I’m collecting recipes that are easy and affordable for today’s times.  Here’s one of my grandmother’s Depression-era recipes.  She called it Poor Man’s Bread.

1 Cup flour
1 Teaspoon baking soda
Water

Stir in enough water to make a batter and pour into a greased skillet.  (Grandma said to use a cast iron skillet.)  Fry until brown on each side like a pancake.  Tastes great with homemade butter and jam.

Homemade butter?  Sure, Grandma had cows.  I just have Scarlett and Wilson.  Now about that chokecherry jam …

It’s a day’s work moving me from my soft and pillowed spot on the couch to somewhere else … especially when that somewhere is away from the house. Before … when we had only Lily the Cat and we didn’t have Scarlett the Dog and Wilson the Other Dog, and Before, when I had two good legs and one good head, and then, Really Long Before, when we were young and portable … moving from here to there was really very simple.

We just stood up and moved.

Now, we’re a full Cecil B. DeMille production, complete with lead actors and a cast of thousands. The script is always fluid and marred by missing pages and writers on strike. We’re a Keystone Cops flurry of nonsense and all we need is a piano player to embellish our silent movie comedy.

Going somewhere starts early morning with a one-legged Pat Morita crane pose over the kitchen sink to wash my hair and other reachable body parts. Then it’s a literal hop, hop, hop through the process of dressing, hair, makeup and, most likely, a wardrobe change somewhere in the midst of it all, simply because I’m such a raging diva.

We’re an uncut movie of scenes; coaxing Wilson into his crate, transferring me to a wheelchair, bump, bump out the door and down one step, into the car (the one with the wide door), then back into the house for a frantic search for a forgotten book, a left-behind purse, Oh, oh, my shoe. Get my shoe, please. And my pen. Do I have my pen?

Close the door, start the car.

Down the street 200 yards, then a U-turn and back up the driveway. Poor Dan. I thought you went. Sorry, I forgot. We truly are a drama of entertainment. Thank God the shooting of this movie’s halfway done and in the can.

Popcorn, anyone?

P.S.  Thanks, Fotosearch.com, for the really nice stock photo.

This is a DELICIOUS day.  Saturday.  From my vantage point, I can look out onto our small inset patio.  It’s along the narrow side of our back yard and is ringed with Queen Palms, an Ocotillo with its little ovate leaves swaying in a rare breeze, iridescent flowers set atop the arms of a needle-sharp cactus.  The neighbor’s tree hangs over the side fence like it wants to start a conversation.  I almost feel obliged.  A little society of bunnies congregate across the street to breakfast on soft leaves and tender flowers.  A single, skinny Coyote trots along the street, hoping for an easy meal of bunny or, perhaps, a more substantial offering of yard cat or small Bichon Frise.  The sight of a hunting Coyote tracking down a suburban street is startling.  But then, this is the desert and it’s nice of the Saguaros and snakes to accommodate us.  Dan has made coffee and we sit quietly, sipping and sharing a newspaper, commenting now and then.  Shaking our heads.  Laughing, even.

I love Saturdays.

Saturday is school day for Wilson; of course, he thumps his tail wildly at the prospect of any car ride.  Scarlett is happy to have a rest from the constant onslaught of Wilson’s adolescent pranks.  Dan’s looking forward to a couple hours of golf this afternoon.  All is well.

It’s Saturday.

I move across the day like a kite in a breeze — running, lifting, flying.  Figuratively, at least.  A woman with a broken leg can’t walk, much less launch into the sky.  It’ll be several Saturdays before I’m well again.  Nevertheless, it feels like I’m skipping through the day; a book here, a movie there.  Here a scrumptious bowl of soup, there a delectable glass of wine.  Now a dwindling sun.

Ah, Saturday.

I’ve gotten lots of lovely emails congratulating me on my HuffingtonPost publication of an opinion piece.  Thank you, everyone.  It seems odd to be on the fringe of things.  Neither in nor out, but sort of like some creepy cyber lurker.  Other than my dear little Bloggybirdery home pack, friendships are conducted via email, blog responses and mail that comes addressed to Dear Occupant.

