Cherry Nut Mix
In a medium bowl, combine: 1 cup raisins
I cup dried, sweetened cherries
½ cup toasted whole almonds
½ cup coconut, toasted
½ cup dry roasted peanuts
½ cup (3 oz) semisweet chocolate pieces
½ cup sunflower seeds
* * *
Cranberry Cashew Trail Mix
In a medium bowl, combine:1 cup dried, sweetened cranberries
1 cup toasted whole almonds
1 cup cashews
¾ cup pumpkin seeds
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
1 cup popped popcorn (air popped, no oil or salt)
1 cup (6 oz) semisweet chocolate pieces
* * *
Go Bananas Mix
In a medium bowl, combine:1 cup dried banana chips
1 cup dried, sweetened cranberries
½ cup pumpkin seeds
1 cup granola cereal
1 cup (6 oz) chocolate peanut butter cups, quartered
* * *
Sir Gaylord Mix
In a medium bowl, combine:1 cup (6 oz) white chocolate chips
½ cup coconut, lightly toasted
1 cup slivered almonds
1 cup popped popcorn (no oil)
1 cup rice squares cereal
Fame, Fortune, Friends
Chapter 9
Longer Than a Lot of Marriages
Before getting my job as Waterfront Counselor at Camp Fiddlecreek, I had to be certified, which I was through the Red Cross, passing the life saving and swimming instructor courses.
The same proficient qualification applied to becoming a camp counselor. I had to pass a course. I did this through the C.I.T. (Counselor In Training) program at another Girl Scout Camp.
Camp Cedarledge, in Pevely, Missouri, offered a two-year course. Older aged teenagers usually in their junior and senior years of high school signed up for four-week sessions of training. This included everything from guidance and leadership skills to campcraft. We aspirants lived in the camp’s CIT unit, a row of tents opposite an old swimming pool.
The pool was no longer used except for phase one of learning how to canoe. A large latrine stood at the end of the pool. Both of these sat atop a slight hill, maybe six or eight feet higher than the majority of the ground at our campsite. The tents, the kitchen area and the campfire circle were below this, on flat land. For some reason, I got into the habit of running down the latrine hill and loudly calling, “Charging rhino.” I realize it makes no sense, but it was a habit. You can’t have an opinion about that.
We counselors-in-training had our choice of attending the first or second period during the summers.
That’s where I met Paula. She lived in Arkansas. I thought it odd that she came all the way to the St. Louis area to get her counselor training. I later found out that in the mid 1960s, which was when we attended camp, the Greater St. Louis Girl Scout Council was the second largest in the nation.
We CITS spent our days ‘apprenticed’ to various units in camp, helping the head counselor, and learning how to manage (manage the girls, not manage to survive). We learned how to lead songs around a campfire, how to organize the girls into groups for fire building, cooking, and cleanup. We learned basic first aid and canoeing and nature craft. We were responsible for the end of camp campfire and big final program, too.
It wasn’t all work. Every afternoon we had an hour rest period in our unit. August is very hot in the St. Louis area, and it felt even hotter with the heat bouncing off the dry, packed soil and browned grass. We rolled up the sides of our canvas tents to get what breeze there was, and sat on our cots while we wrote letters (no internet at that time, so no email) to our families back home.
In order to get the maximum coolness during these body-baking breaks, we sat around without our tee-shirts on. Paula, who was writing to her boyfriend, told him we sat around with our socks off.
Paula played the ukulele and I played guitar. That helped bond us. The Kingston Trio was hugely popular at the time, and I used to sing many of their songs, among which was “Strange Day.” It had a line about bleached straws. Paula colored her hair then, and whenever I sang the song, I’d stare at her.
She also came back to my house for our session break. My parents ‘adopted’ her, and she and I did our laundry, cooled down for twenty-four hours, and grew into great friends.
On completion of the CIT program, we stayed in touch, and when she graduated college and got a job, she began coming up to St. Louis over the Martin Luther King, Jr long weekend. She made that trip year after year, and continued the journey even when I got my own house. It was nice to know she liked visiting me and hadn’t come for my mom’s cooking.
I visited her in Arkansas, too, though not faithfully or as often as she came north. But no matter where we were, it somehow developed that we’d always eat some Mexican dish sometime during our visit. We had a lot of burritos, and I made a tamale pie. I eventually enlarged my repertoire to include tacos, which seemed to be a staple of lunch with my other friends who formed our folk singing group, The Six Pack.
I looked forward to Paula’s January visits not only because we had a good time singing camp and 1960s folk songs, playing guitars and watching old movies, but also because I could cook for her. Mexican is always on the menu, even now, but I’ve been branching out to include Italian. What a bold step.
The last half dozen or so times she’s come here I’ve taken to hiding candy in her bedroom and the adjacent rooms. I place a note on her bed, telling her the total pieces I’ve hidden and giving her one piece so she knows what she’s looking for. It’s always something in individual wrapped pieces, and part of the candy piece must be in plain sight—nothing behind, under or hidden. Kind of like the Jungle breakfast items of my youth. The time she came up to view the total solar eclipse in 2017 the candies were dark chocolate disks. I thought that a very clever choice and very fitting to the occasion.
