December meme (so far behind) -- Lucy, Hogwarts, and exploding sweet potato casserole

[rthstewart]

SO FAR BEHIND, but, let’s try and get caught up!

 

vialethe  wants me to talk about Lucy

 

Corellian_sugar asked about cooking successes and disasters (I’ve been waiting for this one)

Anon wants to know where I’d assign the Pevensies in Hogwarts houses

 

 

OK, Lucy first.  Lucy was the last character I tried to write.  I found her very intimidating and really did not know where to begin.  At first, I had done very little with her in Spare Oom because I always thought she had the least distance to go.  I do know that I really loathed the fic that focused upon Lucy being bad a cooking and infantile and needing to be protected by her big brothers.  In this, I think she and Edmund have quite an accord – they tired of their big brother and sister babying them long before big brother and sister stopped doing so.  Something else important – and this was deliberate – was that I gave her she-Wolf guard so that, when the time came, Lucy would have an advocate.  Whenever anyone says, well girls/women are  not supposed to do that, Briony is there to say, well, why not?  I’m female and I do those things, so why shouldn’t Lucy? 

 Lucy, as I’ve written her, is headstrong and passionate, impatient, incredibly insightful, with a direct line to Aslan, very spiritual, and in Spare Oom, she talks to dead people.  I’m currently a bit stuck on Lucy’s story as there is one place I’ve intended to take her all along, which is advocacy involving the Chinese merchant seaman after the War, and this additional idea, which cropped up, of her having all the school trouble and problems with authority figures.  Unlike the older ones, Lucy is denied the ability to do much of anything because of her age and sex and it just infuriates her.

 I wrote this a long time ago about her, in Chapter 1 of TQSiT, and it’s still holding pretty true: 

"Having gone to the effort to take us to Narnia, teach us there, and then bring us back, he expects us to continue do his will here." She spoke so flatly, it was not a question, or even a statement inviting comment. "That's what's confusing me now."

This did surprise him. Given how closely Lucy was attuned to Aslan, Peter had not thought that his youngest sister would have any difficulty divining what the Lion intended for her.

"Confusing … how, Lu?"

"I'm not quite ready to talk about it, Peter. It's something that started when I was writing to you this summer."

Peter did not really know what to say. He hadn't picked up on anything especially unusual in Lucy's letters. They were and had been cheerful, thoughtful, and funny.

"I'm listening, if you want to try to put your confusion into words."

She squeezed his hand, and with a deep breath, carefully picked through her words. "I'm finding I don't have a lot of patience for those who claim to know Aslan and purport to do his will here. I've become suspicious of such people, since I do know Aslan and am mindful of his will."

Lucy paused for a contemplative sip of her tea then continued, "I wanted to speak to Aslan about it and didn't get the opportunity."

"And this is confusing because…" Peter prompted, leading her on.

"I'm confused because I'm not sure yet if what I'm thinking and feeling is bringing me closer to Aslan, or further away."

Peter nearly snorted his incredulity. "I find it difficult to believe that anything you think or feel is taking you further from Aslan, Lucy."

She nodded her agreement, for Lucy's confidence in the Lion and her faith in him was that great. "As do I. Maybe to put it better, I don't know yet if this is what Aslan wants, but I mean to find out. If it is, then I must act on it."

Lucy had this way of speaking with such insight, it robbed him of anything but stammering admiration. She had indeed hinted at a lessening tolerance for hypocrisy in her letters; Peter however, had not followed her musings to this logical conclusion.

"You were always the Valiant one, Lucy, there or here," he told her.

"Yes," she agreed, stating it without any false modesty, "I am. I'm not the least bit afraid or shy about standing against those things and people that I believe are against Aslan, or worse still, when they claim to act in his name, and I know they are not. I healed the wrongs they did with my cordial, and fought them with my bow and dagger. This is what I did in Narnia, and I think this is what Aslan expects of me here."

Unleashing the indomitable Queen Lucy the Valiant upon an unsuspecting England was a fearsome, wondrous thing to consider. Peter stroked the golden head resting on his shoulder, and knew that only Aslan could have given him the words that followed. "So, my Valiant sister, if the Lion so commands, what you must do is find the equivalent of your cordial, knife and bow here."

Lucy threw her arms around him, fortunately setting down her hot tea first. "Yes," she whispered. "Thank you. That's it exactly."

 

Cooking disasters

 

I’ve been saving this one.  It happened when I was in high school, over Thanksgiving.  I was on the road, traveling with my horse show barn and my mother and sister decided to host Thanksgiving without me.  This was… a mistake in retrospect.  I was getting ready to go into the ring when I called home to find out how it was going.  My sister said, “Mom, can’t talk.  She’s sobbing on the kitchen floor and we’ve ruined the sweet potato casserole, again.”

Me:  “Whaaa?”

[The sweet potato casserole was one of these awful things involving canned yams, orange juice, brown sugar, marshmallows, and liquor. ]

Sis:   “And they’ve run out of rum at the store so we can’t make it again.”

M: “Well, just leave it out.”  Pause.  “How can they run out of rum at the store?”

Sis:  “We’ve bought it all and every time we put a quarter cup in, the casserole blows up in the oven after 30 minutes.”

::me doing the calculations of 750 mL bottles of rum and ¼ cups of rum (about 70 mL)::

Sis: “And the whole house reeks of rum and everyone is arriving in 2 hours.”

I return to the really befuddling part.  “How can the store be out of rum when you are only using ¼ cup?” 

Sis:  “Well, we’ve needed two bottles for each recipe…”

It turned out that in some exaggerated notion of thriftiness, they were using rum extract…  two bottles at a time and putting it in the casserole, with the predictable results.  They did this 3 times and were scraping goo out of the inside of the oven. 

 There was also the time involving the little chicken cordon blus in their adorable little plastic jackets that really should NOT go in the oven…

 

 

 

And Pevensies and Hogwarts

 OK, just because there are 4 of them and 4 houses does not mean each Pevensie must go in a different house.

 Lucy in Gryffindor.  Duh.  Peter… as I’ve written him, Gryffindor as well, though I’ve seen good argument for Hufflepuff.

 Susan would be in Slytherin, if you think of Slytherin as not all inherently evil (sigh) but as clever, subtle and ambitious – like Horace Slughorn.  Also, as I’ve written her, Susan is very practical and utilitarian, and she is a moral relativist who is very comfortable with dodgy means to pursue moral ends.  This distinguishes her from her siblings and especially from Peter. 

 I think the Hat would have offered Edmund Slytherin, as it did to Harry, as a means to achieving greatness.  He would have been tempted and depending on where Edmund is in his timeline, might have accepted.  But, as I’ve written the older Edmund, he would have gone to Hufflepuff because he tremendously values loyalty.  He failed the test of loyalty and so greatly admires those who have it and wants to be among those he can trust. 

 

 

Phew.  Still behind but there’s 3 days worth!!!  Thanks so much!!

Also, Yuletide in.  I'd love to try and get a treat done.  We'll see.  I baked about 14 hours this weekend, managed to miss a Christmas party and my hands are covered in burns and cuts.  I have chocolate in my hair and under my fingernails.