But like some Waldenesque solitude, it’s not so bad.  Really, it’s not.  Unlike so very many, I at least know there will be an end date to this forced confinement.  I’m not exactly purifying or sanctifying my heart during this time of quiet, but then again, I’m not exactly wilting either.  If nothing else, there’s plenty of time to think.  To write.  To be who I am, without apology, without excuse.  Without makeup.

It’s not so bad to be nearly through this particular Saturday.

It means I’m one day closer to driving myself to my favorite latte joint, ordering up and sitting down to spend time in the company of strangers.  I’m still a long way off, but the breeze is back and my mind is once again flying like a kite toward that first day back out in the world.

I think it should be a Saturday, don’t you?

The thing no one tells you about being on the injured list is that the television remote is REALLY not your friend.  Especially if you’re a news junkie like me and the news these days causes the “F” word to spill from your pristine lips faster than a glass of grape juice spills in the hands of a toddler in the middle of your white-carpeted living room.

The answer?  Turn off the f@&#(ng television.  See what I mean about my poor disintegrating language?  I’m a disgrace.

But after one giant killer Gin and Tonic and the latest copy of Southern Living magazine (I LOVE Southern Living magazine — Hi Subscription folks), I’m back to my normal, sweet, genteel state.  A half hour with my beloved magazine and I can once more utter the word, Southern, with the best drawl ever drug across a fan-fluttering, porch-sitting woman’s lips.  And I’m not even from the South.  Never been there.  Closest I’ve come is a meal one time at a Po’ Folks restaurant in Sacramento.

Nevertheless, I love the style.  I love the recipes.  I love … I love.  I should have been an alligator-wrestling, kudzu-chopping, vowel-elongating Southern woman.  But alas, I live in the desert with scorpions, rattlesnakes and bunny-eating coyotes.  It’s mid-September and still over a hundred degrees here!  What a waste of a perfectly good woman.

I need a porch where I can cool my dear broken leg in a bayou-scented breeze.  I need a plate of grits and greens to soothe my misplaced manners.  I need a Mint Julep with a Sweet Tea chaser.

Oh Lordy, I need my f@&#(ng fan.

We’ve all settled down here in our humble Bloggybirdery after yesterday’s big excitement.  This little writer can only tap out a one-legged Happy Dance for so long.  So it’s now back to my spot on the couch, screaming at today’s latest economic meltdown news on the television and wishing I could get to that nice box of wine in the garage refrigerator.  Did I mention it’s only 10:00 a.m.?

Yeah, we’re pretty much back to normal today.  Dan’s back to practicing his putting.  Wilson’s back to trotting through the house with a contraband sock hanging from the side of his mouth, laughing NEENER, NEENER at me because I can’t give chase.  Scarlett is back to snoozing under the table.  And I’m back to writing about how we ended up with Br’er Rabbit tricksters begging us to PLEASE not throw them into their familiar briar patch of economic foolery.  The Br’er Rabbit stories may have originated in Cherokee myth, but today’s problems are certainly real.  Writing at least keeps me quiet for whole minutes at a time.

Dan:  What’cha doing?  You’re so quiet.

Me:  Nothing.  I didn’t do anything.  Why are you asking?

Dan:  Because you look furtive.

Me:  Don’t be using big words on me, mister.  Don’t you know there are kids out there working hard to pay for college and you’re using all their big words before they even get there?

Dan:  Okay, you look … um, surreptitious.

Me:  Big word.  BIG.  WORD.

Dan:  You’re changing the subject.

Me:  Yup.  Yup.  And I’m pretty good at it, huh?  Hey, where you going?  Don’t you want to watch me looking guilty some more?

Dan:  Nope.  Nope.

Gotta go.  I think I hear Dan firing up the tar pot.  Oh PLEASE don’t toss me in that Briar Patch!

P.S.  I just listened to The Donald on television telling folks that he recently bought a $$$hundred million-something piece of property and he urges everyone to do the same.  Thanks, The Donald.  As soon as we scrape together enough couch change to fill up the old gas tank, we’ll get right on that.

I’ve learned that one can actually be flat down on a couch, one leg stuck in the air … and still perform The Happy Dance!

