The fictional characters who live inside my mind
Chicken Piccata with Anne | Meet Edna | Recipes for Memorial Day
Hello friends!
Earlier this week my daughter Anne and I cooked Chicken Piccata on a live streaming video and it was the most fun thing ever! Anne is a pastry chef and offered up some insider tips and tricks, showed off some mad knife skills, and was her usual adorable self.
Having adult children who want to do things with you is the greatest. ❤️
If you missed it, here’s where you can watch the replay: Supper At Six with Rebecca and Anne
THANK YOU to all of you who joined us live! Lost Supper Club member
cooked along and then sent me the photo!
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There is a fictional cast of characters that live inside my mind
Here’s something about me that not many people know: I love to make up stories about strangers.
People watching has always been one of my favorite activities. So, when we moved into an RV, I was delighted to discover that the people watching opportunities in campgrounds are spectacular.
Campgrounds are busy places, filled with all sorts of people constantly coming and going. Some of these fellow campers capture my imagination and I make up stories about them.
I give them names, spin up a history, and weave together a story. Every now and then I’ll share these made up stories with Steve… “hey babe. Let me tell you what’s happening with those people…” but most of the time, these fictional characters live only inside my mind.
Then earlier this year, while in San Diego, I wrote one of them down.
A few spaces down from us was a woman who fascinated me. I never met her. She was only visible out my kitchen window, and as I chopped and sautéed and scrubbed, I gave her a name and a history and a story. Then I put it on paper and gave it to
and asked if she would use her sketch pad to bring her to life.And here she is.
Edna
What you would never know about Edna just by looking at her is that she has quite a lot of money. Less than some of course, but much more than most.
She lives in a dilapidated Fleetwood camper, circa 1987, with a half painted door and some ratty bed sheets, one white and one brown, and another that maybe used to be either white or brown, that she likes to tie from the camper to whatever trees or bushes are nearby to create a sort of enclosed front yard.
The other thing you’d never know about Edna is that she’s only 37. Built the same year as her camper and less dilapidated than she appears.
She likes to wear shorts over her pants and threadbare aprons over thrift store floral house dresses and is always bundled up even when it’s warm.
She shuffles around in her thick soled, orthopedic tennis shoes and moves with the kind of hunch that you typically only see in people who are much older than 37.
If you found yourself in San Diego camped next to Edna, you would not suspect any of these things about her and you could count yourself in the majority because no one knows her. Not really.
She’s the kind of person that many people know of, but don’t actually know.
The truth is that most people steer clear of Edna because she frightens them. It’s not that they feel physically threatened by her. She does not seem like an ax murderer and no one worries that she’ll steal their things or kidnap their children.
Rather, they feel frightened in that way that makes them cross to the other side of the street rather than risk getting caught up in a conversation that might be difficult to escape.
Or, frightened in the way that people are when confronted by someone whom they perceive to have a lot of overwhelming problems. The fact that the problems may not be real, that they were invented and then assigned to Edna, does not make it better. It usually makes it worse. Problems that exist inside the mind are usually much worse.
Edna does not see any of this as a problem.
Edna does not see much of anything as a problem.
Her half painted door, one side white and the other side school bus yellow, is the consequence of having gotten halfway through the project and realizing she didn’t want to continue.
Edna rarely does anything she doesn’t want to do and on the rare occasion when she discovers that she doesn’t want to do something that she’s already doing, she stops doing it.
She doesn’t particularly like school bus yellow anyway. She knows that now.
If you were to tell Edna that she should finish painting her door, she might look at you as if she doesn’t speak your language. Edna doesn’t believe in the tyranny of should and should not.
Maybe it’s her mother’s fault for not being diligent about imprinting all the unspoken rules and allowing her to pick out her own outfits no matter how outlandish or inappropriate.
Or maybe Edna wouldn’t have heard the rules no matter what.
Edna loves old, broken things. When she spends too much time around shiny new things in shiny new places, she starts to feel peaky. Like that achy, ominous feeling in your spine right before you come down with the flu.
Her treasures spill out of her camper, piling up on the picnic table, in the back seat of her faded red hatchback, and in neat little stacks around the fire pit. She keeps things where she likes with no interest in the fact that most people keep their waffle irons in the kitchen and their underwear in the bedroom.
What’s it to her where you keep your waffle iron or your underwear? The oven hasn’t worked in years and her limited wardrobe fits inside it almost perfectly.
