Skeletons in My Closet

So here’s the real epiphany to come out of the ladies’ clothing swap I hosted a few weeks ago at my house. I have a lot of horrendously boring clothing.

Laugh-out-loud boring.

Kill-you-with-kindness boring.

Stench of 1995 boring.

I mean, bags of it. Of black pants, and white shells and — gasp! — sweater vests and all sorts of things that I used to wear at my office job at the German Embassy but, which have been dying a slow death in my closet for the past four years.

Perhaps I am an awful friend for trying to lob these staid skeletons off on my friends, but that’s what I did. I wrote about the experience in this month’s Desperately Seeking Salem column over at Salem Monthly.

I invited women from different cubby holes of my Salem life — only two of them knew each other — to bring their own cast-offs and trade for new ones. Anything left at the end of the night I was taking to the Salvation Army.

Here’s what I learned about how to have a clothing swap:

1. Keep it smallish. Nine women in one room is just about the perfect number for a swap; anything more than that and you might as well be at the Goodwill Bins.

2. Invite the ladies — or dudes — to share a story about one of their cast-offs. Every garment has a story.

3. Like all charitable donations, clothing swap are equal parts altruism and greed. I felt good dropping off the bag of clothes at the Salvation Army, but I knew the real benefit for myself was in getting to know these ladies as a group, ridding myself of my boring former self, and achieving the catharsis of a good closet clean-out.

4. Don’t let your husband come. Mine had gone out to Noble’s Tavern, his new dive hangout, with a friend, but returned to find a pile of clothing the size of a three-year-old on our living room floor.  He then went through every single item saying: “This is cute, this would look great on you, are you sure you don’t want this?”  I am married to a champion rummager.

5. My new friends in Salem are awesome.

The Fairest of them All

I remember the first time someone ever called my husband and me a name so loaded, so antiquated, so unspecific that we could only respond based on our own biases.

We were hanging out with our friends Crystal and Cary, who are these unbelievable Midwestern hippies — the only real hippie friends we met while living in Iowa City. I had baked a cherry crumble, which we were eating with vanilla ice cream on a Saturday afternoon as the crowds milled towards Hawkeye Stadium for another football game we were surely not going to follow.

Crystal says: “Hey man, you guys are totally our hippie friends.”

“What? You’re our hippie friends. We’re not hippies.”

“Sure you are. You make your own yogurt and grow plants and are always recycling and eating all that hippie crunchy stuff. You guys are totally hippies.”

“No way, man, you’re the hippie. You’ve got the linguistic habits to prove it, man.”

And so, a misunderstanding, a challenge of sorts. No one really knows what a hippie is anymore. That’s why when I wrote my recent column on finding things to do at Salem until 2:00 a.m. on a Tuesday night and called Venti’s downtown our “go-to place for crunchy hippie food,” I received a little bit of flak from some people downtown who see hippie as a pejorative.

To be fair, I’ve been working on a better way to describe the food at Venti’s to massage the egos of these lovely Venti’s fans. I haven’t come up with anything to explain people who seem to have cut and pasted the best from a number of ethnic cultures to form new and exciting arrangements of hummus and peanut sauce (you get a kick in the pants if the word “fusion” just popped in your head).

But the real issue is the word “hippie.”

Maybe because I grew up on the East Coast, maybe because I have seen so many incarnations of hippies as to warrant the term almost meaningless — and certainly not the catch-all some seem to think it is — I’ve always kind of loved hippies.

We certainly saw our share of their modern incarnations at the Oregon Country Fair yesterday… and since hippies like to make stuff, I’ve selected a few images to show my fairest of the fair — the most interesting things I saw happening there.

Unlike some photographers there, who seemed more drawn to the “nudes” on display, I can’t say I felt compelled to capture the chaotic free-for-all pulsing through the woods at the fair. When things got really jammin’ at around 4:00 p.m., I was almost ready to leave. I can revel with the best of them, but I prefer not to be brushed by a stray breast or an… ahem… half-dressed unicorn.

A one-man stand of on-demand, hand-stitched Sewing Machine Designs:

The artist asked for a phrase of five words or less, which he would then interpret right before your eyes. I was seconds away from asking for “gas stove catching fire on bathrobe,” which actually happened to me last January, but then he was being kind of snooty and unresponsive and we decided to move on. I could have used a patch for that bathrobe, though.

