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advent journal: good time

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
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0
advent journal: good time

good time

the fallacy of the interstate
is that what matters
most is getting there
the highway knows no place
we are nowhere other
than traveling yet every
exit offers the chance

to face the truth of
places and faces that are
more than drive-bys
a reason to remember
there is more to life
than where we are
and where we’re going

every town is a community
each street an address
those handing out coffee
have stories to tell even
when those taking
the drinks don’t think
to stop and ask or listen

life is a journey not
a destination we say
as though we understand
but I’m not sure we do
because we live for
arrivals not engagements
we are in transit not journeying

we spent six hours on
the road and now we are
home without incident but
I only spoke to two people
other than those in our car
I wonder what I missed
making such good time

Peace,
Milton

Thanks for reading. My website is free and ad-free because of the support of my readers. If you would like to become a sustaining member, click here. You can also subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, mixing metaphors.

advent journal: get here, if you can

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
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3
advent journal: get here, if you can

Ginger, Rachel, the pups and I spent the better part of this first day of Advent traveling from Durham, North Carolina, where we spent Thanksgiving, to Baltimore, our halfway stop on the way back to Guilford. We were on the road with several thousand travelers, both coming and going from their holidays, all of us sharing the joys of road construction and thunderstorms. Beyond each other, we have talked only to the people who fixed our sandwiches and checked us out at the WaWa and the hotel clerk and the bartender at the Aloft, a hotel that welcomes pets–oh, and the woman who brought out our food at the pickup spot at the Longhorn Steakhouse.

When we travel, Ginger and I create impromptu playlists that consist of responding to each other’s selections, each of us, in turn, asking Siri to play a song. Since it was raining, Ginger started off with “Rainy Days and Mondays” and we rode the rain theme for about two and a half hours until we stopped just outside of Richmond. When we got back in the car, it was her turn again and she switched to a desert theme choosing “Horse with No Name.” Four or five songs with deserts later, the one that came to mind for me was a favorite from Oleta Adams–“Get Here”

you can reach me by railway
you can reach me by trailway
you can reach me on an airplane
you can reach me with your mind
you can reach me by caravan
cross the desert like an Arab man
I don’t care how you get here
just get here if you can

A couple of hours later, things got quiet in the car and I started thinking about what I would write when we finally got to the hotel because my practice of an Advent Journal is a promise I like to keep and also because I am a long way from feeling like Advent is here, or, perhaps better said, that I am here for Advent. The heart of the season has to do with preparing–with getting ready–and I think I am going to spend most of it just trying to get here.

I don’t mean that statement to sound as dire as it might. In fact, I may not even be saying it well.

What has been going through my mind is we often talk about the season as if something new is happening, like we are waiting or preparing for someone who has not already been born. Yes, I quote Meister Eckhart most every year about Christ being born in our time and our culture, but tonight I keep feeling that we are not waiting on a new birth; we know who is coming. We know who has been born already. We are not preparing for him, we are preparing ourselves to be able to be caught by surprise.

But surprise is not always easy; neither is waiting, one of the other verbs we use often at Advent. Both have rather violent roots. The earliest meaning of wait was “to watch with hostile intent.” The root of surprise is “unexpected attack or capture.” The earliest meaning of surprise party was more akin to an ambush than a celebration. The word preparation carries some of that history as well. We, as human beings, hold a long history of suspicion, it seems, and yet all of those words have grown to mean more than violence. Waiting now carries a sense of expectation, preparation means making room, and surprise harbors hope at least part of the time. However ambushed we may feel, the story is not over.

Many of those associated with the story of Jesus’ birth traveled–some of them significant distances. Mary and Joseph had to deal with holiday traffic to get from Nazareth to Bethlehem, the Magi crossed the desert like Arab men, and the shepherds came running into town in the middle of the night. All of them moved through pain and uncertainty. They all came from complicated situations and Jesus’ birth solved none of them. Still, they got there.

Twenty one centuries later, the story we tell has been layered with life, crowded by the marginalia of tradition and theology, colored by companion stories of compassion and hope, colonized by institutions and patriarchy, midwifed by voices of liberation and diversity, among other things. I find it hard to hear it simply as Love came down at Christmas, true as that may be. I want to hear a version of the story that is more than nostalgia, more than repetition or even ritual, more than being glad we can finally do things like we did before the pandemic.

It will never be before the pandemic again. Do we have the courage to speak up if the way we used to do it doesn’t speak to us anymore? How can we get here if our maps no longer lead us?

As I read over what I have written so far, I am aware it is not particularly linear. I didn’t start with a point in mind other than I feel caught up in the traffic of life and wonder how I will get here for Christmas. Perhaps that makes sense for you, too.

