but i don't want to see lmao

on the subject of signs

here are two advertisements on the Internet that i find absolutely baffling:


to start with, "Trump University"?

?

then. we have "Attend a FREE Profit from Foreclosure workshop". first of all, can anybody give this ad some punctuation to make it intelligible the first time round?

second, The End Must Be Nigh. because right now? right now, with this precipice of a recession that the nation is perched on---caused by inflated house prices/unethical loans/skyrocketing numbers of foreclosures/tent cities of people who have depleted their life savings and are in inescapable debt PAYING ONLY THE INTEREST ON MORTGAGES? right now, on this precipice, i can't think of anything that screams ROCK BTM. NOE MOAR HUMANITY LEFT KTHXBAI more than a commercial that tries to entice you to come learn at its university with the pull of finding out how to profit from other people's miserable lives.

ghastly.

on a lighter note, the seattle public library (beloved of my heart) is inviting teens (and teens only!) to "drop in" to play on the library's Wii or DDR.

now, i know i'm too old and out-of-touch to know what a DDR is (hopefully wikipedia has an entry) but i'm surely not SO VERY old and out-of-touch as to accept the picture of a "teen" they've got up there. presumably to entice fellow "teens" out to the local library to play a spot of computer games.

it simultaneously makes me feel "How quaint and adorable is it that the library thinks that's what a teen looks like" and "Oh how sad no one who's the relevant age will play on that Wii, when even though i'm too old i would really, really love to."

moral of the story: if teenagers ever look like that, please wake me up from my eternal sleep.

if only j.c. penny had hired a proofreader

last night we went to a mall for some mad post-Christmas salez, specifically looking for work shirts for shaun. we don't get out shopping much, and because department stores seem to be particularly labyrinthine, we sure appreciated the omnipresent signage.


i love how so many signs and printed materials here are bilingual---english and spanish---especially since we needed the spanish translation of this sign to work out WHAT THE ENGLISH MIGHT MEAN.

a bit of esoteric humour

in the World Health Organization's (WHO) "Style Guide"---with which i am familiarizing myself for my new, excellent job---i came across the paragraph below.

"Similarly, remarks about 'the increase in alcohol dependence in parts of EURO' might be misconstrued as referring to the WHO Regional Office for Europe when in fact the reference is to the WHO European Region."

i think the writers of the style guide chose the example as a sly, sardonic nudge to fellow grammarians. shaun doesn't think it's an intentionally funny example.

what can i say. proves my point, innit.

a walk to shake off the early-afternoon sleepy blues

another anniversary: part two

i started this website two years ago today.

that is all!

love from leila

it's snowing

taken by Aghman.

it's snowing. in seattle. on Christmas.

in case it's not clear from my emphasis, THIS IS A DREAM. COME. TRUE.

shaun and i are at sharon and tom's place, with carissa. they're all learning domino games that are popular with recreational-vehicle owners in the pacific northwest and one game that's called Mexican Trains. our car is covered with at least a couple of centimetres of snow, and it's warm and cosy inside.

taken by iamelliotjames.

evening, walking through our neighbourhood

juno

shaun and i went to the movies tonight with the mcgees (can anybody say DOUBLE DATE ... without vomiting?).

we watched Juno, which was a unanimous hit with us. it has seriously funny lines, great acting, nuanced character development, and very tender moments.

in fact, for the third day in a row i'm going to tell the internet THERE WERE TEARS.

i like this movie review.

minor quibble: it's hard to understand why such a sassy, on-to-it, and intelligent sixteen-year-old didn't think to use a contraceptive.