In 2014 we celebrated our fifty years of friendship. That’s longer than a lot of marriages survive. I made several large posters on which I’d printed some of our sayings. I hung them up around the house. To commemorate our meeting at camp Cedarledge, I had menus at each of our meals. I tried to serve things that we had on camping trips, but when I couldn’t think of anything, I invented a name. Of course we had s’mores for dessert one time during our celebration. We roasted our marshmallows over a candle flame in the den.
Several years ago she and I began watching “Svengoolie” together. (In case you’re not aware of “Svengoolie,” it’s a television program that features older ‘horror’ movies. It’s hosted by a man, Svengoolie, dressed up in a crazy-looking top hat, black suit, and funny makeup. The movies aren’t really horror in nature. They’re more humorous. Things like Abbott and Costello Go to Mars, or The Giant Claw, or the 1930s Frankenstein movies.) Anyway, Paula still lives in Arkansas and I still live in the St. Louis area. Now, that would’ve stopped us watching television at the same time, if we’d done this when we met in the mid 1960s. But thanks to the invention of smart phones and texting, we can both tune in to the program (luckily it’s on at the same time and on the same day in both of the television markets). We text back and forth throughout the program’s two hours. It’s a constant exchange—about an actress’ dress, about the amount of fog swirling around, what will happen next, our guess as to the bad guy’s identity or how the movie will end… We like the old movies the best, those put out by Universal in the 1930s and 1940s, when Dracula and Frankenstein’s monster and the mummy roamed around. Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney Jr, Otto Kruger and Boris Karloff create havoc, and in so doing give Paula and me a great deal of fun. The movies are atmospheric, which kind of proves that you don’t have to splash blood around to make the story creepy.
This recipe is a favorite with Paula, The Six Pack, and me. It’s probably not authentic Mexican cuisine, but it’s still good.
* * *
Jo
yce’s Tamale Pie
Filling:
1 lb ground beef
½ tsp onion salt
1 15-oz can corn
1 15-oz can cream style corn
1 15-oz can tomatoes
1 tbsp chili powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp garlic salt
* * *
Crust:
1 cup yellow cornmeal
½ tsp chili powder
1 tsp salt
1 can undiluted evaporated milk
¾ cup water
* * *
Preheat oven to 375ºF.
To make the filling: In a large skillet, brown the ground beef, then drain off the fat.
To the beef, add the remainder of the filling ingredients. Simmer while making the cornmeal crust.
Grease a casserole dish. Set aside.
To make crust: In a 2-qt saucepan, mix the cornmeal, chili powder and salt. Gradually add the evaporated milk and water. Stir to mix and cook over low heat, stirring constantly until it is thick.
Spoon the meat filling into the casserole. Top with spoonsful of the crust. Don’t smooth together, leave them as ‘hilly’ clumps of batter.
Bake for 40-45 minutes at 375ºF or until the cornmeal crust is golden brown in parts.
Chapter 10
How ‘Bout a Steel Gauntlet Next Time?
The year following the completion of my counselor-in-training course I took a summer job as a unit leader at a YWCA camp. Not only was I in charge of the group of girls, but also I inadvertently put my life in jeopardy.
Before I relate my seasonal job tale, you need to know that my sister had a pet skunk. He was confined to the kitchen and family room of our home. He was ‘de-skunked’, and a fairly docile fellow. We’d hear his claws clicking on the tile floors as he sauntered around. He had a bed in the corner of the family room and joined us for dinner. By which I mean he walked around and beneath the table in hope of handouts from our evening meals.
For several years, my mom made a ground beef/cottage cheese/noodle casserole that the skunk dearly loved. When he’d get a spoonful of it, he’d rub the food between his front paws. I never figured out why he did that, but I’m not a skunk expert.
Back to camp.
One cheery summer day a few girls and I took a walk through the woods. It was a sort of nature hike. I was pointing out various plants and birds, and how the moss grew thicker on the north sides of trees, when I came to an abrupt halt. A skunk was several yards ahead of us, pulling himself over the ground, dragging his hind legs.
It looked to me as though he had a broken back. Why else wouldn’t he be able to use his back legs? Emotional bonding with my sister’s skunk washed over me. I felt sorry for this little wild creature. I wanted him to be healed. I wanted to take him into town to the vet. I picked him up and we walked to the camp director’s cottage.
I stayed outside, holding the skunk, petting him. His hind legs were draped over my arm. He seemed content and happy that I was stroking him. Two of the girls went inside the cottage and told the director about the skunk and asked if he’d drive me and the skunk to the vet.
I could hear the verbal explosion from where I stood outside. “Tell her to put that skunk down. It might bite her!” The girls rushed out and informed me I should let the skunk go. I gave the skunk one last pat and set him on the ground.
That’s when he bit me.
He didn’t draw blood, but he clamped his teeth onto the side of my thumb, waggled his head from side to side as if to get a real good mouthful, and in so doing broke the skin. I yelled and released him. Without so much as a backwards glance, he dragged himself toward the woods.
