Hilarious!!
I was reading the Martha Stewart Living website while looking for any good recipes that use large quantities of potatoes (why did I buy the 25lb bag at Costco??!!) and I read the obligatory letter from the editor, and I must say it was HILARIOUS. The contrasting images of Martha Stewart's domesticity which she sells in her magazine contrast dramatically with that of PRISON. In fact you'd might be forgiven for mistaking "Alderson", her prison, with a resort/vacation spot. Go to www.marthastewart.com to read the whole "News from Martha". Meanwhile, here's an excerpt written by Margaret Roach, Editor in Chief:
"Martha also continues to be the most resourceful person I know. “See what one can do with nothing?” she wrote not long ago in an upbeat letter full of anecdotes about her many adventures in creative reuse at Alderson. And later in the same letter: “I hope you enjoyed just a glimpse of some nice things. There are many others to recount.”
The tales were always surprising: foraging for wild greens, such as dandelion, on the prison property to augment the limited fresh vegetable offerings in the diet there; decorating the chapel for a memorial service with whatever remnants of the growing season nature had left behind by late fall; cooking up impromptu recipes in the microwave with whatever very basic ingredients the commissary had for sale.
The same skills and interests that fill her time and make her life special at home—cooking, crafts, and gardening, as well as reading, exercising and trying to learn something new every day—have been the fabric of daily life at Alderson. She has been reading voraciously—from Bob Dylan’s Chronicles: Volume One to Richard Rhodes’s biography of John James Audubon (John James Audubon: The Making of an American) to The Clearing by Tim Gautreaux. She initiated and taught a nightly yoga class for about ten women. She also crocheted, but lamented, “My crochet is still very basic,” envying the skills displayed by some of the other residents. One craft endeavor had a more satisfying outcome. When Martha discovered a set of old molds in the facility’s ceramics studio, she decided to cast, paint, and then glaze a nativity scene for her mother as a gift. Would you be surprised to hear that the paint color she custom-mixed from what was available looked like Drabware?"
"Martha also continues to be the most resourceful person I know. “See what one can do with nothing?” she wrote not long ago in an upbeat letter full of anecdotes about her many adventures in creative reuse at Alderson. And later in the same letter: “I hope you enjoyed just a glimpse of some nice things. There are many others to recount.”
The tales were always surprising: foraging for wild greens, such as dandelion, on the prison property to augment the limited fresh vegetable offerings in the diet there; decorating the chapel for a memorial service with whatever remnants of the growing season nature had left behind by late fall; cooking up impromptu recipes in the microwave with whatever very basic ingredients the commissary had for sale.
The same skills and interests that fill her time and make her life special at home—cooking, crafts, and gardening, as well as reading, exercising and trying to learn something new every day—have been the fabric of daily life at Alderson. She has been reading voraciously—from Bob Dylan’s Chronicles: Volume One to Richard Rhodes’s biography of John James Audubon (John James Audubon: The Making of an American) to The Clearing by Tim Gautreaux. She initiated and taught a nightly yoga class for about ten women. She also crocheted, but lamented, “My crochet is still very basic,” envying the skills displayed by some of the other residents. One craft endeavor had a more satisfying outcome. When Martha discovered a set of old molds in the facility’s ceramics studio, she decided to cast, paint, and then glaze a nativity scene for her mother as a gift. Would you be surprised to hear that the paint color she custom-mixed from what was available looked like Drabware?"
