MOUNTAIN CABIN RUM and ROOTBEER

I once dropped a boat engine in a lake - and I didn't even touch it. I was told to sit on the dock and watch the engine to make sure nothing happened to it. I watched - it fell. I am good at watching - lots of people are - I have working eyes and I like to look. It is not hard to fail at watching UNTIL you witness the MIRACLE of BOAT MOTOR SUICIDE. I just sat and watched and next thing I knew there was a SPLASH and then no engine and next thing I hear is Grandpa Seering running down the hill from the Dew Drop Inn waving his bait bucket like those airplane light-up-in-the-dark-stick-guider-guys and yelling if I was "full of hops" and I knew inside I wasn't a BOY but who cares cause when it comes to fishing you just need the WANT of it all - that's all - and some worms....and possibly some Hamm's Beer if you are older and so there I was - jumping in the cold lake while wearing a dress and lugging up the mystery monster engine to let it dry in the sun as Grandpa drank a Black Label and I had a Food Club Cola.

Grandpa LOVED to fish - he also loved picking berries at the cabin in Mountain, Wisconsin where my Uncle Jeff would water-ski his death defying water-ski moves and my grandma would clean berries and fillet fish while I played on these giant boulders which were painted different bold solid colors and I would believe I was in a real version of candy-land until I got stung by bees and run to grandma who would tell me stories of filling big cuts with spider webs in the times when she was a little girl due to poorness and then my mom would tell me about HER grandma (which was weird because you never think of your parents having grandparents) who would tell HER stories about the boy who lived in her ear and how it runs in the family that we know things to happen that haven't happened yet (even though I didn't predict the engine fall incident of 85) and then Grandpa would rush in with a cooler of fish and Muskmelon the size of Basketballs and that ripeness of the fruit mingling with the lakeness of the fish would fill the kitchen and me with a sense of HOME and sometimes grandpa would come home with a GIANT TURTLE and cut off its head and hang it from a tree upside down so the blood would spill into a bucket and it was creepy and scary and deliciously fascinating. The turtle they used for soup and there would be fried ELK and barbecued BEAR and my grandpa made his own caviar by eating STURGEON EGGS - though he was the ONLY one eating THAT - and he also enjoyed his BRAIN SANDWICHES and homemade Blood Sausage which I don't have a recipe for - and he was big on ALL the world of organ meats like heart and tongue and really JOLLY about them -and well - basically - JOLLY ABOUT ALL FOOD and he would get super excited about eating and dining out and one time on the way to a Surf and Turf Supper Club he saw the billboard which said TURN HERE and TURN THERE he did - right into a corn field and we were all screaming in the back seat and he just smiled and smiled and exclaimed that the sign told him to and he was just following directions and sometimes he would bring tomatoes and beans and melons that he grew - he would bring them along with him and give them out as tips to the servers and as thank yous to the supermarket check out people even though they sold things like vegetables and fish and he loved SHARING all of this wonderful world of food he would grow and catch and my grandma would clean and prepare and in the evening all the grown-ups would play card games like Canasta and Pinochle and they would be drinking things us kids couldn't have and I would sit on the stairs in my homemade nightgown and though I was supposed to be in bed I would listen to the laughter of card cheating and stories of water skiing and neighbors and crops and grandchildren and I would sit there silently - holding my breath - hoping I would not be like the engine - and fall off the dock and disturb their world.

MOUNTAIN CABIN RUM AND ROOTBEER
(for adults only)

Get a glass and fill with ice.
Pour a shot of rum (can be spiced rum or regular rum)
Fill with QUALITY or HOMEMADE rootbeer
Stir a bit and ENJOY!!!!