Long before becoming your humble bloggy bird here at DancingBirds.com, I spent over ten years working directly with homeless and at-risk individuals.  I founded and continue to serve as Executive Director of HASPA, the Homeless Advocates and Service Providers Association, Inc. This work provides a nonprofit platform for education and support for those who furnish specific homeless service and advocacy.

Last week I submitted an article to HuffingtonPost.com for their OffTheBus section.  I’m humbled that this notable and prestigious organization decided to publish my article entitled, Hurricane Homelessness.  You can see it here.  Of course the writing and opinion is slanted to favor those dear street-bound friends I gathered over the years.  They were always like little flightless chicks who gave me a much larger measure of love than I deserved.

The piece is political in nature, of course, but regardless one’s persuasions of thought, I hope you’ll find a moment to check it out and make a comment.  Homelessness is a tremendously complicated problem that needs more than simple or dismissive notions.  Nevertheless, I tossed out a slender thread of conversation that I hope you’ll join.  It’s HERE!

Tomorrow it’s back to the millstone, but today deserves a huzzah for all who labor under the weight of words and ideas with grand hopes of finding a path toward publication.  Keep writing, everyone.  Keep writing!

After laying low the past couple of days, I’m back this morning balancing a laptop on my chest while keeping my left leg in the air and my heart in my throat.  Literal and financial hurricanes are kind of making a mess of things.  Be safe everyone.  Me?  I’m just trying not to accidentally give myself a Google mammogram in the midst of all this Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day stuff.  Whoo boy!  So many Huffalumps are strapped into their Golden Parachutes, flying like kites on a windy day.

They’re black they’re brown they’re up their down
They’re in they’re out they’re all about
They’re far they’re near they’re gone they’re here
They’re quick and slick and insincere
Beware Beware Be a very wary bear.

But Hey!  Happy first day of Fall, Internet.  We’re still triple digit temperatures down here in the Valley of the Sun.  Still wearing our shorts and sun tops and flip flops.  Still slathering on our SPF 30s, still swilling anything wet to keep the dust in our throats tamped down.  We’re still doing our business in the early mornings before it gets hot.  We don’t really cool down here until after Halloween.  I noticed on television over the weekend that folks across the country are now wearing long sleeves and light jackets across the country.

They’re green they’re blue they’re pink they’re white
They’re round they’re square they’re a terrible sight
They tie themselves in horrible knots
They come in stripes or polka-dots
Beware Beware Be a very wary bear

Dan filled up the car over the weekend.  We have two old thrashers in the garage, but they’re paid for and don’t guzzle as much oil as some of those big lumbering things that travel our Phoenix streets.  We’re happy about that.  These old gals get us around nicely.  We’re glad that gas is down a few cents a gallon for the day, but wonder how long that will hold.  It was an interesting factoid to see that we have one more car than the Obamas, but we’re down eleven cars from catching up to the McCains.

They’re extra-ordinary so better be wary
Because they come in every shape and size
– size – size – size

If honey’s what you covet you’ll find that they love it
Because they guzzle up the things you prize

They’re black they’re brown they’re up their down
They’re in they’re out they’re all about
They’re far they’re near they’re gone they’re here
They’re quick and slick and insincere
Beware Beware Beware Beware Beware …

Who’d have thought in 1926 that A. A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh would be such a prescient figure?

Dan brought home flowers for me yesterday.  “Look what I found in the street,” he said all winking and smiling and waving them like a blessing over me as I struggled to sit up from my couch-o-torture.  I LOVE flowers!  But I love this man more than any flower ever grown.  All this week, we’ve watched as America struggles under its Chicken Little falling sky, yet this lovely man makes certain I have flowers to cheer up our living room, and thus, my sorrowful, broken leg.

Last night we decided to turn off the torturous news to instead watch some uplifting blood and guts, murder and mayhem movie guaranteed to color anyone’s nightmares redder than our current bloody financial meltdown.  Halfway through the movie, Dan slid from the couch to lie on the floor, sandwiched between Scarlett and Wilson.

There we were, our little pack of creatures.  I maintained the high vantage point like I was looking out for storm clouds and cheetahs.  The rest of the pack stretched out, taking comfort on our small savanna of carpet, colored beige like an arid grassland.  Wilson is so long in the body now, all legs and big feet; nothing quiet around him when he’s awake.  Scarlett is long too, but manages to fold her legs under her as if she might need to spring up at any moment.