HOWEVER. these comments on a racial double standard got me thinking about greater concerns of justice, equality, and ... subtexts. did you think i was going to say "peace for all"? well, i mean subtexts. unless there's a better word for it. i recommend reading phillipe's thoughts if you want to re-think what you think you think.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

the atmosphere around the celebration of Christmas here in the united states seems to be a lot of Christmas lights everywhere (which i love); very determined, bustling shoppers (not my favourite); and omnipresent Christmas music (unfortunately seems contrived rather than charming).

at one point i remember having to ask shaun, "Christmas is about the birth of Jesus Christ, right?" because it kind of feels like energies are being directed in every direction BUT the celebration of the birth of a Manifestation of God, and i was beginning to feel like my thought association of Christmas with Jesus Christ was some urban myth i'd mentally assimilated along the way.

i'm not the first person to comment on the (american) commercialization of Christmas. i don't think i have anything insightful or meaningful to add to the debate. but i did want to think about the birth of "the Spirit of God" and to commemorate His life, so I went researching and found this:

Jesus Christ declares that the sun rises upon the evil and the good, and the rain descends upon the just and the unjust—upon all humanity alike.

Christ was a divine mercy which shone upon all mankind, the medium for the descent of the bounty of God, and the bounty of God is transcendent, unrestricted, universal.

... Therefore, all of you must strive with heart and soul in order that enmity may disappear entirely and that strife and hatred pass away absolutely from the midst of the human world.

... You must follow the example and footprints of Jesus Christ.

Read the Gospels.

Jesus Christ was mercy itself, was love itself. He even prayed in behalf of His executioners—for those who crucified Him—saying, “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.” If they knew what they were doing, they would not have done it.

Consider how kind Jesus Christ was, that even upon the cross He prayed for His oppressors.

We must follow His example.

We must emulate the Prophets of God.

We must follow Jesus Christ.

We must free ourselves from all these imitations which are the source of darkness in the world.

i hate to turn this post into another outpouring of emotion, and it's more than a bit embarrassing to reveal how easy it is to move me to shed tenderly falling tears, but reflecting on the divine kindness and love of Jesus Christ that is described in these passages, as well as these, gives me more Christmas spirit than all the tinsel and tunes we've been surrounded by for the past months. for REAL.

also, thing to do before i die: Read the Gospels.


dad, this picture of satsumas is for you, in remembrance of your childhood Christmas gift of one orange each (circa the turn of the century).

otherwise, good night and Merry Christmas.
love from leila

dear shaun

as you are well aware, i have been thinking about our two-year anniversary of marriage for a while now. in fact, for a long time, on the 23rd of every month, i reminded us of another anniversary. way back when at the beginning, i insisted on celebrating every friday, which was the day of the week that our marriage was held on.


to start with, there is too much to say and not enough hours in the day to write this letter. i wanted this to be more a Vignettes From Our Marriage (Thus Far), but it turned out more like An Emotional Recollection Of The Emotional Bits According To Me, and this less humorous version will have to suffice because i have to turn out the lights.

i never understood how you didn't want to acknowledge the value of how i was measuring the age of our marriage the way new parents measure the age of a newborn, carefully tending to its growth with regular celebrations of weekly milestones. in my mind, this made perfect sense: CAKE ON FRIDAYS. FOR EVER.


i don't know when i stopped counting the fridays of our marriage, but i kept on doing the months right up until november of this year, which was cool because of the 23rd-month anniversary/23rd-day of the month consonance.


this was pretty much the last monthly reminder you "let" me have, and i had to admit that it would be difficult counting up to, for instance, twenty-eight, if anyone ran out of conversation enough to ask me how long we'd been married. plus, it would sound obsessive? almost like i keep track of that kind of stuff.


so now we're at twenty-four months, which of course is two years, and YIKES that feels like a long time.


it is a long time. it feels like a good, solid amount of time, like we've started building up momentum to carry us the distance. like, we're really getting to a point where we understand the other and know what it will be to live with each other for EVER. you've even started calling me your tempestuous wife. and---to inadvertently paraphrase a sarah mclaughlin song that was on loud repeat in the dorms of maxwell circa the winter of 1999---it's better than cake. on fridays.


remembering the beginning of our marriage reminds me of how calm i was beforehand, how easy it seemed to marry you, after months of your patiently persuading me that marriage between us made sense and moreover was a good idea; months of my taking solitary walks and wrangling with myself about whether i could imagine being a wife and call some GUY my husband---then later, the pros and cons of our possible union; and finally, months of waiting for consent from our parents.


