The madhouse is mostly over

I have survived. First semester of graduate school, first semester of marriage, first semester of a new club team, a new habit (climbing), a new location, a new set of responsibilities. And I made it which is a good feeling. I suppose I shouldn't celebrate until my grades come in and my students leave me alone for good but it's hard not to. Today was a good change. Back in a real kitchen (it's been too long) with all kinds of kitchen-y toys begging to be played with - and we got to use the knives and the stand mixer and the food processor and the sifter and the scale and the cookie sheets and the silicon spatula and aside from all that we made ravioli for the first time (butternut squash, with a spinach-basil pesto) and pfeffernusse and then chili and cornbread for dinner. A good day of food, with lovely beer and sparkling pomegranate to top it all off. Ethan cringes at the domesticity of it sometimes but I really do love to spend a whole day surrounded by the making and eating of good food. To bring pfeffernusse to my Chicago life is a thrilling and terrifying step - one that says "I'm married" the way few other things have. Because in all truth, my life has changed very little. Ethan and I relate the same way - we do talk more, but we also are enabled to do so. Otherwise we concentrate on school and me on frisbee (nothing new there...) and we see each other when we can and go to Giordano's for some tasty pizza. So goes life. But pfeffernusse means Christmas to me more than anything else. It means a late night of grating nutmeg and then a long day or more in the kitchen with (at least) mom, rolling dough and flouring hands and washing them and starting over for countless hours. Thai food for dinner, since we can't bear to cook any more. Dad hides in the bedroom but will grate orange and lemon rinds as needed. My sister is, or isn't, around. We bake. Lots. Some years we count - I remember 1234 always since it was such a nice number. And then we go deliver, driving around the city to all corners, to old family friends and new family friends. This is Christmas, and this year I'm missing it. I'll be in Chicago and on an airplane during the backing, poolside in Florida during delivery. No fighting with my sister over gingerbread shapes or lemon press designs. No red yarn to tie into bows around the bags. I am losing Christmas in more ways than one so we took action today, drove halfway to Indiana for the citron, set the mixer on low and whirled a batch together. We used to talk about how the dough was perfect to make fake facial features for television - like the ridges on Bajoran noses - putty colored and stiff - but enticingly fragrant. I had the added challenge today of a strange oven temperature and no clear window to peek through without letting the heat out, but it seemed to work in the end. We got about 65 instead of the called-for 80 and I'm tempted to make another recipe of them later in the week, but Christmas arrived at 5704 today and I was quite pleased with the results. Maybe next year I'll tackle Ethan and we'll end up with some cedar or juniper even a tiny tree. Until then we still have the windowsill garden... maybe I could string up the asparagus fern with lights.