when life gives you lemons

The saying, "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade" is great when you're in your 30's. Sweeten things up, make the best of a bad situation, blah blah blah. At midlife I raise my glass to the updated version: when life gives you lemons, add vodka.

It's not about the lemons or the vodka, it's about the deep understanding that making the best of something no longer cuts it. We know better.

I've got a more accurate adage now. Stone soup? Season to taste.

You can't disguise stones with seasoning. They are not tempered or molecularly transformed. They don't go away. But at least there's something palatable in the mix when you season to taste. And notice that it's "to taste." Meaning my taste. Your taste. What works for each of us according to the lot of stones in our lap. Or pot, as it were. None of this "just add sugar" and all will be well. Blech.

Life isn't that simple. Solutions to problems don't come in packages that you can pluck off the shelf. Each person, each family, has its own dynamics and needs its own strategy and blend of care to apply to the array of stones over which we stumble or which slide down the hill of life's surprises to crash through our roof or block our way on the road to wherever it is we're headed. Sorry for that run-on sentence.

I've got a pile of stones in my pot right now. I haven't a clue what seasoning to add to make the soup of my life more palatable, but I'm starting here, writing to you. A dash of update and a pinch of sharing my lot is a tentative and cautious place to start.  I suspect a lot of tastings and adjustments will be part of the mix before I'm through, but isn't that how you make soup?

Time to simmer. Thanks for keeping me company in the kitchen.