Life Is Like A Toast Quotes

We’re toasting the chlorophyll rising in our bodies, catching the energy from the universe. Nobody’s ever been young like we are right at this moment.

No one has ever made me feel like this, no one. So much regret, so much loss, and so much desire all swirled together in my muddled brain. In my muddled heart.

Continually looking for the meaning of life is like looking for the meaning of toast. It is sometimes better just to eat the toast.

When you get older, you notice your sheets are dirty. Sometimes, you do something about it. And sometimes, you read the front page of the newspaper and sometimes you floss and sometimes you stop biting your nails and sometimes you meet a friend for lunch. You still crave lemonade, but the taste doesn’t satisfy you as much as it used to. You still crave summer, but sometimes you mean summer, five years ago. You remember your umbrella, you check up on people to see if they got home, you leave places early to go home and make toast. You stand by the toaster in your underwear and a big t-shirt, wondering if you should just turn in or watch one more hour of television. You laugh at different things. You stop laughing at other things. You think about old loves almost like they are in a museum. The socks, you notice, aren’t organized into pairs and you mentally make a note of it. You cover your mouth when you sneeze, reaching for the box of tissues you bought, contains aloe. When you get older, you try different shampoos. You find one you like. You try sleeping early and spin class and jogging again. You try a book you almost read but couldn’t finish. You wrap yourself in the blankets of: familiar t-shirts, caffe au lait, dim tv light, texts with old friends or new people you really want to like and love you. You lose contact with friends from college, and only sometimes you think about it. When you do, it feels bad and almost bitter. You lose people, and when other people bring them up, you almost pretend like you know what they are doing. You try to stop touching your face and become invested in things like expensive salads and trying parsnips and saving up for a vacation you really want. You keep a spare pen in a drawer. You look at old pictures of yourself and they feel foreign and misleading. You forget things like: purchasing stamps, buying more butter, putting lotion on your elbows, calling your mother back. You learn things like balance: checkbooks, social life, work life, time to work out and time to enjoy yourself. When you get older, you find yourself more in control. You find your convictions appealing, you find you like your body more, you learn to take things in stride. You begin to crave respect and comfort and adventure, all at the same time. You lay in your bed, fearing death, just like you did. You pull lint off your shirt. You smile less and feel content more. You think about changing and then often, you do.

Kissing Kate is like nothing I’ve ever experienced. And as much as I want to think I’m the good guy, as much as I’ve proclaimed that sleeping with an attached girl isn’t my style, I’m not walking away. I can’t. I have her now. She’s mine. And I’m not going anywhere.

She could hear her hair growing. It sounded like something crumbling. A burnt thing crumbling. Coal. Toast. Moths crisped on a light bulb. She remembered reading somewhere that even after people died, their hair and nails kept growing. Like starlight, travelling through the universe long after the stars themselves had died. Like cities. Fizzy, effervescent, simulating the illusion of life while the planet they had plundered died around them.

Potato slices, crispy and fragrant. And toast glistening with what looks like actual creamy butter. And three fried eggs. That’s more eggs than I’ve had on the same plate ever in my life.

Do your work, I tell myself. And after? Find a patch of lawn and sit down and hug your knees to your chest and let everything you’ve ever been told and everything you’ve ever seen mingle together in a show just for you, your own eye-popping pageant of existence, your own twelve-thousand-line epic poem. The tickle of the grass on your thighs, the sky moving over you, sunless or blue, echoes from a homily or a wedding toast or a letter your grandmother sent. Remember something good, a sunburn you liked the feeling of, a plate of homemade pasta. Do your work, Kelly. Then lean back. Rest from the striving to reduce. Like the padre said, life is a mystery to be lived. Live your mystery.

I was in the fifth grade the first time I thought about turning thirty. My best friend Darcy and I came across a perpetual calendar in the back of the phone book, where you could look up any date in the future, and by using this little grid, determine what the day of the week would be. So we located our birthdays in the following year, mine in May and hers in September. I got Wednesday, a school night. She got a Friday. A small victory, but typical. Darcy was always the lucky one. Her skin tanned more quickly, her hair feathered more easily, and she didn't need braces. Her moonwalk was superior, as were her cart-wheels and her front handsprings (I couldn't handspring at all). She had a better sticker collection. More Michael Jackson pins. Forenze sweaters in turquoise, red, and peach (my mother allowed me none- said they were too trendy and expensive). And a pair of fifty-dollar Guess jeans with zippers at the ankles (ditto). Darcy had double-pierced ears and a sibling- even if it was just a brother, it was better than being an only child as I was. But at least I was a few months older and she would never quite catch up. That's when I decided to check out my thirtieth birthday- in a year so far away that it sounded like science fiction. It fell on a Sunday, which meant that my dashing husband and I would secure a responsible baby-sitter for our two (possibly three) children on that Saturday evening, dine at a fancy French restaurant with cloth napkins, and stay out past midnight, so technically we would be celebrating on my actual birthday. I would have just won a big case- somehow proven that an innocent man didn't do it. And my husband would toast me: "To Rachel, my beautiful wife, the mother of my chidren and the finest lawyer in Indy." I shared my fantasy with Darcy as we discovered that her thirtieth birthday fell on a Monday. Bummer for her. I watched her purse her lips as she processed this information. "You know, Rachel, who cares what day of the week we turn thirty?" she said, shrugging a smooth, olive shoulder. "We'll be old by then. Birthdays don't matter when you get that old." I thought of my parents, who were in their thirties, and their lackluster approach to their own birthdays. My dad had just given my mom a toaster for her birthday because ours broke the week before. The new one toasted four slices at a time instead of just two. It wasn't much of a gift. But my mom had seemed pleased enough with her new appliance; nowhere did I detect the disappointment that I felt when my Christmas stash didn't quite meet expectations. So Darcy was probably right. Fun stuff like birthdays wouldn't matter as much by the time we reached thirty. The next time I really thought about being thirty was our senior year in high school, when Darcy and I started watching ths show Thirty Something together. It wasn't our favorite- we preferred cheerful sit-coms like Who's the Boss? and Growing Pains- but we watched it anyway. My big problem with Thirty Something was the whiny characters and their depressing issues that they seemed to bring upon themselves. I remember thinking that they should grow up, suck it up. Stop pondering the meaning of life and start making grocery lists. That was back when I thought my teenage years were dragging and my twenties would surealy last forever. Then I reached my twenties. And the early twenties did seem to last forever. When I heard acquaintances a few years older lament the end of their youth, I felt smug, not yet in the danger zone myself. I had plenty of time..

You know what I think the trick to dealing with family is? I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately.” “What?” I said, spreading strawberry jam on my toast. “Marrying your best friend.” He wiped his mouth with a napkin. “You marry your best friend, and at family gatherings you deal with your shitty relatives together. You laugh about it and have each other’s backs. Share looks and text each other from across the room when everyone else is being an asshole. And nobody else really matters because you have your own universe.” He held my eyes for a moment. “That’s what I want. I want someone to be my universe.” He’d have no problem finding that. No problem at all. Josh could have any woman he wanted. After all, he was the sun. Warm and vital. He would be the center of a big family one day, just like he wanted, and they’d all adore him. And I was just some passing comet. Momentarily distracting. Useless and unimportant. I was nice to look at, fun to observe, but I’d never give life or be the center of anything. I’d streak through and be gone, and Josh would forget me before we knew it.

I tried to imagine what it would be like if Constantin were my husband. It would mean getting up at seven and cooking him eggs and bacon and toast and coffee and dawdling about in my nightgown and curlers after he'd left for work to wash up the dirty plates and make the bed, and then when he came home after a lively, fascinating day he'd expect a big dinner, and I'd spend the evening washing up even more dirty plates till I fell into bed, utterly exhausted. This seemed a dreary and wasted life for a girl with fifteen years of straight A's, but I knew that's what marriage was like, because cook and clean and wash was just what Buddy Willard's mother did from morning till night, and she was the wife of a university professor and had been a private school teacher herself.

[excerpt] The usual I say. Essence. Spirit. Medicine. A taste. I say top shelf. Straight up. A shot. A sip. A nip. I say another round. I say brace yourself. Lift a few. Hoist a few. Work the elbow. Bottoms up. Belly up. Set ‘em up. What’ll it be. Name your poison. I say same again. I say all around. I say my good man. I say my drinking buddy. I say git that in ya. Then a quick one. Then a nightcap. Then throw one back. Then knock one down. Fast & furious I say. Could savage a drink I say. Chug. Chug-a-lug. Gulp. Sauce. Mother’s milk. Everclear. Moonshine. White lightning. Firewater. Hootch. Relief. Now you’re talking I say. Live a little I say. Drain it I say. Kill it I say. Feeling it I say. Wobbly. Breakfast of champions I say. I say candy is dandy but liquor is quicker. I say Houston, we have a drinking problem. I say the cause of, and solution to, all of life’s problems. I say god only knows what I’d be without you. I say thirsty. I say parched. I say wet my whistle. Dying of thirst. Lap it up. Hook me up. Watering hole. Knock a few back. Pound a few down. My office. Out with the boys I say. Unwind I say. Nurse one I say. Apply myself I say. Toasted. Glow. A cold one a tall one a frosty I say. One for the road I say. Two-fisted I say. Never trust a man who doesn’t drink I say. Drink any man under the table I say. Then a binge then a spree then a jag then a bout. Coming home on all fours. Could use a drink I say. A shot of confidence I say. Steady my nerves I say. Drown my sorrows. I say kill for a drink. I say keep ‘em comin’. I say a stiff one. Drink deep drink hard hit the bottle. Two sheets to the wind then. Knackered then. Under the influence then. Half in the bag then. Out of my skull I say. Liquored up. Rip-roaring. Slammed. Fucking jacked. The booze talking. The room spinning. Feeling no pain. Buzzed. Giddy. Silly. Impaired. Intoxicated. Stewed. Juiced. Plotzed. Inebriated. Laminated. Swimming. Elated. Exalted. Debauched. Rock on. Drunk on. Bring it on. Pissed. Then bleary. Then bloodshot. Glassy-eyed. Red-nosed. Dizzy then. Groggy. On a bender I say. On a spree. I say off the wagon. I say on a slip. I say the drink. I say the bottle. I say drinkie-poo. A drink a drunk a drunkard. Swill. Swig. Shitfaced. Fucked up. Stupefied. Incapacitated. Raging. Seeing double. Shitty. Take the edge off I say. That’s better I say. Loaded I say. Wasted. Off my ass. Befuddled. Reeling. Tanked. Punch-drunk. Mean drunk. Maintenance drunk. Sloppy drunk happy drunk weepy drunk blind drunk dead drunk. Serious drinker. Hard drinker. Lush. Drink like a fish. Boozer. Booze hound. Alkie. Sponge. Then muddled. Then woozy. Then clouded. What day is it? Do you know me? Have you seen me? When did I start? Did I ever stop? Slurring. Reeling. Staggering. Overserved they say. Drunk as a skunk they say. Falling down drunk. Crawling down drunk. Drunk & disorderly. I say high tolerance. I say high capacity. They say protective custody. Blitzed. Shattered. Zonked. Annihilated. Blotto. Smashed. Soaked. Screwed. Pickled. Bombed. Stiff. Frazzled. Blasted. Plastered. Hammered. Tore up. Ripped up. Destroyed. Whittled. Plowed. Overcome. Overtaken. Comatose. Dead to the world. The old K.O. The horrors I say. The heebie-jeebies I say. The beast I say. The dt’s. B’jesus & pink elephants. A mindbender. Hittin’ it kinda hard they say. Go easy they say. Last call they say. Quitting time they say. They say shut off. They say dry out. Pass out. Lights out. Blackout. The bottom. The walking wounded. Cross-eyed & painless. Gone to the world. Gone. Gonzo. Wrecked. Sleep it off. Wake up on the floor. End up in the gutter. Off the stuff. Dry. Dry heaves. Gag. White knuckle. Lightweight I say. Hair of the dog I say. Eye-opener I say. A drop I say. A slug. A taste. A swallow. Down the hatch I say. I wouldn’t say no I say. I say whatever he’s having. I say next one’s on me. I say bottoms up. Put it on my tab. I say one more. I say same again

Around them, the dawn gently wakes Borg like someone breathing into the ear of someone they love. With sun and promises. Tickling light falls over warm duvets, like the smell of freshly brewed coffee and toasted bread. It shouldn't be doing this. It's the wrong day to be beautiful, but the dawn doesn't care.