Let’s travel together.

Peace,
Milton

running out of daylight

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
-
3
running out of daylight

running out of daylight

it’s not that the night bothers me
I find comfort in the way the dark
wraps itself around lamps and
light bulbs like a custom fit suit
I love the deep expanse of the
night sky reminding me that
there will always be more
than I can see or comprehend

it’s that the days grow shorter
in the same season as the trees
let go of their leaves a prophetic
cascade of color and connection
or disconnection we won’t always
be here but we are here for now
we are here as the sun falls like
a leaf into the arms of the dark

Peace,
Milton

Thanks for reading. My website is free and ad-free because of the support of my readers. If you would like to become a sustaining member, click here. You can also subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, mixing metaphors.

tahini, fig, and almond cookies

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
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2
tahini, fig, and almond cookies

I had a rare opportunity this week to a part of Project PX, an amazing program sponsored by St. Luke’s UMC in Houston. My friend Sid Davis asked me to come do a house reading and concert on Saturday and then connected me with Meredith Davis, his daughter, who runs Project PX along with Chef Adam Garcia.

Project PX is “a workforce development training program in a culinary setting” that takes a group of “fellows” into an eighteen-week full-time program that centers not only around culinary skills, but also life management skills and mental health. Each cohort has four or five fellows. They get a full-time wage and serve lunch twice a week to folks in and around the church. Meredith describes the program this way:

We are not a culinary school; our graduates can enter into any field of their choosing. And our holistic approach sets us apart as we include social/emotional health and financial literacy in our curriculum. We also have the unique opportunity to practice skills in real time as we serve meals, cater events, and very soon will have a full cafe that the fellows will help run.

Part of our mission is to give young people a place to learn and hone skills that will serve them regardless of the career path they choose. We pay our fellows for their full-time work, giving them a space to learn while still helping sustain their families. It is a place to discover talents and skills, and figure out how to make those gifts work for you long-term.

My task was to bake cookies with the fellows–Brandon, Chris, Dan, and Kenneth–and to talk with them about how I got into cooking. Our collaboration and conversation also gave  me the privilege of hearing some of their stories. I brought two recipes–Peanut Butter, Chocolate Chip, Sriracha; and Tahini, Fig, and Almond. The recipes go together for me because, at their base, they are the same cookie in that they both use plant-based butters. Then, because of the different flavors of peanuts and sesame seeds, they go in different directions.

Over two hours, we compared recipes, prepared the doughs, shaped the cookies, baked them, talked a bunch, and ate the fruits of our labors–and we shared some as well. Chef Adam sets a tone of kindness and attentiveness in his kitchen. The guys worked hard, listened well, and made good cookies. We all had a good time. If I lived closer, I would be there everyday.

One of the lessons I learned (again) from Project PX is that the best way to change the world is in small actions rather than grand gestures. The guys I worked with are the fifth cohort for Project PX. Meredith and Adam and all those who work with them are changing the world one eighteen-week cohort after another. What makes the difference in everyone’s life are relationships, which means the energy runs both ways: everyone in the room is teaching and learning, everyone is giving and receiving, everyone matters in the mix.

Alongside of Brandon, Chris, Dan, Kenneth, Adam, and Meredith, I got to change the world with cookies.

I got to see the plans for the new building that will open in a year in the Sharpstown area and will allow for the program to grow as well as to offer a community center and other things. I hope one day I get to bake cookies there as well.

I have posted the recipe for the Peanut Butter, Chocolate Chip, and Sriracha cookies before, but the tahini cookie is a cookie I have only made one other time, when we did the Milton’s Famous popup in Durham in August of last year. I wanted to make something new and kept thinking about what could replace the peanut butter. Thinking of tahini made me think of Mediterranean, North African, and Middle Eastern flavors, so I used orange extract instead of vanilla, added cardamom and black pepper to the dough and then finished with sliced almonds and chopped dried figs.

All of it sounds a bit odd, but they really taste good.

tahini, fig, and almond cookies

1 cup butter (2 sticks) room temperature
16 oz, tahini, mixed well
2 cups (17 oz.) brown sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
1 tablespoon orange extract

3 cups (16.5 oz.) all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons black pepper
1 teaspoon ground cardamom

8 oz, dried figs, chopped
3 oz. sliced almonds
granulated sugar

Preheat oven to 375°.

In a stand mixer using the paddle, mix the butter, tahini, and brown sugar until well emulsified. In general with my cookies, I let the mixer run for about ten minutes at this stage to make sure the fat absorbs the sugar and it takes in a lot of air.

Add the eggs and orange extract and mix until combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.