The bed sheet walls she hangs outside to enclose her space are more for the containment of her things than for privacy.
She has no use for privacy because she has no use for the opinions of other people. It’s more than that…
She has no use for other people. They are, mostly, superfluous.
Even though she could go anywhere, she rarely leaves San Diego. She likes the weather and the beaches (who doesn’t?) and also, two of the fancy RV resorts don’t have the restrictions of other resorts.
Most RV “resorts” (sometimes the name doesn’t match the experience) don’t allow campers from 1987 and absolutely will not allow you to hang bed sheets in your space.
Their uniformed staff point to the piles of stuff on the picnic table and then to rule #487 that says, clearly, “clean up your trash.”
The piles are not trash. But there’s no point in trying to explain.
She is aware that there are places, like the beach, where people expect her to be and therefore pay her little attention. And other places where people don’t expect her to be and therefore watch her very closely. Like the gift shops at Hotel de Coronado, where they’ll let her stay if she buys something and doesn’t linger too long.
She likes the floor of the hotel with all the old photographs and the gift shop filled with new things that look old. She always buys something then drops it off, unopened, at the local goodwill on her way home or hands it to one of the homeless people on Park Blvd.
Or Liberty Public Market where the vendors eye her nervously as she wanders through the colorful stalls filled with handbags, and jewelry, and candles. She could buy anything she wants.
But she doesn’t want.
Instead, she goes back to her camper and washes the bird shit from the collection of old water bottles on her picnic table and lights a campfire where she animatedly tells herself stories and laughs at her own jokes.
What you would never know about Edna just by looking at her is that she enjoys her own company most of all.
About the illustrator
is food blogger, designer, watercolorist, dancer, figure skater, runner, and dog lover (especially Sirius). I met Sarah last year after searching for someone who could help me design and organize the Let’s Get Lost Cookbook. I fell in love with her immediately and we’ve been working together ever since.
Sarah recently launched Confessions in Watercolor where she writes essays accompanied by watercolor paintings and sketches.
Recipes for Memorial Day weekend
In honor of Edna, who I like to imagine is still living happily in her camper in San Diego, I am resharing some of the recipes from the time we spent there earlier this year.
If your Memorial Day weekend involves sharing food with friends, these recipes are a slam dunk.
Slow Roasted Pulled Pork Tacos with Green Slaw. This recipe comes from the fabulous
and they are crazy good.Jicama and Papaya Salad. This salad was inspired by one I had at a restaurant in Palm Springs in January. It’s bright, colorful, and refreshing with an interesting mix of flavors and textures. In other words, to my mind, it’s exactly what a salad should be.
Orange and Date Cake with Candied Pistachios. Unsurprisingly, California produces almost all of the country’s dates and pistachios and is one of the top three orange-producing states. So, what does one make for dessert while in California? An orange and date cake with candied pistachios, that’s what.
Three more crowd pleasing recipes for Memorial Day gatherings:
Chimichurri Steak Sandwiches: Thin slices of perfectly seared filet mignon on a toasted French roll smeared with garlic aioli, topped with chimichurri sauce and melted provolone. This is one of those sloppy two-handed sandwiches for which you need a stack of napkins and a hearty appetite because there is no chance you'll be leaving even one bite behind. No one has that kind of self control.
Filipino-Style Chicken Adobo with Coconut Milk. This is truly one of the easiest and most delicious ways to cook chicken. Bone-in, skin-on pieces of chicken are simmered in a flavor-packed sauce and then left in the refrigerator to marinate for up to 24 hours. Right before serving, simmer the sauce to thicken and sear the outside of the chicken to a deliciously caramelized golden brown. Serve the tender pieces of chicken over rice, smothered with the velvety sauce.
Chocolate Chip Pecan Cookies. These massive cookies are extra thick with a soft, gooey center loaded with milk chocolate chips and crunchy toasted pecans. They are for those of us who are serious about wanting a cookie we can wrap both hands around and dig into with abandon.
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Thank you for reading! Wishing each and every one of you a wonderful weekend. I’ll see you next week.
I read this entire post with a massive smile on my face. One of my kids asked what I was reading! I may ‘mind my own business’ but I love observing and secretly guess what is going on - haha!.
I too would be watching Edna - a lot!
I love this concept. Several books could be written about this. We were full-time for 5 years part time for another three. We never ran into a stranger. Everybody has a story to tell and they want to here yours. I can't look at your posts too often. I'll get hungry.