I hope you gaze at cloud art galleries against azure summer skies and pause to gasp at rainbows and watch butterflies fly by; I hope wildflowers make you happy and sad songs make you cry and old books stacked in dusty nooks are gems you can't pass by; I hope burnt toast mornings are little things you handle with a smile and midnight talks and starlit walks keep you up once in awhile; I hope laundry warm from the dryer brings a sigh of contentment and front porch swings on cool evenings offer rest when you are spent; I hope your life is light in sorrow and heavy with laughter and you greet each season of your life like a new favorite chapter; I hope you honor every soul you meet and always go that extra mile and when you think of me, my love, I hope it's with a smile.

John Adair had little liking for the simple life; he said it was not simple, but the most damnably complicated method of wasting time that had every existed. He liked a constant supply of hot water, a refrigerator, an elevator, an electric toaster, a telephone beside his bed, central heating and electric fires, and anything whatever that reduced the time spent upon the practical side of living to a minimum and left him free to paint. But Sally [his daughter] did not want to be set free for anything, for it was living itself that she enjoyed. She liked lighting a real fire of logs and fir cones, and toasting bread on an old-fashioned toaster. And she liked the lovely curve of an old staircase and the fun of running up and down it. And she vastly preferred writing a letter and walking with it to the post to using the telephone and hearing with horror her voice committing itself to things she would never have dreamed of doing if she'd had the time to think. "It's my stupid brain," she said to herself. "I like the leisurely things, and taking my time about them. That's partly why I like children so much, I think. They're never in a hurry to get on to something else.

The first seventeen years of my life, I fasted. I kept my body clean and my spirit pure. Now, I wanted to feast like a glutton, spread lust on my breakfast toast, shoot violence and sip greed. And I want you to teach me, sinner man, because you're the only man for the job.

I climbed into the honey wagon with my hair uncombed, with May handing me buttered toast and orange juice through the window and Rosaleen sticking in thermoses of water, both of them practically running alongside the truck while August rolled out of the driveway. I felt like the Red Cross springing to action to save the bee queendom.

I just want to say one thing. If I ever write a novel again, it's going to be in defense of weak women, inept and codependent women. I'm going to talk about all the great movies and songs and poetry that focus on such women. I'm going to toast Blanche DuBois. I'm going to celebrate women who aren't afraid to show their need and their vulnerabilities. To be honest about how hard it can be to plow your way through a life that offers no guarantees about anything. I'm going to get on my metaphorical knees and thank women who fall apart, who cry and carry on and wail and wring their hands because you know what, Midge? We all need to cry. Thank God for women who can articulate their vulnerabilities and express what probably a lot of other people want to say and feel they can't. Those peoples' stronghold against falling apart themselves is the disdain they feel for women who do it for them. Strong. I'm starting to think that's as much a party line as anything else ever handed to women for their assigned roles. When do we get respect for our differences from men? Our strength is our weakness. Our ability to feel is our humanity. You know what? I'll bet if you talk to a hundred strong women, 99 of them would say 'I'm sick of being strong. I would like to be cared for. I would like someone else to make the goddamn decisions, I'm sick of making decisions.' I know this one woman who's a beacon of strength. A single mother who can do everything - even more than you, Midge. I ran into her not long ago and we went and got a coffee and you know what she told me? She told me that when she goes out to dinner with her guy, she asks him to order everything for her. Every single thing, drink to dessert. Because she just wants to unhitch. All of us dependent, weak women have the courage to do all the time what she can only do in a restaurant.

Not erotic life, but the pleasure of the mind filling like the lower chamber of an hourglass with the slow-moving grains of a perfect day—sky, carnations, walking, reading, writing, Toasted Cheese, the presence of another who wishes to be so still, so silent too.

A writer sets out to write science fiction but isn’t familiar with the genre, hasn’t read what’s been written. This is a fairly common situation, because science fiction is known to sell well but, as a subliterary genre, is not supposed to be worth study—what’s to learn? It doesn’t occur to the novice that a genre is a genre because it has a field and focus of its own; its appropriate and particular tools, rules, and techniques for handling the material; its traditions; and its experienced, appreciative readers—that it is, in fact, a literature. Ignoring all this, our novice is just about to reinvent the wheel, the space ship, the space alien, and the mad scientist, with cries of innocent wonder. The cries will not be echoed by the readers. Readers familiar with that genre have met the space ship, the alien, and the mad scientist before. They know more about them than the writer does. In the same way, critics who set out to talk about a fantasy novel without having read any fantasy since they were eight, and in ignorance of the history and extensive theory of fantasy literature, will make fools of themselves because they don’t know how to read the book. They have no contextual information to tell them what its tradition is, where it’s coming from, what it’s trying to do, what it does. This was liberally proved when the first Harry Potter book came out and a lot of literary reviewers ran around shrieking about the incredible originality of the book. This originality was an artifact of the reviewers’ blank ignorance of its genres (children’s fantasy and the British boarding-school story), plus the fact that they hadn’t read a fantasy since they were eight. It was pitiful. It was like watching some TV gourmet chef eat a piece of buttered toast and squeal, “But this is delicious! Unheard of! Where has it been all my life?

Reuben says in many cultures, the wedding ceremony and all of it's rituals are much the same as a funeral: a transition into another phase of life. It is like dying and being reborn, if you believe in the afterlife. If you don't believe in an afterlife, then you are toast

Life as a widow, she thinks, will always be like this. The friends will go on proposing toasts for months (for years!). To her. To their new center of attention. What she doesn't know yet is that, after a few courtesy calls, it will all be over. The silence that will follow is the same silence that always falls after a life in the shadows.

Byron published the first two cantos of his epic poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, a romanticized account of his wanderings through Portugal, Malta, and Greece, and, as he later remarked, “awoke one morning and found myself famous.” Beautiful, seductive, troubled, brooding, and sexually adventurous, he was living the life of a Byronic hero while creating the archetype in his poetry. He became the toast of literary London and was feted at three parties each day, most memorably a lavish morning dance hosted by Lady Caroline Lamb. Lady Caroline, though married to a politically powerful aristocrat who was later prime minister, fell madly in love with Byron. He thought she was “too thin,” yet she had an unconventional sexual ambiguity (she liked to dress as a page boy) that he found enticing. They had a turbulent affair, and after it ended she stalked him obsessively. She famously declared him to be “mad, bad, and dangerous to know,” which he was. So was she.

For as long as I’d been dating, I’d had a mental flow chart, a schedule, of how things usually went. Relationships always started with that heady, swoonish period, where the other person is like some new invention that suddenly solves all life’s worst problems, like losing socks in the dryer or toasting bagels without burning the edges. At this phase, which usually lasts about six weeks max, the other person is perfect. But at six weeks and two days, the cracks begin to show; not real structural damage yet, but little things that niggle and nag. Like the way they always assume you’ll pay for your own movie, just because you did once, or how they use the dashboard of their car as an imaginary keyboard at long stoplights. Once, you might have thought this was cute, or endearing. Now, it annoys you, but not enough to change anything. Come week eight, though, the strain is starting to show. This person is, in fact, human, and here’s where most relationships splinter and die. Because either you can stick around and deal with these problems, or ease out gracefully, knowing that at some point in the not-too-distant future, there will emerge another perfect person, who will fix everything, at least for six weeks.

I tried to imagine what it would be like if Constantin were my husband. It would mean getting up at seven and cooking him eggs and bacon and toast and coffee and dawdling about in my nightgown and curlers after he’d left for work to wash up the dirty plates and make the bed, and then when he came home after a lively, fascinating day he’d expect a big dinner, and I’d spend the evening washing up even more dirty plates till I fell into bed, utterly exhausted. This seemed a dreary and wasted life for a girl with fifteen years of straight A’s, but I knew that’s what marriage was like, because cook and clean and wash was just what Buddy Willard’s mother did from morning till night, and she was the wife of a university professor and had been a private school teacher herself. Once when I visited Buddy I found Mrs Willard braiding a rug out of strips of wool from Mr Willard’s old suits. She’d spent weeks on that rug, and I had admired the tweedy browns and greens and blues patterning the braid, but after Mrs Willard was through, instead of hanging the rug on the wall the way I would have done, she put it down in place of her kitchen mat, and in a few days it was soiled and dull and indistinguishable from any mat you could buy for under a dollar in the Five and Ten. And I knew that in spite of all the roses and kisses and restaurant dinners a man showered on a woman before he married her, what he secretly wanted when the wedding service ended was for her to flatten out underneath his feet like Mrs Willard’s kitchen mat.

My CB handle is Flaming Chick, but name’s Melba—dry and crisp like the toast. Meet my co-pilot, Spark Pug,” she snorted, “Most people walk their dogs, but he’s so old I take him out for a stand . . . it takes all he’s got to lift his leg.

She'll bake bread and make jam, because she likes those made her way, but she says she cooked a good meal from scratch every night of her marriage, and now if she wants to live mainly off toasted sandwiches and ready meals, she has the right.

