#51: Reflection and Recipe
As the year ends a recipe for Atholl Brose
Reflection
Here we are at the end of 2001. Oops! I meant to type 2021 but 2001 is another year where our lives change so dramatically. No more rushing to the airport at the last minute and still being able to run to the gate to catch a flight; meeting loved ones at the gate; changing a flight at the last minute to one later or earlier in the day without a care…or an exorbitant service charge. I once take all that for granted.
For me, the last week of the year is a time of reflection, and one of the things I do is make two lists; one is of things I am ready to leave behind in the old year, and the other is of hopes to carry in to the new year. The ‘leave behind’ list I burn at 11:59PM on December 31. The ‘carry in’ list will be tucked into a safe place and I will look and reflect on it a year from now.
My lists have changed over the years from personal affirmations…
Excercise more
Get to bed earlier
Weed gardens more regularly
and this year’s…No more coffee
to larger ones…
Climate change and hunger
COVID
Black Lives Matter
Gun control
I grieve for young children who no longer can play freely at parks, ride bikes, or roller skate around neighborhoods like I did, and it breaks my heart that we must have lockdown drills at schools.
But that being said, I am very grateful for personal blessings this year…
My family
My friends
Good neighbors
A bountiful harvest from the garden
Meaningful work, both teaching and writing, and your continued support of it
Over the next days I will post again with a few more traditions I do to bring in the new year.
But I’ll start with Atholl Brose. It’s easy to make but does take a few days for the flavors to develop, so you may want to start it now.
Recipe
Atholl Brose is a drink made from two very Scottish things…whiskey and oats. In the book, A Taste of Scotland (1970), Theodora Fitzgibbon says that it’s been “famous since 1475 and is named after the then Duke of Atholl who captured his great enemy, the Earl of Ross, by filling the well at which Ross was known to drink with this potent libation. Ross drank deeply of this magical liquor and was taken.”
Below is the recipe that was given by the 8th Duke of Atholl.