Changing Hats, Again

I wear a lot of different hats, both literally and figuratively. This month, for example, I’m wearing my chef’s hat a lot. I’m promoting the sale of my cookbook at Studio East’s production of “Singin’ in the Rain,” but I’m also cooking for some pretty big groups. I had 14 men over for breakfast earlier this month and served baked apple-cinnamon French toast. That went over big. Last Friday, I did both Greek pastitsio and baklava for a hundred people at the gala opening of “Rain.” This coming Saturday I’m doing Umbrian pasta sauce for 100 at Northlake UU Church. And then there is the release party for Steven George & The Dragon coming up on the 25th and I think I’ll be serving baklava at that.

 

But I have hats of almost every shape and style for different occasions. Andrew once commented that I seemed to have a hat to go with every outfit I have (and they aren’t all black!). Jo commented that I was so well coordinated with my two dogs when I wear a black jacket (Lucy) and a golden tan hat (Bliss). I didn’t actually buy the hats to go with the various sport coats or jackets or dogs. I bought the hats because I “didn’t have one like that.” That just happened to leave me with a hat for all seasons.

So it was natural to have a hat as one of the central characters in Steven George & The Dragon. It is a sheepskin hat, modeled in my mind after a kaciula hat from Eastern Europe. The idea of decorating the hat with feathers, snakeskin, a talisman, and a chicken bone came from our NaNoWriMo municipal liaison, Mandrina. She challenged everyone to include a duck that sat on the head and made a strange sound in our novels that year. And thus came the Implausible Hat. Steven includes something about the hat in each of the stories that he tells, after the fashion of “country people who tell fantastic tales of the adventures of various items of clothing,” as the thief tells his guests. I keep thinking that I should wear such a hat when I read from the book at the release party.

 

Hmmm. I don’t have one like that!