Leslie Marmon Silko whispers the story is long. No, longer. Longer than that even. Longer than anything. With Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath drink at the bar. Laugh the dark laughter in the dark light. Sing a dark drunken song of men. Make a slurry toast. Rock back and forth, and drink the dark, and bask in the wallow of women knowing what women know. Just for a night. When you need to feel the ground of your life and the heart of the world, there will be a bonfire at the edge of a canyon under a night sky where Joy Harjo will sing your bonesong. Go ahead-with Anne Carson - rebuild the wreckage of a life a word at a time, ignoring grammar and the forms that keep culture humming. Make word war and have it out and settle it, scattering old meanings like hacked to pieces paper doll confetti. The lines that are left … they are awake and growling. With Virginia Woolf there will perhaps be a long walk in a garden or along a shore, perhaps a walk that will last all day. She will put her arm in yours and gaze out. At your backs will be history. In front of you, just the ordinary day, which is of course your entire life. Like language. The small backs of words. Stretching out horizonless. I am in a midnight blue room. A writing room. With a blood red desk. A room with rituals and sanctuaries. I made it for myself. It took me years. I reach down below my desk and pull up a bottle of scotch. Balvenie. 30 year. I pour myself an amber shot. I drink. Warm lips, throat. I close my eyes. I am not Virginia Woolf. But there is a line of hers that keeps me well: Arrange whatever pieces come your way. I am not alone. Whatever else there was or is, writing is with me.

Mostly I live in this moment, right now, and I'm grateful for it. I know that most of this life lies behind me, but what I Live for is today, and for the tomorrows that remain. My eyes are bombarded by the sights of this beautiful world. Every breath has the rich fragrance of trees and flowers. I'm privileged to be alive to share these wonderful feelings with you. I toast our fallen comrades, all of whom live on in our hearts. So far, so good. Do I sound like I think I'm going to live forever? you bet your fucking ass. I know better, at least in my mind. But this heart still beats a little faster for all the beauty in the world. I can honestly say that I've lived my time here fully. Perhaps the life story I have recounted in these pages will help you to avoid some of the pitfalls that tripped me up along the way.I hope so. And I hope that you'll live the rest of your time to the fullest. I don't see any other good way to go.

Those of you who know me know that I'm a huge fan of my sister. She's my rock, my soul mate, and the reason that I'm still standing here, alive and well. When her heart beats for someone, mine falls in line and thumps for them too. Baron, there's one thing I cannot take from you–you make her happy. Glow, even... Some loves are old, and sure, others are new and frantic. Yours is both, and that's what made your feelings toward one another outsoar everything. Even the past... I wish you joy, freedom, health, and wealth, though I think you're all covered with the last one... So I guess I would like to make a toast to two of my favorite people. To the woman I love more than life itself, and to the man who spends his life making her happy. Baron and Millie, you don't need my words to make it work. You have this thing covered. But just in case, I wish you everything you wish for yourself and more. Now down these glasses and have some fun.

Education is like a fine wine, getting better with age and never losing its taste. It's the fountain of wit and wisdom that keeps on flowing, making you the classiest connoisseur of information. So, raise your glass to lifelong learning, and let's toast to being the savvy scholar with an endless appetite for education!

I had this idea we would have ordered some good champagne, launched toast after toast to our humanity, which after all had created everything: the opportunities for the bug, the bug itself, and its solution. I think now it might have changed us, softened our failures, made us feel we belonged to—had a true stake in—those lives full of code we had separately stumbled into. I like to think it would have reassured him, saved him: To know that at the heart of the problem was the ancient mystery of time. To discover that between the blinks of the machine’s shuttered eye—going on without pause or cease; simulated, imagined, but still not caught—was life.

As he ran, he thought about everything and anything, about the life he’d led, the children, the snatches of time frozen in his mind: a moment when he’d gotten shot in an alley, and the flash of the man who’d shot him; the first sight of a newborn daughter; his mother’s face, crabby with an early morning slice of toast in her hand, her image as clear in his mind as it had been twenty-five years earlier, on the day she died…. They all came up like portraits and landscapes hanging on the wall of his memory, flashes of color in the black-and-white night.

Here's my bright idea for life on earth: better management. The CEO has lost touch with the details. I'm worth as much, but I care; I come down here, I show my face, I'm a real regular. A toast: To our boys and girls in the war, grinding through sand, to everybody here, our host who's mostly mist, like methane rising from retreating ice shelves. Put me in command. For every town, we'll have a marching band. For each thoroughbred, a comfortable stable; for each worker, a place beneath the table. For every forward step a stumbling. A shadow over every starlit thing.

On New Year's Eve, when the children had gone up the hill to be with their father, I went to a Mensa party in San Francisco, but returned home relatively early, wanting to face the first few hours of the new year away from the noise and lurching of people who had drunk too much. I stood outside on the deck, in darkness, looking up at the star-frosted sky, letting myself feel without censoring the ache and hope that belonged to that night, and I sent out prayer for connection with someone who would be --finally -- the person I'd needed to be with all my life, someone who would have gone through his own changes and wars of the spirit and emerged a true adult. A grown-up man. Who wouldn't mind my being a grandmother, for Pete's sake. A man somewhat like Shura Borodin -- or what Shura seemed to be. I cried a bit because the wanting was so very intense and the clear night sky so very indifferent, and everything I was in body and soul might yet grow old without a lover and friend who could be to me what I was capable of being to him. I toasted myself, hope, the new year and the magnificent cold stars with a bit of wine, then went to bed.

I messed up the toast,” she said quietly. “Nah,” he said, stretching his long legs out in front of him and slouching down a bit to get comfortable. “Just think how many people you educated on the mating ritual of parasitic worms. They should be thanking you.” Mollie groaned. “It was supposed to be romantic. I did a paper about them for my systematics and biotics diversity final. They’re unusual because they’re bonded for life. Most organisms sleep around or, you know, the male dies after mating—” Jackson winced, and Mollie wished she could wither and die just like a male bee.

If you had to lose everything, what would you miss most? It wouldn't be anything gross, like the big house, or the fancy car, assuming you had such things. It wouldn't be your impeccable reputation, or fame, or the regard of others. No; if you had to lose everything – I mean EVERYTHING – it would be the things you most take for granted now that you would miss. It would be different for each person, and it would probably surprise you to know what it was: a lilac tree in flower, the sound of a train in the distance, the smell of marmalade or hot buttered toast. Rain on a windowpane. A fruit thingummy.

These are some of my favorite smells: toasting bagel, freshly cut figs, the bergamot in good Earl Grey tea, a jar of whole soybeans slowly turning beneath a tropical sun. You'd expect the latter to smell salty, meaty, flaccid- like what you'd smell if you unscrewed the red cap of the bottle on a table in your neighborhood Chinese restaurant and stuck your nose in as far as it would go. But real, fermenting soybeans smell nothing like sauce in a plastic bottle. Tangy and pungent, like rising bread or wet earth, these soybeans smell of history, of life, of tiny, patient movements, unseen by the naked eye.

I tried to imagine what it would be like if Constantin were my husband. It would men getting up at seven and cooking him eggs and bacon and toast and coffee and dawdling about in my nightgown and curlers after he'd left for work to wash up the dirty plates and make the bed, and then when he came home after a lively, fascinating day he'd expect a big dinner, and I'd spend the evening washing up even more dirty plates till I fell into bed, utterly exhausted. This seemed a dreary and wasted life for a girl with fifteen years of straight A's, but I knew that's what marriage was like, because cook and clean and wash was just what Buddy Willard's mother did from morning till night, and she was the wife of a university professor and had been a private school teacher herself.

Peter sits with his back to the wall in the hallway. He looks up at me when I lean over him, his dark hair stuck to his forehead from the melted snow. “Did you reset her?” he says. “No,” I say. “Didn’t think you would have the nerve.” “It’s not about nerve. You know what? Whatever.” I shake my head and hold up the vial of memory serum. “Are you still set on this?” He nods. “You could just do the work, you know,” I say. “You could make better decisions, make a better life.” “Yeah, I could,” he says. “But I won’t. We both know that.” I do know that. I know that change is difficult, and comes slowly, and that it is the work of many days strung together in a long line until the origin of them is forgotten. He is afraid that he will not be able to put in that work, that he will squander those days, and that they will leave him worse off than he is now. And I understand that feeling--I understand being afraid of yourself. So I have him sit on one of the couches, and I ask him what he wants me to tell him about himself, after his memories disappear like smoke. He just shakes his head. Nothing. He wants to retain nothing. Peter takes the vial with a shaking hand and twists off the cap. The liquid trembles inside it, almost spilling over the lip. He holds it under his nose to smell it. “How much should I drink?” he says, and I think I hear his teeth chattering. “I don’t think it makes a difference,” I say. “Okay. Well…here goes.” He lifts the vial up to the light like he is toasting me. When he touches it to his mouth, I say, “Be brave.” Then he swallows. And I watch Peter disappear.

Anyone looking back at the log later, trying to piece together a mystery, would find nothing but times and dry entries. It was a lazy Sunday. What made it meaningful were not the facts or details, but the imperceptibles. Inner life. The smell of the beach grass and the feel of sand on a bathroom floor when changing out of a swimsuit. The heat of American summer. Line ten of the log read simply: 10:22 Condor ate second breakfast. It couldn’t capture the perfect toasting of the onion bagel or the saltiness of the fish in contrast with the thickness of cream cheese. It was time lost in a book—a journey of imagination, transportation—which to others simply looks like sitting or lying stomach-down on the rug in front of a summertime fire, legs bent at the knees, up ninety degrees, kicking absently, feet languid in the air.

First, the idea of the multiverse is essentially the fantasy of preserving perfect information. One of the hard things to deal with in life is the fact that you destroy potential information whenever you make a decision. You could even say that's essentially what regret is: a profound problem of incomplete information. If you select one thing on a diner's menu, you can't know what it would have been like to taste other things on it, right then, right there. When you marry one person, you give up the possibility of knowing what it would have been like to have married any number of others. But if the multiverse exists, you can at least imagine there's another version of you who's eating that other thing you thought about ordering, or who's married to that other man you only went on two dates with. Even if you'll never see all the information for yourself, at least you'll be able to tell yourself that it's there. 'The second reason the multiverse seems like such a neat idea is that it gives human beings just an incredible amount of agency, which they can exercise with the least effort. Why, Carson here created an entire alternate universe when he ordered hash browns on the side of his French toast instead of bacon—' 'Ah, I should have gotten bacon, how could I forget,' Carson said, and attempted to hail the waitress. 'But the history of science shows that any theory that covertly panders to the human ego like that, that puts humans at the center of things, is very likely to be found out wrong, given enough time. So, just for the sake of argument, let's assume that there's just this one universe, and we're stuck with it. What happens to our time traveler then?

Enjoying the taste of toasted raisin bread or the humor in a cartoon may not seem like much, but simple pleasures like these ease emotional upsets, lift your mood, and enrich your life. They also provide health benefits, by releasing endorphins and natural opioids that shift you out of stressful, draining reactive states and into happier responsive ones. As a bonus, some pleasures—such as dancing, sex, your team winning a game of pick-up basketball, or laughing with friends—come with energizing feelings of vitality or passion that enhance long-term health. Opportunities for pleasure are all around you, especially if you include things like the rainbow glitter of the tiny grains of sand in a sidewalk, the sound of water falling into a tub, the sense of connection in talking with a friend, or the reassurance that comes from the stove working when you need to make dinner.