i remember loving you and being in love with you and deciding that all of the incompatibilities i could discern between us were negligible in importance compared with the integrity of your character and how i never ever, not ever, grew bored of your company.


but no one warned me about the way it feels to know that everyone is holding their breath, giving you extra oxygen to suck in so that you can exhale the words, "We will all, verily, abide by the will of God", which is the only part of a Baha'i wedding celebration which is obligatory.


sitting there, in a crowded living room full of lots of our spiritual family, the prayers that people had chosen to offer had lulled me into a deep meditation, during which i wept unremittingly. i had in fact forgotten that this was my wedding.


the cue which signalled that the Baha'i vows would be recited by each member of the couple, followed by your saying the prayer for marriage revealed by Baha'u'llah, quickened me. the waves of transcendence crashed away as i opened my bloodshot eyes to the world and my reality.


it is a lot of pressure, in the sight of God and man, to pledge such a weighty commitment at just after 10 on a friday morning, after time divided between chopping vegetables in your pajamas and crying your eyes out because you're thinking about the incredibleness of Mount Carmel. i felt time and space compress in on me; light became very, very bright, but the tears i had already shed for the sincerity of the morning's prayers allowed me to feel the reverence of what was about to happen.


the fear of God, not the fear of marriage, comes close to describing those moments before i could vow to be your wife. there is a rareness in gravity and sacredness in this world. i want to say that the seriousness of love, not the intoxication of it, was what strengthened me to open my lips, look into your eyes, and affirm with power, "We will all, verily, abide by the will of God."


and that meant me, you, and the roomful of witnesses who got out of bed early on their weekend to bring a plate of food or a face of smiles to our celebration.


We will ALL, verily, abide by the will of God.


almost a year later, we were taking shelter in our bathroom while a siren wailed over the city of Haifa. some recent rockets from Lebanon had hit streets and buildings so close to our apartment that the walls had shuddered with impact, like a big earthquake. the conflict and my living in it was making me think about peace, war, life, death, intent and purpose in ways that i could never have imagined before.


as we waited there, taut and silent, remaining calm despite the circumstances, i thought about you, and my life with you. i thought about how patiently and seriously you took the situation of living in a city that was under attack, yet never worried or panicked or obsessed about possibilities. i realized that your humour and trustworthiness and integrity in all the things we had faced in our marriage were things that i admired. this train of thought led me to a profound sense of gratefulness for you, and the life that we were creating together.


i couldn't believe how innocent i had been of what kind of excellent man i was hooking up with when i married you. it was then that i had a revelation: i faced the toilet and braced for the near impact of a missile from another country, and for the first time in my life i felt TRUE LOVE.


when we were children and would sit around the dinner table as a family, we would talk about the different things we did that day. dad would ask us to bark out strictly regimented "homework reports" (does it say anything about my personality if i confess that i submitted to these reports well into my teens, even though surly and mumbled?). then we would beg him to ask us general knowledge questions, where we would "buzz" our placemats to be able to give the answers.


at the end of these lively, happy dinners, interspersed with witty jokes from dad that none of us ever fully got, mum would inevitably be impelled to get up from her seat and strangle dad's head with a hug and affectionate (Iranian) cheek smacking, asking her bemused children, "Girls, do you ever think you will find a husband as wonderful as your father?"


shaun, in response to my mamma, after two years of marriage that just keeps on getting better and better, i think i will tell her, "Yes. I believe I have."


love from leila

two-year anniversary

shaun and i have been married for two years. today, 23 December, is our anniversary.

how'd you like them apples.

this afternoon we returned from a weekend jaunt to the olympic peninsula, where we tried to avoid the rain, walked to a waterfall, ate safeway croissants, were dumbfounded by public rural nativity scenes, went through all the socks we'd brought, learned about submarine warfare, and had excellent evening conversation with a septuagenarian who had a penchant for cussing and discussing good and evil.

