1. I'd have to say that Debbie and I take over the kitchen in bursts. Debbie is on a burst right now. She volunteered without pause to fix hummus, our contribution to tonight's Moroccan family dinner, chopped up a cornucopia of vegetables for future salads, and purchased a chuck roast at Yoke's which she has already planned to fix for Wednesday's dinner.
2. Lately, Carol has had a burst of ideas for family dinner when it's been hers and Paul's turn to host. The last time she hosted we had an Asian meal focused on miso congee and tonight she created a menu of Moroccan food.
At the center of our dinner was Carol's Moroccan Vegetable Tangine seasoned with spices I cannot name, but that were wondrously delicious. Christy contributed a superb Rice Pilaf and Debbie prepared a distinctive Moroccan Hummus that went beautifully with a flatbread Carol prepared called Aloo Paratha.
Carol offered us a bowl of almonds and figs for dessert, a perfect conclusion to this tasty and, at least to me, adventurous meal.
3. It turned out that Debbie and Paul are both using apps to learn languages. Debbie is chipping away at German and Paul has dived into French. The news of their ventures opened up one of my favorite family dinner discussions of all time as we talked about how different languages function, the relation of languages like French, German, and Latin to English, and what approaches to learning a new language work best.
I realized during this discussion how much I've forgotten over the last nearly fifty years since the study of English grammar, German for reading knowledge, French, and even a summer of Latin study was a central part of my academic life along with studying literature.
I wasn't particularly good at language study, but I learned a lot that fascinated me. Over the years, in the same way I can no longer name the starting lineup for the 1968 San Francisco Giants, things I once knew have receded and tonight I missed having had that knowledge, but the discussion invigorated me and some of what I used to know began to wake up.
It also invigorated me after Debbie opened her Christmas gifts 🎄🎅🤶 when Paul came over where I was sitting and had me read a passage from Days of Awe and Wonder, a book by Marcus Borg, a now deceased emeritus professor at Oregon State University and a Christian thinker and scholar to whom I owe a great debt of gratitude for his clear, sane, generous, and wide-minded writing about Christianity.
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