Weekend Update January 13, 2014

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. 

Dr. Seuss

I love Dr. Seuss. Really. Lines from his books, lodged in the brain after years of reading them aloud, still give me comfort and courage. Except.  Except here's a thing about making resolutions, choosing directions and  steering new courses. You write them down on ruled lines and plot them directly from point A to point B but after not very much time you realize that resolutions are like spaghetti- they start out straight and smooth and simple, but dunk them in hot water,

and they get a little tangley.

Take, as a teensy microcosmic example, this little blog. Last week, my mind was occupied with the phenomenon of resolution rebound. That is, the thing that happens when you try to shape your life around a negative

Surely you've seen it- someone spends the energies of her most energetic years determined to NOT, NEVER, NO WAY be like her mother, and one day she calls you to laugh or cry over the thing you already knew-

she is an awful lot like her mother.
Of course, if  her mom has loads of style,
this is may not be a horrifying revelation.
(I mean, pink with red hair in
the 50's! What a woman!)

Last week, the thought occurred that resolves get results when they're shaped around what you love. Which is not as easy as it sounds.

Because the world is filled with lots and lots of things to love.   What if, for instance, you love the things that a fit and healthy body can do for you,

but you never met a cookie you couldn't fall
in love with?

  Or, say you resolve to up the healthy eating around here with a positive plan for Meatless Mondays and  Fishy Fridays, but then things you love ever so much more than a plan come to town?

You flex the plan,
and direct yourself toward
the things you love best of all.

 Early in the week, dlife Cabbage Soup went off without a hitch,

super easy, super tasty

 Two notes:  1) My friend Ester was right- throwing a sliced  low fat sausage into this soup makes it even better.

2) The raisins! Weird as it seems, don't leave them out- they add a wonderful mellow sweetness to the soup, and plump up and sink out of sight to the bottom of the pot. Which is nice. Because, as it turns out, though raisins may make this soup taste good, they are even more unattractive waterlogged and bloated

than they are when they're
all shrively.

 Then the  arrival of our son and his girlfriend took the weekend in a happily different direction.  Suddenly a plain plank of baked salmon wasn't nearly fun enough, so our first fishy Friday slipped off the hook. But  this absolutely fantastic coconut soup and this great Pad Thai recipe came together and turned Fishy Friday into Thaiday Friday. 

Next came a night of plowing through the fridge for leftovers- let's call it Salvage Saturday.

Which meant no leftover chicken or fish for today.

So our fish tacos were made, for the first time ever, with firstover fish- turning today into a great Salmon Sunday!

What a great recipe! Here are the chunks of (very cheap frozen) salmon in a zip bag with cumin and chili powder:

And in the pan, after a very short (about 6 minutes) sear in a hot pan:

And on a tortilla with the last of my Mother's East Texas Cabbage, avocados, jack cheese and Rodrigo sauce

Upside: One week into the new year, and I have not yet totally busted the let's-have-fish-once-a-week plan.

Downside: These tacos were so good that tacos with leftover fish will from now on and forever seem not quite as good.

Meh.  As the downside of this week's foodventures, I can live with that.

I hope the downsides of your week are easy to live with-

And I hope that what you need more of

 lies within easy reach and

what you need less of 

falls away gently.

I hope all the things you wish for 

surrender graciously to all the things you love best.

And that the path 

down which your loves lead you

is full of happy adventure.