some photos are starting to emerge on flickr.

until i can wedge some blog time into my schedule

here is what i finished reading yesterday: "Shattered Dreams: My Life as a Polygamist's Wife" by Irene Spencer.


personally, when someone describes a book as a "masterpiece", i think "A Tale of Two Cities", "Crime and Punishment", "The First Circle" or "The Picture of Dorian Grey". you know: books written by dead white european men. (ha ha. i can so totally think of masterpieces written by women. can you?) so for me "Shattered Dreams" does not count as a masterpiece.

what DOES merit that adjective is this woman's life, in her courage and frankness. a theme in this book is resilience, especially her natural humour and joyfulness. none of it made me laugh out loud, but it was sweet the way each chapter ended with her light-hearted and irreverent (sometimes scatological) repartee written as dialogue, usually with her pious and much more serious husband---whom she shared with nine other wives and FIFTY-EIGHT CHILDREN.

actually, it was more than sweet---it was a necessary counterpoint to the relentless grind of ploygamy and poverty and childbirth that would otherwise have made this book utterly depressing. and i mention "childbirth" and "depressing" in the same sentence only because i also mention "polygamy" and "poverty". i could also mention "disease" and "crazy" as afflicting the polygamous community they lived in, for further accuracy.

i realized it's actually impossible for me to imagine one man fathering almost sixty children and the same man thinking that it's possible to treat ten wives fairly and equally.

one of the beliefs that Irene Spencer describes is this idea that there are souls in heaven waiting to be born into this world, and combined with the idea of an impending holocaust or armageddon, it is imperative that these Mormons adhere to "The Principle"---that men should marry as many women as they can and father as many children as they can while alive, so that these souls can be born into bodies ... and then be taken up to heaven again? um ... maybe my understanding is a bit sketchy.

but it made me think about what the Baha'i Faith describes as spiritual reality on these points, and i remembered the analogy of the soul as having a "potential existence": "It is like unto the existence of a tree within the seed. The existence of the tree within the seed is potential; but when the seed is sown and watered, the signs thereof, its roots and branches, and all of its different qualities, appear. Likewise the "rational soul" has a potential existence before its appearance in the human body, and through the mixture of elements and a wonderful combination, according to the natural order, law, conception and birth, it appears with its identity."

elsewhere Shoghi Effendi explicitly states, "The soul or spirit of the individual comes into being with the conception of his physical body."

likewise, i found it important to remember the Baha'i position on polygamy:

"Know thou that polygamy is not permitted under the law of God, for contentment with one wife hath been clearly stipulated. Taking a second wife is made dependent upon equity and justice being upheld between the two wives, under all conditions. However, observance of justice and equity towards two wives is utterly impossible. The fact that bigamy has been made dependent upon an impossible condition is clear proof of its absolute prohibition. Therefore it is not permissible for a man to have more than one wife."

Polygamy is a very ancient practice among the majority of humanity. The introduction of monogamy has been only gradually accomplished by the Manifestations of God. Jesus, for example, did not prohibit polygamy, but abolished divorce except in the case of fornication; Muhammad limited the number of wives to four, but making plurality of wives contingent on justice, and reintroducing permission for divorce; Bahá'u'lláh, Who was revealing His Teachings in the milieu of a Muslim society, introduced the question of monogamy gradually in accordance
with the principles of wisdom and the progressive unfoldment of His purpose. The fact that He left His followers with an infallible Interpreter of His Writings enabled Him to outwardly permit two wives in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas but uphold a condition that enabled 'Abdu'l-Bahá to elucidate later that the intention of the law was to enforce monogamy.