Can anyone tell me what these are?

A puppet show about two bunny rabbits who go on a picnic:

Strange, carnival-esque Francophile revelers at the beginning of the fair:

More puppets: You are seeing a pattern. These are made by Portland’s Alchemystical Workshop.

Finally, things we ate at the fair:

1 potato and mushroom kanish
1 potato and garlic kanish
2 baklavas
1 cup of famous gumbo
2 ice cream sandwiches dipped in dark chocolate
1 homemade root beer float
1 avacado dreamboat stuffed with hummus, cheddar-jack and yogurt

Final verdict: Hippies like delicious food, making neat stuff that doesn’t always make sense, banging drums in circles, dancing like West Africans, whole grains, dressing up in fairy garb, forests, belly-dancing, natural childbirth, folk music, and puppets.

I won’t profess to being a hippie, but I still like them quite a bit, even —  as our pork dude at the Salem Saturday Market calls them — the “nudes.”

Monster basil menaces eastern Oregon

I’ve got a pretty rockin’ herb garden growing at the corner of my house. Most of the herbs I picked up at the Bush Barn plant sale earlier this spring, but I’ve had a little more trouble tracking down some really great Genovese basil to add to my mix of sage, French thyme, chives, oregano and rosemary.

But I’ve waited on the basil. Not long enough, it would seem.

A couple of days ago I bought this smaller, piddly basil at Life Source for about $3.50. I figured I’d leave it alone for a while and see if it would grow into the kind of frothy basil bush I need for my summer tomato dishes.

And then, just yesterday, on my way home from the airport, I followed the throng of finely-coiffed little old ladies heading into the Lake Oswego Trader Joe’s and was  thrown to the floor by the stench — and when there’s this much basil, it can really overpower — of a couple hundred plants of MONSTER BASIL bushes being sold for $2.99 a pop.

The TJ checkout dude tells me they’ve been getting an entire trucks worth for the past week and they’ve been selling out every day.

Oh, the paradox is just flooring me: You can’t wait to eat basil so you had really better just wait to get basil.

This basil is so big I imagine it sneaking into my bedroom at night, dragging its perfect, green-hued tendrils over my skin before strangling me with its leafy hands. Not a bad way to go, really.

Poor, sad little cousin basil. I think I’ll just put it out of its misery and chop him into a salad tonight.

Salem Mystery: Solved

For months you passed by a red building on Center Avenue and 17th bearing the words “LIQUIDATION” and wondered when Aztec Imports might be going out of business. You never stopped, you just relived the drama of another failed small business again and again on your commute, on your way into town, on your way to Word of Mouth, on your way elsewhere.

And then, one day a few weeks ago, you passed by and saw that the sign was painted over. Secretly you cheered inside, you bubbled all up that the market for imports from Spanish-speaking countries was so large as to warrant an entire shop of them at a strange location next to the Cricket, across from Johnny’s, and caddy-corner from H&R Block. Privately your heart soared as you wondered what exactly — other than Che Guevera merchandise — sat in the showcases of Aztec Imports.

But inwardly you were a little bit sad that Salem has lost its equivalent of the Israeli electronics store, the kind that has a “ONE DAY GOING OUT OF BUSINESS SALE” every day of the year.

Here’s what actually happened:

Aztec Imports has been having a sale since Christmas and had chosen to announce that sale with the word “Liquidation.” A little bird told me that the city recently asked the store owners to paint over the sign, which they did, leaving a kind of blotchy red on red wall that also features — if you’re looking for it — a little red-on-red heart above where the liquidation sign uses to be.

As for Aztec Imports. The place has some really awesome finger puppets from Peru that I would have bought if I had had some money on me, as well as a much-anticipated shipment of dresses from Thailand in two weeks. If you go in, be sure to engage the owner, who is awesome, the best kind of proprietor. You know, the kind who is so nice he makes you feel bad when you don’t buy anything.

I am all about sleuthing the Salem mysteries in plain sight. Know of any others?

