a chili tragedy

Finally, FINALLY! On the first official day of fall, it was cool enough in the upper Midwest to have a crew of people over and serve them chili and apple crisp.
(I told them that even if the temperature had been hovering around ninety, I would have served the same menu. Because I am stubborn and don’t change gears easily.)

As an optimistic overachiever struggling to reconcile with middlin-achiever brains and skills,
I made four kinds of chili.
Four.
-White chicken chili
-Traditionally classic ground beef
-Sausage black bean
-Vegan, because I, the lone star vegan in the crew, need to eat too.

Either the dinner guests were exceptionally polite, or they saw that the middlin-achiever was fatalistically certain that no one liked any of the chili offerings, apple crisp, or me.
They promised everything tasted fine and ate enough to convince me of their kindness and maybe even honesty.

Wait, I forgot the detail crucial to this whole post.
They encouraged me to leave the chili choices in their respective crock pots. Everyone could serve themselves, thereby saving me several extra bowls to wash.
Lovely thought that I embraced, with one exception.
Years ago my brother-in-law gifted me with a lovely Pfaltzgraff tureen.
Perfect for the traditional chili recipe. Classic, meet Classic.

After everyone left, with my audiobook reeling out “Sense and Sensibility,” I cleaned and put away leftovers and let overachiever me gloat a bit.

Did I say gloat?
Don’t I know by now that pride goes before a fall?
That tragedy always nips the heels of triumph?
Yes. Yes I know, but evidently need periodic updates.

This happened to my beautiful Pfaltzgraff tureen.

Pretty certain it is irreparable.
That didn’t stop me putting it carefully away in the buffet cabinet.
Because fatalistic me is at constant war with optimistic me who believes my husband might be able to glue it, and fantasyland me who thinks it may spontaneously regenerate.

Happy Fall, y’all!