Ian

Pandemic Journal, Entry 4: Mrs. Markham’s Pandemic Dining Journal

Sunday

Sunday family dinner is a tradition at the Markham house and without fail Hubby, our twelve year old son Karl and three year old daughter Honey join hands around the dinner table, lift our voices in prayer, and enjoy the bounty the lord has given us. Today’s meal was London broil seasoned with my special garlic powder mix, a side salad with my extra special ingredient (rhymes with cottage cheese!) and baked potatoes, followed by my adoptive mother’s famous carrot cake. Simply scrumptious!

Monday

The start of each work week calls for a special dinner, unless of course there’s no work – but still! My Spaghetti al Markham is always the talk of the church carry-in, and my family loves it just as much when I serve it at home! Hubby says the vodka in the sauce is what makes it but please don’t tell my church family!

Tuesday

Inspired by six back-to-back episodes of Guys Grocery Games, I challenged myself to make dinner using ingredients selected by Karl and Honey. I won’t humble brag, as the kids say, but I made a pretty mean dish of rice, corn starch, and rosemary!

Wednesday

Theme dinners are always fun! Tonight’s was “Cabbage, bitches!” It’s always a good idea to experience new things, and Cabbage Three Ways was a most unexpected experience for everyone. Best of all, there were plenty of leftovers after the entire family could only eat a single (small!) helping. 

Thursday

Imagination is the most powerful thing we can possess. “Karl?” He looked up from poking the cat with a stick. “If you were on death row and ordered a last meal, what would you imagine it would be?”

“A cowboy ribeye medium rare, two large BK fries, and a whole watermelon,” he answered, as if he’d been thinking about my question for days.

“Well Karl, imagine you’re in a Texas prison,” I replied, serving him a single saltine topped with (Dukes!) mayonnaise. 

Friday–Date Night!

Without fail, during our five years of wedded bliss, Hubby and I have dedicated Friday dinner just to us so that we can stoke the romantic fires, if you know what I mean! I spiced up this date night by tossing the car keys and twenty bucks to Karl. “Get you and Honey something to eat. No peanuts, no shellfish. You know Honey’s deathly allergic. I’m not kidding.”

I know what my man needs, and that was some “me time” in the basement, watching a rerun of the 2003 Bills/Patriots game, with the company of that half gallon of Stoly he keeps for those days that he feels extra sad. 

I also know the importance of self care, and that meant a bottle of Kim Crawford Pinot Noir and a half-gallon of Rocky Road, while I sobbed quietly where nobody could hear. 

Saturday

Someone said that breakfast is the most important meal of the day because if you’re not home in time for it you’re in a lot of trouble! I guess that meant the entire Family Markham was in hot water, after we spent all night and most of the morning at the ER after Karl fed Honey a (double!) helping of Shrimp Pad Thai! We gathered around Honey and waited with bated breath for her purplish skin to turn its more typical pale custard. 

Awkward mealtime conversations are always to be avoided. You don’t need to be Emily Post to understand that! To spare the hospital staff the unbearably awkward discussion about “no insurance” or “declined credit cards” we waited for the nursing shift change and empowered Honey to discharge herself! 

Sunday

Another week, another blessed gathering of the Family Markham. Sadly, Hubby is not with us for this meal thanks to the untimely intervention of the sheriff, who had questions about our abrupt departure from the ER.

He’s with me in spirit, and I can feel this as I sit in his special lounger in the basement, cuddling his Stoly. He’ll be home soon (I’m certain of it!) and once again the whole famdamnily will gather around the table each night, at least until the last rotting vegetables in our fridge are gone.

Pandemic Journal, Entry 3: Jeff, Interrupted

Jeff Bezos was a genius with the pallet wrapper. His flair for efficiency allowed him to wrap five more pallets per day than his predecessor who had made the job-killing mistake of uttering the word “union” in front of a co-worker who everyone in the warehouse knew had the corporate tip line on speed dial. 

Jeff looked across the vast warehouse at pallet after pallet of toilet paper, and sighed.

Wrapping TP in a Nebraska warehouse hadn’t been his plan when he started The World’s Largest Bookstore (he could no longer say the company’s name without weeping uncontrollably). Sales had been brisk, and the bell that rang in his office every time a book sold soon took on a taunting insistence that slowly drove weaker souls mad. Jeff took note and raised the bell’s volume.

