something to sink your teeth into

trying to look innocent, eating corn flakes and sporting avocado-applesauce shampoo.

"Does baby have a little toofy?"

There is a stranger goo-goo-gaa-gaaing at my baby on the bike path and I've warned her he may be cute, but the kid takes no prisoners when it comes to biting.

“Is there a toofy in there? Hmm??”

“Um, he has 8,” I tell the woman, who clearly has not taken my warning seriously enough.

She stops, straightens up, drops the gooey smile and looks me in the eye. “Eight?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well,” she says in a huff of exhale, as if offended by my infant's dental progress.

I'm relieved to have snapped her out of her baby talk, though I can see this will end our recently ignited relationship.

You could say Rhys experiences the world through taste. One of his favorite things to play with is the large Rubbermaid container of his socks (all of which are either too big or too small, like a true full moon, they only really fit him for a moment. Aaaaaaand...NOW! ). His favorite way to play with his sock container is to tilt it to his face and catch the falling socks in his mouth. He then grips the captured

sock or pair of socks in his teeth like a puppy playing tug-o-war and, solidifying the analogy, shakes his head from side to side snarling.

The child eats anything he can get his hands on – food, yes, but also any accompaniments – the avocado peel, for example, all the grass he can cram in his face, a cheese stick, stolen from my hands, the plastic wrapper torn open easily with his fangs before I can even react.

At the one play group I've managed to attend at the library, all the other babies were mobile but mine. Rhys surveyed the room with excitement, his chubby little arms and legs kicking and flailing at the sight of the other babes. There he sat on his blanket while half a dozen babies tottered around him or zipped by on all fours and his pleasure grew untethered. High-pitched hoots escaping his mouth, he waited until one of the wee ones got within striking distance and then – blam!-- he'd reach out as far as he possibly could, leading with his mouth wide open. Mama's little attack spider manning his web.

The other day I noticed the netting on his pack-n-play portable crib was torn in two places. Odd, I thought. Until I realized, that, no, it's not been torn, it's been bitten.

I'm thinking his first words might be “Tastes like chicken.”

conducting. the world is his edible symphony.

Ode to the Mexican Tacquería in Northampton, Mass

Bless your enchilada-less menu that brings me, no really,

to tears as I stand there hoping for dinner. True depth

of emotion is so hard to find our daily lives.

Praise to your tasteless beans, lukewarm pile in a Styrofoam box;

they won't burn my hungry boy's mouth, their lack of spice refusing

to detract his focus from the beauties of spring that surround us.

Light and love go with your bored, surly employees, not one

of whom is Mexican, but who here, in this Land of Opportunity,

can nonetheless work in a self-proclaimed ethnic eatery,

stepping up to the counter as they do, to offer me, a stranger,

their assistance.  

Detour: Open Letter to Michelle Obama

Dear Mrs. Obama:

I am writing to discuss your campaign, surely a worthwhile one, against childhood obesity in our country.

I have just completed a cross-country driving trip that took my family and I on a 5,000 mile journey from California to Massachusetts. While I have seen many extraordinary things along my travels, I have also witnessed a plethora of menus that would curl your toes and people sitting behind those menus who, let's just say could have benefited from the type of campaign you have embarked on some years back. It has been no less than a strenuous and continual struggle to eat anywhere close to properly as a 6-7-month pregnant woman also feeding her young child while crossing the (ample) midsection of the United States.

That battle for nutrition was one of the major reasons I was thrilled to arrive in your adopted hometown and former home of mine, Washington, D.C. Thinking nothing of our ability to find a decent lunch while out and about in the city, my family began our day at the Air and Space Museum.

I recently learned that this building is the second most-visited one on the planet (the first being Paris' Louvre Museum). And so, I took my place as one of millions this year that will examine exhibits about the physics of flying, marvel at the bravery and foolishness of those early enthusiasts with not much more than a wing and a prayer, take in the accomplishments of the first African-Americans in flight, wonder about the future of space exploration, and lots more.

And when lunchtime came, we migrated to the food court. There we would make a grave and upsetting discovery: McDonald's. McDonald's, as you may know, or not, has a 100% monopoly on the food options at Air and Space. McDonald's, Mrs. Obama.

