"Look at me. Even though I'm safe, back in my comfortable home, I'm still acting like a refugee--scavenging, foraging, guarding my small space, waiting out the end of the war. I'm going to survive, I know that. Someday I will talk about this calmly and insightfully. And for a good many years after that, I…
A burgundy leaf fell from the Japanese maple and landed upright in a spinach artichoke dip. It was chilly in the shadow under the tree. Soon, there would be the long winter, cold and white. An erasure of this night, the garden. -Lauren Groff (Fates and Furies) When I last left you, it was high…
Alice in Wonderland birthday parties; Spanish-speaking nannies; healthy children harvesting perfect blue chicken eggs from the back-yard coop; homeschooled wonders who read by age three; flat, tight bellies; happy husbands; cake pops; craft time [...] homemade lip balm; tremendous flat pans of paella prepared over a beach campfire. What sort of sadist is running these…
It was a rimy morning, and very damp. I had seen the damp lying on the outside of my little window, as if some goblin had been crying there all night, and using the window for a pocket-handkerchief.-Charles Dickens (Great Expectations)As I sit here writing this in the Greek's and my bedroom listening to the…
She allowed the hum and buzz of the park to lullaby her. Life wasn't about becoming, was it? It was about being. Dr. Kellet would have approved this thought. And everything was ephemeral, yet everything was eternal, she thought sleepily. A dog barked somewhere. A child cried. The child was hers, she could feel the…
Just thinking about her made him warm inside. No longer did he wish to be a fish or a sunflower--or anything else, for that matter. He was glad to be human. For sure, it was a great inconvenience to have to walk on two legs and wear clothes. There were so many things he didn't…
This is what you have been waiting for, he used to say to me. And I'd say, What?And he'd say, This--holding up my cheese and mustard sandwich.And I'd say, What?And he'd say, This, sort of looking around.-Marie Howe ("The Gate")Last week, last Sunday in fact, this little blog turned 3. It was an occasion that…
"You know, writers are like beekeepers. A writer is the thief of knowledge. And we beekeepers, we are honey stealers. In both cases, you have to be a hunter of dreams. Otherwise you cannot dream." -Adam Gollner (from an excellent article on Crete in Lucky Peach 7) Although I have a lot of recipes I…
So Ludwig's thoughts about honour were private thoughts, and he sought wisdom from an Athena who was not Gracie, and certainly not the problematic idea of his native land. Who after all was America? A freedom fighter, a slut, a demon, a Daughter of the Revolution? What now was he to her or she to…
Two years ago today, on a foggy California day, I put on a nice dress and headed to a Mediterranean restaurant to meet a guy. That guy, as it would turn out, was the Greek. Our first meeting was pleasant, but, looking back now, kind of strange. You see, I had just returned from the…
Dining with Dostoevsky 