In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and spices. Whisk them together and add them to the wet mixture in the mixer. Mix until combined, but don’t mix it to death. Scoop the dough into a large bowl and work the figs and almonds in by hand so they are scattered throughout the batter.

Using a 2 ounce scoop, drop the cookies on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Shape each ball into a sort of mini hockey puck that is about an inch and a half across and dip the tops in granulated sugar and return them to the baking sheet. Bake for 9-10 minutes. I usually turn the cookie sheet halfway through.

Let them sit on the baking sheet–on a cooling rack–for about five to ten minutes before removing them.

As I said, these taste good. The next time I make them they will even taste better because they will also hold the memory of my day with Brandon, Chris, Dan, and Kenneth.

Peace,
Milton

Thanks for reading. My website is free and ad-free because of the support of my readers. If you would like to become a sustaining member, click here. You can also subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, mixing metaphors.

the funeral of reasonable expectations

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
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0
the funeral of reasonable expectations

the funeral of reasonable expectations

you would think a funeral
would be more quiet
the din makes it difficult
to discern my emotions

in these days of
venom and vitriol or
know what dreams have
a chance of survival

how then do we hope
when so many seem
so committed to
fighting to the death

war shrinks our word
choices our imaginations
victory at any cost means
we all lose everything

once upon a time
it was reasonable to
think what mattered
most was each other

relationship over
doctrine over party
over ideology over
anything else

anything else
how else do we
survive how else
do we survive

amid the screaming
I see you I am with you
after the funeral
we will keep living

Peace,
Milton

Thanks for reading. My website is free and ad-free because of the support of my readers. If you would like to become a sustaining member, click here. You can also subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, mixing metaphors.

banana pudding cookies

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
-
1
banana pudding cookies

banana pudding cookies

I was invited by my friend Taylor Davis to be a part of an All Saints celebration at his church. During the past year, they have experienced a season of profound grief that included the deaths of two of their pastors. Taylor asked me to come and prepare a meal to go alongside Communion for their Saturday night service and he had the idea that we might make some of the pastors’ favorite dishes, which included hot dogs, Thai food, red beans and rice, and banana pudding. Oh–it also needed to be pick-up food.

Working on the menu was a unique experience because I didn’t know either of the pastors and was working to create a connecting experience for a congregation I didn’t know either. What I do know is food sustains us not only physically but with deep ties to memory and relationship. I learned, once again, that the Internet is my friend when it comes to recipe ideas and, with the help of other people I have never met who are willing to share their knowledge and creativity, I put together a menu:

Thai-inspired hot dogs (we cooked the hot dogs and then dipped them in a peanut and coconut milk sauce and topped them with shredded carrots and scallions);
red beans and rice empanadas (we made the red beans and rice and then put it in egg roll wrappers that we folded into triangles and baked–wontonadas?)
banana pudding cookies (recipe below)

The meal was well received, but the best part of it, for me, was the prep time. Four folks from the church showed up a couple of hours early to help me cook and they brought great energy and ideas. Since all of the recipes were new to me, we had to problem solve and improvise. I had bought bags of slaw mix to add a salad element, but had no dressing. I also made too much of the peanut sauce, so that became the salad dressing–and it was really good. The first tray of cookies helped us learn we needed to flatten them a bit before they went in the oven.

Right before the meal, I read a poem of mine that was in Keeping the Feast:

congregation

God has made a habit of gathering
undesirables, the less than perfect,
or at least those as broken as they
are brazen – I could name names
but it serves just as well to look in
a mirror, or around most any room
filled with the fallen and faithful;
what privilege I enjoy I have not
earned; any hardship or suffering
I have endured was not inflicted;
what sense of belonging I have
known, what love I have found –
or has found me – came wrapped
in the dusty envelope of humanity,
fraught with fingerprints that point
to both a checkered past and a promise
that love binds us together because
it is not earned, but given and received.

Love binds us together; thus say the cookies.

banana pudding cookies

24 oz. butter (3 sticks), room temperature
1.5 cups brown sugar
.5 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons banana extract
4 large eggs, room temperature

4.5 cups all purpose flour (24.75 oz)
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 5.1 oz package Jell-O Banana Cream Pudding Mix
12 oz white chocolate chips
12 oz. dried banana chips
6 oz. mini vanilla wafers, crushed

Preheat the oven to 375°.

In a stand mixer, cream butter and sugars for about ten minutes, until light. Add eggs and banana extract and mix well.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt, and dry pudding mix. Whisk to combine and then add to wet mixture. Mix just until everything is integrated. Depending on the size of your stand mixer, you can add the white chocolate chips, banana chips, and vanilla wafers, or you can transfer the dough to a large bowl and work them in by hand.