Should I have counted for you the number of ice cream stands within the food court? Should I even bother to go so far as to challenge you to find a healthy meal under the (deep-fried) golden arches? Much less a healthy vegetarian meal? The signs posted about McDonald's commitment to the health and well-being of children only caused me to grow more upset. How dare this corporate giant of salt and fat, whose food literally won't even rot, try to school me on health.

I think I know how to eat well, Mrs. Obama. And I think you do, too. It is not at McDonald's. We cannot make people eat well, but the issue is choice.

While clearly, we could go elsewhere for food, to do so was impractical given our immediate hunger and our schedule. We were left to pick at a greasy pizza and some sugared up yogurt. By the time I found myself in the glitzy food court of Air and Space, I had already been a prisoner of poor food options for thousands of miles. My patience was tried. My children deserve better.

Do you sincerely want McDonald's representing a government-maintained, U.S. citizen-owning institution of culture such as the Smithsonian Museums? I would respectfully request that you investigate the issue of nutrition and childhood obesity as it manifests in your own backyard and as it impacts millions of visitors every year in our nation's capital.

Days Twenty-Five & Twenty-Six Part 2: Eating in Iowa

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Any vegetarian, or budget traveler for that matter, backpacking in Europe knows that if you want a decent meal for not so much money, you find the Hare Krishnas. They aren't hard to find; they usually find you. You eat their food, decline their other offers of circle chants and head shaving parties, and voila! You're back in action.

What I've learned more recently is that if you are a vegetarian or a budget traveler road tripping in the Midwest, you follow the university students. May I introduce Ritual Cafe in Des Moines and the Red Avocado in Iowa City. Oh, but don't go running to the pork farmers – I'm sure those crazy kids are just in an “experimental phase.”

Before we left Walnut, Iowa, we were treated to a free continental breakfast where Isaac eyed the Fruit Loops with the little grin that he uses when he knows something is off limits but he'd going to try anyway. I cupped my hand under the dispenser and pulled the lever gently. “Here,” I said, handing him the colored sugar Os, “This is your lifetime allotment of Fruit Loops. Enjoy.”

Looking ahead to Annawan, Illinois – where we bailed to a hotel because the state park we wanted to camp in was 90 degrees and 85 percent humidity at 9 pm – we'd enjoy things like the Annawan “salad bar” that included, in fact, many salads: tuna salad, macaroni salad, bean salad, potato salad, jello salad... Then there were the “fried cheeseballs” which in desperation we ordered from the menu and Isaac wouldn't touch (bless his little California heart). Have these people even heard of leaves?

But before all of that, there was also this...

I got one for ya. No, no, listen. Okay, here goes – a pork farmer and a vegetarian walk into a bar. Pork farmer says...

We were at Glenn's Pub in Walnut, our one and only choice of eating establishment, ordering homemade pizza from the owner, whose name, naturally, was Jerry. “And I'll have a beer,” Mike says. “Bud Light?” says Jerry shooting my husband with his finger gun. It is not a question. Mike stumbles momentarily, “Uh, I...Sure. Bud Light.”

We were pretty much exhausted; we wanted to eat and crash. But the three locals sitting behind Bud Lights at the bar would not let the foreigners off easy. You see, it had come to their attention that we had not ordered any meat toppings on our pizza.

“You ain't veg-e-tar-ians, are you?”

I thought about shouting “Boo!” and seeing if that'd take care of it. These were (GMO) corn-fed Iowans, though, better go for the big guns. Hocus-pocus vegetable stew, bring me some wheat grass or I'll infect you!

The next 30 minutes of my life were dedicated to trying not to ask my pork farmer friend if he enjoyed ramming his fist up pigs' asses. “Wull, whyyy are you a ve-ge-tar-ian?” He'd ask again every so often. But mostly he talked. And talked. Punctuated by the always good for a punchline phrase, “What you hear in the (Ed.'s note: bleeding heart liberal) media is bullshit! It's bullshit!”

Look, I don't preach and I don't pry. Eat whatever the hell you want to. I sit across from friends eating meat all the time. What had I done to deserve this??

“One of my best friends is from Iowa and she still talks to me,” I tell him, desperate for peace.

“Yeah, but not much.”

“What would you do if your granddaughter married a vegetarian?” I ask.

“It'd be okay with me. I just wouldn't pay for the wedding.”

May she marry a vegan.

Day Five Continued: Otter Pops!!