I want to be grateful, and I want to be humble. I want to do my bit to make this world a better place. But I also want to experience it all—devour as much of this life as I possibly can. I want to dress in beautiful things and taste all the gorgeous flavors the world has to offer. I want to dance with the most beautiful man alive, whom I have the luxury to call my own. I want to carefully put on makeup and make my bed neatly every morning, put flowers in my windows and toast the beauty I see. I want to walk down the street feeling like a stunning creature. And I want to nod my head in recognition to all of you other stunning creatures out there. To you who make an effort, who give a damn. To all of you who are grateful and appreciate. And who want to experience it all. This might be shallow—it probably is. I might be shallow—I probably am. But you know what? I’m ok with it.

Under a Torremolinos Sky (Psalm 116)8 For Jim The first thing I notice is not the bed, oddly angled as all hospital beds are nor the pillowcase, covered in love notes. Not the table filled with pill bottles nor the sterile tools of a dozen indignities. I’ll notice these things later, on my way out perhaps. But first, my wide-angle lens pulls narrow, as eyes meet eyes and I am seen. How is it, before a word is spoken, you make me know I am known and welcome? What can I give back to God for the blessings he’s poured out on me? I’ll lift high the cup of salvation—a toast to God! You smile behind the plastic that keeps you alive, and as I rest my hand on your chest we conspire together to break the rules. The rhythm of your labored breathing will decide our seconds, our minutes, our hours. Tears to laughter and back again always in that order and rightly so. We bask under a Torremolinos sky and hear the tongues of angels sing of sins forgiven long before the world was made. I’ll pray in the name of God; I’ll complete what I promised God I’d do, and I’ll do it together with his people. Talk turns to motorcycles and mortuaries, to scotch and sons who wear their father’s charm like a crown, daughters who quicken the pulse with just a glance. Time flies and neither of us has time to waste. I’ll make a great looking corpse, you say because we of all people must speak of these things, because we of all people refuse to pretend. This doesn’t bring tears—not yet. Instead a giggle, a shared secret that life is and is not in the body. Soul, you’ve been rescued from death; Eye, you’ve been rescued from tears; And you, Foot, were kept from stumbling. Your chest still rises and falls but you grow weary, my hand tells me so. It’s too soon to ever say goodbye. When it’s my turn, brother, I will find you where the streets shimmer and tears herald only joy where we wear our true names and our true faces. Promise me, there, the dance we never had. When they arrive at the gates of death, God welcomes those who love him. Oh, God, here I am, your servant, your faithful servant: set me free for your service! I’m ready to offer the thanksgiving sacrifice and pray in the name of God. I’ll complete what I promised God I’d do, and I’ll do it in company with his people, In the place of worship, in God’s house, in Jerusalem, God’s city.

You... you were telling me about your diet?" "Well, mostly I was raised on milk, potatoes, dulse, fish-" "I beg your pardon, did you say 'dulse'? What is that, exactly?" "A kind of seaweed," MacRae said. "As a lad, it was my job to go out at low tide before supper and cut handfuls of it from the rocks on shore." He opened a cupboard to view a small store of cooking supplies and utensils. "It goes in soup, or you can eat it raw." He glanced at her over his shoulder, amusement touching his lips as he saw her expression. "Seaweed is the secret to good health?" Merritt asked dubiously. "No, milady, that would be whisky. My men and I take a wee dram every day." Seeing her perplexed expression, her continued, "Whisky is the water of life. It warms the blood, keeps the spirits calm, and the heart strong." "I wish I liked whisky, but I'm afraid it's not to my taste." MacRae looked appalled. "Was it Scotch whisky?" "I'm not sure," she said. "Whatever it was, it set my tongue on fire." "It was no' Scotch, then, but rotgut. Islay whisky starts as hot as the devil's whisper... but then the flavors come through, and it might taste of cinnamon, or peat, or honeycomb fresh from the hive. It could taste of a long-ago walk on a winter's eve... or a kiss you once stole from your sweetheart in the hayloft. Whisky is yesterday's rain, distilled with barley into a vapor that rises like a will-o'-the-wisp, then set to bide its time in casks of good oak." His voice had turned as soft as a curl of smoke. "Someday we'll have a whisky, you and I. We'll toast health to our friends and peace to our foes... and we'll drink to the loves lost to time's perishing, as well as those yet to come.

From the cobbled Close, we all admired the Minster's great towers of fretted stone soaring to the clouds, every inch carved as fine as lacework. Once we had passed into the nave, I surrendered my scruples to that glorious hush that tells of a higher presence than ourselves. It was a bright winter's day, and the vaulted windows tinted the air with dappled rainbows. Sitting quietly in my pew, I recognized a change in myself; that every morning I woke quite glad to be alive. Instead of fitful notions of footsteps at midnight, each new day was heralded by cheery sounds outside my window: the post-horn's trumpeting and the cries and songs of busy, prosperous people. I was still young and vital, with no need for bed rest or sleeping draughts. I was ready to face whatever the future held. However troubled my marriage was, it was better by far than my former life with my father. Dropping my face into my clasped hands, I glimpsed in reverie a sort of labyrinth, a mysterious path I must traverse in the months to come. I could not say what trials lay ahead of me- but I knew that I must be strong, and win whatever happiness I might glean on this earth. It was easy to make such a resolution when, as yet, I faced no actual difficulties. Each morning, Anne and I returned from our various errands to take breakfast at our lodgings. Awaiting us stood a steaming pot of chocolate and a plate of Mrs. Palmer's toast and excellent buns. Anne and I both heartily agreed that if time might halt we should have liked every day to be that same day, the gilt clock chiming ten o'clock, warming our stockinged feet on the fire fender, splitting a plate of Fat Rascals with butter and preserves, with all the delightful day stretching before us.

The Outer Cape is famous for a dazzling quality of light that is like no other place on Earth. Some of the magic has to do with the land being surrounded by water, but it’s also because that far north of the equator, the sunlight enters the atmosphere at a low angle. Both factors combine to leave everything it bathes both softer and more defined. For centuries writers, poets, and fine artists have been trying to capture its essence. Some have succeeded, but most have only sketched its truth. That’s no reflection of their talent, because no matter how beautiful the words or stunning the painting, Provincetown’s light has to be experienced. The light is one thing, but there is also the way everything smells. Those people lucky enough to have experienced the Cape at its best—and most would agree it’s sometime in the late days of summer when everything has finally been toasted by the sun—know that simply walking on the beach through the tall seagrass and rose hip bushes to the ocean, the air redolent with life, is almost as good as it gets. If in that moment someone was asked to choose between being able to see or smell, they would linger over their decision, realizing the temptation to forsake sight for even one breath of Cape Cod in August. Those aromas are as lush as any rain forest, as sweet as any rose garden, as distinct as any memory the body holds. Anyone who spent a week in summer camp on the Cape can be transported back to that spare cabin in the woods with a single waft of a pine forest on a rainy day. Winter alters the Cape, but it doesn’t entirely rob it of magic. Gone are the soft, warm scents of suntan oil and sand, replaced by a crisp, almost cruel cold. And while the seagrass and rose hips bend toward the ground and seagulls turn their backs to a bitter wind, the pine trees thrive through the long, dark months of winter, remaining tall over the hibernation at their feet. While their sap may drain into the roots and soil until the first warmth of spring, their needles remain fragrant through the coldest month, the harshest storm. And on any particular winter day on the Outer Cape, if one is blessed enough to take a walk in the woods on a clear, cold, windless day, they will realize the air and ocean and trees all talk the same language and declare We are alive. Even in the depths of winter: we are alive. It

Would the pair of you like to turn your backs so you exclude us more effectively?” Jode asks. “We’re just adding to the list.” I hold up my journal. “Daryn.” Gideon shakes his head, pretending to be disappointed. “It’s our list.” “A list?” Jode leans back, resting his head against his bag. “What’s this list about?” Rather than explain it, I just lean over and give it to him. Gideon puts his hand over his heart and winces. “I hate sharing, Martin.” I lean up, whispering in his ear. “Some things are only for you.” He gives me a long unblinking look that makes my face burn and my body feel light and hot. “This is an outrage,” Jode says dryly. “I’m in here once and Gideon is here … two, three, four times?” “Three,” I say. “The last one doesn’t really count.” “Oh, it counts,” Gideon says. “How many times am I in it?” Marcus asks. “Are you guys making this a competition?” “Of course.” “Yeah.” “Definitely. And I’m dominating.” “For real,” Marcus says. “How many times am I on there?” “Once, like me. For your winning smile.” Jode closes the notebook and tosses it to Marcus. “But don’t let it go to your head. Gideon’s arse has a spot on the list as well.” Gideon looks at me and winks. “Like I said, dominating.” “Dare, you got a pen?” Marcus asks. This catches me by surprise for a moment. “Yes.” I toss it to him, smiling. This is perfect. Whatever he adds, it’s already perfect. As Marcus writes, Jode leans back and gazes up at the trees. “You’re thinking it’ll be five for you after this. Aren’t you, Gideon?” “You know me well, Ellis.” Marcus finishes writing. He sets the pen in the fold and hands the journal to Gideon. I lean in and read. Marcus’s handwriting is elegant cursive—almost astonishingly elegant. And what he wrote is, as expected, perfection. Even better is that Gideon reads it aloud. “‘Twenty-eight. The family you make.’” He looks at Marcus. “Damn right, bro. This is the best one here.” He looks at me. “Tied with fourteen.” “Ah, yes,” Jode says. “Gideon’s Super Lips.” Marcus shakes his head at me. “Why?” “It was a mistake. I wrote it before the list went public. What’s your addition, Jode? It can be anything. Anything that has significance to you.” “Full English breakfast,” he says, without missing a beat. “Bacon, eggs, sausages, baked beans, grilled tomato, mushrooms, toast, marmalade. With tea, of course. One of life’s undeniable pleasures.” My mouth instantly waters. “Well, it’s no trail mix, but all right.” I add “English Breakfast” to the list.

