I mean this in the sense that someone might be saying 'my heart is full.' I think when they say it, they mean it is full of happiness, but sometimes I wonder. Did you see the Joanne Woodward movie "The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds" (1972)? She plays an embittered, alcoholic, widow raising two teen-age daughters. One is very smart and when the mother just barely manages to get herself to the science fair to see her daughter report on the marigold experiment, Joanne Woodward says 'my heart is full' but somehow the context and the way she said it left me wondering if it was a good thing or a sad thing.

So my refrigerator is full because my cousins (the ones who were going to help me bury my dad's ashes - see "Burying Tom" earlier post) are coming tomorrow for lunch. We are not going to do the burial, just have lunch and off they continue on their madcap way to Chicago. Taking the three hour detour to come here is a concession on the part of her husband.

The reason I am stressing about it is, come to find out, the husband is gluten (allergy to wheat**) and dairy free, and one of the small children is also dairy free. One reason it irritates me is that the whiniest members of my husband's family are gluten free and for all I know have decided to drink soy milk, so I refuse to cook for them. If they come to the cabins to stay I always tell them to be sure to bring food that they can eat, especially for breakfast.

Breakfast is a tricky meal because people seem to have fairly strong opinions about what they want to eat in the morning but one thing that usually bridges the gap is to make a nice coffee cake or some muffins or biscuits or even toast from home-made bread. But if there are gluten free folks, then special flours and mixes must be purchased at exorbitant prices from that pirate Granny of Granny's Gluten Free Zone. Many of the supermarkets and health food markets around here have started stocking gluten free products next to the regular food on their shelves, but I don't want to build up a supply of the stuff, I just want to live a normal life with my all-purpose, bread, and whole wheat flours.

Back to why this matters: I don't like Mr. Troutbend seeing me doing all this cooking and slaving over the hot stove to come up with a gluten free meal when it's my relatives but I won't do the same for his relatives. I wouldn't blame him if he was a little miffed about it, although it's not his nature to make issues of things. Well, the difference is that when I invited them and asked her if there is anything special her kids do or don't like, I had no idea we were falling into the quicksand of gluten free.

Tomorrow's menu, which I have decided will be ready by 11:15 am whether they are here or not is going to be chicken marinated without soy sauce; red and green striped Jello; rice baked with V-8 juice and bacon (an old family recipe); baked beans made from scratch using dry beans, brown sugar, tumeric, and onions; Fritos Scoops and Tostitos Scoops; salsa, and watermelon. The beverage will be limeade from fresh-squeezed limes.

There was going to be potato salad, but I made it with a homemade walnut oil vinaigrette that turned the potatoes darkish brown so it doesn't look sunny and normal. It's very good, and I keep eating it, plus I just added some chopped black olives to it, and now it is really, really good, but I don't think little kids would like it. Miracle Whip is allegedly gluten free, in case you were wondering, but that's another reason not to serve it - I'm not positive. It's not like the guy would keel over dead, but I don't want to be serving something that someone would be left out of.

** It seems like just about every prepared food including a lot of condiments and soy sauce has some form of wheat in it. Modified wheat starch is a very common additive, so gluten frees spend a good part of their time reading labels and quizzing waiters about how stuff is prepared. Even breakfast cereals like Cheerios, which is oats, are off limits because they are manufactured in the same production processes as wheat-containing cereals.

Well, tra-la. Off to bed. Have to get up early tomorrow to start cutting up that chicken.