Little Orphan Orange

Alexander the Grape

Poncho Punch

Louie Blue Raspberry

Sir Isaac Lime

Strawberry Short Kook

Anyone else remember these frozen pops you squeezed up their little plastic tubes after you'd ripped them open with your teeth?? Major flashback moment in the camp store!!

We'd gone in looking for sports drinks; trying to get some electrolytes into my kiddo.

“No way! Otter pops!” I exclaim.

“What? What?” Isaac wants to know.

Man alive, and they are 25 cents! I look down to be sure I haven't turned into my 10-year-old self, glance at the cars outside to ensure it is not suddenly 1979 and I'm not in some hokey movie where the dog talks or the people trade bodies for the appropriately alliterated day of the week. Otter pops.

I glance perfunctorily at the list of ingredients. I'd be hard-pressed to find any food from my formative years that did not contain high fructose corn syrup, which is, naturally, listed second only to water on the Otter Pops label. HFCS is known around our house as “that 'gredient Mommy doesn't like,” and alternatively, the “not-good-for-you sugar.”

It's only day five on the road and already our nutritional and hygenic rules have bent so far as to be unrecognizable.

“What flavor do you want, Iz?” I call cheerily.

Like the serendipity that surrounds us all if we only choose to look, my boy picks “the green one,” i.e., Sir Isaac Lime.

Day Four Continued: Nutritional Challenges & More of the Road to Sedona

Emily can be a bit of a backseat driver.

In Seligman, AZ we stopped for lunch. This had been tricky so far – lunch, that is. In preparing for the trip, I'd worried about going places to eat or run around along the way and having to leave Emilycat in a hot van. In fact, what we were finding was that there were no places inviting enough so far along the route to want to slide into a booth over.

Instead, we'd order a burrito to go from a window connected to the convenience store or patchwork together a meal from what we had on hand and the refrigerated cases at the gas marts. There was a bit heftier a selection than your average 7-11 of course. Aware as they might be of their strategic locations, these places were sometimes stocked in things like cream cheese, parfaits, and chopped apples, as well as bungie cords and neck pillows. Still. Baby ain't exactly enjoying an organic, gluten-free ride.

We'd left Monterey just hours before the first peaches of the season were due at the farmer's market, a detail I couldn't reckon with easily. Mocking my craving for fresh California produce were establishments we passed like “Wagon Wheel Restaurant” and “Roadkill Cafe.” These names repeated at the various exits. The issue was not chains and franchises, but simply people who thought they were all the very first to be quite that clever.

As she'd done at the last half dozen stops, Emily would just stay with Mike in the van under the shade of the gas pump ports while Isaac and I tried to find a compromise among the limited choices and use the bathroom. We waited in line with our hard-boiled eggs, banana, pretzels and ice cream bar behind a man talking to the cashier about Obama being a traitor to the Muslim world and blah, blah, blah. He finally turned his body enough that I could throw my pretzels on the counter and did so, attempting the hint.

“I've got a six-year-old by the hand and a cat in the van, pal,” I wanted to tell him. “Save it!”

He faded away still mumbling and we heard the bell on the door buzz.

“Whatever,” the cashier said, shaking her long grey hair and rolling her eyes.

“You're the bartender!” I told her laughing.

“I am,” she confirmed.

We left again for the parking lot where everyone was moving to and from their cars, pretending it wasn't hot enough to melt eyebrows.

We settled in, distributed our provisions, and headed off. The road kept stretching east, more mountains presented themselves, signs read “Elk next 20 miles.” And to think, I was so distracted when we left Monterey, I hadn't even noticed the moment we turned away from the coast.

for the love of produce

“It's beautiful!” exclaims my son. “Look at it!”

He is referring to a carrot.

I am speechless. Overcome with joy and pride. It's worked. All that time other children spent at the park, or soccer practice, my boy was in training at the farmer's markets.

My work is done here. Thank you. Good night. 

We've come a long way, baby.

pomegranates as religion

I knew it would be the perfect time. Late October. I hadn't been to the market in a few weeks – well, not to THE market, the one that has my favoritest farmer with my favoritest fruits. Tuesdays are market day (THE market day), and Tuesdays have been a challenge lately with our current family schedule. It takes more time and effort to get to downtown Monterey than I am able to sustain some weeks. The neighborhood where I live isn't so down with the organic produce, though you can run into any number of steeples within a stone's throw of my house. (If you are craning your neck skyward toward those steeples too long though, you better beware of the ragged chainlink waiting to snatch at your legs, such is the beauty of my 'hood.) Four years ago I moved to a neighborhood where it was all about a healthy soul. Too bad I'm more interested in cultivating a healthy body and somehow cling to the notion of aesthetics as integral to my happiness. But enough about fenced in evangelists.

