Nothing happened outside today. Nothing. It was simply grey all day with a light breeze. But then this evening, right about the time I met Amy on Zoom, the wind kicked up. There was a brief spell where the sun came out and it blew about 30 mph for an hour, and that was the extent of the windstorm here. I wonder what it did elsewhere. Just in the past hour it’s started to rain.

Since we were cooking on Cinco de Mayo we decided to celebrate our Mexican friends; though we chose an unconventional enchilada, substituting a cauliflower-feta mixture for meat.

The sauce involved onion, garlic, oregano, and tomatoes, so I simplified by opening a jar of organic marinara and supplementing garlic and oregano. It also called for five dried Ancho chiles, but I only had Guajillo. Amy looked up heat comparison: 500-1000 SHU for Ancho, 2500-5000 for Guajillo (you can compare your chiles here). I used just one for equivalent heat, but it wasn’t enough so I added two more, which topped my pepper tolerance; next time, just two Guajillos.

All it all it was a restful day and a fine evening. I’m grateful for exercising with my cousin over the phone, having a kitchen to clean in order to make another fun mess in it, for food in the house, for hot running water, for the first Broadtail Hummingbird of the season, for rain from the heavens, and for a reprieve from the planetary winds. I’m always grateful for Zoom Cooking with Amy: for our easy rapport and our fifty-two year friendship, for our shared history and things we talk about and things we don’t need to say, for someone who’s known and loved me since I was twelve.

Tonight we decided I need to survey my readers. When my brother and I were little, our mother tucked us in with a prayer. Most of you know how it begins: “Now I lay me down to sleep/I pray the Lord my soul to keep…” It goes on, “If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.” My dear mother thought that was grim/scary/horrible, and so she changed the last two lines. I was grateful to speak with my brother this past week, and finally remembered to ask him if he remembered, and he laughed at the thought that he might. I was grateful to hear his laugh. Amy only said the first two lines as a child. I guess her mother thought the same as mine about the last two. We both remember that afterward we “god blessed” a list of names. And while we were talking about it, the third line came to me. I’m pretty sure mom said, “And in the morning when I wake…”

But I cannot yet recall the final line! So the survey is, what do you think it was? Please offer your suggestions in the comments. Sweet dreams.