CHAIN GANG MAGIC DUMPLINGS

Today I got to be a member of a chain gang making these giant chain links for some fancy pants magician's billboard......... I don't like magic.

I have a faint and defined memory of one evening in this Pizza Parlour Basement Restaurant near the brownstone I first grew up in on 6th Street in Milwaukee. One particular FAMILY NIGHT we all went to have pizza in this vine-coated cellar full of smoke and garlic and dusty plastic grapes and SOON - the pizza was coming and I was excited because there was to be a MAGIC SHOW and all little girls LOVE magic because it is what girls loved besides ponies and TV's Judy the Monkey and Partridge Family and my homemade white dress with daisies on it and things that glitter and I once had a fun gift given to me by a distant relative who bought me a camera that squirted water when you said CHEESE and BOY did I think that was MAGICAL and I was eager to see a PRO at work with his arm flingings and TA-DA's and everything ABRACADABRA - and this magician meant business with his top-hat and red velvet cape and he was a MOUNTAIN of a man - a MAGICAL MAN - and there were card tricks and birds and laughter and then - the END-ALL TRICK TO END ALL TRICKS ! - CUTTING A LITTLE GIRL IN HALF! and I sat there wide eyed and scared and secretly hoping he would pick me though I knew that THAT meant there might be blood and no legs and I sat there and then - MAGICALLY -all pizza-eating stopped at the table because MR. RED VELVET TOP HAT was there - standing in front of me and I look at the little-girl-cutting-box on stage and there was this GIANT SHINY SILVER SQUARE KNIFE BLADE that was bigger than the pizza next to the cutting-little-girls-in-half- box and then he is speaking his mystical speak to me and next thing I know is that my eyes have turned into pancakes and I was shaking my head - NO NO NO - I WANT TO LIVE and tears are running down my cheeks and I just wanted the SCARY MAGIC MAN to disappear into that magic hat of scarves and bunnies and bag of tricks - I would not, could not look into his hypnotic, lightning-bolt BLACK EYES and so I threw my UNCUT, NOT-HALVED BODY into the nook of my mom whose Jean Nate Perfume and last night's Vicks Vapo-Rub and her HUSHES- meant only for me -quieted THE FEAR - and made me calm and finally allowed me to fall - like Alice - into the lap of a different, new kind of magic.

CHAIN GANG MAGIC DUMPLINGS
(discover the MAGIC and COMFORT of simple ingredients turned magical)

1/2 cup NON-SKIM milk (or cream)
dash salt
2 eggs - maybe 3 - depending on consistency
2 1/2 cups flour plus 1 TBSP

Mix together so neither runny nor stiff. Dollop about 1 TSP into boiling soup/water for 10 minutes.

Enjoy the light, dumpling magic!