Death and Facebook

Facebook reminds me today that it is my niece Sara's birthday. I don't remember off the top of my head the year she was born or the year she died. But like her presence on Facebook that remains, she is present in my life and in my mind. Most of all I remember her smile - a little quirky, like she always knew something no one else did.

We've been friends over a lifetime with an artist from the Indiana Dunes.  His son has been posting updates on his recent illness and his death this morning. It's been years since we spent time together, or even wrote. And yet we still consider him a friend. We mourn his passing and celebrate his life. We remember the long walks on the National Lakeshore, sitting in his living room playing music and laughing, watching him run his train set in the room dedicated to that narrow gauge Rocky Mountain railroad. His smile is etched in our memories: it always made you imagine you were part of something magical.

When I scroll over my list of friends on Facebook I see friends with whom we no longer have physical contact, friends we only know through Facebook, friends whose lives have diverged so far from ours as to have only marginal connections, and old friends who have passed in death, but whose names still appear. There is a feature on Facebook where you can actually turn a page into a memorial page, acknowledging that the person behind that profile is no longer living on this earth. Unless a profile is made into a memorial page, Facebook doesn't know that the person has passed. We do. The smile that their mention with an anniversary of some event brings to us is accompanied by a wistful feeling of how much we miss their immediate presence.

"But I always thought I'd see you sometime again ...." rings its truth to our daily lives. When you reach the age that most of the people you knew in your youth are no longer physically present on earth you may also realize that each encounter with a friend may be your last encounter with that friend. It's always true, even when you are young and immortal. The realization of that truth is what makes it so hard to said goodbye to children and grandchildren when visits are few and far between. A Facebook presence eases the pain of saying goodbye, but it can also serve as an excuse for abbreviating physical presence, and it is no substitute for one to one sharing of feeling - whether through a hug, laughter, tears, or a held hand.

The lesson in this trying time of COVID 19, where physical closeness is restricted, is that we need to treasure and savor those moments we are given, and not to fear letting the people around us who give us joy to know how much we appreciate that gift - and that it is a gift. And later, on facebook, or email, or a real letter, remind them of how much we value their friendship, their help, or merely their presence. 

It has often been said that the present is a gift. I am grateful for the memories of shared times, but I suspect that I am the only one who knows how much those times meant to me. I resolve to be better about saying "You make a difference for me. You make the world a better place." Because you do. Especially when you smile.

Happy Birthday, Sara Katharine Hoyt. RIP Dale Fleming.

   

Buckwheat sweet potato pancakes

Tonight's project was pancakes. So Sweet Potato pancakes it was.  They came out so well I had to post them to facebook and now I want to remember the recipe (more or less). So I took one rather large sweet potato and diced it up small. Cooked it until it was tender and allowed it to cool.  Then put it in the blender with two eggs, maybe a half cup of half and half, a couple tablespoons of sorghum and blended it together. Then added a half cup of buckwheat flour and a half cup of Bob's Mill one to one gluten free flour, a half teaspoon of salt and 2 teaspoons of baking powder. Blended it all together to make a nice pancake dough. Fried the pancakes at medium low temperature skillet in coconut oil.

I served them with a sauce of fried apples, sausage, butter and maple syrup.  

More about scones

Our pastor, Theda McBryde (Bethlehem Presbyterian Church), has asked for my scone recipe. If you're looking for a basic scone recipe you can go to my blog About Scones. And then come back here for the modifications!!

My recipes evolve over time. Generally speaking, I find a recipe I like and use it until it seems second nature. Then I basically use it, but I change it to accommodate the ingredients I have on hand, or some particular flavor I'm craving. So, what I'm saying is that my recipes are not firm ... they are more like guidelines. 

When I started using gluten free flour the scones came out pretty crumbly.  (Sometimes they still do!) I found the recipe for biscuits on the Bob's Mill 1 to 1 gluten free flour and tried that for scones. It worked well enough I have gone to using it as my guideline. (Now I can't find it.) So, basic ingredients:

2 1/2 c. flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 stick butter
2 eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup sugar (optional)

Work the butter into the dry ingredients until it resembles cornmeal. To facilitate this process cut the butter in to 1/4" cubes before added it to the dry ingredients. You can also use frozen butter and grate it into the flour.

Thoroughly combine the eggs, buttermilk, and sugar. Add to the dry ingredients and mix. You can use your hands for this, but it will be sticky and you'll need to get it off your hands for the next step.

The Bob's Mill recipe gives a complicated method of using plastic wrap to handle the dough. My method follows:

Flour your hand so you can get half the dough in sort of a clump.

Transfer to a floured board and knead it a bit but not too much. Shape it into a circle about an inch thick. Using a floured knife, cut it into sixths or eighths, transfer to un-greased cookie sheet. Do the same with the remaining dough. Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.

I use sorghum instead of sugar. I use oat flour, buckwheat flour, or sorghum flour - usually half and half with the 1 to 1 flour. Different flours result in different flavor and texture. Sometimes I use sweet cream or half and half instead of buttermilk since I don't always have buttermilk. Then I would leave out the baking soda, and maybe use a bit more baking powder.  I think you could use applesauce instead of eggs and still get a nice scone.

I'm not precise with my measuring, and sometimes I need to add more flour or more liquid.