"Shattered Dreams" also helpfully explained some legal things about polygamy in the united states, the history of Mormonism (a.k.a. "The Church of the Latter-Day Saints"), and key beliefs of fundamentalist Mormons (... but i still don't get the part about coffee being forbidden). i was happy to be enlightened a little bit on these subjects, although i'm told that South Park already produced a condensed version of the Joseph Smith (prophet of Mormonism) story for your perusal.

the view from my office

reflections

ON HIGH HEELS

walking made difficult. not painful, but the kind of discomfort you feel when you're having oral surgery and the dentist sticks a plastic prop between your cheek and your teeth to keep your mouth pried open. so like oral surgery, but on your feet.

ON MUSHROOM BURGERS

especially ones that i have ordered for my lunch: mushrooms are already a protein. let's dispense with the meat already.

ON CUSTOMER SERVICE

i know it can be hard to juggle when there's a sudden rush of customers, but everyone will feel safer in your hands if you're seen to attend one customer at a time, in the order they started waiting. listening to the order/request from one customer, only to turn away and actually help another one, will entirely feel like you are upholding your right to REFUSE SERVICE TO ANYONE. the right that you broke free of the pickling jar in order to use, since i noticed that your sign said you normally PRESERVE that right.

ON TEMPERATURES

i know that it's not technically winter yet? and i definitely prefer the cold that comes with blue skies and sun to the claustrophobically low clouds and endless drizzle that however is warmer and more temperate. but i really REALLY don't understand how 34 degrees fahrenheit is only one. degree. celcius. which brings me to

ON FAHRENHEIT

note to self: make effort to learn meaning of periodic table of fahrenheit. is far too vague to internally adjust temperatures to something meaningful by saying 40 - 49 is "need coat", temperatures 30 - 39 is "also apply scarf and regular cups of hot tea", and temperatures 15 - 29 is "what are you doing in a snow storm in the mountains without the protective covering of a yurt?"

ON "AUTHENTIC" SCANDANAVIAN BAKERIES

i'm loving the cardamom everything, but when was the coconut plant introduced to sweden?

ON ALL THOSE CIGARETTES

especially vis-a-vis the cold, the near-vertical hills in downtown seattle, and being worried that i will be late for first day at work: should never have inhaled. curse the teenage idea of Cool.

ON HIGH HEELS, AGAIN

i never knew that you can overtake the entire contents of morning pedestrian traffic on city hills when wearing them. so this is what "life-long learning" feels like.


love from leila

i was here and awake when it snowed this morning

but when i went to rouse shaun to enjoy the snow with me, he emphatically stated, "I am NOT snoring."

grammar geekery

omg!! apresheyashun kek is lolcatz!!!1!

last week, i got a job. a GREAT job. AM helped me get it.

last night we had the mcgees over for dinner, and this is what we had for dessert:


i wanted to get her something marzipan, but then i was like That Cake Is So Full-on and She'll Think I'm Proposing Marriage, so when the bakery asked "Would you like to have something special written on it?" i knew EXACTLY the perfect way of mitigating the pink icing-flower effect.


i tink her likeded it.

selective hearing, or, kick me when i'm down

last weekend i wrote about my love for snow.

i could have mentioned that a little while ago, shaun and i went to a ballet performance of The Nutcracker, courtesy of birthday tickets from my brother- and sister-in-law, WHICH I LOVED. i'd never seen it before; i wasn't even familiar with the storyline. i used to be a dancer, you may never have guessed, and my teacher, Katie Haines de Viere (graduated from the new zealand school of dance in 1970), put on at least two major productions while i danced classical ballet and then jazz ballet (that is actually the technical term, or at least it was in 1991, and it involved a lot of big bouncing in imitation of a stag and isolating rib movements from one's hips---you know, jazzy things) under her (not literally).

so i took some pictures during the intermission and before and after the show, which i have and which i will stick up here one day soon with appropriate annotation, because it was such a lovely, memorable experience. and i want the internet to remember with me.

but i mention it now because i want to augment my expression of love for snow with the memory of the romantic snow scene in The Nutcracker, complete with individual dancing snowflakes. this was the scene where i fell in love with this ballet.

and i know that i'm mixing metaphors, but even though this scene was set in the frosty cold of a snowfall, wouldn't ballerinas as snowflakes just melt your heart, too? they totally would.

so last saturday it snowed in seattle, while we were up in the mountains. today is saturday, too.

at 7:04 in the a.m., when it's still dark outside, shaun woke me up:

"Did you know it's snowing a little?"

that was the magic word. my eyes snapped open, and the light inside our bedroom was indeed the kind of vague blue of pre-dawn winter. the kind of vague blue that makes it look like there's a higher sun-to-earth ratio than there is in reality ... because SNOW must be reflecting the light everywhere!