Defending the real at the Wednesday Market

I love interacting with the vendors at the farmer’s markets in Salem because it gives me a good idea about which way the trends are trending. All I need is to stand there for a few moments and listen to the conversations and I get a good idea what is drawing people to more authentic, locally-produced, extraordinary products.

For me, farmer’s markets are all about connecting my pride of place with my raw Lebenslust. I can’t help but feel closer to the Willamette Valley by drinking it in.

Glub glub glub.

But it is easy to see that farmer’s markets are also places where people in the know live out their food trends and consumer fashions in a ridiculously public way.

So yesterday I finally made it to the Wednesday farmer’s market that takes place downtown on Chemeketa Street. My companion and I were sharing a mind-blowing vegetable quesadilla from Canby Asparagus Farm. I ran back to ask the cook for an extra tenedor and swung by a stand I haven’t seen at the Saturday Market — Hot Lips soda. As I stood there, it became very clear what is so hot about hot lips.

Family-owned company + carbonation +pulpy  local and regional fruits + Portland marketing aesthetic =

Seven different flavors of awesome!

I tasted the raspberry which is sweet but not cloyingly so. For someone who just might move 2,000 miles away to reap the fruits of a berry-growing region, a real berry soda is like my own kind of happy pill. Also, most of the sugar content in the soda comes from the actual berries, making this a pretty healthy sody pop.

Suck it, Orangina, I’m buying Oregonian.

Flower Bouquets in the Coraline Economy

Two Asian flower stands had gorgeous bouquets at the Salem Saturday Market today, of peonies and lilies, all sorts of gorgeous.

But I just can’t bring myself to buy flowers when my garden is exploding in them. The woman who lived in my home before me had a rose fetish and planted them all over my yard — along with poppies, columbine, hyacinth (now gone), lilac, and all sorts of wonderful color explosions.

I’ve always thought of roses as an older woman’s flower — scientists have actually confirmed this — but in yet another sign of my getting older (and now I’m even older, and now I’m even older), I can’t help but bring them indoors.

So I put together this small bouquet of roses, columbine and buttons. It is one equal parts grandma and grandma’s attic, and I kind of love it.

And though I have vowed never to start blogging or tweeting about my cats, one of them, DeKooning, 2, kept inserting himself into the frame.

How to find a stylist in Salem

Of all the annoyances that accompany a move, finding someone to cut your hair must rank down there in the ninth circle of hell (the eighth is dealing with moving companies). Must be why I just got my hair cut fir the first time in six months.

I have lived places where I never really found a stylist I jived with — State College, PA, for one — and I have lived in cities where my stylist became privy to the most intimate details of my life — my girl Cookie at VSL in Dupont Circle, Washington, D.C.

But ugh, finding a new stylist is a careful dance of diplomacy and consumer service.

And so, since this blog sometimes becomes a stomping ground for newcomers to Salem, I offer you a story of how I found mine: Viola, a dark-haired Mexican woman who talks it up at Bella Vita Salon and Day Spa, located behind the Starbucks on Liberty Street (no, not that Starbucks, the other one, in the Liberty Plaza).

Step 1: Ask people who have good hair where they go. This is kind of difficult in Salem, land of burocrat bobs, home to two-toned Pettie Page-reworks, or the anything goes nape-of-the-neck pony tail.

Step 2: Ask some more people. Like 20 of them.

Step 3: Wait six months to gauge the consistency and longevity of the stylists’ work.

Step 4: Let yourself go a little crazy as you put off getting a haircut.

Step 5: Call up the most highly-recommended place at the last second and hope you land on a winner.

Ta da! I got Viola, a bubbly, funny, sassy senora who only shuts up when she’s rubbing Aveda’s signature aromatherapy oils into your scalp before the wash.

I must be pretty lucky, because I got just what I wanted — someone who can take a little bit of direction but who is confident enough in her vision to really make me look good.

The whole team at Bella Vita seems to be doing well, since their business has actually picked up during the recession.

Viola: “People still need to cut their hair!”

She tells me they are even considering opening the salon on Sundays to meet demand. If that’s something you’re interested in, I suggest you call them, pronto, and let them know.

The Tickle-Me Elmo for the New Millenium

Apparently I am one of the estimated 3,569 Salem residents burned by this year’s one-day only composter sale. In more proof that local advertising is bucking national trends and that people are still looking for more stuff to buy for the home, the one-day event, last Sat., May 2, was so popular that demand for these $29 Earth Machines vastly exceeded supply.

