We'll Be Fine -- Flash Fiction

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We’ll Be Fine

“We’ll get everything all set up before the boys get there. We’ll be just fine,” she said.

And we were. For two-hundred and fifty-three miles. Then we stopped for a late lunch on the north side of the lake.

“Just a hop, skip, and a jump,” she said as we pulled away from Red’s on the Lake Café where the elite meet to eat, according to the sign.

Most of the trees still had their leaves, but the fall colors had faded to a uniform brown promising winter. At least there wouldn’t be any chiggers or ticks. And the way the temperature was dropping, the snakes should be denned up.

Then it rained. Freezing rain slashed across the windshield. The defroster and windshield wipers were helpless in the onslaught.

“Can you see?” I asked.

“Not very well, dear.” She slowed to little more than a crawl, which seemed recklessly fast to me.

“Maybe we should turn back,” I suggested.

“It’s closer to go on. We’ll be fine.”

Forty-five minutes of adrenalin induced gut twisting on some God-forsaken country road finally dumped us out in front of the cabin. After that drive, it didn’t look so bad.

“It won’t take us long to get the lights on and the heat.” She pulled up close to the porch. “We don’t need to bring everything in tonight. Just the things that might freeze.”

I’d never gotten so wet and cold as quickly as I did from the car to the door.

She flicked the light switch. Nothing happened. She flicked it several times. Still no light.

“Probably just the breaker, dear.” She rummaged in her purse until she found a flashlight. “Just put that stuff down on the table. It won’t take a jiffy.”

But it wasn’t the breaker. The power was off.

“Probably a tree down on the lines. Or ice.” She opened the cabinet and brought out a kerosene lantern. She waved her flashlight toward the fireplace. “Bring me one of those matches. We’ll get some light in here and start a fire. We’ll be fine.”

The lamplight flickered and sputtered as she opened the back door letting in a gust of arctic air. And again when she reentered with both arms full of firewood. She skillfully laid the wood, strategically placing slivers of fat pine. She applied a match, and it caught. The tension across my shoulders relaxed and I sat on the quilt-padded bench before the fireplace.

Then the fire belched sending clouds of suffocating, eye-burning smoke into the room.

“Just the damper, dear. Silly me. I had it closed. Help me open the windows.”

Cold wind blew through the cabin while the fire danced, merrily mocking us.

“With the power off we’ll have no water, but there’s an outhouse thirty feet or so from the back door. As cold as it is we sure won’t dawdle if nature calls,” she said, laughing.

“At least the bears should be hibernating,” I said, trying to join in her eternal optimism.

“I don’t think Oklahoma bears hibernate, dear.”

No, the way things were going, they probably didn’t.

I made a quick trip to the outhouse and a quicker trip to the car to get a bottle of very nice pinot noir. I hadn’t thought to bring a flashlight or a chamber pot, but I had brought wine.

We’d be fine. 

Words Are My Life

Pig or Hog

Actually this is probably a gilt, meaning a female pig who has not yet given birth. She's a Duroc which is my personal favorite breed of swine. 

 

All Natural Sausage

INGREDIENTS:

PORK, WATER,

CONTAINS 2% OR LESS OF: SALT, SUGAR, BLACK PEPPER, SAGE,

RED PEPPER, SPICE EXTRACTIVES.

This is not the list of ingredients in my favorite sausage, but I had some for breakfast this morning and it was pretty good. My favorite sausage has a few more ingredients.

 

The point of these pictures is the use of the word 'Natural' by the marketing folks. Now other than the long line of chosen genetics for the beautiful Duroc, she is natural. I'm sure there is a great deal of pork in her and quite a bit of water, too. And some salt. As for peppers, sage, and spice extractives, I doubt there is anywhere near the 2% listed for the sausage.

 

Now, don't get me wrong. I'd much rather have the pork with additives at my table for breakfast than the pig in the other picture. Though I once knew a perfectly well-behaved Pot-Bellied Pig named Beverly. She had pierced ears and lived in the house. Pigs are very bright and actually quite clean when given the chance to be.

 

But it's the words marketers use that set me off on this rant. The words indicate to me that our society is either woefully ignorant, apathetic, or willing to be led by the nose. The old story of  "I don't know and I don't care. What do you want me to do?"

 

This morning I bought a quart of buttermilk to make biscuits. Normally I use powdered buttermilk because it's cheaper and keeps well in the fridge. That buttermilk I bought today was identified conspicuously as 'reduced fat.' Buttermilk is what you have left after the butterfat is removed? How much fat could there be in it? And, no, they had no buttermilk without the 'reduced fat' identifier. That's because ALL buttermilk is reduced fat. Naturally.

 

Now that I think about it whole milk is only 3.25% fat anyway. About the same as cooked, skinless white chicken meat. Compare that to ground beef which ranges from 3% to 20% depending on how much you want to pay, or how much will cook away.

 

If it ain't got wheat or wheat products in it, it's gluten-free. Including those fat-free after dinner mints and ice.

 

GMO? Give me a break. Most of what we eat is genetically modified either through selective breeding or genetic engineering. We would not recognize the original, natural orange or potato or corn on the cob. Or hog, for that matter. And strawberries!

 

And, friends, if you want a no calorie, caffeine free, artificial dye and artificial flavor free drink that's natural -- try water.

 

I know, I know. Chlorination and fluoridation. That's a whole 'nother story. It's called improved public health and I won't jump on that soap box today.

 

Words! Words! Words to mislead us, massage our insecurities with promises that this or that is better and we needn't think about it, we needn't make any kind of decision because somebody somewhere will show us the way -- preferably somebody who deals in magic. Smoke and mirrors. Snake oil.

 

Come to think of it, I've known some well-behaved snakes who lived in their people's houses, too.