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…
But Mousie, thou art no thy lane,In proving foresight may be vain:The best laid schemes o' mice an' menGang aft a-gley.An' lea'e us nought but grief an' painFor promised joy. -Robert Burns ("To a Mouse")Last Friday we discovered that there was a mouse in the house. Needless to say, this was a horrifying discovery; I…
I'll be the first to admit that, when it comes to food, I'm terribly susceptible to kicks. In my third year of graduate school, when I taught the horrible 8-9 a.m. section of a reading and writing class, I used to get up at 5:54 a.m. everyday to make myself stove-top oatmeal with banana and…
Become the sky. Take an axe to the prison wall. Escape. -Rumi I recently watched the documentary, Oma and Bella, which tells the story of two widowed Holocaust survivors who live together in Berlin and spend most of their days cooking. Food seems to be one of the only things that eases the burden of their…
The field of cornflower yellow is a scarf at the neck of the copper sunburned woman, the mother of the year, the taker of seeds. The northwest wind comes and the yellow is torn full of holes, new beautiful things come in the first spit of snow on the northwest wind, and the old things…
"A good rotation. A rotation I define as the experiencing of the new beyond the expectation of the experiencing of the new. For example, taking one's first trip to Taxco would not be a rotation, or no more than a very ordinary rotation; but getting lost on the way and discovering a hidden valley would…
Before leaving California this year, the Greek and I decided to have our own little Christmas dinner the night we exchanged presents. While it was but a humble feast since I largely spent the day grading papers and the Greek had to make an early evening lab run, we ate well and discovered some recipes…
When the spirits are low, when the day appears dark, when work becomes monotonous, when hope hardly seems worth having, just mount a bicycle and go out for a spin down the road, without thought on anything but the ride you are taking.-Sir Arthur Conan DoyleThe way Sir Arthur describes it, bicycling may just be…
Raise me a dais of silk and down; Hang it with vair and purple dyes; Carve it in doves and pomegranates, And peacocks with a hundred eyes; Work it in gold and silver grapes, In leaves and silver fleurs-de-lys; Because the birthday of my life Is come, my love is come to me. -Christina Rossetti…
There is a silence where hath been no sound. -Thomas Hood ("Silence") I know I've written about pizza before, but, frankly, when all is said and done, it's something worth revisiting again and again. Pizza is just one of those irresistible comfort foods: you put whatever you're in the mood for on top of a…
Dining with Dostoevsky 