HOW DO YOU SAY

I want to jump in the car and drive down the one lane highway some cool sunny morning, just as the mist is burning off.  I want to be hot by the side of the corn field, see the roadkill’s progress, startle a groundhog, disappear into the woods like I used to do instead of class. To linger on the hill by the big tree in the dark, under the moon, over the river.  The big sky. The smoke cloud around me.

I don't get mad often. I mean, I'll make a show every once in a while, mock exasperation, but it's usually just that: entertainment for my friends.  I get it off my chest with a laugh and it's gone. However. There are some deeper currents.  I'm at the most solid place in my life that I've ever been--I have a fulfilling job, awesome friends and family who support me, a fun relationship, good health--which throws into focus the areas that continue to stagnate.  I can't fathom the toxic junk that I've been holding onto, and for how long. At this point, it's purely self-punishment.  I ruined some relationships--friendships, screw-arounds, people who expected more or less from me than I wanted to give them--before I learned how to give myself.  Or rather, that was my beginning.  I'm still beginning.  Because here's the kicker: I am currently in the midst of a seething rage at myself for allowing myself to be vulnerable.  Vulnerable in the ...

TW: eating disorders Food is the conscious center of my life. I spend more time thinking about food than anything or anyone else.  Food in relation to hunger, to comfort, to my body.  Maybe it's the same for everyone?  Or I am a ravenous lunatic?  But really.  I grew up with a Paris-trained chef for a mother who had the education and the privilege to put time and work and love into everything she makes.  And salt.  Lots of salt.  From an early age I trained as a runner, which allowed me (as a teenager) to consume whole boxes of pasta in one sitting and not look like an amorphous blob.  I took food for granted until college, where I promptly became very sad and very lonely and very anxious and discovered that food is a powerful drug. By the time I noticed that I'd ballooned out of control, it was too late. I panicked. Started counting calories, restricting and bingeing, restricting and bingeing.  I had a constant running total in m...

How's this for proof that libraries are not dying: on a cold, snowy Tuesday morning on which pretty much everywhere else in the county had decided to close, the library was open. And not only was it open--it was packed. The thought process must go something like "Oh shit, snow. Must panic until toilet paper and library books are acquired." Although it's more than that. I didn't fully realize the impact that libraries have on communities, despite being a semi-regular library patron for all of my reading life. In just a few weeks, I've helped a man apply for a job; showed some elderly women how to send and receive text messages; introduced a kid to a series I loved as a kid; walked a lady through the basics of downloading books to her new eReader. The library sometimes stays open as a "warming center" for the homeless and those without heat. Parents and grandparents use the library as a sort of daycare center for not-too-young children. Thanks to lib...

I don't know what this is going to be about, but based on previous experience I can promise that it will be harrowing and bewildering. Perhaps, at turns, entertaining. A couple things we should consider: 1. This blog needs a new name. And I can't take the pressure, man. I'm sure my friends could help because they're all linguistic geniuses--just in the last few days I have been dubbed a "mythical Banshee of the Lake" (new boyfriend, drunk) and "a lightning rod for awesometude" (best friend). Whoops, guess I just inserted my own rave reviews. I'll think of something, but I care too much so it might take a while. 2. This blog is an immigrant. All it has ever known is being a lonely stranger in Italy. Please be patient as it gets its footing in a place where everything is familiar and expected and people do supremely ridiculous or baffling things less often than one would hope. We're not in Italy anymore, Dorothy. Ah, culture. Haven't ...

Wake up in the middle of the night to a loud wailing, think it must be wind but notice the shutters aren't banging.  Fall asleep, wake early, before everyone else, and drink yesterday's cold espresso before lacing up your running shoes and running all the way up the biggest hill, the one you never made it up all those other times, because this is your first and last chance.  Reach the top, feel your fists clenching.  Take your second to last shower and wonder when's the next time you'll count things like showers.  Visit the city and notice the visitor in you is gone.  Notice how the sun feels in your hair, your spine.  Buy stockings because the old one's holes have stretched too far.  Come home and hear someone mention the earthquake last night and inwardly say "oh."  Say "oh" about a lot of things.  About how mental landscapes change.  About how every place you've ever been has been breathtaking, when you think about it.  About how...

Was flipping through a cookbook and came across a photo of what I thought was a scrumptious-looking chocolate tart; scanned over to the recipe, found that the first ingredient is pig blood.  So I'm translating the recipe for y'all and the first person to make me a pig blood chocolate tart wins.  The three black circles next to "difficolta" indicate that this will be no easy feat, but then probably 2.5 of those circles represent the task of procuring pig blood.  Or maybe I'm a total ignoramus and pig blood is really out there, outside of pigs, in abundance?  Like, maybe at Whole Foods, next to the molasses?  Anyway, here you go.  Get on it.  You might have to go make friends with a butcher. Migliaccio alla romagnola   (a traditional dessert made for Carnival, according to the internet; migliaccio actually means pudding) Time: 3 hours Oven temperature: 180 C Ingredients: 300 gr pig blood - 200 gr honey - 100 gr almonds - 100 gr chocolate - 10...