Paper Trail

Mac got it exactly right, the dues for Allah reference, which is specifically the flaw you weave into a rug because only God is perfect. I don't have to do that, because I make enough mistakes otherwise, but it's a nice conceit. We fall into habits. I usually go outside to pee, in the early morning, and it's bracing, I'm nearly naked and the temps are in the mid forties. Sometimes I can't wait to get back in my sleeping bag, and sometimes I start another paragraph. I never know which is going to happen. If I stay up, and it's chilly, I pull on sweat-pants and a bathrobe, usually get a last drink and always roll a smoke. If it's cold, and I don't want to build a fire, I pull on my Linda hat, over my ears, and sometimes pull on the knit gloves that she made me that keep my fingertips free. Major leaf fall. Everything is turning yellow. The Sumac and the wild grape vines. The Hickories are an orange yellow, and the Chestnut oaks go through a mustard phase. For six months everything is green, one shade or another, then it turns yellow through red, then it's stick trees and everything is black or white. I love winter, because it isolates, but I hate winter, because it isolates; I don't have a cross to bear, whatever happens, happens. I had a large (six quart, I think) cast iron pot I'd picked up at a junk store, rusted, and looking quite awful, and I'd recently found a Pyrex lid that fit it perfectly so I decided I'd restore it and maybe make a pot of chili. I have a large plastic tub I rescued from the dumpster at the lake that I keep under the house, and I always keep a can of lye around, specifically for cleaning rusted cast iron. Heavy rubber gloves, you soak the item in lye-water and scrub it with a wire brush, rinse and continue scrubbing through several changes of water. Then I fire up the grill (I suppose you could do this in the oven, with a foil-lined cookie sheet underneath) and dry it completely, rubbing cheap cooking oil into all the pitted surfaces. Then I treat the inside with olive oil and heat. When I started the project I'd put on a pot of black beans to cook. Beans, chicken stock, and onions. I'd taken one of the pork tenderloins out of the freezer. After my new pot was ready (this took hours) I cubed the still slightly frozen tenderloin into bite-sized pieces, dredged them in a highly seasoned corn flour, browned them slightly, added the beans, large cans of green enchilada sauce, diced roasted peppers, several spoonfuls of the incredible dried green chili powder from New Mexico, and pulled the pot over to the coolest part of the stove. I'd let the fire go out, but the stove was still hot. I just let it cook there the rest of the day. It's fantastic. With some corn tortillas, you could kill yourself.