I made a long speech in bad French in which I admitted that I was no critic, that I was always passionate and prejudiced, that I had no reverence for anything except what I liked. I told them that I was an ignoramus, which they tried to deny vigorously. I saidl would rather tell them stories. I began—about a bum who had tried to hit me up for a dime one evening as I was walking towards the Brooklyn Bridge. I explained how I had said No to the man automatically and then, after I had walked a few yards it suddenly came to me that a man had asked me for something and I ran back and spoke to him. But instead of giving him a dime or a quarter, which I could easily have done, I told him that I was broke, that I had wanted to let him know that, that was all. And the man had said to me—"do you mean that, buddy? Why, if that's the way it is, I'll be glad to give you a dime myself." And I let him give it to me, and I thanked him warmly, and walked off. They thought it a very interesting story. So that's how it was in America? Strange country ... anything could happen there. "Yes," I said, "a very strange country," and I thought to myself that it was wonderful not to be there any more and God willing I'd never return to it. "And what is it about Greece that makes you like it so much?" asked someone. I smiled. "The light and the poverty," I said. "You're a romantic," said the man. "Yes," I said, "I'm crazy enough to believe that the happiest man on earth is the man with the fewest needs. And I also believe that if you have light, such as you have here, all ugliness is obliterated. Since I've come to your country I know that light is holy: Greece is a holy land to me." "But have you seen how poor the people are, how wretchedly they live?" "I've seen worse wretchedness in America," I said. "Poverty alone doesn't make people wretched." "You can say that because you have sufficient …." "I can say it because I've been poor all my life," I retorted. "I'm poor now," I added. "I have just'enough to get back to Athens. When I get to Athens I'll have to think how to get more. It isn't money that sustains me—it's the faith I have in myself, in my own powers. In spirit I am a millionaire—maybe that's the best thing about America, that you believe you'll rise again." "Yes, yes," said Tsoutsou, clapping his hands, "that's the wonderful thing about America: you don't know what defeat is." He filled the glasses again and rose to make a toast "To America!" he said, "long may it live!" "To Henry Miller!" said another, "because he believes in himself.

We danced to John Michael Montgomery’s “I Swear.” We cut the seven-tiered cake, electing not to take the smear-it-on-our-faces route. We visited and laughed and toasted. We held hands and mingled. But after a while, I began to notice that I hadn’t seen any of the tuxedo-clad groomsmen--particularly Marlboro Man’s friends from college--for quite some time. “What happened to all the guys?” I asked. “Oh,” he said. “They’re down in the men’s locker room.” “Oh, really?” I asked. “Are they smoking cigars or something?” “Well…” He hesitated, grinning. “They’re watching a football game.” I laughed. “What game are they watching?” It had to be a good one. “It’s…ASU is playing Nebraska,” he answered. ASU? His alma mater? Playing Nebraska? Defending national champions? How had I missed this? Marlboro Man hadn’t said a word. He was such a rabid college football fan, I couldn’t believe such a monumental game hadn’t been cause to reschedule the wedding date. Aside from ranching, football had always been Marlboro Man’s primary interest in life. He’d played in high school and part of college. He watched every televised ASU game religiously--for the nontelevised games, he relied on live reporting from Tony, his best friend, who attended every game in person. “I didn’t even know they were playing!” I said. I don’t know why I shouldn’t have known. It was September, after all. But it just hadn’t crossed my mind. I’d been a little on the busy side, I guess, getting ready to change my entire life and all. “How come you’re not down there watching it?” I asked. “I didn’t want to leave you,” he said. “You might get hit on.” He chuckled his sweet, sexy chuckle. I laughed. I could just see it--a drunk old guest scooting down the bar, eyeing my poufy white dress and spouting off pickup lines: You live around here? I sure like what you’re wearing… So…you married? Marlboro Man wasn’t in any immediate danger. Of that I was absolutely certain. “Go watch the game!” I insisted, motioning downstairs. “Nah,” he said. “I don’t need to.” He wanted to watch the game so badly I could see it in the air. “No, seriously!” I said. “I need to go hang with the girls anyway. Go. Now.” I turned my back and walked away, refusing even to look back. I wanted to make it easy on him. I wouldn’t see him for over an hour. Poor Marlboro Man. Unsure of the protocol for grooms watching college football during their wedding receptions, he’d darted in and out of the locker room for the entire first half. The agony he must have felt. The deep, sustained agony. I was so glad he’d finally joined the guys.

You break her heart, and you’ll have to deal with me and her three brothers, and if you survive that, Her Grace will ensure your social ruin unto the nineteenth generation. I remind you, all of my boys are crack shots and more than competent with a sword.” “It is not my intention to break her heart.” “Oh, it’s never our intention.” His Grace’s brows drew down in thought, and he was once again the affable paterfamilias. “Maggie is different. I hope that’s from being the oldest daughter, but her unfortunate origins are too obvious a factor to be dismissed. She’s in want of… dreams, I think. My other girls have dreams. Sophie dreamed of her own family, Jenny loves to paint, Louisa has her literary scribbling, and Evie must racket about the property as her brothers used to, but Maggie has never been a dreamer. Not about her first pony nor her first waltz nor her first… beau.” Nor her first lover. The words hung unspoken in the air while the fire crackled and hissed and a log fell amid a shower of sparks. It wasn’t what Ben would have expected any papa to say of his daughter, but then, marrying into a family meant details like this would be shared—Esther Windham misplaced her everyday jewels, and Percy thought his daughters should be entitled to dream. In a different way, it felt as if Ben were still lurking in doorways and climbing through windows, but this window was called marriage, and Maggie was trying to lock it shut with Ben on the outside. “I’m not sure Maggie wants to marry me.” It was as close as he’d come to touching on the circumstances of the betrothal. His Grace regarded him for a long moment. “I’m her papa, but I was a young man once, Hazelton. Maggie is only a bit younger than Devlin and a few months older than Bart would have been. When I married, I had no idea either of my two oldest progeny existed. I’d no sooner started filling my nursery when—before my heir was out of dresses—both women came forward, hurling accusations and threats. If my marriage can survive that onslaught, surely you can overcome a little stubbornness in my daughter?” It was, again, an insight into the Windham family Ben gained only because he was engaged to marry Maggie. Such confidences prompted a rare inclination toward direct speech. “I think Maggie’s dream is to be left alone. If she jilts me, she’ll have one more excuse to retire from life, to hide and tell herself she’s content.” “Content.” His Grace spat the word. “Bother content. Content is milk toast and pap when life is supposed to be a banquet. Make Maggie’s dreams come true, young Hazelton, and show her contentment is shoddy goods compared to happiness.” “You make it sound simple.” “We’re speaking of women and that particular subspecies of the genre referred to as wives. It is simple—devote yourself to her happiness, and you will be rewarded tenfold. I do not, however, say the undertaking will ever be easy.

I put my hand on his forearm, I don't know why I do this, and it's not exactly natural, although it's not unnatural, except that I really want to touch his skin. It's smooth and tan just a little bit and feels like summer, like something familiar and warm and good, like my skin did on the first days aboard 'Fishful Thinking' before it salted and burned and peeled. 'We broke up three years after that.' I sit back in my chair and give a sly smile. Relationships are complex and sometimes you can't really explain them to an outside party. 'I can't believe I just told you that' 'YES! YOU! ARE! LIVING! YOUR! FULL! LIFE!' A third time. I am not imagining it. 'There you are.' This time my heart does skip a beat. I look down at his arm, and we are still touching, and he has made no attempt to retract his arm or retreat. All my surroundings, the red formica table top, the pink yogurt, the blue sky, the green vegetables in the market, they all come alive in vibrant technicolor as the sun peers from behind a cloud. I am living my full life. 'Honesty in all things,' Byron adds, lifting his cup of yogurt for a toast of sorts. I pull my hand away from him and the instant my hand is back by his side, I miss the warmth of his arm, the warmth of him. Honesty in all things. I should put my hand back, that's where it wants to be, that's Lily's lesson to me. Be present in the moment, give spontaneous affection. I'm suddenly aware I haven't spoken in a bit. 'Did you know that an octopus has three hearts?' As soon as it comes out of my mouth, I realize I sound like that kid from 'Jerry McGuire.' 'Did you know the human head weighs eight pounds?' I hope my question comes off almost a fraction as endearing. 'No,' Byron says with a glint in his eye that reads as curiosity, at least I hope that it does, but even if it doesn't I'm too into the inertia of the trivia to stop it. 'It's true, one heart called the systemic heart that functions much like the left side of the human heart, distributing blood throughout the heart, then two smaller branchial heart with gills that act like the right side of our hearts to pump the blood back.' 'What made you think of that?' I smile. It may be entirely inappropriate first date conversation, but at least it doesn't bore me in the telling. I look up at the winsome August sky, marred only by the contrails of a passing jet, and a vaguely dachshund shaped cloud above the horizon. I don't believe in fate. I don't believe in love at first site. I don't believe in angels. I don't believe in heaven and that our loved ones are looking down on us, but the sun is so warm and the breeze is so cool and the company is so perfect and the whole afternoon so intoxicating, ti's hard not to hear Lily's voice dancing in the gentle wind, 'one! month! is Long! Enough TO! BE! SAD!' ... 'I recently lost someone close to me....I don't know, I feel her here today with us, you, me, her, three hearts, like an octopus,' I shrug. If I were him, I would run. What a ridiculously creepy thing to say. I would run and I would not stop until I was home in my bed with a gallon of ice cream deleting my profile from every dating site I belonged to. Maybe it's because it's not rehearsed, maybe it's because it's as weird a thing to say as it is genuine, maybe it's because this is finally the man for me. Byron stands and offers me his hand, 'Let's take a walk and you can tell me about her.' The gentle untying of a shoe lace. It takes me a minute to decide if I can do this, and I decide that I can, and I throw our yogurt dishes away, and I put my hand in his, and it's soft and warm, and instead of awkward fumbling, our hands clasp together like magnets and metal, like we've been hand-in-hand all along, and we are touching again. ...

The traditional hospital practice of excluding parents ignored the importance of attachment relationships as regulators of the child’s emotions, behaviour and physiology. The child’s biological status would be vastly different under the circumstances of parental presence or absence. Her neurochemical output, the electrical activity in her brain’s emotional centres, her heart rate, blood pressure and the serum levels of the various hormones related to stress would all vary significantly. Life is possible only within certain well-defined limits, internal or external. We can no more survive, say, high sugar levels in our bloodstream than we can withstand high levels of radiation emanating from a nuclear explosion. The role of self-regulation, whether emotional or physical, may be likened to that of a thermostat ensuring that the temperature in a home remains constant despite the extremes of weather conditions outside. When the environment becomes too cold, the heating system is switched on. If the air becomes overheated, the air conditioner begins to work. In the animal kingdom, self-regulation is illustrated by the capacity of the warm-blooded creature to exist in a broad range of environments. It can survive more extreme variations of hot and cold without either chilling or overheating than can a coldblooded species. The latter is restricted to a much narrower range of habitats because it does not have the capacity to self-regulate the internal environment. Children and infant animals have virtually no capacity for biological self-regulation; their internal biological states—heart rates, hormone levels, nervous system activity — depend completely on their relationships with caregiving grown-ups. Emotions such as love, fear or anger serve the needs of protecting the self while maintaining essential relationships with parents and other caregivers. Psychological stress is whatever threatens the young creature’s perception of a safe relationship with the adults, because any disruption in the relationship will cause turbulence in the internal milieu. Emotional and social relationships remain important biological influences beyond childhood. “Independent self-regulation may not exist even in adulthood,” Dr. Myron Hofer, then of the Departments of Psychiatry and Neuroscience at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, wrote in 1984. “Social interactions may continue to play an important role in the everyday regulation of internal biologic systems throughout life.” Our biological response to environmental challenge is profoundly influenced by the context and by the set of relationships that connect us with other human beings. As one prominent researcher has expressed it most aptly, “Adaptation does not occur wholly within the individual.” Human beings as a species did not evolve as solitary creatures but as social animals whose survival was contingent on powerful emotional connections with family and tribe. Social and emotional connections are an integral part of our neurological and chemical makeup. We all know this from the daily experience of dramatic physiological shifts in our bodies as we interact with others. “You’ve burnt the toast again,” evokes markedly different bodily responses from us, depending on whether it is shouted in anger or said with a smile. When one considers our evolutionary history and the scientific evidence at hand, it is absurd even to imagine that health and disease could ever be understood in isolation from our psychoemotional networks. “The basic premise is that, like other social animals, human physiologic homeostasis and ultimate health status are influenced not only by the physical environment but also by the social environment.” From such a biopsychosocial perspective, individual biology, psychological functioning and interpersonal and social relationships work together, each influencing the other.