"I'm getting up."

in truth, i was so groggy and sleepy that i stumbled out of bed and struggled to right myself (we sleep on a matress on the floor. for some reason). like some hunchback of Notre Salle de Séjour for venetian blinds, i tugged on the pulleys to clack up the serried sheets of metal, even though my eyes were so blurred with sleep i couldn't see properly out the windows.

i peered and i peered and i peered. it's horrible when even the adrenaline of SNOW! doesn't jolt your body into hyper-awakeness. i mean the spirit is willing, but the flesh is ancient. it kind of feels like the impending doom of OLD BODY, where the synapses aren't firing anymore at a speed of CONSTANT WONDERMENT. maybe this is why people start saying "I feel young at heart".

but everything looked pretty normal and snowless and boring to me, so i shuffled back to bed, very disappointed, and wriggled up to shaun.

"If it's snowing, it's snowing so very little that i can't even see it."

"Who said anything about snow?"

"You did!" (thinking: not only am i disappointed about not seeing snow, but my husband thinks it's fun to mess with my morning-fuddled brain.)

"No, i didn't."

"Shaun, that's why i got up. You said, 'Did you know it's snowing a little?'"

"No. I said, 'Did you know you're snoring a little?'"

cuisinical mishaps

as much as i'm learning to like cooking and baking, as much as i'm learning about the chemistry of food + heat, i keep on making fairly colossal mistakes.

recently, and inspired by the film, i made ratatouille. i remember my mother's version being a rich, delicious, steaming stew. even a touch of television-style italia in the tomatoey sourness. together with the vision of sewer rats cooking food, my mouth was watering in anticipation.

the betty crocker recipe book that we brought with us from haifa has been really reliable and generally excellent, if i remember to use only a third of the sugar and butter the recipes call for.

this was my guide for the ratatouille, and the main ingredients all seemed to be there---eggplant (aubergine), zucchini (courgette), red/green capsicum (bell pepper), and tomatoes (tomaydoze). i skim-read the instructions, and all seemed normal and followable under the circumstances of my kitchen.

when i was in full cooking swing, i read that the zucchini and eggplant should be pre-prepared as indicated on pages blah diblah and blah di blah. i read the instructions, which were in a multi-page table of Vegetables And The Boring Ways They Must Be Prepared: cut into 1/2-inch slices or cubes and then steam, boil, or fry. i chose steam for both my nightshade and my squash.

while they were happily steaming away, their pores opening up and becoming progressively mushier, i happily carried on with the other vegetable prep and heating up a pan with oil.

"2. Cook all ingredients together in a pot, adding salt to taste, for about 15 minutes or until the zucchini is tender."

...

if i could add or hyperlink a video of tim allen's HUH? that he always did on home improvement---a show that i never watched but whose opening jingle has somehow ingrained itself on my consciousness so that sixteen years later i refer to it, apropos of my own blunder, in a blog post about ruining ratatouille (congratulations, advertising!)---i would here, so that the confused pause in my life could be fully conveyed. BECAUSE NO ONE DOES STUPID AND CONFUSED LIKE TIM ALLEN.

the cogs that keep my brain smoothly functioning soon facilitated the understanding that if the zucchini should become tender while cooking with the other vegetables, then it probably follows that it has to be raw going into the pot and that the instruction to prepare the veggies as previously indicated intended that i should stop after "slice or cube into 1/2-inch pieces".

rats.

