I should know better than to use these cheap haircut salons even if it’s just for a neck trim or light cosmetic work. Today she misunderstood me and shaved half an inch above my ear in a clean line around the side of my face to where I now look like a professional wrestler or a member of Metallica, that combination of long hair and shaved lines that’s a bit 80s for my tastes, a bit Red Hot Chili Peppers or Last of the Mohicans. It makes for good blog fodder at least. And it grows back.

One thing I’m grateful for this year is the fungal scalp has dissipated (add that to my Christmas letter). Though it did take many visits to the dermatologist and lots of emulsion foam and medicated shampoo. If last year was the frozen shoulder anomaly and this year the scalp fungus it makes you wonder what comes next. In both cases the doctors said we don’t really know where it comes from but we do know it goes away. I’m grateful for that.

I let the pepperpot simmer overnight in the InstaPot and feared when I unlocked the lid in the morning it would look desiccated or ruined but instead a light scent wafted out, a nice skein of collagen on the surface like pond scum, the beef fall-apart tender and the little package I’d made for the whole cloves still intact (I’d read you can wrap whole cloves inside a tied coffee filter so as to not have to fish them out with a spoon).

The dish is basically stewed beef cuts (oxtail, chuck roast, short rib) with sautéed onion and habanero, garlic, dried orange peel, cinnamon and cloves, grated ginger. You also make a marinade for the beef from fresh parsley and basil, thyme, more habaneros and garlic. And there’s the vital ingredient: the cassareep, black and thick as molasses, from the cassava root. Which I know nothing about. But it acts as a preservative so theoretically you don’t need to refrigerate the stew, you just keep it on the range all day and bring it to a boil periodically. In some parts of the world this stew is served on Christmas morning and made in advance so the flavors fully develop. I thought I’d try it for when our daughter returns home from her studies abroad, tomorrow night.

In the Caribbean they make it with pickled pig tail or something called cow heel, or goat/mutton, ghastly options in my mind but I’ve never tried the more “exotic meats” like cow tongue or cow face. Maybe just don’t put anything with the word face in my soup.

Yesterday I thought of my old friend and one-time AA sponsor Donnie, thought I might look him up. I tried doing the 12 steps but stalled out at #3 and then just couldn’t talk to him anymore or see him (he’s also my hair guy and since I grew mine out, well, there’s that).

But it dawned on me that maybe in the new year I’d go back to AA, not for myself but for someone else. That sounds noble and maybe too lofty for me but I’d like to think I’m capable of being a support for someone who’s got the same thing as me. That’s the whole point of the program really, it’s just humans holding each other up out of compassion. The ones with the problem identify with the ones who are struggling the most. Donnie tried to help me see that but I never could, I didn’t want anything to do with it. I think I was ashamed.

I didn’t need to contact Donnie to do that. Would be better to tell him after I’d started attending meetings locally. Maybe get a new sponsor even. There was an odd connection for me between AA and Christianity. On the surface you think it’s one thing but then if you spend more time with it you realize it’s something else.

We were close enough to Christmas now they could predict the weather with reasonable accuracy and there was no snow in sight, the best we could hope for was a wintry mix. And that sounded just fine to me.

Categories: Addiction, Creative Nonfiction, Memoir

Tags: Creative Nonfiction, journal writing, Memoir, pacific northwest