In the early morning rain...

is moving overseas a way of recapturing the fountain of youth?

Rainy morning in Braga, Portugal

There’s something romantic about a European city, or any city really, in the morning rain. Sitting outside the Bom Jesus café on the periphery of the Braga cathedral with my dog, me sipping a meia de leite, him crouching under the table to stay dry, we watched the world go by. It was one of those I’m in Europe moments and it took me back to my time as a poor student in France 45 years ago, whiling away rainy days in cafés, when that feeling was new and brought with it the promise of a great wide world to spend my life discovering, propelled by a red Eurail pass.

Discovery looks a little different at age 63. There are residency permits to obtain, rental cars to contend with, houses and cars to buy, drivers licenses to exchange, doctors to find — all the trappings of being a responsible adult with money, immigrating to a new country.

Still, these moments of pure Proustian youthful romanticism are to be savored.

Do you remember who you were and where you were when you first had the feeling of being unleashed and set free to explore the world on your own terms? (tell us about it in the comments)

In one of those small world moments that seem to be cropping up with some frequency, J and I recently found ourselves sharing artisan pizza in a lovely café with A, one of his sister’s best friends, who now lives with her partner 15 minutes away from us in Portugal. 40 years ago J’s sister and A had some wild European adventures, which I am not at liberty to divulge here. We reminisced about those escapades and then A told me about the Living, Aging, and Dying Well seminar she was planning to attend a few days later.

The time from red Eurail passes and romantic escapades to emergency bracelets and advanced directives goes by in a flash.

We take solace wherever we can find it.

Being new in a country where you barely speak the language is like being a wobbly toddler learning to walk. As I write this, there is a pot of water on the induction stove and a load of laundry in the dryer. The “hobs” on that stove bewilder me. I tried to boil water for pasta the other night and it never actually reached a boil. The induction-friendly wok in our rental apartment never gets hot enough for our stir-fries to achieve a satisfying crunch. How and when the hobs reach optimal heat confounds me and I routinely over or under cook food. The washer and dryer are similarly mystifying. Yesterday, I ran a load four times to get rid of the extra suds that kept seeping onto the floor. I know now not to pussyfoot around, but to set the dryer on the four-hour “seco plancha” setting if I want the clothes to have a chance of getting dry.

Like my daughters, I have a lot of “adulting” to figure out.

Guacamole and Skinny Dip almonds — introducing our neighbors to tastes of home.

For the first time in 40 years, I have a landlord and, though he seems to be a lovely man, I am afraid of displeasing him.

As we prepared for our weekly wine and tapas gathering with our downstairs neighbors, I prodded J to invite Senhor M, who was working on the property, to join us.

Gostaria de se juntar a nós para um copo de vinho? is what Google Translate advised us to say. J returned and said Senhor M would be up as soon as he finished his work.

Hours later, when the wine and the guacamole were exhausted, we’d played a few card games, and still no Senhor M, we looked out the window and saw that his car was gone. “Well I think that’s what he said,” laughed J.

On our way home from our residency permit interviews in Braga and Bragança (same day and time, two different cities, two hours apart, but we were up for that challenge), we stopped for coffee in the medieval city of Guimarães, where a former colleague of J’s and his wife have just settled. Together, we laughed about their ineptitude in carrying out basic and not-so-basic tasks, like arranging to get a cashier’s check for the downpayment of a car, and our various flubs. They were living in a mostly unfurnished apartment, with one plate and one set of utensils for each of them, and a little bit of Ikea furniture.

Takes you back, doesn't it, we all agreed.

There it is again, that lovely spirit and appreciation of discovery. Thanks, Braga.

While you are learning and adjusting, there’s nothing to be done, but forge ahead with good humor and a good attitude.

That’s why, the other day, with time on my hands, I decided to figure out metric conversions, find substitutes for baking soda and buttermilk, and navigate the convection oven to make a batch of Orange (from the bounty of our orange tree) and Oat Scones. I’d actually been planning this for a while and in the treasure hunt that is grocery shopping here (there are at least six different major grocery chains, all with different specialties), I was pleased to discover that the French chain, E LeClerc, seemed to carry butter in stick form, so I stocked up in preparation for baking.

Oops, not sticks after all!

Thanks to the Food 52 baking mat that I’d brought with me (seemed frivolous when I was packing it. Now, not so much), I could handle the metric conversions, and a quick Internet search told me that you can use baking powder as a substitute for baking soda (I have since learned you can buy flour here that already includes it) and add vinegar to milk to simulate buttermilk. But the butter stymied me. Instead of sticks, I had bought a box of individually wrapped pats. A quick metric conversion let me know that I didn’t have enough to bake an entire batch of scones, so I gathered what I needed for half a batch and put the other pats back in the refrigerator.

I mixed the dough using the dough hook that came with my new food processor (which is also a juicer and comes with a blender attachment. Multipurpose small kitchen appliances seem to be a thing here). As I unwrapped each pat of butter, I consoled myself that at least I didn’t have to chop the sticks into smaller pieces. I shaped the dough into scones and into the oven they went. I congratulated myself that I didn’t burn them.

The scones were great for breakfast the next morning, topped with delicious French raspberry jam.

While I was cleaning up, I found a pile of butter pats, which left me scratching my head. Had I forgotten to put these in the refrigerator with the rest of the unnecessary butter or, annoyed by the tedium of unwrapping individual pats, had I forgotten to put them into the batter? I honestly don’t know. The scones were fine. Could they have been butterier? I’m on the continent of butter apologists, so sure.

Back to the rain. It’s been raining for the better part of two weeks here in Portugal. This is not misty, passive-aggressive Seattle rain. Several times a day, the rain will pound down like a monsoon, surprisingly violent for such a gentle country. Then it’s over.

Portugal seems to be telling me to take each squall as it comes, knowing that there are blue skies ahead. My younger self might not have believed that, but I’ve done enough living to know that it’s true.

One of the Only Decent Things I Recently Cooked

Orange and Oat Scones from My Nepenthe: Bohemian Tales of Food, Family, and Big Sur.

I went to college in Monterey, California, and have many happy memories of Nepenthe, the Big Sur restaurant that is one of the most magical places I’ve ever been. I discovered so much about life and the world at that period of my life.

I returned to Big Sur after 40 years for my 60th birthday, which occurred during the height of COVID, when travel was still restricted. I used to think you can’t go home again, but there’s something quite satisfying about returning to a place that shaped you.

The scone recipe I used came from Romney Steele’s delightful Nepenthe cookbook. Here’s Heidi Swanson’s take on the recipe. Note that it calls for sticks of butter lol.

I discovered this song at around that time in my life. Enjoy.