Isaac was starting his second month of swimming lessons. He's a confident swimmer for whom being submerged in chlorine is a dream come true. I can remember us taking him to the pool long enough ago that many weeks he'd conk out for a nap before we could get him in the car. Long enough ago that we've added “swim diapers” to our family's personal responsibility for landfill waste. Now, excited to be learning strokes and dives, he's a better swimmer than I will ever hope to be. In fact, he's a polar bear.

Living in Monterey and its environs means that swimming levels are not called things like 1, 2, 3, or 4. Oh no. We'll save that kind of ho-hum for the landlocked, the impoverished souls that don't have a National Marine Sanctuary off their shores. In Monterey, the swim levels are called things like “Dolphin” and “Starfish” and “Sea Turtle” and it's up to the parents to buy into this clever but bizarre culture of the appropriate sea life corresponding to your child's ability to do the breast stroke.

I recently had a conversation with the aquatic director in which the terms “Seahorse,” “Penguin,” and “Polar Bear” were tossed around to such a degree it was impossible to follow what the hell he was talking about, though he acted as if rational adults speak this way every day. It was a bit like inserting the Jabberwocky into casual conversation. “He's very good with the vorpal sword. I really think he'll be ready for the Bandersnatch next time. The jaws that bite and the claws that catch shouldn't bother him a bit. Now, if he's worried about the Jubjub bird, then I'd say he might want to stay away from the slithy toves, but otherwise, O frabjous day! Callooh Callay!”

The point here is not supposed to be how magnificent my son is in water, nor how oddly labeled his skills might be. The point here is that the sports center is a mere two blocks from the market. Doubtful I was supposed to leave the premises, I abandoned Isaac with his new instructor, his fellow Polar Bears, gave up my spot on that horrid metal bleacher filled with a crowd of parents leaning toward the poolside to see how little Xavier the Guppie was doing and dashed out and down the street toward my one true love: Pomegranates!

When I arrived, the pomegranates were even better than I'd even hoped for.(O frabjous day!...) They were monstrous, engorged beauties their crowns glistening in the sun. A day of rain over the weekend had split them and their juicy rubies showed through the cracks. (I'm pretty serious about my fruit.) Dale, my buddy, the farmer himself, was not there on this day and one of the other farm workers who doesn't know me was minding the stall. As I started to pile the poms bigger than softballs into a bag, he grew concerned. “Lady,” he said to me. “They're three dollars a pound!”

Some women shop for clothes. I spend all my money at the farmer's markets.

“Mommy! Mommy! Why is it so cold in the house?”

“Put on a sweater and eat your pomegranates, Isaac.”

“But Mommy! Why can't I go to swimming lessons anymore?”

“Wouldn't you rather float on a bed of pomegranate seeds, honey? Now pass the bowl.”

In my defense, pomegranates are high in vitamin C and potassium. The little immune boosters contain yummy antioxidants. If these pomegranates could swim, baby, they'd be Orcas. Amen.

Pomegranate Season Again

and here I am with pen

in hand. Each year I try:

tiny baubles I call them,

rubies, gems, clusters

of cranberry eggs sparkling

like Christmas – all of the metaphors

lacking or taken, though I go on

spilling blood

on my kitchen counter -

a California slasher movie

starring Persephone.

And once she comes into it,

well, it's all over, isn't it?

A girl in the dark, a mother

pacing above, her grief enough

to keep the blossoming world

at bay. Is any fruit worth this --

family fissures, death, and blood-letting?

Even Neruda with his Odes -

the tomatoes, to the onion,

didn't have to contend with the maiden

cum queen, the hungry earth

wrenching open in a muddy maw.

One must grow into one's majesty

the immature among us

fastened to the branch

by the crowns

of our heads.

To know so young one is royal,

to spoil such sweetness.

Now on my counter they lie

huge and heavy, weighted down

by their own juices,

oversized doorknobs locked

against innocence and painted

for all the world to see

like the lips of a geisha.

I take the knife to them. The berry bodies

explode with a spray of red-black droplets,

not unlike the octopus before surrender,

a final message as the end approaches --

secrets never told,

blotchy reminders of a simpler love.