AUNT CAROL’S CRUNCHY SALAD Salad         2 tablespoons butter         1 package ramen noodles (like the $.13 package)         ½ cup or so of chopped almonds         Handful of sunflower seeds         4 to 6 cups sturdy lettuce (I like romaine)         2 cups or so of chopped broccoli         Some chopped green onions         You can add any crunchy thing: carrots, radishes, snap peas, cabbage Melt the butter in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add the uncooked ramen noodles (break them all up), almonds, and sunflower seeds, and saute until toasted light brown. Maybe 3 to 4 minutes. Let cool. Pour the dressing (recipe below) into the bottom of your salad bowl. Add the lettuce, broccoli, green onions, and toasted crunch mix. Toss when ready to serve. Vinaigrette         4 tablespoons brown sugar         1 teaspoon salt         6 tablespoons rice wine vinegar         2 to 3 drops Tabasco         ½ cup oil (olive, sunflower, walnut, whatever oil you like. Aunt Carol uses canola oil, so no need to get trendy) Mix all the vinaigrette ingredients with a whisk (or just shake this all together in a mason jar if you want to control the quantity or make extra). This is so good. Cannot deal. Add chicken or shrimp, and it is a whole meal. This is a doldrum fixer. I’m so

I am Sebastiano, and your name?” he asks. “Violet,” I say as we step over the threshold. “Violetta!” he says, throwing his arms wide. “English girl, Italian name!” And across the room, I see a dark head turn in our direction. That much taller than the rest of the boys, he stands out, his straight black silky hair falling over his face, his blue eyes as bright and cold as the water of the fjord next to my grandmother’s summer rental cottage. I was looking for him before and couldn’t see him anywhere; now that I’ve been distracted by dancing and a Chianti-drinking donkey, he’s spotted me. His gaze flicks like a knife between me and the boy, who’s at the gigantic wine bottle now, filling cups and handing me one. “Salute!” Sebastiano says, touching his cup to mine, and I glance up at Luca, seeing that he’s taking this in, too. A rush of confusion fills me as I toast. I’m glad that Luca’s seen me with someone else, that I haven’t been a wallflower at this party, that I’ve proved him wrong, even a little bit, because there’s a boy here who seems to like me, who’s talking to me, anyway, getting me a drink. In films, in books, flirting with a boy is a surefire way to get the one you actually like interested in you, draw him over to your side. They’re supposed to like competition, the challenge of going after a girl who’s popular. But maybe real life doesn’t quite work that way. Because Luca arches one black eyebrow, his mouth quirks up on one side in a sneer, and he turns pointedly away sliding a cigarette into his mouth, and lighting it with a flip of his Zippo. Disgusting habit, I think as firmly as I can. I’m glad he’s not coming over, smoking a nasty stinking cancer stick. It’s awful when you lie to yourself. I do think smoking is foul, but I’m also more than aware that if Luca strolled over to talk to me, with that cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, I wouldn’t walk away, complaining about the smoke; I’d stand there staring up at him, trying not to grin as widely as a five-year-old meeting Cinderella at Disneyland.

For the past three months I've been lodged in the staring-out-the-window-and burning-toast stage of grief. According to Dr. Rupert, I had a depressive breakdown brought on by grief...as though showing up at the office in your bathrobe is perfectly understandable. I'm not afraid of dying. I'm afraid of everyone else dying and leaving me behind. You don't feel as though you're having a conversation, ore as though you're listening to a book on tape, the title "Steve the Sales Guy Goes on a Dinner Date". Isn't there some way around having to start this new life without my husband? I can't return Crystal as though she's an appliance that broke before the warranty expired. I'm significant otherless. By the time he calls, maybe I'll be a ndw person with self-confidence and cute comebacks. Straight hair, a better job, a smaller waistline. How could I have managed to lose my husband, my job, my house, and my ass all in one year? I'm so eager for intimacy, I would date a tree. It's a myth that people experience grief for a certain amount of time and then they're over it. Nine of the fifteen pounds I want to lose cling to me like an overprotective mother who doesn't want me to take my pants off until I'm married again. Good-riddance list. It's a list of all the stuff you don't like about a guy. You're supposed to make it when you break up with someone. It's funny how you don't have to be related to someone to love them like family. Dangerous rebound guy. My grief is diminished, but it feels permanent, like a scar. Another grief gold star. Marion & Crystal moved in with me. How can I live happily ever after without loving someone again?

out and started again? Well, she hated cold tea, so she tipped it onto the grass, holding her breath. No complaint, so she began again. ‘Milk?’ Hannah studied him from under her hair. ‘Yes, please, just a small amount. Lapsang is a very delicate tea and too much milk kills the flavour.’ ‘I’ll need lots of milk then.’ Balancing the cup, saucer and spoon carefully, she offered it. ‘Thank you, Miss Hollis.’ ‘Hannah.’ She poured her own tea, wondering if it would taste like the ashtray it smelled like. With cup only in hand, she leaned against the back of the wooden chair then threw a leg over the side arm. ‘So, Miss Hollis, what brings you to Cornwall?’ ‘Call me Hannah. Miss Hollis makes me sound like some old school marm.’ ‘Is that a problem? Most old school marms, as you call them, of my acquaintance are delightful people.’ ‘Sure, but boring I bet.’ ‘Not at all.’ ‘Right. Not to you, maybe.’ Hannah braved a sip and winced. ‘Back to the question: what has brought you to Cornwall?’ ‘Bloody bad luck,’ she said, frowning at her tea. ‘No need to swear,’ he said. ‘I didn’t swear.’ ‘You did,’ he said. ‘What? Are you talking about bloody?’ she asked. ‘Yes. It is a curse.’ ‘No,’ she said. ‘Yes.’ ‘Well, maybe in the dark ages it was, but it isn’t now.’ She began to wonder if she’d walked through a time machine when she’d come through the gate earlier. It was a nice one, though. The orchard was beautifully laid out and the table and chairs were a lovely weathered blue. ‘Who advised you of this?’ he asked. Hannah sat up and put her empty cup on the table, not quite sure when she had drunk it. ‘Look, it’s a word that’s used every day.’ ‘Yes, but does that change its meaning?’ he asked. ‘No, but no one takes it like that any more.’ ‘Who is no one?’ he asked. ‘I mean no one who hasn’t lived in the dark ages.’ She looked at his wrinkled skin and tried to guess his age. ‘You mean anyone over the age of, say, sixty?’ he suggested. ‘Yeah, sort of.’ ‘Well, as I fit that category, could you refrain from using it?’ ‘Yeah, I guess. If it bothers you that much.’ ‘Thank you. Would you be kind enough to pour more tea?’ Old Tom leaned back into his chair. The sun wasn’t coming through the east window when Maddie opened her eyes for the second time that day; instead, she found Mark standing at the end of the bed with a tray. She blinked. When she last peered at the bedside clock, it had been eight a.m. and she’d thought that if she slept for another hour, she would begin to feel human. What a wasted day. What had Hannah been up to? Had she come into the room and seen her like this? Well, it was a lesson in what not to do in life. The end of last night, no, this morning, was more than fuzzy; in fact, she didn’t remember coming up to her room. The last clear memory was saying goodbye to Tamsin and Anthony. She and Mark had gone back into the kitchen and had another glass of wine or two. ‘Good evening,’ he said. ‘It’s not that late?’ ‘Almost time for a drink.’ He smiled. She winced. ‘Oh, don’t.’ ‘Would a bit of tea and toast help?’ ‘It might.’ Maddie eased herself onto her elbows and then slipped back down again. She was only wearing knickers. Mark’s eyes widened. ‘Could you hand me that shirt on the end of the bed?’ she asked. ‘Certainly.’ She wrestled with it under the duvet. ‘Sorry. I couldn’t find your pyjamas last night.’ ‘What?’ Maddie

I can’t breathe. I’m 97% sure that my nerve endings are literally on fire, and true to his promise, walking today, or the days in the near future, will be a challenge. God bless him. “God, Sarah.” If I could move right now, I’d open my eyes and look down at him, but I can’t. He’s still inside me, his body also still quivering. I didn’t think it was possible, but this round might be better than any of the previous six. Six. Rounds. Of sex. In one twelve-hour period. I collapse on his chest, bury my face in his neck, try to regain use of my extremities, and purr when he wraps his arms around my back and hugs me close. His arms make me want to bite him. In the best sexual way possible. I don’t know what he does to keep them so…awesome, but dear sweet Moses, am I thankful. “I’ll make you breakfast,” he murmurs against my neck, sending a fresh round of goose bumps over my skin. “Okay. I’ll get off of you in about a month.” He chuckles and slaps my ass, and then before I know it, I’m flat on my back and he’s leaning over me, smiling down at me with those amazing green eyes of his. “How can you move?” “Quick recovery,” he says and kisses my nose. “You stay here and collect yourself and I’ll go cook.” “Cook what?” I ask. “There’s nothing in your fridge.” “The bagel place delivers.” He winks, places a smacking kiss on my lips, then jumps up and saunters out of the bedroom. Naked. Holy shit. I cover my face with my hands and can’t help but smile. What a night! Adam didn’t wait until this morning to have his way with me again. No, that happened sometime around 2:00 a.m. It seems that man can’t keep his hands off of me, and that doesn’t hurt my feelings in the least. I was so right. One night with Adam Spencer was unforgettable and a giant boost to my ego. I giggle and sit up, sighing when my muscles complain. Good lord, muscles I didn’t even know existed are protesting after the night of exhausting sex I just had. I had sex. A lot. With the hottest man ever. I giggle once more and stand, groaning now at the uncomfortable pull of my inner thigh muscles, and walk into his bathroom to clean up. The shower is quick, and before I know it, I’m in his kitchen, wearing last night’s clothes, kind of excited about the walk of shame I’ll do when he drops me off. “I like that smile,” Adam says as he walks into the kitchen holding a brown bag that was just delivered. “You put it there,” I reply with a wink. “You put on shorts.” He raises a brow. “I can take them back off.” “No.” I shake my head and laugh as Adam opens the bag of food. He smirks and passes me a bagel, already toasted with cream cheese. “How do you feel?” “Sore.” I lick cream cheese off my thumb and grin at the sexy man taking a bite of his breakfast. “Well sexed.” “Mission accomplished then.” He reaches over the island and drags his thumb down my cheek. He kisses my forehead, then pulls away. “Thank you.” “For?” “Dinner. Breakfast.” The most amazing sex of my entire life. “You’re welcome.

