Chopping Onions

We didn't fight, exactly - I just said something stupid right after she got home from a stressful day, and she rightly called me out on it and left me in the kitchen cooking dinner.

I was still sort of muttering to myself in that way you do when you know you're in the wrong, but you haven't yet entirely admitted to yourself that you might be the asshole, and I was cutting onions, really strong ones. My eyes were watering as I carefully sliced them into quarters and diced them.

I realized I didn't want to cook our food with anger and make it taste bad, so I breathed deeply and calmed myself and tried to project as much love as possible into the bulgar wheat, the onions and peppers, the avocado, the taco shells, the salsa.

First Rule

"I'll be okay," I say. "I'm just tired."

"No you're not - you're dying," Katie says, watching my face. "Oh my God, did you read the comments?"

Old Salt

Katie peeks out from the bathroom. "Did you stumble, doge?" she asks sweetly.

Sure enough, Coco seems to be having another minor bout of old dog vestibular syndrome, which is making her head spin. She staggers to the door for her evening walk like the apartment is a storm-tossed ship that tilts and lifts without rhyme or reason, and I sigh and go for the harness so I can carry her down the stairs to the street.

The Bright Side

Occasionally, my desire to encourage people and help them see the positive side of things makes things awkward.

"Oh, my dog is fifteen years old too," the woman smoking out in front of her brownstone says after Coco, outraged at her overfamiliarity, barks her dry, coughing bark. "The vet says she won't live too much longer."

"Well, I hope she lasts you through the holidays," I say cheerfully before walking quickly away with my smile dripping down my face.

A Discourse on Unheimlich

"The Wiz LIVE" on TV felt too long and rushed at the same time. We popped popcorn and were prepared to be impressed, and we certainly enjoyed parts of it, but overall it just left us bored and a little depressed.

I remembered the feeling of watching the movie when I was a child, watching Michael Jackson bend, twist and tremble as a scarecrow in some alley in what looked like an apocalyptic wasteland while the crows told him, "You can't win," and Katie told me stories of how much the Wheelies terrified her as a little girl. There was something profound and frightening and weird about that show that I don't think the producers could really capture, that feeling that a child gets of seeing something he doesn't completely understand, but which he knows is terribly wrong, which made the brighter, happier sections shine more in contrast.

Lighten Up

I came home and made a butternut squash and saffron risotto, and then Katie and I sat on the couch and ate it and drank wine and cuddled. 

The risotto was rich and comforting, and after we finished the wine, we drank eggnog. We watched the tree in Rockefeller Center light up and thought about San Bernadino, both the city, and the song I've been singing all day since a couple of vicious people decided it would be a good idea to kill a bunch of other people.

Maybe that's all I have to say: it seems pretty dark, but look for the light.

Sounds Pretty Good, Even to a Vegetarian

"It's like Army Base Stew," our new friend says about the sausage stew (a simmering broth stocked brimful with sausage, tofu, scallions, hot dogs, and what I'm pretty sure is Spam) at the Korean restaurant. "But it's really good with a slice of American cheese on it."

I'm understandably skeptical, but he continues, "It melts, right? And makes the whole thing kind of creamy."