Ten.Two Hundred & Sixty-Seven
1. The clouds are low and there is just a sliver of pale yellow peeking through.
2. I set out the ingredients: flour, sugar, butter, salt, vanilla, blueberries. I find the sifter and the hand-mixer and the large mixing bowl. The oven is preheating.
3. Instead of warm lemon water I opt for warm water with apple cider vinegar and an abundant teaspoon of honey.
4. How do you plan to stay and leave at the same time? It's impossible to shut off knowledge. It's hard to trick your own mind. Maybe it's remembering that I am always in my own body. Maybe it's not that I don't know how to stay in this place while dreaming of another. Maybe it's that I am out of practice in feeling at home with myself.
5. She makes a face when she sees my fine amount. I tell her it's okay, that I lost the book, had been hoping someone would return. That it's ironic that I lost a book about food writing in a coffee shop. I pay it and then check my daughter's account (she is free and clear) and then we go off to our separate racks to find books. She returns with two thick chapter books and then grabs the Bouchon Bakery cookbook. I tell her that I've eaten there and it's delicious. Maybe we'll make something over spring break.
6. I come home with a book on writing poetry by Mary Oliver, two books by Joan Didion, Mary Karr's book on writing memoir, and "Parable of the Sower" by Octavia Butler.
7. “I'm trying to speak--to write-the truth. I"m trying to be clear. I'm not interested in being fancy, or even original. Clarity and truth will be plenty, if I can only achieve them.” - Parable of the Sower
8. Why have I waited so long to read her work?
9. I tell him that this is not a good book to read before bed. "Why?" he says.
10. Maybe I'm a little bit too much like Lauren Olamina. Not quite a hyperempath, but empathic enough to not be able to read this book at night, right before I go to sleep. I force myself to close the book, get a small bowl of ice cream, and then watch Frasier until I can no longer keep my eyes open.