After  68 years, Gourmet Magazine is going away. Since I do not have a subscription and I am not a gourmet, my remorse at the magazine’s demise may appear odd. But I am a fan of Ruth Reichl, one of my favorite writers and Gourmet’s editor who has abruptly joined the ranks of the unemployed.

In 1972 I stumbled on a delightful paperback book with the improbable title “Mmmmm, A Feastiary”. It’s a crazy stew of zany photographs, graphics, and writing about the sensual pleasures of seasonal food. For good measure, a number of recipes are tossed in.

This was Ms. Reichl’s first book, and I’ve been a groupie ever since. She’s the M.F.K. Fisher of my generation, and, although I love Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher’s writing, I do not need to know “How to Cook a Wolf”.

From cooking at the collectively-owned Swallow Restaurant in Berkeley, Ms. Reichl went on to be the food critic of California Magazine and the L.A. Times. She switched coasts when the New York Times offered her their prestigious restaurant review column. After six years as the Times critic, she moved to Gourmet.

Her books are pure pleasure. In “Tender at the Bone” she explains her penchant for fine food. Her mother’s bizarre food concoctions and casual attitude toward refrigerator mold brought young Ruth into the kitchen to protect visitors from food poisoning. Check out this excerpt, “The Queen of Mold”.

Before being hired for the N.Y. Times job, Ms. Reichl discovered her picture was posted in restaurant kitchens all over Manhattan. Every establishment would want to put their best plate forward if the critic came to dine. Ruth created not only elaborate disguises, but also assumed personas for her characters. She chronicles her alter-ego adventures in “Garlic and Sapphires”.

Here’s the good news. Ruth Reichl now has plenty of time to write a new book about her reign at Gourmet Magazine. I can’t wait to read it. Ms. Reichl knows that living well is the best revenge.

Good things bear repeating. I recently had occasion to revisit the KattenKabinet, and it remains delightful.

“KattenKabinet” is Dutch for “Cats’ Cabinet”. Don’t envision an emporium of Hello Kitty cuteness. This museum has a serious collection of fine art with works by Rembrandt, Picasso, Manet, Toulouse Lautrec and many other artists. An entire room is filled with sculptures, paintings and prints by Theophile Alexandre Steinlen. The subject matter of these master works is the unifying factor… all the artworks depict cats.

The museum was founded in 1990 by a well-to-do financier, William Meijer, in memory of his red tomcat, John Pierpoint Morgan. Mister Meijer’s taste in pets and art was obviously refined.

If you are not a lover of art or felines, you still might enjoy the KattenKabinet. The museum is in an elegant old canal house in the heart of Amsterdam on Herengracht, the Gentlemen’s Canal, which was named for the seventeen gentlemen who directed the Dutch East Indies Trading Company. The neighborhood remains upscale.

A small, discrete sign announces the museum, and you must ring the doorbell for entry. Opulent does not begin to describe the interiors. For felineophiles a final treat is in store. Several real cats live and roam freely through the museum. I must admit that this is the only museum I have ever been in that has a litter box in the corner of one of the galleries.

Antique dealers must get extremely tired of hearing these words. “Why, we had one of those at home when I was a kid!” I have certainly blurted out that cliche many times.

I feel no guilt at being so trite. I simply like meeting old friends, even if it’s just a clone of my beloved, oval, metal train car lunch box that went off to grade school with me every day.

Antique dealers will just have to put up with us; after all, they did choose to be in the nostalgia business, and, after a person reaches a certain age, antique stores become memory repositories.

I’ve reached the point where I get a triple whammy. Not only do I encounter treasures from my grandmother’s house (her cast iron dog doorstop) and my mother’s house (her Wonder Shredder), I also meet things from my own house.

My husband and I are surrounded by a classic collection of mid-century modern furniture, dishes and art. It’s simply the stuff we bought when we were married forty-five years ago.

A while back we were in downtown Minneapolis at a contemporary Scandinavian design furniture store. A sign pointed us upstairs to a collection of antique furniture. Visions of Carl Larsson’s farmhouse furniture appeared in my head. We went upstairs to be confronted with our own bedroom set and a good deal more of our household furnishings. After the initial shock, we laughed most of the day.

Now we can’t wait to go to St. Paul and do “the Retro Loop”. That’s a series of small, antique shops that all feature mid-century designs. We just replaced our dwindling silverware at one of these tiny shops. It’s delightful to shop in stores where not even one thing is stamped “Made in China”.

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The curtain came down today at 4:19PM CDT. Summer has bowed out; Autumn begins its reign.

My husband and I agree on almost everything from politics to the horrors of oatmeal. One glaring exception is goldenrod. He hates it; I love it.

“It’s coarse and ugly,” he says.

I suspect another dimension to his distaste of this plant. My husband’s favorite season is summer. Yellowing goldenrod is a harbinger of fall. He wants to shoot the messenger.

Every spring I must wage a campaign to save the sprouting goldenrod. I’ll capitulate and let him tear up a few stalks that are trespassing in the daylilies or pampas grass. He will be kind and leave large, sprouting swathes untouched.

As I look out onto our yard now, the goldenrod is waving like amber surf. And everywhere I drive, the roadsides are shimmering. Alongside the roads, the goldenrod teams up with huge stands of lavender-topped Joe Pye Weed and royal purple asters. Soon the sumac will turn brilliant crimson and join the party.

Summer may be dying, but its last act is sheer brilliance.

Shakespeare is almost always right on the mark, but he missed the target when it comes to lawyers. They should not all be killed.

My lawyer is wonderful, and I would have had a hard time coping the last 23 years without him. Anyone who could guide us through five estates and one attack by a hugely talented scam artist who preyed on one of my relatives is a treasured person.

I did not choose this lawyer, my Aunt Vi found him. Her original lawyer had died, she needed a new will and she could not drive. Being staunchly independent, Aunt Vi hatched a great scheme for finding a new attorney. She decided to ride the Lincoln Avenue bus that ran in front of her apartment to the end of the line. She knew there were many office complexes where the bus route ended. Then she would start walking (my Aunt Vi was a great walker), pick an attractive office complex and check the lobby index for lawyers.

Her plan worked like a charm. Her choice has been our family lawyer through thick and thin.

My beloved Aunt Vi was the first of our elders to die. She was 89 and died of a massive heart attack that hit her at the end of a 6 mile walk on a frigid January day.  My first job as an executor started, and three more have followed. My husband had one estate to execute as well.

I believe an alarming “do-it-yourself” trend has invaded America. Lawyers are replaced by a “Write Your Own Will In 30 Minutes” book, teachers by home schooling, doctors by a crop of Echinacea or St. John’s Wort in the front yard and police by the fully loaded home gun cabinet.

Do we live in a nation of multi-tasking geniuses? I prefer to rely on the professionals… I need all the help I can get.