Happy Birthday Raymond P. Riker, III

Well, it’s been a while.  But, it’s a perfect day to post in my Blog.  Today is Ray’s birthday.  He would have been a young 56 year old man!  Of course I miss him as much today and I did at 9:10pm on January 3.  The wounds have scarred over though.  I still see them, but they are not as noticeable. 

I came across this great list of “30 Things to Do Before You Die.”  I found it on the website mindbodygreen.com .  This is not your traditional “bucket list” – but it’s a bucket list I think everyone needs to achieve.  Check it out below:

30 Things To Do Before You Die:
1. Stop worrying about debt.
2. Forgive your ex-lovers.
3. Stop trying to control your outcome.
4. Look in the mirror and love yourself unconditionally.
5. Leave the job you hate.
6. Find your purpose and live it full heartedly.
7. Adopt a furry friend.
8. Don't feel guilty for holiday weight gain.
9. Trust that everything is in right order.
10. Travel to the place you keep thinking about.
11. Try something that scares you daily.
12. Be open to change.
13. Let go of your past.
14. Stop trying to change people.
15. Stop looking for answers outside of yourself.
16. Stop thinking you did something wrong.
17. Be your weird, crazy, beautiful self.
18. Follow your heart.
19. Risk everything for love.
20. Reject rejection.
21. See the world as a beautiful, safe, and loving place.
22. See everyone as equals.
23. Give up all attachments to stuff.
24. Recognize the journey is the reward.
25. Stay hopeful and optimistic in difficult situations.
26. Welcome all life lessons.
27. See the opportunities in every challenge rather than give up.
28. Live your values.
29. Inspire others by your own bigness.
30. Play with the world.

Sounds easy, but this is really tough stuff!   We are very emotional beings, and at a certain age we are set in our ways.  Sometimes it takes a real life change to rethink how you live. 

For me, even after 5 years, I am still figuring out how my life should “be.”  I met Ray at such a young age that we built our life to be what it was over a 21 year period.  That all changed in the blink of an eye.  At 47 I am now still restarting who I am…and it’s very difficult.  Everything I/we dreamed of our life after retirement has vanished.  I don’t even think I will ever be able to retire now. 

I will do what I can to accept my changes and I think these 30 bucket list items can help in that.  Happy Birthday Raymond Riker, III.  I love you!  - Jimmy

Joy Peace Strength

Ray and Me New Year's 2005

Today is the fifth year anniversary of the loss of my best friend and soul mate, Raymond P. Riker, III.  I could tell you exactly everything I did that day hour by hour.  Etched in my mind forever.  As I mentioned in my Facebook post today, I am not the person I was and I am not the person I will be.  I have grown.  I have learned.  I still have a long way to go. 

I had a dream about Ray this week.  We were at some type of social event.  He kept his distance from me.  When I would come near him he would turn and walk away.  I felt he was pushing me away from him.  I finally met up with him and asked him "what is wrong, why do you keep ignoring me?"  He said "I know what's going on.  You're living with another man in a house."  I told him I wasn't, and asked him who told him that.  He said "your grandma."  I kept promising him I wasn't seeing or living with another man.  When I woke up I was telling Drew about the dream and then I just stopped and started thinking.  What if this is him speaking to me from beyond.  It's quite a stretch of the imagination, but I'd like to think he is letting me go and move on with my life with Drew.  Or maybe it was just a dream from eating spicy food.

Drew has a significant "issue" he is dealing with right now.  Of course, as his partner it affects me as well.  I was in bed this morning praying that God would take this away from us.  Then I thought, it doesn't matter if he takes this away from us, there will just be another burden placed on us again and again.  So I prayed that God would help me keep joy while going through this, peace in my soul, and strength to get through and deal with it.  I felt much more peaceful after that.  I'm just leaving it in God's hands.

I will go to the cemetery this evening when Drew gets home from work.  I'm sure he will want to go.  Enjoy life! - Jimmy

Miss You Wiley!

Amity and Wiley - about 1997

On December 10^th my oldest cat, Wiley, died while lying on my chest in bed.  His health sure was deteriorating, but he didn’t seem to be suffering.  Old age, but he still purred while lying on my chest.  On the evening of the 9^th he jumped off the couch and his legs gave way.  He just plopped to the floor.  I picked him up and placed him in front of his food bowl, but when I set him down he just dropped like a bag of rags.  I knew it was only time before he would go.  I had scheduled to have him put to sleep on the 12^th, because I knew if he made it that long it was too long.