I hugged Wes and inhaled the scent of his neck- a reassuringly familiar combination of coffee and leather and something sweet I always had trouble putting my finger on. What was it? Butter from his morning toast? A package of chocolates left over some hotel stay? Maybe a hint of the honey he liked to drizzle on apples. I smiled, allowing myself a moment to believe in the possibility of a shared life full of sweet things.

Sirius took a breath, and then tapped his spoon on his wine glass. The reception was quiet as they all looked to him. All eyes were on him now. It was time for the Best Man to make his own vow. He had to support them. He had to smile for them. They were happy. And he knew that James would be happy for him if their roles were switched. James was looking right at him, and so was Lily. They wanted him to rise and talk. And so he did, holding his glass in his hands. "Well," Sirius said, his voice echoing through the now silent Leaky Cauldron. They were all staring at him, "I'm supposed to make a speech, being the Best Man and all . . . but I'm really not one for speeches. That was always James's department. . ." There was a small laugh through the crowd. "When I first met you, Evans," Sirius said, as the room went quiet again, "I swore that you were wrong for James. And yes, I was jealous. And yes, I acted like an idiot. But I know James, and now I know you, and I know that you both were made for each other." Lily smiled warmly at him, and Sirius cleared his throat and continued. "Who would have thought I would be sitting here, making a toast to that four eyed freak that came running into my compartment that first day of school?" he said, "I know I wouldn't have guessed it. But I'm glad that I can see you on the happiest day of your life. I'm glad I was a part of it." He raised his glass to James, and got that mischievous smile again, "You were right, mate. It is like a fairy tale. And we all know what happens at the end of fairy tales. All evil's conquered, everything's set right, and Prince Charming and his girl go riding off in the distance happily ever after. So don't be scared, James. Because you two were written out to live happily ever after. I see the real thing in you two. Something that none of us here in this room is ever going to have for ourselves. You really do love each other." James took Lily's hand, and smiled down on his best friend. Sirius smiled back, and then turned to the crowd, his glass still raised, "So, here's a toast to true love, mates. Here's a toast to my brother," he turned, and looked to Lily, "And my sister." "Here, here!" the audience roared, clashing their glasses together, and Lily looked to Sirius, in an expression that she had never given him. Not one of loathing, or disgust or annoyance. . . but of surprise. Sirius grinned, and raised his glass to her again with a nod. She returned the nod, her smile rising again, and then Sirius took his seat. "Touching," Remus said. "Don't push it, wolf," Sirius growled as he went back to playing with his food. Lily was still staring at him from where she was sitting. He could feel her eyes on him, trying to get him to look at her again. But he wouldn't let himself. He had said what he had said, and there was nothing else about it.

Sirius took a breath, and then tapped his spoon on his wine glass. The reception was quiet as they all looked to him. All eyes were on him now. It was time for the Best Man to make his own vow. He had to support them. He had to smile for them. They were happy. And he knew that James would be happy for him if their roles were switched. James was looking right at him, and so was Lily. They wanted him to rise and talk. And so he did, holding his glass in his hands. "Well," Sirius said, his voice echoing through the now silent Leaky Cauldron. They were all staring at him, "I'm supposed to make a speech, being the Best Man and all . . . but I'm really not one for speeches. That was always James's department. . ." There was a small laugh through the crowd. When I first met you, Evans," Sirius said, as the room went quiet again, "I swore that you were wrong for James. And yes, I was jealous. And yes, I acted like an idiot. But I know James, and now I know you, and I know that you both were made for each other." Lily smiled warmly at him, and Sirius cleared his throat and continued. "Who would have thought I would be sitting here, making a toast to that four eyed freak that came running into my compartment that first day of school?" he said, "I know I wouldn't have guessed it. But I'm glad that I can see you on the happiest day of your life. I'm glad I was a part of it." He raised his glass to James, and got that mischievous smile again, "You were right, mate. It is like a fairy tale. And we all know what happens at the end of fairy tales. All evil's conquered, everything's set right, and Prince Charming and his girl go riding off in the distance happily ever after. So don't be scared, James. Because you two were written out to live happily ever after. I see the real thing in you two. Something that none of us here in this room is ever going to have for ourselves. You really do love each other." James took Lily's hand, and smiled down on his best friend. Sirius smiled back, and then turned to the crowd, his glass still raised, "So, here's a toast to true love, mates. Here's a toast to my brother," he turned, and looked to Lily, "And my sister." "Here, here!" the audience roared, clashing their glasses together, and Lily looked to Sirius, in an expression that she had never given him. Not one of loathing, or disgust or annoyance. . . but of surprise. Sirius grinned, and raised his glass to her again with a nod. She returned the nod, her smile rising again, and then Sirius took his seat. "Touching," Remus said. "Don't push it, wolf," Sirius growled as he went back to playing with his food. Lily was still staring at him from where she was sitting. He could feel her eyes on him, trying to get him to look at her again. But he wouldn't let himself. He had said what he had said, and there was nothing else about it.

She takes a cautious approach to toasting bread. She does it by degrees, nervous of burning it. But the trouble is, by popping it up and down five times to check on its progress, she provides herself with plenty of opportunities to forget about the toast entirely and burn it to a crisp. Her cautious approach to toasting, I fancy, actually has the unintended consequence of making it more likely she'll burn her breakfast. Is there a life lesson in this, I wonder?

Tea is the soothing potion that turns "calm down" into "chai down." It's like a warm hug in a cup, a liquid oasis in a world of chaos. Sip by sip, it transforms stress into serenity, worry into wonder. With its aromatic steam rising, it whispers, "Relax, rejuvenate, and refill your cup of sanity." So, let's raise our mugs and toast to tea—the humble hero of hydration, the aromatic ally of afternoon delight.

favorite recipe is Carrie Brown’s Fig and Olive Tapenade, which she serves up at the Jimtown Store in Healdsburg, California. Her recipe uses dried figs, which means less pitting and cuts the saltiness of the tapenade. I like tapenade with pita bread points that have been brushed with spiced oil, then toasted until crisp (This Page). Ice-cold rosé or vin d’orange are lovely accompaniments, too. ½ cup (85 g) stemmed and quartered dried Black Mission figs 1 cup (250 ml) water 1 cup (170 g) black olives, rinsed and pitted 1 garlic clove,

I’m looking at flour like you would a carton of milk or a bag of peaches. Because it’s a fresh product. It’s alive.” “Versus everyone else?” I asked. “Everyone else pursues shelf life. Most flour preservation is done by toasting it slightly—it’s called kilning—and what you’re doing is drying out the grain further so there’s absolutely no moisture. That’s what we eat. Wheat picked long past ripeness, then broken apart, and then mummified. Mills are abattoirs for wheat.

Wisdom is gained like grain for bread, I think as I butter my toast. I’d better butter both sides, just in case I drop it it’s sure to land butter side up. Ah, but that’s life, no?

Let’s get this over with,” Walt blustered to Noah. “They’re setting up some mighty fine-looking food back at the house and those Riordans are circling like starving dogs. I’d like to get back there while they’re still sober enough to make the toasts.” Noah looked at his watch yet again. “Let’s give Ellie another minute—she’s helping with the music tonight. Tomorrow is a no-brainer, she can just start the CD and—” “You sure she’s coming, Noah?” Walt asked. “I saw her wrangling a couple of big suitcases down the stairs…” “You saw her what?” “When we were driving into town, past the Fitch house. She was on the stairs with a big suitcase—one still on top, one already sitting behind her car. I thought maybe she was…” “Oh, God, no,” Noah said. “George, handle this for a few minutes. Lucy, stay!” And then he bolted out the side door and ran down the street like the seat of his pants was on fire. Or like he might be losing the love of his life. When

Among these have been an unhealthy number of near-death moments, many of which I look back on now and wince. But I guess our training in life never really ends--and experience is always the best tutor of all. Then there are the most bizarre: like jet-skiing around Britain in aid of the UK lifeboats. Day after day, hour after hour, pounding the seas like little ants battling around the wild coast of Scotland and Irish Sea. (I developed a weird bulging muscle in my forearm that popped out and has stayed with me ever since after that one!) Or hosting the highest open-air dinner party, suspended under a high-altitude hot-air balloon, in support of the Duke of Edinburgh’s kids awards scheme. That mission also became a little hairy, rappelling down to this tiny metal table suspended fifty feet underneath the basket in minus forty degrees, some twenty-five thousand feet over the UK. Dressed in full naval mess kit, as required by the Guinness Book of World Records--along with having to eat three courses and toast the Queen, and breathing from small supplementary oxygen canisters--we almost tipped the table over in the early dawn, stratosphere dark. Everything froze, of course, but finally we achieved the mission and skydived off to earth--followed by plates of potatoes and duck à l-orange falling at terminal velocity. Or the time Charlie Mackesy and I rowed the Thames naked in a bathtub to raise funds for a friend’s new prosthetic legs. The list goes on and on, and I am proud to say, it continues. But I will tell all those stories properly some other place, some other time. They vary from the tough to the ridiculous, the dangerous to the embarrassing. But in this book I wanted to show my roots: the early, bigger missions that shaped me, and the even earlier, smaller moments that steered me.

I thought of my favourite saying, the one that I tell myself when things get very, very dark – which, in my dramatic and somewhat chequered life, they have frequently done! I call it the Toast of the Unrepentant Cowgirl. I came up with it while sitting on a gravestone, back in California, after a very bad day. It’s best accompanied by a shot of straight tequila, and it goes something like this: ‘One day, the world will knock me down and I will not get up again. But that day is not today you sons-a-bitches. Not today!

Rita turned around at the stove and smiled. “Dexter,” she said. “There’s coffee. Would you like some breakfast?” “More than life itself,” I said, and seconds later I was staring down at a steaming mug of coffee and a stack of Rita’s French toast. I don’t know what she puts into it, but it tastes better than any other I’ve ever had, and after four pieces of the French toast, a slice of perfect, ripe cantaloupe, and three crisp strips of bacon, I pushed back from the table and poured a second cup of coffee, feeling like there might be some point to this short and painful existence after all.

The second round of toast popped up behind David. He said, "I don't know what destiny feels like, but if this is it, I don't like it. I want to un-destiny this place from my life.