it was at this point in my retelling of the story to shaun (because he relishes the minutiae of my life) that he said, "And so of course you cooked the other vegetables separately and then added the steamed zucchini and eggplant at the end."

reader, will you think less of me if i confess i did not think of that? (i do, however, confess that i have been reading Jane Eyre. again.)

so i've got a quite tasty stock of ratatouille (unfortunately a bit over-doused with basil, which now makes the stew resemble pho in flavour) that consists of red chunks of capsicum and tomato in a gelatinous soup of disintegrated eggplant and courgette.

it's even more unattractive than it normally looks, and i'm either going to have to blindfold myself each time i warm it up for lunch; spread it on a homemade pizza dough and sprinkle it with cheese (betty's already thought of that!) like we had last night; or attack it with the same spirit in which i cut up tonight's dinner of salmon:

shaun, normally you are home to do this sort of thing, because even though i am a vegetarian and have only been able to bring myself to put a (1/2-inch slice or cube of a) dead animal in my mouth under very especial circumstances, i love fish.

i'm a pisci-vegetarian (sounds like "pesky vegetarian"), or a vegequarian (sounds like "aquarium"), or a non-mammalian (sounds like i'm not a human being).

so this "sort of thing" that i'm talking about is the sort of thing where you choose one enormous piece of salmon and then you cut it up with the fish knife when we get home before we fry it (with 1/2 teaspoon of ghee, chili powder, salt and pepper) so that there's one piece for you, one piece for me, and one more piece to take for your lunch the next day.

tonight, you were not at home. you had gone to a wonderful, interesting seminar about the Smart Grid held at the university of washington, and because we had a Ruhi Book 5 class tonight, you'd asked that i get dinner started so we could rush out without dilly-dallying about the kitchen.

i know no one says dilly-dallying anymore. least of all you. you? you are hard core. me? i am a lemon-cream puff. i can't even cut a piece of fish without wishing i'd never been born.

i pulled out the salmon and ripped off the plastic, trying not to get any fish-smelling gunk on my fingers. this was even when i registered that the fish was practically odourless. i didn't want to touch it in case it reacted chemically with the smell that my hands intrinsically have, causing a stench that would force me to hold them awkwardly and far away from my nose, like a 1950s fashion model.

without even touching the styrofoam with the fingernail of my left pinky, i slammed the normaller-looking edge of fish knife onto the salmon with my right hand and tried to saw the fish apart. and when i say "saw", i need you to widen your idea of neat, rhythmical strokes to include hectic, jerking, hacking.

i didn't want to touch it. i hated that the knife was snagging on strings of fish skin. i was revolted that contact-lens fish scales were clinging to the sides of the salmon, and to the fingernail of my left pinky. i became fastidious about rinsing my hands.

at some point i realized that this would be a far more sensible process if carried out on a chopping board. the fish and the knife (now embedded in the scales, bones, and stratified flesh) were transferred.

only the thought of my hard-working husband, returning on foot in the cold from an engineering seminar, expecting a hot dinner of blackened salmon, could have helped me endure my ordeal.

now, i don't take myself so seriously that i didn't realize at the time that my reaction to slicing a denuded, gutted, and totally clean fish was ridiculously melodramatic. but i literally couldn't help myself. contrary to all common-sense, i turned away from the sight of helpless knife in marine life, and, screaming with only the muscles in my face, continued to saw into the skin JUST PLEASE MAKE IT END, PLEASE NOW LET THIS BE THE LAST CUT, SURELY THIS IS WHAT WAITING FOR DEATH IS LIKE, I CAN'T BEAR THIS ANY LONGER, MAKE IT END MAKE IT END OH MAKE IT EEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHND.

to refresh, the point of this story is that i have some ratatouille that looks like i already regurgitated it for baby squirrels, and one of my options is to force myself to eat it while crying I WANT TO DIE OH PLEASE JUST MAKE IT END.

and, not to make this sound like a CAKE OR DEATH scenario? but i think i'll just go with more homemade pizza, actually.

love from leila

to gloam

twin falls and snoqualmie pass