 

When I went to bed he was lying in the living room on the floor next to the chair I sit in.  At 3:00am I got up to go to the bathroom.  He was lying on the floor in front of the bedroom door.  He must have mustered up as much strength as he could to try and crawl into the room to be with me.  He was still alive…barely, so I picked him up and had him laid on my chest.  I was up for three hours petting and kissing him.  At about 7:15 am I could tell his body became lifeless.  He was gone.  I was sad, but had a sense of relief that he was no longer weak and frail. 

 

I didn’t cry.  I didn’t even tear up.  He had been with me for 19 years and I knew he had such a wonderful life.  All the way from Royal Oak, to the purchase of our condo in Douglas (he and his sister were named after the cross-streets in Douglas, Wiley and Amity), on to the Kirby House and then the “after Kirby House” life.  I was glad he had a couple years post-Kirby as he would be up in the apartment at Kirby all day with no human contact.  He was happy, but he would have preferred to be around Ray and me most of the day.  The last two years he has been able to be so much more a part of my daily life as I didn’t have to separate him from “the rest of the house.”

 

Yesterday was a different story.  I started thinking about him and how much I missed him!  I cried twice yesterday.  It’s been quite a while since I’ve cried but I guess I needed to get the emotions of missing him released.  Mondo and Harley seemed to sense something was wrong and came on the bed with me and put their faces up to mine as if to say “what’s wrong?” 

 

Our home is a bit quieter now.  Moscow died in July and now Wiley.  This just means that Mondo and Harley will get all that much more love attention from us!

 

I’m pretty much all ready for Christmas.  Just have a few gifts to wrap.  I have off Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and then I don’t come into work until 1:45pm on Friday!  I’m looking forward to a nice, quiet Christmas. 

 

No recipe today -Merry Christmas

-Jimmy

Inner Peace and Snowball Cookies

"Thanksgiving 2014"

Well here we are, another December has come upon us.  Every day brings a reminder of December 2009.  Five years have now passed and yet it seems like yesterday. 

I’ve still been having trouble with anxiety.  Even with medication and meditation I have still had this trouble with anxiety which keeps me from feeling completely “well.”  It’s like there’s just something inside me that just won’t let it go.  I keep expecting “something” to happen.  I hate it!  On some mornings it’s so bad I get nauseous and sick.  On the outside no one sees it…I hide it well.  And on some counts, when I’m busy doing things it’s not so bad.  But Drew sees it.  He knows, and it’s great to know he’s there for me in this very personal matter.

I think I’m starting to do better.  At least that is what I’ve been telling myself the last three days in which my anxiety level hasn’t been that bad.  I took Harley for a walk last nice.  It was so nice!  It was a very cold evening, but the moon was almost full and I could see it’s reflection on the Kalamazoo River as it peacefully rolled along.  I thought to myself “that is beautiful” and then realized I felt at peace inside.  Maybe that’s what I have been lacking.  Maybe it isn’t actually anxiety that I’m having, but inner peace that I’ve been lacking. 

There is an old hymn titled “It Is Well With My Soul.”  I remember singing as a youth in church.  (Remember, my father was a Baptist Minister, so church was our life!)  The first part of the hymn is “When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll; Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, It is well, it is well with my soul.”  I think my walk last night along the river gave me that feeling.  I just may be on to something – I need to have and accept inner peace.  Peace and acceptance of my “lot” – where I am in life right now.

Many times while writing my blog I get an epiphany.  It seems that just writing out my thoughts they sometimes come together as an “ah ha” moment for me.  Today may just be one of those days.

Now on to a recipe!

This weekend “Lakeshore Lodging” is participating in the “Cookie Tour of Inns.”  This event is a fund raiser (this year to purchase a new tree for Saugatuck).  People can buy a ticket and then go from inn to inn or cottage rental or motel, hotel and get a tour and a cookie from a family recipe.  I am making an old traditional cookie that our family always called “Snowball Cookies.”  I think it’s because my grandma only made them at Christmas…and they kind of looked like small snowballs.  They’re also called “Butter Ball Cookies” and other names.  It’s the easiest cooking in the world to make and oh so good!

SNOWBALL COOKIES

Ingredients:

1 cup butter

2 cups flour

2 teaspoons vanilla

1 ½ cups walnuts, chopped

¼ cup sugar

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup powdered sugar

Directions:

1.     Cream butter, sugar, salt and vanilla

2.     Blend in flour and nuts

3.     Scoop and roll into balls

4.     Bake 325° for 22 to 25 minutes

5.     Remove from oven roll into powdered sugar

45 Days

My Snowmen Display

Five years ago yesterday I took Ray for his first (and only) “routine” colonoscopy.  I decided to support him by fasting along with him the night and morning before.  Thank God I didn’t have to drink the “stuff!”  We both planned to go to eat at Panara Bread after the procedure as he had never been there before.  After waiting an hour and a half in the waiting room a nurse called me to the back.  I figured they just need me to help him out in the wheelchair.  When they took me into a room where Ray was sitting and asked me to have a seat I knew it wasn’t good.  This is when the whirlwind happened.  Little did we know he only had 45 days left to live. 

