Category: Jewelry

A Little Food Adventure ~ Trippin’ with Tracy and Kelly in Arizona Again 2024

Anytime I come to see Tracy and Kelly,  I’m gaurateed to eat really good and interesting foods and to visit some outstanding galleries and such. The photos in this post were taken at the Fry Bread Lounge, next door to the Native Market in Scottsdale.

Tracy and I are showing off our turquoise and silver rings. (Tracy’s has coral, too). Many, if not most, of the art in the market were made by local artisans. It was cool to see their photos and to read the bios. Not your usual tourist trap.

The Fry Bread Lounge is native owned and operated, as is the market. The drinks were so good and unusual. We’re going to try to replicate our favorite when we get to Sedona.

 

There’s me giving some love to Kelly and a couple of shots of the food. The”fry bread flight” came with different sweet and savory dips. I can’t remember the name of the plate, but it was a wonderful mix of hominy, wild rice and vegetables.

If you ever get to Scottsdale, don’t miss the opportunity to visit these outstanding businesses.

Missing from this post are photos of the first restaurant visited when I just got in from Portland. Extraordinay Chinese food at the “Big Buddha”. Not your typical American Chinese food at all. The orange chicken was not drowned in the usual flouresent orange sticky sauce, the egg foo young was … well, how can I describe it? The chop suey was indescribable, as well. Can I just say delicious and surprising? I can’t believe I didn’t take any photos of the food and of the giant Buddha. You know what they say: a picture is worth a thousand words.

Then last night, we drove to Alhambra to eat at the “El Tiburon” (The Shark). Kelly’s sister Mo joined us. This took me right back to Mexico. The building, the colors both inside and out, the dark lighting and disco club flashing lights, the two guitarists standing and singing the music of Juan Gabriel, Rocio Durcal, Marc Antonio Solis, and Pedro Infante.

The outside of the “El Tiburon” is painted turquoise and was festooned in white lights. If Tracy’s friend had not recommended this place, we would never have found it, because how would we know? We ate giant oysters with discs of pulpo (octopus), avocado and fresh salsa, fish fillet smothered in butter, fish tacos in blue corn tortillas, shrimp and octopus cocktails (in glasses the size of a child’s head)… beer, margaritas, and piña coladas.

One marked difference from restaurants in Mexico is that the restroom had toilets with seats.

Why, oh, why did I not take photos? I promise to do better.

Since temps are reaching 111° – 113° daily, here’s us in the pool.

Unsolved Mystery of the Heart

Just recently, I found the answer to a mystery  I had given up on resolving many years before. I mostly didn’t even know that I was still looking, but the search was hidden away in my heart to emerge only occasionally.  

There were few things of value that I even cared about because Mom left so little behind. But there were a few of precious value to the heart only. Nothing she ever owned was embued with monetary value.

But there was one mystery to solve, known only to me as, “The  Missing Heart.” I would have found the answer if I had known to ask the right people. Why did the loss of this small charm occur to me again? Oh, yes, I remember! My niece, Sharon, was going through her mother’s (my sister’s) jewelry and came upon a bracelet she didn’t recognize, and neither did I.

I asked if among her things, had she come upon a small silver and marcasite heart with a mother of pearl inset? At first, I couldn’t remember the stones, so it was hard to describe. Her first answer was, “No”,  she said,  but she would keep an eye out for it.

I looked online to see if I could at least find something similar to help her identify it. Why did I even care, you might ask. Because, as a small child,  like all curious children will,  I loved to look in my mother’s jewelry boxes and in her top drawer to see her linen hankies and soft gloves of silk, cotton and leather, small veils of soft netting, hat pins, hair barretts and other small pieces and mementos.

On top of her dresser, among the crystal bowls, was her hair brush, a handheld mirror, and containers of face and body powder and fancy glass bottles of perfume and fragrant lotions.

There, also sat my favorite music box. It was a small wooden piano with just enough room to hold a few small pieces of jewelry.

The music box

Mom’s dresser was always dusty with the powders she used liberally. Her favorite perfume was Tweed. The fragrance is strong, with the tiniest bit of floral notes to keep it feminine, but mostly, it is dark, moody and earthy, woody, and resinous. Perfect for Mom, but not for a small child or even a teenager. I was never tempted to use it, but it smelled spectacular on my loving yet stoic mother.

But, back to the heart.

I sent my nephews and neices online images of similar items. Sharon said she would continue to look.  She said she would also ask the other girls. My sister had three girls and four boys that she left behind way too early. She also said that there was a story that went with that heart, if the one I was looking for was one that she remembered. I didn’t remember any such story.

Not long after, another of Kristi’s three daughters, Shauna, sent a message with a photo of the heart. “Is this the one you’ve been looking for, Auntie?” she wrote. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

There it was! She explained that her mother had given it to her, before she passed away, to wear at her wedding. Sarah, one of the three daughters, now had it to wear at her upcoming wedding.

She went on to explain the story behind the heart, a story I had never heard: It was a gift from Mom’s first love. If that’s true, why hadn’t I heard it?

I should have been happy just to know that it was still in the family… but. I wasn’t. I was hurt, confused, and frustrated. When did Mom give that to Kristi? Not known to lie nor even to be secretive, could Kristi and Mom have  kept this gift giving a secret? When did this even take place?

I couldn’t be upset with the girls, and of what use is it now for me to be angry with Mom  and Kristi, now that they passed on years ago. I decided to sit with the feeling. I couldn’t shake it anyway.

Now, after a couple of weeks, I guess I’m happy that the heart is in safe and loving hands. Somethings I’ll never know, like when or why Mom decided to give the heart to Kristi. We were and are a close and loving family. I know also that Mom and Kristi hadn’t between them, an ounce of secretive intent.

Each of the girls wore the necklace at their wedding, and if I had it, it would have been enjoyed and cherished by only me.

“I beg you to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.”

–Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet (1929)

Poor Messed Up Fox

My fox was brand new

All shiny of hue,

‘Til I found it had puntured

The bottom of my shoe.

Unbeknownst to me,

I had walked a mile or two,

And scraped the poor thing,

‘Til it’s black and it’s blue.