high summer 2024

I fully plan to eat my weight in watermelon between now & Labor Day

Hello from my kitchen table inside my very quiet house. It is strange, it is wonderful, it is weird, it is sad, it is delightful. I am my very own Inside Out 2! (Anyone who has ever been a teenager and/or who has raised a teenager: go see that movie.) 

Here in Houston, we are all hunkered down in anticipation of Tropical Storm Beryl, and “hunkered down” is not a bad way to describe my internal state or even my plans for the rest of the summer.

I am nesting, going through all of the drawers and cabinets–Goodwill piles abound. I load the dishes, I unload the dishes. I do the laundry, I water the plants, I walk the dog, I make the phone calls, I parent the child. All of this sounds silly, maybe, impossibly simple, but I am proving to myself that I can do this thing by doing it: this living alone, this being on my own. When I get overwhelmed, I remind myself that there is very little that *must* happen right now, so if I don’t have the energy for it, I choose something else. 

Often that “something else” is sleep. Grief requires a lot of energy, I am remembering. Grief is also compounding, in that one grief can often bloom another, the way that a rock may skip once, twice, or seven times on its path across a pond. I am grieving the end of a relationship and the life I had envisioned inside of it; I am also grieving my marriage, which ended not so very long ago, and that life path which I, for two decades, imagined as my future. And then there’s the fact that the eighteenth anniversary of my father’s death is in two weeks and my child’s twelfth birthday is in ten days. You see? HUNKERING. 

I’ve got a giant Rubbermaid tub of journals I’ve been keeping since I could write, 50 of the damn things, that stairstep me all the way into the present, and I plan to read through all of them, in chronological order. Lord, it’s going to be painful. Probably hilarious as well. I couldn’t tell you what I think will come from this, only that the inside voice I’m trying very hard to listen to said she thought it was a good idea. So, down the rabbit hole of self we will go. Stay tuned for findings!

In the meantime, here are a few things I can recommend to you:

• Eating a giant bowl of Lucky Charms and watching Queen Charlotte. This was my (almost twelve-year-old!) child’s idea for yesterday’s rainy afternoon, and I gotta say, she’s got good instincts. Might cure what ails you.

• Listening to the audiobook of Everything Sad is Untrue (A True Story) by Daniel Nayeri. It’s been a while since a book thrilled me on so many levels: the former teacher in me knows what an amazing classroom book it would make, the writer in me was inspired by the beautifully layered storytelling structure, and the reader in me wanted to stay in Nayeri’s presence long after the book ended. This book is poignant, hilarious, and will make you hungry for Persian food. 

• Making & eating this black bean salad. Okay, so it’s not Persian food, but it is really yummy. Summer cooking is bringing me such joy–going to the Farmer’s Market, getting lots of fresh stuff, not messing with it too much. This recipe (which I originally posted on the food blog I had a million years ago) is super forgiving, super easy, and my go-to when cooking for others right now. It is GREAT alongside grilled steak and would, I imagine, likewise be delish with grilled portobello. You can even taco it up with tortillas, sour cream, cheese, etc. 

ingredients:

2 cans black beans, drained & rinsed

2 cobs fresh corn, kernels removed

1-2 avocados, cubed* 

1-2 diced summer tomatoes (you can also halve about 15-20 cherry tomatoes)

½ yellow onion, diced 

½  jalapeño, minced (bump to 1 full jalapeño OR sub 1 diced bell pepper)

½ bunch cilantro, roughly chopped

juice of 2 limes 

½ - 1 tsp. cumin, depending on preference 

salt & pepper to taste

Mix together and enjoy.

*If making ahead, wait until just before serving to add avocados.  

I hope the summer is treating you well. More from my little Nishta cave soon!

xoxo