley, Elwin and Tim’s houses although I think they were different.
What in the hell does all this mean? I admit the thought worried me at four in the morning. After ruminating on the matter all day long, I can conclude only one of three things. 1) Some builder knocked out copies of the same house, and managed to market his product over many miles. 2) We are random although somehow ordered creations in the mind of some stellar being, or 3) there is some sort of chaotic yet orderly recipe for the world, as we know it.
My logic tells me that the first explanation is correct, but I wonder – do we have the vaguest clue as to who we really are, or even loosely realize what motivations or earth-shattering processes control our destinies?
Eric'sWeb
Mostly, during times like these, I want to locate a key in my brain and turn it off, at least for a few hours. This morning, it was not to be and proved somehow different. While raking through the trash piles of my brain, I discovered something that blew me away. I want say remembered, because this snippet of information is something that I have always inherently known, but have never put together in a logical thought process. What did I discover? Well, this may not sound so unusual to you fair readers out there, but the more I think of it, the stranger it seems to me.
For whatever reason, I was thinking about my grandparents. My dad’s mother, Dale and her husband Oscar lived on a farm outside of Atlanta in east Texas. My mom’s mother, Lela and her husband Jim lived about a mile from us in Vivian, Louisiana. As random thoughts raced through my brain like water through an empty pipe, I gradually became aware of an apparent truth that had somehow escaped me my entire life.
The houses of both my grandparents were identical. They were exactly the same size and all the specific rooms – bathroom, kitchen, bedrooms, dining room, and living room – occupied exactly the same place. They even had the same directional orientation.
Strange, I grant you, but not beyond the realm of simple coincidence considering they were all built about the same time, and not more than fifty miles from one another. Then it dawned on me. The house were I grew up was the same as my grandparents, right down to each individual room. The only difference was the directional orientation. My house was situated perpendicular to that of my grandparent’s.
Wide-awake at four in the morning, I began trying to remember my neighbor’s houses and those of my friends. My friend Clay’s house, I realized, was exactly like mine except it was oriented differently. I could not quite remember the interior of Rod, Wiley, Elwin and Tim’s houses although I think they were different.
What in the hell does all this mean? I admit the thought worried me at four in the morning. After ruminating on the matter all day long, I can conclude only one of three things. 1) Some builder knocked out copies of the same house, and managed to market his product over many miles. 2) We are random although somehow ordered creations in the mind of some stellar being, or 3) there is some sort of chaotic yet orderly recipe for the world, as we know it.
My logic tells me that the first explanation is correct, but I wonder – do we have the vaguest clue as to who we really are, or even loosely realize what motivations or earth-shattering processes control our destinies?
Eric'sWeb
Monday, July 27, 2009
Shotguns and Bloody Noses
Five years of age sounds sort of young, but I started the first grade, learned to read and shot my first gun when I was five.
During visits to my grandparents in Cass County, Texas, my Dad would often take his shotgun and go hunting. He rarely returned with any game and was probably just trying to get a little peace and quiet. One Sunday, Brother Jack and I raised a ruckus until Dad took us with him. We followed him, single file, into the woods. Feeling confident I began begging him to let me shoot the big gun.
Dad's Uncle Jim had given him the loud old twelve-gauge shotgun that packed quiet a punch."You're too little to shoot it," he told me.
"I can do it," I begged.
"Okay," he finally said, handing me the gun that was longer than me. "Hold it tight against your shoulder, point it that way and squeeze the trigger real slow."
I found the shotgun big and heavy, and much too long to wedge its butt against my right armpit. Instead, I had to allow most of the stock to protrude behind my back. When I jerked the trigger, things happened faster than I could handle. The blast blew the gun out of my grasp after hitting me in the face and bloodying my nose.
My old man could hardly stop laughing, along with Brother Jack. He finally yanked me up off the ground, wiped my bloody nose with his handkerchief, and then retrieved his gun. I was crying then, but I got the last laugh.My Dad was an only son, my Grandma adored him. It didn't matter. When we returned to the farmhouse, she saw the blood caked on my face and shirt, and my rapidly swelling eye, and began giving old Dad pure Holy Hell. My mother, hearing the ruckus, quickly joined the fray.
The rest of the day, I basked in the attention heaped upon me by Mother and Grandma. Maybe I felt just a wee bit guilty at the abuse heaped on Dad, but I didn't feel a whit bad about my jealous brother. The attention I reveled in quickly wore off, and I was soon again just little Eric. It didn't matter. I had shot Dad's gun before big brother had. To this day, that moment of elation has never left me.