Scoop or pinch 2 ounce cookies and roll into balls. Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet and flatten a bit. Bake at 375° for 8-10 minutes, until tops begin to brown.

NOTE: Because of the pudding mix, these are naturally softer cookies, so they will be done before they feel done.

NOTE: This is a large recipe. You could half it if you want fewer cookies, which begs the question who wants fewer cookies?

The recipe lends itself to experimentation with other pudding flavors as well. Let me know if you try any.

Peace,
Milton

Thanks for reading. My website is free and ad-free because of the support of my readers. If you would like to become a sustaining member, click here. You can also subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, mixing metaphors.

items may have shifted during flight

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
-
1
items may have shifted during flight

items may have shifted during flight

getting from one place to
another quickly takes a lot

of time what began as a seven
hour journey has turned into

ten and I am floating in the
endless transition of an

airport lounge packed with
others who are not yet where

they are supposed to be
in transit is not a way to live

but the food and drink are
free so we keep queueing up

for cabernet and mini club
sandwiches convinced that

free means we can somehow
be more demanding about

what is due us in our state
of passage and privilege

those behind the bar are at
work in a place where they

come everyday to talk to
those of us passing through

offering a hospitality that
rarely results in personal

connections (where are you
headed?) other than with

those who stand beside them
still they are grounded in

ways the rest of us are not
since travel is not in real time

it makes us less than human
unless we choose to land

to connect to tell a story to
do more than pass through

so I say as i sit and type as
the others order drinks

Peace,
Milton

Thanks for reading. My website is free and ad-free because of the support of my readers. If you would like to become a sustaining member, click here. You can also subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, mixing metaphors.

death is not far away

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
-
3
death is not far away

death is not far away

I have lived long enough
to learn that those who
have died don’t go anywhere
at least not to some land
far beyond the skies like
I was taught to sing about

what I mean is wherever
they go is not above or
below but among beside
a dimension we have yet
to comprehend but not
distance no not distance

my mom shows up in the
cornbread david drops in
to watch the world series
my dad hangs out in any
hot dog stand I can find
no one has flown away

to have one day to honor
the dead must be humorous
to them who move among
us or perhaps sad since we
can’t sit still more often
for them to find us again

too often we make distant
what we don’t understand
or we try to make simple
that which is unexplainable
even as our loved ones wait for
us to catch a glimpse of love

Peace,
Milton

Thanks for reading. My website is free and ad-free because of the support of my readers. If you would like to become a sustaining member, click here. You can also subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, mixing metaphors.

time travelers

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
-
0
time travelers

time travelers

we shared a table
under the art tent
then a table next
to the pizza truck
at the sunday school
saturday kickoff

I remembered her
even though I had
not seen her in three
summers I didn’t
recognize her I
said to her father

she’s four now he said
and I realized
two and a half years
to me was half of
her entire lifetime
she wasn’t coming

back she was tracing
new lines coloring
fresh pages playing
tag eating pizza
in a world broken
open not broken

closed her pandemic
came early while mine
came late I am old
enough to remember
she’s young enough
to forget the half

of her life spent in
masks and missing all
that happened before
I’m a grief-pilgrim
she’s a wonderer
we used to cross paths

at coffee hour we
try to remember
the kind of september
where life feels tenuous
at least for me
she is still coloring

Peace,
Milton

PS–My writing here and in my newsletter are offered for free, thanks to the help of my members who help to support me. You can subscribe to my weekly newsletter (which is also free) and become a member. Thanks for reading.

volcano

Milton Brasher-Cunningham
-
1
volcano

The days have been full and my mind and heat have been quiet, so Went back through words I have written before and found this poem in a Long Ago File that spoke to me tonight. I hope it finds you as well.

volcano

do you remember the grade
when we built volcanoes
hollow towers of papier-mâché
and the incendiary mix
of vinegar and baking powder
that spewed over the sides

it was about the same time
our sorrow began to stack up
the strata of struggle and
shame solidifying into a
debilitating monument where
our fault lines intersect

we watched movies of molten
lava bursting forth from the
center of the earth with
unstoppable fiery force
searing the landscape
and then turning to stone

what a surprise to find
that what forces up from the
core of our beings through
the fault lines of failure
the center of our sorrow
is the lava of laughter

a mighty river of love
that knows shame by name
and runs as hot as hope
down the stacks of sorrow
the geology of grace
the pumice of promise

My writing here and in my newsletter are offered for free, thanks to the help of my members who help to support me. You can subscribe to my weekly newsletter (which is also free) and become a member. Thanks for reading.

Peace,
Milton

 

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