The Geometry of Love: Space, Time, Mystery and Meaning in an Ordinary Church by Margaret Visser, originally published in 2001, now available in hardback, paperback, and Kindle versions. Link is to Amazon page.
In this book, the historian and anthropologist Margaret Visser takes the reader through a Roman church, Saint Agnes Outside the Walls (Sant’Agnese fuori le Mura), exhaustively describing the architecture, history and current activities centered on this ancient structure. Sound boring? Oh believe me, it’s not. It is one of the most fascinating books I’ve ever read, and I’m so sorry that we didn’t visit this church when we went to Europe back in 1993. We’ll do so someday! I had read the book many years ago (it came out in 2001) and then again in 2013 when we went on our big driving trip to LA.
It was kind of a disconcerting experience to be reading about an ancient Roman church and then to look out the car window and see the hills of California flashing by. I said at the time that perhaps one should plan one’s trip reading to fit in with the areas one is visiting, but I’m still glad that I re-read it. When we do make it back to Rome I plan to bring along a paperback of the book and spend as much time as I can just walking around the church and reading the relevant passages. (Jim will be thrilled, I’m sure.) I also need to re-read Visser’s books on the signifance of dinner, since I want to get better at taking trouble with that meal on a regular basis.
I was reminded (or re-reminded) of this book after Tuesday night when I fed the Cherry Creek Chorale membership for our annual business meeting. Suddenly I felt like the cook who is described as being in charge of food for events at the church (although I’m not famous and I don’t have a house near a set of catacombs). Here’s the quotation:
Sant’ Agnes’s has a famous resident cook, who prefers not to be named in a book. She lives in her own house over the entrance to the catacombs. She has presided over many memorable parish parties, and is said to outdo herself on ceremonial occasions. (p. 175 in the hardback edition)
I’d love to go to one of those parties, but since I’m never going to be a member of this Roman Catholic church in Rome I guess it won’t happen. (And she’s probably not there any more anyway, as the book was written quite awhile ago.) So I’ll content myself with being in charge of the parties and meals for my own organization. It’s interesting to me how doing a job you’re really suited for, even if it’s stressful, feels enormously satisfying. I find myself taking more and more ownership of my role as food and hospitality coordinator.
So what did I do for Tuesday night? In the spirit of trying to make things easier on myself (ha!) I decided to just have make-your-own sandwiches with salads. As usual, I ended up simplifying and eliminating as time ticked down. Originally I was going to have that spinach and strawberry salad that’s so good, but that went by the wayside and I instead just served spring mix straight out of the containers.
Here’s how the day went:
1. Baking six batches of my homemade rolls. This took more time than I would have thought possible. A little more coordination and efficiency would have been helpful, as I needed to have each new batch of dough ready to go as the previous batch went into the oven. As I said in the post about these rolls, people are so impressed when you make bread that you’d think you’d taken out your own appendix.
2. Making a huge batch of an on-the-fly version of tabbouleh. If you take a look at my previous post of this recipe you’ll get an idea of what to do, but this is one of those very flexible combinations. I was out of garlic and didn’t think that the dressing I ended up making was all that great, but people loved it, so who am I to argue? Note to self, by the way: Don’t keep putting off a needed trip to the grocery store. Tabbouleh requires bulgur, and I had forgotten to buy any. As the day progressed I kept trying to come up with something else I could use that I already had on hand, but in the end I had to make a last-minute run to the store, get home and pour the boiling water over the grain, then spread the still-hot mixture out on sheet pans and take it with me to the church. In all the chaos I left the actual serving dishes behind, so I ended up having to serve it out of the big turkey roaster I had used as a mixing bowl. No one seemed to mind.
3. Using up leftover desserts from the reception along with the contributions brought in fresh from some kind-hearted Chorale members. I just refused to do any more baking! And we had plenty.
We had a great crowd, and people descended upon the food like the locusts in Egypt. (In a good way, of course.) It was a very successful evening, and now life has moved on. I just have to laugh at my post back in March about the next 52 days and how once the Chorale concerts were over I’d be done with a very busy stretch. But I’d forgotten about doing this dinner, and at that point we hadn’t sold the house and so weren’t sure when we’d be faced with the huge project of moving. Now we’ve sold the place and have the closing at 2:00 Monday afternoon. The hardest of hard deadlines! Here I sit at the kitchen table in my bathrobe. Today will be all packing, all the time. Jim has been absolutely on top of things, deciding that the only workable solution to the problem that we wouldn’t have the carpet installed before the move was to schedule delivery of several of those pod things, which are now sitting in our driveway. That move has bought us some much-needed time, as we have them for a month. So our possessions can sit in them, safely protected from the weather, while we get the downstairs into final shape. Otherwise, we were going to have to move our furniture in, then move it out again for the carpet installation, and then move it back in, and if it was raining on the day in question we’d be kind of sunk. And it’s not all that much more expensive than renting a moving truck would have been. So the next couple of weeks will be sort of a campout, and the kitchen won’t be finished for a little while longer. It’s all painted, though, by yours truly (I hate painting!), the cabinets are sitting in the garage, the floor is finished, and the ceiling tiles and light fixtures have all been purchased. The countertop material has been chosen but not bought. We still have to pick out appliances and backsplash tile. Sometime, maybe by the end of June, I’ll look around and say, “Wow—this looks pretty nice!” And the chaos, work and anxiety will be only a memory. It will seem normal to be . . . normal.
Onward to 2:00 Monday! What big deadlines are looming in your life? What are you doing to prepare for them?