Women and Food

Mike found this beaut of a “cookbook” during one of our trips to the dump. Copyright 1948. There is a photo of the back cover at the end of this post which explains a lot – don't cheat! No scrolling down! It's a little gem of a surprise waiting for you.

Been thinking a lot about food lately. What with my hot new one-stop tour almost ready to roll.

Been trying to write about food. Hypoglycemia and gluten-free don't ride smoothly into the stanzas of my poetry, though they are the biggest things on my plate (for future reference, puns always intended) at the moment. But I also realized how many of my poems leak food even when I don't intend it. Like the one about my grandmother. The grandmother I never met. It's an imagined scene, and intuitively, I set her among food, feeding people, among edible metaphors.

The poem begins:

Anna was in the kitchen

The windows were fogged,

pasta on the stove,

dough rolled thin on the counter,

more than enough.

A pickle crock figures prominently in the scene, a lunch pail. There is this bit:

after so many years, he, 
close to deaf, she, having to shout 
her love to him: Your shirts are pressed!
And the perfume smelling like cooking oil...

And on and on. Women and food. I have several unfinished pieces involving food that are neither here nor there in terms of prose or poetry. Like this snippet:

The cans of green beans in dubious liquid stocked my mother's cabinets like bomb shelter provisions. (Ed: To this day the woman prefers CANNED asparagus over the fresh version. Mom, I know you are reading this and let me announce to the internet that you are WEIRD, not to mention nutritionally challenged.) Food was what could be quickly made and quickly consumed off paper plates or flimsy silver trays where the courses were compartmentalized – even if the corn tended to trip here and there into its neighbor frame: the dark brown backdrop of the square of chocolate cake sitting still as a 70's game show prize.

You might imagine my shock then, when in the middle of college (after living on a diet of pizza, beer, local vodka, and Entenmann's banana chocolate crumb cake) I headed off to Mexico, in an "exchange" program for which there was no Mexican student with poor eating habits coming north to balance the transaction.

There, people picked lemons from their backyards; offered mangoes from branch to blender. It was my first lesson in eating from the earth. Mud pies no longer felt quite like simple child's play, but more like intuitive renderings of a life source.

Here, in California, years later, the roots of my dinner plate still astound. My friend offers me pears from her tree of which she complains, "It won't stop!"

And, here, in California, today, driving the highway, dodging merging flatbed trucks strapped with strawberries, I eye with suspicion, venom even, the new homes' serpentine line as it advances behind brown and green raised beds of seedling vegetables. Already it sits on land that used to reap food.

Food. Whole journals are dedicated to the stuff. And just when you thought it didn't matter anymore, it defines and redefines your identity for goodness sake...

Soul Food

A cluster of women

in traditional Korean dress

leaves the Mexican taquería

and crosses the street in front of the Ford pickup.

From high, bowed waists each skirt releases

its own soft color: mint, peach, custard, a velvety blue.

Their rich black hair is cut bluntly,

all just below the jaw line.

The wind billows their exaggerated skirts,

so that they look like bells or gumdrops

gliding along on the breeze.

I wonder where they came from

to appear here in the downtown crosswalk,

in the bustle of this

Saturday morning.

Perhaps the wedding food

left that much to be desired,

and they headed – in full regalia –

for the safety of a burrito and chips.

I picture those skirts

bunched into a vinyl booth

while a ranchera plays over the speakers.

I imagine them laughing together quietly,

as the Mexican hot chocolate arrives,

as they lick salsa from their fingers.

saving food - a personal Olympics

“This vegetarian cooking is all new to me,” my mother-in-law sighs, her palms turned up in askance. I have been with her son for nearly 13 years, the entirety of that time as a vegetarian. But let us not allow such pesky details to come into play.

In preparation of our visit this time, my mother-in-law has gone out and bought all kinds of crazy things – Exotic items like beans and brown rice and hummus. You have to give her credit. She's doing her very best. She even found me gluten-free bread. And a strange food known, she'd told, as polenta. She buys these things, despite their complete foreignness in her world, and then, she turns the reigns over to fate.

Mike, for example, had to save the polenta from imminent disposal. It went something like this:

“Do you know what this is?” (She holds the yellow log away from her face to read the label as if for the first time.) “Po-lenta? Do you eat this?”