I left it at that, not wanting to tell the camp director that his prophecy had come true and the skunk had bitten me.
A few days later I noticed the area around the bite site was swollen and a reddish line trailed toward my wrist. I told a friend about the skunk episode and the swelling. She was also a counselor at the camp, and she told the director about the situation. Minutes later I was in the director’s car and we were driving into town to see a doctor.
Somewhat later, back at camp, I packed my clothes, guitar and other items, bid goodbye to everyone, and left. I was home an hour later.
The next day I learned from my friend that Missouri State Troopers had arrived at camp hours after the skunk bite episode. They’d combed the woods, found the skunk, and flew its head to a lab in Jefferson City (our state capital), where its brain was examined under a microscope. Verdict? The animal was rabid.
Because the bite site was located below my neck I went through only two weeks of shots. (If I’d been bitten on the neck or face, I would’ve received three weeks of shots.) Back then, the rabies serum was injected subcutaneously. In the stomach. The actual puncture sites varied across this vast abdominal area. Shot one somewhere on the left half; shot two on the right side; shot three on the left side but not too near the first injection; shot four back on the right half but away from the second and third jabs… They did that because the shots caused the injection locations to swell. It wasn’t long before my stomach sported elongated bulges like pink mole runs. Toward the last few shots it was difficult to find a bit of smooth, unmarred skin for the day’s fun.
The injections hurt. I won’t lie. You run a syringe needle horizontally beneath the top layer or two of your skin and see how good it feels.
It was imperative these shots were taken daily. You couldn’t miss a day, so on Sundays when the doctor’s office was closed, mom gave me the shots. I was lucky with that because my mom was a lab tech at a hospital hematology department. She had a way with syringes.
Soon after the serum doses began, I developed an allergic reaction to it. I got a shot to alleviate the hives I’d developed. Fun. Hives and rabies injections.
My mom told me years later that the only thing these injections could do was to prevent rabies—hopefully. And despite the daily shots, I still could’ve died any time within a year. So she watched for telltale symptoms during that span. Once contracted, there’s no cure for the disease. Luckily, I’m still walking around.
Today, as with many things, the rabies serum injections can be taken less frequently than in the 1970s. It’s something like on days three, seven and fourteen, if I remember correctly. And they’re merely given in the arm, the same as any injection. I know, because a few years ago I was bitten by a raccoon and went through the vaccine injections again…and had a tetanus shot. (No, I didn’t pick up the raccoon. I was putting out food for it when it raced up to me and, in her hunger, lunged for the food, overshot the dish, and bit my hand. Wasn’t my fault.)
The scary thing about rabies, beside the fact that there’s no cure for the disease if you contract it, is that the animal’s infected saliva might be lying on the grass or the leaves of a plant. If you happen to have an open cut and you happen to brush against that plant, the virus could enter your system via the cut.
As much as I love raccoons and skunks and other wild animals, I don’t feed them anymore. In fact, the top rabies carriers are skunks and raccoons. The others topping the list are bats, coyotes and foxes. Coyotes and foxes also populated the subdivision that housed my hungry mother raccoon. To this day I don’t approach or touch a wild animal. Two times tangling with potential rabies is quite enough. I don’t want a third time. That might break the charm.
In honor of my sister’s skunk, which loved this dish, we named it Skunky Casserole. It’s probably not any different from the dozens that currently are online or in cookbooks, but it’s fitting I include it in this chapter. And you don’t have to have a pet skunk to enjoy it.
* * *
Skunky Casserole
2 cups uncooked egg noodles
½ pound lean ground beef
2 tablespoons finely chopped onion
1 8-ounce can tomato sauce
½ teaspoon sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon garlic salt
Da
sh ground pepper
¼ cup cream-style cottage cheese
2 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 tablespoons sour cream
3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
* * *
Preheat oven to 350°F. Cook noodles according to package directions.
While the noodles are cooking, in a large skillet cook beef and onion until the meat is no longer pink. Drain off the fat. Remove pan from heat. Stir in tomato sauce, sugar, salt, garlic salt and pepper.
In a small bowl, combine cottage cheese, cream cheese and sour cream.
Drain the noodles. Put half the noodles into a greased 1-qt. baking dish. Spoon half of the beef mixture over the noodles. Layer with cottage cheese mixture and the remaining noodles. Top with the remaining beef mixture, then sprinkle with the Parmesan cheese.
Cover and bake 20-25 minutes or until the casserole is heated through.
Chapter 11
Food Fight
People meet in many different ways: school, clubs, playing sports. I met five great gals during a food fight.
For a few summers, I was one of the Waterfront staff at a Girl Scout camp, Camp Fiddlecreek. Troops came and went, staying for a week while they cooked, hiked, swam and did other camp things. We members of the staff were there the entire summer.
The staff consisted of the camp director, the nurse, the cook for us staffers, the director of Waterfront, a dozen or so senior Girl Scouts, and me. Cooky, our cook (what other camp name would she have?) made delicious meals, but for some reason during several weeks we had a plethora of food.
The food wasn’t the result of poor grocery shopping. It came as gifts.
Tea In a Tin Cup Page 5