Yes, there we were, watching No Country For Old Men, swarthy actors chasing each other across our little screen, guns screaming through the television, dogs snoozing through it all … and yet, these amazingly tranquil flowers simply looked on from their place on the table.

For over two hours, we were simply stretched out in the comfort of each other.  Today it’s back to the messiness of this stupid economy … or the economy, stupid.  However you look at it, it’s a mess.  But a surprise bouquet of flowers, one damned good husband and two really good dogs somehow makes it all better. I think I can ride this couch one more day.

Be well everyone. Be well.

Yesterday I got a lovely get well card from my big sister.  She’s the one who claimed me as her very own baby doll, taking me from our mother’s arms and had to be bribed with candy before she’d give me back.  She’s the one who, when I was sick with Rheumatic Fever and totally missing Christmas, stood in the snow outside my bedroom window telling me her name was “Spunky” and was my own personal Santa’s Elf.  She’s the one who saved me from drowning when the ocean came crashing into an Oregon coast cave we had been playing in.  She’s the one who sat at the kitchen table with me and a math book while I thrashed and cried, I DON’T GET IT!  She’s the one who helped me dress for my first teenage date and gave me my Something Blue for my wedding.  She’s the one who’s been my best friend, my cheering fan, my beautiful big sister.

Now on the occasion of my broken leg, she’s the one who sends me this … this wee Irish sentiment … causing me to spit coffee through my nose and laugh until I finally had a rollicking good cry over my confinement.

May those who love us, love us,
And those who don’t, may God turn their hearts.
And if God can’t turn their hearts,
May He turn their ankles that we may know them
By their LIMPING.

Thanks, Sis.

One of my favorite paintings is Vincent Van Gogh’s Starry Night.  His magnum opus, this brilliant painting depicts the view outside his sanitarium room window at night.  Oddly, a woman stuck on her living room couch with her leg stuck in the air and her own window’s view of nights passing overhead has its own sanitarium moments.

I received a cast change today.  They do fun things in the cast room.  You can get your favorite team colors.  (Rah! Rah!)   Candy stripes.  Holiday themes.  Hot Pink.  Bright purple.  Somber dark or boring white or just about any rainbow color combination you’d want.  The guys in the cast room (Brian and Brian – no I’m not making this up) are artists.  I guess they figure if you’re going to sit around for weeks on end staring at an insult to your body, you might as well have fun with it.  In my case, every two weeks I get to belly up to the cast bar and order up the concoction du jur … or just stick with the usual.

Today I told Brian (No, not that Brian … the OTHER Brian) to surprise me.  He decided on deep blue.  At first I thought it would be a sorrowful bottom-of-the-ocean color, but as he started to wrap my leg, Don McLean’s haunting song, Vincent, began to float through my head.  Starry, starry night sang through my mind.

Starry, starry night.
Paint your palette blue and grey.
Look out on a summer’s day,
With eyes that know the darkness in my soul.

Hey, I said.  Can I have silver sparkles?

Ooooo.  My leg looks like Van Gogh got at it, laying down on his canvas a blue and silvery night just ripe for whirling stars over the village of Saint-Rémy.  Poor, sad one-eared Vincent.

Those of us in the broken leg crowd exist in two-week segments.  Every two weeks another evaluation.  Every two weeks another new cast.  I’m allowed to get up off the couch a little bit now.  I’m still six weeks from touching foot to floor and gingerly shifting my weight onto what I’m sure will be a very frightened left leg.  But every day is a day closer to mobility, even if that first step is a total Mother.  I’m told I won’t like it much.  Swell.  Then there will be weeks of physical therapy.  Months perhaps.  Great.  I’m told my leg will be a living barometer and I’ll know when rain is coming long before the first splash.  Whoopie.  I’m told I’ll set off security alarms.  Whee! I’m told I won’t.  I feel so much better now.  I’m told to keep a copy of my X-Ray and be prepared to model my very long scar just in case.  I’m told.  I’m told.

Thanks Vincent.