The last four years I have not really been very excited about Christmas.  All the reminders come back.  The snow, the decorations, the early darkness, the cold, it brings back those horrible 45 days and the months and years following.  However, this year for the first time I am actually excited about Christmas.  Not about gifts, but about the fun with friends, decorating, putting lights up, yes, even the snow!  I’ve already got the tree up with lights on it (no decorations yet) and many boxes from the storage unit pulled out ready to unpack, unwrap and decorate.  I hung lights along our outside second floor screen porch too!  I went through the motions in years past, and had some good times, but I just feel so at peace this year and excited!

The snow is heavy here in Saugatuck/Douglas right now.  It came even earlier than last year!  However, it is supposed to go into the upper 40's at the beginning of next week so there will be a lot of melting, slush and probably ice.  It's so nice to live so close to work!

OK, so it's almost Thanksgiving.  Here is Ray's Aunt Mae's pie crust recipe.  After Ray died I decided to make a quiche.  I went to the store to buy a pre-made crust.  I got home and forgot to buy it.  I could hear Ray in the back of my mind..."you can do it."  So I pulled out the recipe and made it.  And..it worked!  Just follow the recipe and you will have a great pie crust!

Aunt Mae's Pie Crust

3 Cups all purpose flour
1 Cup Crisco Shortening
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 Tablespoon Vinegar
6-8 Tablespoons Ice Water - ICE COLD

Place flour in bowl and add shortening. With shortening in the flour and using two knives cut into pea size chunks.

In a separate bowl beat egg with a fork and add vinegar. Sprinkle into flour mixture.

Mix lightly with spoon and add water slowly. Do not overmix or pastry will be tough.

Using hands, form together adding water if needed.

Split into two balls and roll on lightly floured surface into sheets.

　
-Jimmy

Fall Activities & Drunken Pumpkin Chili

Drunken Pumpkin Chili

It's been way too long since I've blogged...and I promised to share recipes.  Sorry for the delay.

Over the last month and a half not too much has really happened in my life.  It's routine and that's good.  Drew and I went to Detroit to visit my family.  We had a great time!  Got together with a Kirby House guest/friend and spent an afternoon in downtown Detroit.  What a great time!  The city looks wonderful.  Much different than my last day of work on April 24, 1998.  We spent most of the time in the Bier Garten - that sandy beach area right in the center of downtown.

Then we were treated out to dinner in Royal Oak by another guest/friend.  (I need to start getting rid of the "guest" part.)  What a nice treat.  After dinner we went to a bar in Royal Oak and ran into Saugatuck friends!  How crazy is that?

The rest of our time was spent going to Greenfield Village, Eastern Market and spending time with my family.  It was a great trip.  Wish we had more time.

Last year I didn't get the backyard gazebo down in time before the early snow fall and the roof of it collapsed.  We got a new roof this year and we enjoyed it this summer.  The last few weeks I did get all the furniture, cushions put away, the roof off and everything else buckled down and tied up.  Even got most of the leaves raked.  I made it just in time!

Drew and I had been trying to share the Audi with our work schedules.  We both live so close to work that I couldn't justify another vehicle, until I found one.  We got a 2001 Dodge Grand Caravan for $250!  A couple minor and cheap repairs and it's been running great.  At least it's dependable enough for me to get to and from work....even Holland!  Not sure that I would trust it on a lengthy road trip, but hey, it works for our needs.  Thank God!

Ok, so now for the recipe.  This is great chili, especially for the fall and winter months.  Make a big pot and store some in the freezer.  (Be sure to label the container-so you know what's in it and when you made it.)  This is not my recipe but I found it on the internet and have made it twice.  The recipe says the prep time is "10 minutes" that is bull crap!  It's more like 30 minutes at least.  So, take your time and just enjoy chopping the vegetables as you watch an episode of Judge Judy or something on the Food Network!