Evenings, he and his ex would stroll through Seattle, and each time they passed an independent bookstore they would smile at one another, murmur “disrupt” and share a chaste kiss.

His growing empire wasn’t profitable, and there were missteps. Jeff’s vanity project, a self-published 20-volume set of his musings on management, translated into Mandarin, flopped and would have caused the company to miss payroll had he not fired 20% of the staff. He wasn’t heartless, though, and gave each departing employee one of the 20 volumes along with a hearty pat on the back.

It was the knives that killed him. Not him. And not literally.

Books weren’t enough, and an evening walk brought him to a kitchen store where he gazed at the knives shimmering in the window display. Involuntarily, he murmured “disrupt.”

The next day a pallet-load of knives appeared at the warehouse. Back in the office, the bell rang incessantly, whispering to Jeff, “Cheap knives, cheap knives. More profit. More profit.”

The screams that echoed across the warehouse were louder, as unpackaged knives unexpectedly flew down the conveyor belts. Fingers littered the floor. As pickers stared at one another in fingerless disbelief, blood soaked packages continued to slide down the conveyors. 

The bell kept ringing. 

Jeff didn’t know it at that moment, but the bell was tolling for his empire. 

Now, a thousand miles away from the investigations, lawsuits and criminal indictments, he wondered, “Is it lunch time already?”

Pandemic Journal, Entry 1: My Hobby

We all need hobbies during this pandemic and mine is holding Fidel Castro-length press conferences in my front yard each evening. If you have friends in the media, please share this with them because all I’m getting are well-meaning comments from my neighbors. Like, “Turn that megaphone off! It’s 10 PM!” Or, “I’m calling the police!”

But I persist. 

My press conferences will continue as long as the pandemic confines us to our homes. Or at least until our governor sees the error of his ways and, brought to his senses by 25 bellowing Christians in full tactical gear, allows us to exercise our constitutional right to walk around Best Buy dreaming of 4K TVs that unemployment have put just out of reach. 

In case you missed last night’s press conference, which ended sooner than planned thanks to “enhanced law enforcement presence,” here’s the transcript:

Me (Muffled): Is this thing on? Did you remember to buy batteries?
Beth: This is a very bad idea. Shut up and come inside. 
Me (at the top of my lungs): Members of the mainstream media, liars and believers in “science”, I have all the power. 

(I hold up a picture of Vince Offer. Google him.)

I am using that power to nominate and confirm ‘Muricas new Economic Vitality Czar. He was not my first choice, but after my people shared with me the unfortunate news that Larry Vaughn is not a real person, I made the snap, perfect decision that Vince is the man to lead us back to Dow 20,000. I can’t wait for him to read about my decision on Twitter and come crawling to join my team. 

You’re welcome. 

I’ll now take questions. But not nasty ones. 

Neighbor: STFU!

Me: My mouth will not STFU until it’s uncovered by N95 masks that don’t exist.

Neighbor: I’m calling the cops. 

Me: Tell them I thank them for their service. 

(Long period of awkward silence. Sound of beer bottle shattering in street. Sirens. Lots of sirens.)

Spiritual Homelessness

Last week I resigned my membership at First Friends, the Quaker meeting Beth and me have attended for almost 19 years.

At monthly meeting Sunday, my resignation was noted and sparked a lengthy, emotional discussion. I won’t go into the reasons I chose to leave. Ministry and Counsel will have to discern whether to share or act on those. But they’re foundational issues about how we live in relationship with one another.

This isn’t something I take lightly. Beth and I raised our son in the meeting, we’re both former clerks of M&C, and we’ve extended our hospitality to countless people who have visited that community. They’re a meeting that does a lot to combat food insecurity and address difficult social issues. I have many friends there. But the last few months our committees and elders have focused on process while failing those of us who are hurting.

Beth’s more patient than me. She’s hanging on.

The phrase “spiritual homelessness” came to mind while I was sitting in my last monthly meeting at First Friends. There’s a distinction between the Quaker idea of church (wherever two or more are gathered in God’s name) and the institutional church. There is a powerful connection between Beth and me, and the many people in that community who love us. We don’t take that for granted; we’ll work to grow those bonds. That idea of church is still intact.

But, standing outside the institutional church after nearly two decades means two things to me: Starting over, and finding a new faith community where I can build new bonds and trust. And, missing the structure and formal bonds that made First Friends a spiritual incubator, where leadings and the support and discernment of friends led to powerful things.