Louisiana Mystery Writer
During visits to my grandparents in Cass County, Texas, my Dad would often take his shotgun and go hunting. He rarely returned with any game and was probably just trying to get a little peace and quiet. One Sunday, Brother Jack and I raised a ruckus until Dad took us with him. We followed him, single file, into the woods. Feeling confident I began begging him to let me shoot the big gun.
Dad's Uncle Jim had given him the loud old twelve-gauge shotgun that packed quiet a punch."You're too little to shoot it," he told me.
"I can do it," I begged.
"Okay," he finally said, handing me the gun that was longer than me. "Hold it tight against your shoulder, point it that way and squeeze the trigger real slow."
I found the shotgun big and heavy, and much too long to wedge its butt against my right armpit. Instead, I had to allow most of the stock to protrude behind my back. When I jerked the trigger, things happened faster than I could handle. The blast blew the gun out of my grasp after hitting me in the face and bloodying my nose.
My old man could hardly stop laughing, along with Brother Jack. He finally yanked me up off the ground, wiped my bloody nose with his handkerchief, and then retrieved his gun. I was crying then, but I got the last laugh.My Dad was an only son, my Grandma adored him. It didn't matter. When we returned to the farmhouse, she saw the blood caked on my face and shirt, and my rapidly swelling eye, and began giving old Dad pure Holy Hell. My mother, hearing the ruckus, quickly joined the fray.
The rest of the day, I basked in the attention heaped upon me by Mother and Grandma. Maybe I felt just a wee bit guilty at the abuse heaped on Dad, but I didn't feel a whit bad about my jealous brother. The attention I reveled in quickly wore off, and I was soon again just little Eric. It didn't matter. I had shot Dad's gun before big brother had. To this day, that moment of elation has never left me.
Louisiana Mystery Writer
Thursday, July 02, 2009
Summer Heat and Cool Guitar
It’s summer in Oklahoma, the weather hot and humidity out of sight. As I drink a beer and dink on my laptop, I’m reminded of the many similar summers I experienced while growing up in northwest Louisiana.
We had no air conditioning then, only a ceiling fan and a lot of open windows. As I pay attention to my new Eagle’s CD I’m also reminded that the music we listened to back then was either on scratchy LP’s or radios with tinny speakers.
I like the new Eagle’s album. It has some good songs on the two CD’s, although most a little too country for my tastes. My personal favorite is Last Good Time in Town sung, and I guess written, by Joe Walsh.
Age-wise I’m contemporaries with the Eagles and I’m happy to hear that in their sixties the boys haven’t lost their creative spark. I grew up about thirty miles from the equally tiny town where Don Henley lived but hey, thirty miles across the Texas border may as well have been a thousand miles away.
Walsh’s song features one of his patented guitar riffs, his style as catchy as any musician that ever played the instrument. The lyrics are meaningful but don’t weigh your soul down with some maudlin message. The beat and back-up instrumentation keep enticing you to get out of your seat and start dancing. Yes I did!
A new steamy summer and a fresh Eagles album make me happy and I’m glad the boys, in their sixties, haven’t lost their creative spark. Maybe there’s hope for me yet!
Louisiana Mystery Writer
We had no air conditioning then, only a ceiling fan and a lot of open windows. As I pay attention to my new Eagle’s CD I’m also reminded that the music we listened to back then was either on scratchy LP’s or radios with tinny speakers.
I like the new Eagle’s album. It has some good songs on the two CD’s, although most a little too country for my tastes. My personal favorite is Last Good Time in Town sung, and I guess written, by Joe Walsh.
Age-wise I’m contemporaries with the Eagles and I’m happy to hear that in their sixties the boys haven’t lost their creative spark. I grew up about thirty miles from the equally tiny town where Don Henley lived but hey, thirty miles across the Texas border may as well have been a thousand miles away.
Walsh’s song features one of his patented guitar riffs, his style as catchy as any musician that ever played the instrument. The lyrics are meaningful but don’t weigh your soul down with some maudlin message. The beat and back-up instrumentation keep enticing you to get out of your seat and start dancing. Yes I did!
A new steamy summer and a fresh Eagles album make me happy and I’m glad the boys, in their sixties, haven’t lost their creative spark. Maybe there’s hope for me yet!
Louisiana Mystery Writer
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