I am processing words for dinner, cutting
sentences into juicy bite-size chunks,
heaping them into a bowl, a casserole, a
stainless steel vat, and putting them on the stove
to simmer. I have dirtied every utensil
in the house. Even the cherry pitter needs washing,
and the apple peeler corer that mounts on the wall.
I am packing brown bag sonnets to go. It’s the one thing
I know how to do in the kitchen. If you’re hungry,
eat it now. The dishes can wait till tomorrow.
Published in Alimentum: The Literature of Food
After retiring from a column-writing gig lasting eleven years and yielding over 300 personal essays, I find I still have something to say. My thoughts range far and wide, and occasionally deep, on subjects including being an Iowan who misses Colorado; surviving marital violence; raising an amazing daughter and an equally amazing son; being justifiably angry about the world “these days;” writing poetry and plays; wondering if I’ll get Alzheimer’s like my mom and her two brothers; wanting to write about my twin granddaughters without sounding all Hallmark-y; fixing OCD-ish food; making sense of pants that come in shorts / crops / ankle-grazing / bootcut; being a librarian in public, academic, archival, and medical libraries; waiting 46 years to attend my high school reunion; having a gorgeous garden I can’t take care of; seeing a shaman; loving good men despite all the bad ones; and trying to wrest a little joy from life despite an 11-year-and-counting chronic migraine.