June 6, 2026
Good morning!
It’s Saturday. The world, it seems, is divided into two camps: those who love rhubarb, and those who don’t. Most of my life, I only knew it as a sour, gloopy component of strawberry rhubarb pie and was happy to go without.
At some point, however, curiosity got the best of me. I planted what has become a rather overzealous specimen and quickly became a born-again rhubarb lover. More specifically, a lover of what rhubarb can do for liquid refreshments.
Ever since playing Martha Brewster in Arsenic and Old Lace in high school, I’ve had a secret hankering to become one of those old ladies who keeps homemade hooch in a cabinet and offers it to visitors. (Rest assured that, unlike Martha Brewster or her sister, I have no desire to poison my visitors and bury them in the cellar.)
And so, in addition to chopping some of these stalks and boiling them into a sweet syrup, I’ll be chopping the rest, placing them in a very big jar, topping them with sugar and an orange peel, and then drowning them in a robust glug-glug-glug of gin before leaving them to ponder the meaning of life for a month or so.
At last the bits will be strained and the pink boozy elixir enhanced with a splash of Grand Marnier before being poured into a prettier bottle, corked, placed in a cabinet, and proudly offered to visitors. No arsenic, I promise.
“People will forget what you did, but they'll never forget how you made them feel.”
—Maya Angelou
Onwards we go,
Clara
As a child in the early 50's, my sister, myself, and the neighbor's son would grab a salt shaker from home, head to where the rhubarb grew, break off a stalk or two each and happily sit down munching away. We would salt the end, bite it off and repeat. We had no idea about the danger of the leaves and our parents probably didn't either. Still remember doing that at almost 83.
I don’t usually drink by myself. This drink may push me over the line.