“We have.”

“I don't know what to do with it. Do you want to cook it? If you don't, I'm just going to throw it away. We won't eat it.”

The crescendo-ing danger to the polenta having been spelled out in rapid succession from its introduction, Mike swings into action. He's trained for just this moment. He is not going to give it less than his all.

His body extends out, then folds into a pike position -- no one has attempted this move before!! -- as he dives with all his might, blocking the trash can -- a highly technical move!!-- and catching the modified corn meal. He hugs it to his chest just before he crashes hard on the kitchen floor (particularly slippery in today's conditions of extreme cleanliness).

The replay shows him grimacing as his left shoulder meets with the Formica counter, knocking over the wooden owl napkin holder that must be at least 40 years old. But he did. not. let. go. This is what is looks like to be a champion. This is it.

He's done it!! He's done it!! He has managed to save the polenta! Snatching it from the jaws of the trash can just in the nick of time, before it landed, forever wasted, on top of the hummus that went before it. The crowd is on its feet. The Romanian judge has given his a 9.45!

The Russian Food Saver - once the gold medal favorite -- is quoted in the press as challenging Mike's gold. Without the quadruple, he says, it is just a dance. The Koreans -- always top in the field and fierce on the playing field -- have said he doesn't deserve the medal. But Mike is gracious, calling attention to his competitors' long history in the sport, restating his pride in everyone's efforts.

Then, we all watch that fucking BMW commerical for the 500^th time. And Mike slumps back into obscurity, training in a small town on the Central Coast of California.

At 41, this could have been his last chance. Unless of course he can manage to push through his Vegestan citizenship and enter the Games under their flag (which naturally features an avocado and a rice cracker) in four years. No telling what one will do for the chance at gold.

PS -- Isaac turned FIVE yesterday!! Pics to follow.

the making of a vegetarian

Here's another book post that was just too big for the sidebar.

For Isaac's birthday last month, our sitter got him the book First Thousand Words in Japanese, a picture dictionary, essentially. Isaac is obsessed with it. We must read it at any nap and every bedtime. "I can't find the 'kai,'" he'll say at the beach scene, searching diligently for the boat oar. We don't put the oversized purple volume back on the bookshelf anymore. It just lives by the bed.

It has also become an unlikely forum for discussing the inevitably complicated world of food choices. We've come across the butcher on the professions page, and the various kinds of meat on the food page. Isaac studies them with the ultimate in consternation, or, some days, simple curiosity or confusion.

We are vegetarians. Let me revise. Isaac and I are vegetarians and although Mike hasn't eaten any meat to my knowledge for years, he rejects the title. Whatever. The only animal product that Isaac consumes is fish oil vitamins. For now, it is easier to break with our morals on this one point and get some important stuff in him.

Even more interestingly, our sitter is a vegan. And yet here we are, among the bikes and boats of the book, the scenes from the countryside, the living room furniture labeled in Japanese, stuck on a couple pages that provide us with a new education and, can I also say, just a bit of torment for parent and for child.

Here are a few of the encounters we've experienced lately:

Day One: Professions

We open the book to where Isaac and his dad left off the day before. It's the professions page. Before I can get started on anything, Isaac zeros in on the butcher slicing ham. Pointing he looks up at me and reports seriously, "Pig."

"Hmm, yeah, pig."

He stares at the picture, not ready to move on. We are quiet.

"That would be ow-y for the pig if it got cut like that."

"Yeah, Iz, I think it would be."


Day Two: Food

"Pig," Isaac announces pointing at the ham.

"Chicken," he says, mashing his finger into the picture of the headless, roasted bird.

His dad beat me to the punch again.

We look at the whole page - the words for toast, rice, honey, circling back again and again to the meats - Isaac's choice. He insists on calling the ham "pig," which is fine with me since I have this crazy idea about honesty.

My kiddo is in deep contemplation, then, "Mama, maybe they eat the eyes too."

"What do you think, Isaac?"

"I don't know," he says accompanied by a troubled look. "Probably before they caught the pig, the pig tried to run away."

"Hmm."

"But they just had a gun and they shot the gun at it."

"What do guns shoot?"

"Candy, mostly."

"Hmm. So what do you think of all that?"

My heart nearly breaks waiting through the pause, heavy with what is maybe the weightiest thing his four-year-old mind has had to sort...

