The Legacy of Kitchens.

They say that the average person will spend 25 years of their lives sleeping. If that's the case, and it seems legit, I will spend at least 12 in a kitchen. Maybe not all of those years in my own but in someone's. Some of my most favorite memories take place in kitchens.

My mom cooking up dinner and turning to Brandy and me at the table where we were drinking too much soda and saying, "so girls, what's the drama?" with her hand on her hip. Never knowing at the time that we would cherish those moments (and the delicious hamburger helper that she was whipping up).

Cleaning up after a huge Thanksgiving meal with my aunt and my cousins while the men watch the TV. Baritone voices talking from the living room while I laugh with my grandma that we are just alike when it comes to the order of our houses and we tease her for the 10 thousandth time about what we can or cannot put in the trash compactor.

Doing dishes at the cabin with Aunt Diane when all the other kids had left to play. I don't remember what we talked about but she always made what I said important just by listening.

My friend Erika who can create a dish out of thin air and make it look like a breeze-commiserating and talking with her while she took over my kitchen.

Baking bread, making food, humming, singing, crying, cleaning, talking, laughing....all because of an oven.

Kitchens speak a feminine language that a man could never understand. And it is a legacy that you rob your daughters of if you don't let them sit and open cans and cut onions while you cook. They won't know how it feels to knead bread or lick the chocolate chip cookie bowl. They won't see the value of sitting in the oven warmed room and just simply being. They won't remember you as someone who turned around with a wooden spoon in her hand, shirt covered in flour. They won't have a memory of you elbows deep in boiling water washing greasy dishes and teaching them about life without saying a word.

They might not become the kind of women that know to set the table-or see the importance of eating at it. And they might not become the kind of young ladies that instead of watching MTV all afternoon will sit for hours on bar stools talking about everything and nothing and baking cup cakes.

Let the girls in your life laugh. Do the dishes with them. Sing too loud with them. Listen to them. Show them that no matter where they end up in life that where there is a kitchen there can be family, warmth, friendship and love.

I know that in my life, it has always made all the difference.

My closest friends are bee fighters.

hotandspicy600 - m4w - 24 (anchorage)

hy are you lonely and what some compony or other sexual desire then i'm your man here's alittle about me i have been in anchorage for a little over 2 years and loveing it what i love is art,music,photography,hanging out with friends so if you what to contack me text me at seven-six-four-five-nine-five-zero i'm free enytime in the evens and i do not care if your chuby and i do not care about hair typ or other stuff like that and i well go for a ltr to or just

friends with befites well hear form you later and i can host if you can not

______________________________________________________

 

Dearest Hotandspicy600,

   I am writing you this letter to tell you that you are in luck! I am currently in the market for a friend with befites! (Just so you know though I think it is spelled 'bee fights'.) The only problem I am having with this arrangement is that I am allergic to bees so if one stings me I will go into anaphylactic shock (sp? nevermind you don't care about spelling) and could die. So could you please give me more information on what bee fights entail? Are there a lot of bees? Are they in a cage? Do I get to wear a trendy honey getter suit?

Also, I would like to contact you but I don't know which days are even. Do you start your week on a Monday or a Sunday because that clearly affects which days are even and which ones are odd?

Um, okay, that is all then! Let me know about the bee thing.

Thanks,

Sara

Come, let us have tea and talk about things.

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law-Galation 5:22

Fall in Alaska begins in August. This will be my 25th Alaskan summer and as any girl from the Last Frontier knows that after a leafy, beautiful fire show the trees will stand naked against nights that grow colder. Frosts steal the color from the yards, the flower beds, and the mountainside. The air is crisp and still. There is a sharp, well known smell outside. Like everything just waits for the blanket of snow. And within the month it will cover our world in white.

And I get a new beginning. Just like the snow makes everything new. Every year. 

But still the leaves cling to the last bits of summer and dreary days will find me consuming more and more chai tea. And that is how today began and how it is ending. Me, a clean house, Michael Buble, and my tea. Reflecting on the summer and the year so far, what I have learned. And here is what I know for sure....

The spice of life is steeped in joy, peace, and love. The spice can only be found by appreciating the moments in each day where you can't help but be thankful. It is found in your best friend who can make any terrible day better because she understands you deeply. The laughter of a loved child. The morning murmurs of teenage girls just waking up from their sleepover. A day of shopping with your mom who no matter how many years pass never seems any older but who continues to give  the best advice even though so many times it has not been taken. Your oldest friend taking vows that promise lifelong devotion to her husband. A visit from someone you love deeply even after the water under the bridge has gotten so deep that the shoreline has been swallowed.
Spice is one part pain of regret, two parts the fear of rejection, and three parts an aching, hurting heart; knowing that all the wishing in the world cannot change someone else; and stirring it passed anger and into hope.

It is remembering that whether you are a daughter, mother, wife, sister, or friend that you are both capable and deserving of forgiveness. Of love. Of moving on. It is acceptable to feel vulnerable. To feel sadness. To feel. But in the end to find happiness you have to know that happiness is not a destination. It is most often a choice that you make not in spite of the things around you but BECAUSE of them. Everyone has bad in their lives. But there is goodness in life too...and sometimes it hurts too much to see but that is when our eyes need to be open or we will miss the way the sun shines in beams through the clouds. The way someone looks at us. The way nothing is better for the soul than helping someone else. We will dwell on what didn't happen instead of what is right in front of us today. What is waiting in tomorrow.

Because it is all beautiful. To not see it, to miss out because we don't feel like it...I don't want to live like that. Do you?

Sara