Drunken Pumpkin Chili

Total Time: 1 hour, 20 minutes

Prep: 10 minutes - (more like 30)

Cook: 1 hour, 10 minutes

Yield: 6 servings 

Ingredients

1 pound 93% lean ground beef (optional)

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 medium onion, chopped

2 large carrots, diced

1 yellow bell pepper, diced

1 bay leaf

1 tablespoon cumin

1 tablespoon dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon allspice

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1 cup pumpkin ale

15-ounce container pure pumpkin puree

15-ounce container diced tomatoes

2 canned chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, seeds removed and minced

15-ounce container black beans, drained and thoroughly rinsed

15-ounce container cannellini beans, drained and thoroughly rinsed (optional)

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Directions

Add the ground beef to a dutch oven or large stock pot and adjust heat to medium-high. Break up the meat using a wooden spoon, and immediately add the minced garlic, diced onion, diced carrots, and diced bell pepper.  Season with salt and pepper.  Cook for about 7 minutes, or until the meat is nicely browned and the veggies are softened. Reduce the heat to medium.  Add the bay leaf, cumin, oregano, cinnamon, allspice, and tomato paste, and stir to combine.  Add the pumpkin ale and stir to deglaze the bottom of the pan.  Allow the pumpkin ale to cook and reduce for about 5 minutes.  Add the pumpkin purée and diced tomato.  Season with salt and pepper.  Add the minced chipotle peppers, and stir to combine.  Partially cover the pot, reduce the heat to low, and allow the chili to cook for about 45 minutes.  Add the black beans and cannellini beans (if using), stir, and allow the chili to cook another 10 minutes.  Season to taste with salt and pepper, and serve.

Happy 25th Anniversary Ray Riker!

Twenty-five years is a generation.  A complete new life cycle.  I sit here at the computer writing a very important blog for me with the Food Network on in the background.  Twenty-five years ago there was no Food Network.  There was no internet.  My "car phone" was in a big bag and I paid $59 a month for 15 free minutes, if I went over that it was 59 cents per minute during peak time or 17 cents per minute between 7:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m.  No Facebook, no texting, no true home computers.  But 25 years ago tonight is the anniversary of Ray and me.  (Is that proper English?)

Ray and I first saw each other on Memorial Day of 1989.  My brother and I took a walk and passed by Ray's house.  Eyes met and after many walks around the blocks over the next couple months a friendship grew.  There were a lot of difficult circumstances surrounding our relationship but September 22, 1989 sealed it.  We went to dinner at Salute in Detroit, near Six Mile and Woodward.  There was an hour and a half wait but we could not have cared a less.  We talked, and flirted, and talked and flirted.  I assume we had an amazing meal, but I really don't even know what we ate, but we knew that we were falling in love.  (I actually fell in love the very first time I set eyes on him.)  I would never believe such a thing could be possible if I didn't experience it myself.  We were in love...we were soul mates.  It was that night he "mouthed" to me "I love you."  I was in shock, and happy.

This was an era where you did not go in to work on Monday and tell everyone you were in love.  I had to hide everything.  I had to hide my absolute true love from my parents, my siblings, my co-workers.  I was in heaven, but I could NOT let anyone know.  We hid our growing relationship.  Some of Ray's family knew, but all in all we didn't dare share our love.  A few close friends, a few family members, but most people couldn't know we were "gay."  In a way our secret love was fun.  We knew it, but no one else did.  It was "our" secret.

Our love grew with ups and downs.  Arguments, fights, vacations, funerals, weddings, dinners, celebrations....they all added to our bonding together as one.  Even today, as I share moments with Ray's family, I feel a part of them...I feel like I am actually part of the Riker family.  As I was...as I am.  We never got to officially marry but I am called "Uncle" by his nieces and nephews.  That's how they know me....Uncle Jimmy.

There is not a day, or a moment that Ray is not on my mind.  I don't believe in dead people roaming around here on earth with us, but I do believe that Ray is always with me, in his memories, his life, his impact on my life...he is with me.  I know what he would say to me, even today. 

I experienced one of the worst things a person could every experience on January 3, 2010...to find your best friend, lover, spouse...dead.  I sometimes wonder why I still need to be on medication, but that would explain it.  It has been 4 1/2 years, but I still can't get over it.  I deal with it and my life has moved on.  I don't know if I would say I am "at peace" with my life, but I have accepted it, moved on and live each day moving forward with a bit of pain from the wounds. 

Today, I am home alone (Drew is at work) and I am celebrating my 25 years having Ray in my life.  I wouldn't change a thing.  And I am so happy that the last year of his life he encouraged (pushed) me into cooking.  Now I still get to enjoy his pasta sauce, chicken noodle soup, fried chicken, chili, and all the other home comfort foods. 

The picture above is from 1990.  I would take it with me when I traveled the U.S. for work.  This was before all the technical social media.  I kept this picture in my brief case.

September 22, 1989 seems like yesterday!

Happy 25th Anniversary Ray! - Love, Jimmy