I couldn’t get to Fred Meyer in time, so I sent one of my handlers, who discovered herself in line with 100 other people too late to get the tiny dirt-makers. They were also selling then at Roth’s Wilco Farm Store in Stayton and Silverton, and at Coastal Farm Stores in Woodburn.

The ad for the new millienium’s Tickle-Me Elmo in Salem Monthly‘s green living section was placed by the Marion County Public Works Environmental Services.

I’ve heard the media buyers at the public works weren’t sure that demand for the composters would continue to be high — some had wondered if the market in this area was already saturated by previous events like these.

Obviously lots of people want to see some good come of their garbage, so I can’t be too sad that I didn’t get my hands on one.

You can still contact the company if you didn’t get there in time.

Fishin out the fresh stuff old school style

Few causes touch my heart more than overfishing. No, seriously. No, really, I care a lot about overfishing, in the way that some people used to care about the rain forest — even wearing a mid-90s garish red frog jungle t-shirt to prove what holds their hearts.

I heart fish. And I love to eat them. That’s why I was I was more than moved a few years ago when a Maryland group came up with an uncommon marketing campaign that fed into my inner-eco-girl while hitting me where it counts — in the gut.

It said: “Save the Maryland blue crab — so you can eat them.”

If it weren’t already taken, I’d say Oregon’s salmon producers should be appropriating the same kind of slogans for their dwindling stocks. Either way, I like to think that I do my part by not buying fish that has been frozen for weeks and flown in from places unknown just to be thrown at me unceremoniously by that girl at the Safeway on Center Street (somebody should act happier to have a  job, and yes, I’m still bitter).

Check out these Dungeness crabs getting ready to duel a la a Sergio Leone Spahetti Western at Fitt’s Fish Market in Salem. I can almost hear the Ennio Morricone score filtering through the water.

There are many reasons to go to Fitt’s, but #1 is to see a duel of these beautiful swimmers.  They are nasty and natural and good for at least a five-minute diversion during an afternoon shopping trip.

The other, real reason is to get some really fresh fish — admittedly, at prices that will seem higher than that of your general grocery store.

I picked up a dozen scallops, which we pan-fried to perfection last Saturday and served with a lemon orzo salad, and a humungo strip of red snapper, which I baked in a hoisan glaze last night for dinner. My fishmonger even cut the bone out for me and offered to pack it in ice for the long trip home (seven minutes, no thanks, I thought).

You don’t go to Fitt’s becuase you’re cooking Van DeCamp dinners for your family of ten. You go because they have the finest and most artfully displayed fresh meats section around, and you can trust the guy who’s selling it to you. You might just venture down there because you are a doomsday girl and your apocalyptic imagination is making you become increasingly skeptical of the traditional food chain and they also sell beef. And you might just  go to catch a glimpse of old Mr. Fitt on the wall, surrounded by hanging chickens.

For me, though, the modest price difference seems small when you factor in the major karma points you get for buying local and the peace of mind that accompanies knowing where your food comes from and buying it from someone who cares about his customers.

Desperately Seeking: New Name

Give a neighborhood a boost, give it a new name. It’s worked for SoHo, and the Pearl, so why not for Salem’s burgeoning neighborhood to the north? You know, the little area north of downtown that is now becoming the Bermuda triangle of hipsterdom?

1. Salem Cinema’s new digs
2. Boon’s Treasury, one of our two McMinnamin’s
3. The Space. Enough said.

I have no idea what this area is called among the people, other than “that area north of downtown,” so I propose the following. How about putting together some ideas for renaming this area into something that speaks of its coolness:

Here are a two ideas:

The Carpet District (isn’t there that carpet place right near here?)

NoBro (as in, Northeast Salem on Broadway)

Put your suggestions in the comments section and we’ll do a contest to select the winner. Or, as it actually works in the great marketplace ideas, perhaps people will just start calling it that.

Oh, and if you’re a trendy wine bar or soap shop or combination cheese store/yarn store, there is an open storefront across from the Salem that is for rent right now. Get in before you can’t afford the rent, yo.