"I think it's not very nice."

my ESL degree comes in handy

Isaac and our next door neighbor, Mrs. Johnson, have what you might call a symbiotic relationship. She likes to give out chocolate; he likes to eat chocolate. Creatively subtle conversations about how we like to limit treats, my dental bills, our family history of diabetes, haven't really made an impact.

I get complete agreement, but ultimately, what she as an 80+-year-old widow who never had children of her own and is an ocean away from her Austrian family likes to think of as “once in a while” and what we as parents having to share close quarters with a scheming sweet-tooth wielding almost-4-year-old consider so, are different.

She piles treats into my arms, onto holiday plates. Things she's made (lemon bars. Mmmmm.), or things that her niece in Salzburg has shipped over for her favorite aunt: “Schoko-Bananen” - chocolate-covered banana-flavored cookie things (barf), or the squares of German and Austrian chocolates shot through with almonds and hazelnuts.

The other day Isaac was digging in the front yard speculating on which kind of dirt might keep away the gopher while I ran in the house for something or other. Before I could get back out, Isaac came barreling in to tell me that “Mit Johnson wanna know if I can hab a tookie, tauz me wortin so hard.”

I sighed, resigned. “I suppose so,” I told him. And out he went like a flash.

A minute later I came back out and found Isaac and Mrs. Johnson in deep discussion. “He can't have a cookie?” she called to me with great umbrage.

“He can have one,” I corrected, surprised.

“He said you said 'no.' Okay, let me get him something.”

...

“Isaac, did you tell Mrs. Johnson I said 'no?'”

“Me toad her 'poze toe.'”

“'Poze toe?'”

“Yeah, you said, 'Poze toe.'”

“Oh, yeah. I guess she must have heard you say 'no' instead.”

“Yeah,” he said, nodding thoughtfully, “Tauz Mit Johnson speat Wing-gwish dit-went-wy den us do.”

“She 'peat Wing-gwish,” he added again generously, “jut dit-went.”

“Yeah, that must be it, Iz.”

family portrait with squash

The large green oblong thing in this picture is what will henceforth be referred to in these entries as “the Squash.” It looked cool and on a whim we added it to our pumpkin selections back in October when pumpkins were still all the rage. It weighed somewhere around 30 pounds.

From the moment we got it home, Isaac wanted to cut it open and see inside. I told him we would open it, but first let's just enjoy it as decoration.

Several weeks went by with Isaac asking every so often about cutting it open. Finally, when he asked again last week, I said okay. “Yay! Yay! Dut it o-pin! Dut it o-pin! Hurray!”

We put in our guesses on what color it might be. Isaac went with white. We ruminated about the size of the seeds. Isaac's estimate was “Big-big-BIG!” So I chopped. Bright orange and Big-big-BIG, in case you were wondering. And then came the dilemma. What the hell were we going to do with 30 pounds of pumpkin guts? A heavy veil of guilt fell over me. I could feed a small nation with this thing and here we were pretty much thinking – eh, compost pile?

Day One with the Squash: Initial dissection. Mike makes squash for dinner. “Me no like it,” concludes our son.

Day Two with the Squash: Pumpkin muffins for breakfast, enough to distribute among friends.

Day Three with the Squash: One hunk takes up half a shelf in the refrigerator, the rest won't fit at all. It sits at the fourth place at our kitchen table. “What punt-tin doing?” It's watching us with that big orange eye.

Day Four with the Squash: Trim off the dried ends and make pumpkin pie for dessert. Mmm. Whipped cream in a can. Sign me up. “Me no like it.”

Day Five with the Squash: It moves from the kitchen table to the top of the washing machine in the garage. Now we can almost forget it's there except when I come around the corner to get my shoes or retrieve the cat food, then BAM.

I feel like we're harboring a criminal, or at least a secret. An old Russian professor of mine liked to collect propaganda posters from the 50s. One that hung prominently in his office read: “ARE THERE BOLSHEVIKS IN YOUR WASHROOM?” You can see the slippery slope – squash on washing machine, Bolsheviks in washroom.

Day Six with the Squash: I throw away the bowl of giant seeds that I never dried out and are now nasty gross. “Mama, what you doing?” Nothing, son. You didn't see a thing, you understand?

Plans for Day Seven include more pumpkin muffins, praying to the gods of abundance, and carving out a ski chalet for Isaac to play in. Stay tuned.











"the eye"