Ten.Seven Hundred & Sixty-Seven

1. I go straight to the kitchen to bake the potatoes. I’ll make the bacon and the onions after I get ready.

2. To coffee or not to coffee?

3. I sit on the sofa. I could close my eyes and fall asleep in two minutes. I make myself stay awake. But this kind of tired has gone on for too long.

4. Okay. So maybe this is it. I thought I would be prepared for this response but now that I’m hearing it, I’m not so sure anymore. But this is all good information. Everything is information.

5. Sandwiches and Sauvignon Blanc.

6. I nap.

7. He asks me if we can have a day where we eat only African food. The question catches me off guard. “Well, I’d want to see a picture of it first.” I think of “The Cooking Gene.” I think of how he doesn’t understand that 400 years separates me from the continent. I think of loss.

8. One more moment of closed eyes.

9. I hear her voice before I walk into the room but when I lift my eyes I see a tall black woman. When we leave he says, “Well, now we’ll never move.”

10. “Oh you’re using the flashlight to read?” “No, I’m using it to write.” “What are you writing?” “A song.”