Slowly, as though touching it might destroy the image, he reached up and put trembling fingers to her forehead . . . her cheek . . . her nose . . . her lips.  The image did not go away.  It did not waver.  And as he stared in wonder and a sort of frozen disbelief, he saw the shyness and joy in the face that stared back at him. A face that he was, after two long months, seeing for the very first time. He saw a square jaw and high, prominent cheekbones that lent her a look of gauntness and strength; dark, velvety-brown eyes fringed by long black lashes; a shy and smiling mouth; full, dusky lips; and glossy hair the color of strong coffee, tightly braided and pinned in a coronet around her head.  She was beautiful, even if not in the conventional sense, striking, slightly exotic, with flawlessly smooth skin of a slightly bronzed tone, not unlike that of a sailor who's spent his life in the sun. It was a lovely color. A warm, toasted, caramel-color that made him want to put his lips to it and kiss her all over. "Amy," he repeated, in a disbelieving whisper.  "I can see you."  He swallowed hard, and traced the shape of her mouth with his fingers.  "I can see you." And he could also see something else.  Mist in those huge, soft eyes — and a sort of awkwardness, if not fear, about his first visual impression of her. "And just what is it you see, Charles?" "I see a beautiful young woman — " he grinned — "garbed in the most singularly hideous gown imaginable." "Oh, Charles," she cried, impulsively flinging her arms around him.  He embraced her in turn.  They remained like that, holding each other, both of them laughing and rejoicing and rocking back and forth in the straw. "It was that damned horse!" he managed, setting her back to gaze into her rapt, mobile face.  "The blow must've done something, must've jarred something loose inside my head.  Don't you think?" "Either that, or your sight was just plain destined to return anyhow.  Maybe God simply decided that the time had come for you to have it back again." "So that I could see you!" "So you could write your own letters!" "So I could find my way without a cane!" Laughing with joy, he hugged her once more, then set her back, trailing his finger down her cheek, the edge of her jaw.  Gently, he tipped her chin up so that her luminous gaze held his.  "And look into the eyes of the woman who has become my dearest and very best friend." And look he did; then, before he even knew what he was about, he closed his eyes and kissed her. Unlike

She always had a big pot of oatmeal going on the stove and was happy to whip up a short stack of pancakes at the drop of a hat, but she pretty much made the rest of the plates to order. After the first week she had a good handle not only on what each man liked for his morning meal, but what he needed. Mr. Cupertino still loved the occasional inspired omelet and once she had made him Eggs Meurette, poached eggs in a red wine sauce, served with a chunk of crusty French bread, which was a big hit. She balanced him out other mornings with hot cereal, and fresh fruit with yogurt or cottage cheese. Johnny mostly went for bowls of cereal washed down with an ocean of cold milk, so Angelina kept a nice variety on hand, though nothing too sugary. The Don would happily eat a soft-boiled egg with buttered toast every day for the rest of his life, but she inevitably got him to eat a little bowl of oatmeal just before or after with his coffee. Big Phil was on the receiving end of her supersize, stick-to-your-ribs special- sometimes scrambled eggs, toast, potatoes, and bacon, other times maybe a pile of French toast and a slice of ham. Angelina decided to start loading up his plate on her own when she realized he was bashful about asking for seconds. On Sundays, she put on a big spread at ten o'clock, after they had all been to church, which variously included such items as smoked salmon and bagels, sausages, broiled tomatoes with a Parmesan crust, scrapple (the only day she'd serve it), bacon, fresh, hot biscuits and fruit muffins, or a homemade fruit strudel. She made omelets to order for Jerry and Mr. Cupertino. Then they'd all reconvene at five for the Sunday roast with all the trimmings.

Is it too late to enjoy some lunch?” “No,” he said, not looking as relieved as she’d hoped; but then, it was what it was. Both of them would have to find their way past their personal disappointment on their own. “Not at all.” He reached for the wine again as she took the rest of the containers out of the hamper and began setting out a more organized spread. “Although,” he said, easing the cork up and out as his grin flickered back to life, like a long-awaited ray of sunshine after a storm, “I don’t suppose you have anything else to wear.” She gave a little spurt of laughter at that, relieved that he wasn’t going to make it harder on either of them, and was perversely that much more turned on. His eyes widened when she grinned and held up a finger, then scrambled back aft and retrieved her canvas tote. She came back wearing the faded hoodie and ancient fishing hat. “Better?” she asked, plopping back down on the blanket and modeling her new look. His gaze skimmed over her legs, then back up to her face, his own eyes glittering now. “Not in the least.” She swallowed. Hard. When he surprised her by not looking away, her palms began to sweat. Then he shocked her speechless by reaching behind his neck, grabbing the back collar of his shirt, and pulling it over his head and off. A life spent on a cattle station had given him a deeply golden, well-muscled torso. One she’d thought about often, though, it turned out, her imagination hadn’t remotely done justice to reality. Even though she’d been on Cameroo Downs for a full year in a wide variety of different situations, this was the first time she’d ever seen him with his shirt off. He grinned for real at her dumbfounded expression, then began filling his plate as if he’d done nothing more than take off his hat. More at ease than she’d seen him since she’d arrived at the dock. “I suppose I deserve that,” she said, shaking her head in a silent touché. He just winked at her, then went back to filling his plate with another lobster roll, a few more hush puppies, and a small mound of blueberries. She laughed--what else was there to do?--then shook her head as he handed her a glass of wine. She lifted it in a toast. “To good food, good company, and a few hours of solid torture on the high seas.” Chuckling, he lifted his glass, tapped hers, then held her gaze over the rim as he took a sip. She was now intimately acquainted with his reference to aching teeth and need. You’re in so much trouble, Kerry McCrae.

Beyond the Judging Eyes” Down a dusty road where the judgments fly, Where the gossips whisper and the rumors pry, If you're lean as a rail, they'll say you're chasing a high, If you're round as a barrel, they'll tell you to diet, oh my. But I'm sick of the box, sick of the fake, We're all just folks, make no mistake. Let's sing it loud, under the wide-open sky, We're all kin in this rodeo of life, Mending fences, not just tearing 'em down, In this country song, we all wear the crown. Dress up like a star, they'll say you're too proud, Wear your workin' boots, they claim you've fallen out, Speak your heart, they'll call you a loudmouth, Keep it to yourself, you're aloof, no doubt. But I'm done with the noise, done with the scorn, We're all diamonds, rough or adorned. Let's sing it loud, under the wide-open sky, We're all kin in this rodeo of life, Mending fences, not just tearing 'em down, In this country song, we all wear the crown. Whether you're the toast of the town hall dance, Or love the quiet of a wide-open expanse, We're each a verse in life's grand old song, In the chorus together, where we all belong. Let's sing it loud, under the wide-open sky, We're all kin in this rodeo of life, Mending fences, not just tearing 'em down, In this country song, we all wear the crown. We're side by side, through the highs and the lows, Lifting each other, that's how it goes, Forget the critics, their talk's just strife, We're the best we can be, in this country life.

Even the Dreamers—lost in their great reverie—feel it, for it is Billie they reach for in sadness, and Mobb Deep is what they holler in boldness, and Isley they hum in love, and Dre they yell in revelry, and Aretha is the last sound they hear before dying. We have made something down here. We have taken the one-drop rules of Dreamers and flipped them. They made us into a race. We made ourselves into a people. Here at The Mecca, under pain of selection, we have made a home. As do black people on summer blocks marked with needles, vials, and hopscotch squares. As do black people dancing it out at rent parties, as do black people at their family reunions where we are regarded like the survivors of catastrophe. As do black people toasting their cognac and German beers, passing their blunts and debating MCs. As do all of us who have voyaged through death, to life upon these shores. That was the love power that drew Prince Jones. The power is not divinity but a deep knowledge of how fragile everything—even the Dream, especially the Dream—really is.

With five little brothers and sisters, I learned to cook at an early age. Nothing fancy, but enough to keep everyone fed.” “That makes it sound like the task fell on your shoulders a lot.” He shrugged, flipping the sizzling toast. “Dad passed away when I was seventeen. Ma had to work as much as she could. Wasn’t much choice, but it never bothered me too much. Life happens. Resentment would’ve only made things worse.

The little ones eat their meal, which at times requires us to coax, plead or threaten, spewing old chestnuts such as, ‘There will be no dessert for you, young man,’ and ‘Do you think dragons leave food on their plates?’ ‘Dragons don’t use plates.’ ‘I know they don’t use plates, I know that. I’m just saying … could you please just finish it.’ After their meal is eaten, sort of, the little ones are allowed to watch a bit of television. Dragons for him, Peppa Pig for her. (There is no question that my wife and I, along with many parents, wish the creators of that irritating animated swine a slow death, but they are so rich they have probably purchased immortality. And yet at the same time said pig allows us respite for half an hour or so every day. May God bless those creators.) While the little kids are immersed, I begin to make culinary preparations for the next ‘sitting’. TV time has ended, and we usher the little ones to bed. As usual the two-year old is screaming between gulps of her bottle because she has had to leave her beloved pink porcine pal. After settling her into her cot, we then take turns reading about dragons to the five-year-old, who proceeds to tell us he’s hungry, so we begrudgingly make him some toast and say something like, ‘I told you to eat your dinner. This is the last time.’ And it is. Until tomorrow.

She dug in and let out a moan. "This is so good. Will you marry me?" He sipped his coffee and watched color fill her cheeks. "Yes." She choked, and grabbed her glass of juice and drank a long gulp. Liam found he liked the idea of Aspen Chandler in his life long-term. She eyed him warily. "I... Um ... I wasn't really asking." He let his smile widen. "I'd be happy if you just moved in for a while, first." Her green eyes went wide. "You're just messing with me, right?" He rested his elbows on the island and leaned over and kissed her nose. "You're the crack PI, what do you think?" "I think I'm going to eat the rest of this fabulos French toast and ignore you.

What would your last meal be?" I asked suddenly. That was a night when I thought it would be all right if my life ended. "A really long omikase. Like at least thirty-four courses. I want Yesuda to cook them himself. He puts the soy sauce on with a paintbrush." "Salmon pastrami from Russ and Daughters. A ton of bagels. Like three bagels." "In-N-Out double double." "I'm thinking about a Barolo, something really ripe and dirty, like from the eighties." "ShackBurger and a milk shake." "My mom's was veal scallopini and a Diet Coke." "Nonna's Bolognese----it takes eight hours. She makes the pappardelle by hand." "A roast chicken---I would eat the entire thing by hand. And I guess a DRC. When else would I taste that kind of Burgundy?" "Blinis, caviar, and crème fraîche. Done and done. Some impossible Champagne, Krug, or a culty one like the Selosse, drunk out of the bottle." "Toast," I said, when my turn came. I tried to think of something more glamorous, but toast was the truth. I expected to be mocked. My suburban-ness, my stupidity, my blankness. "What on top?" "Um. Peanut butter. The raw kind you get from the health-food stores. I salt it myself.

The third and most notable problem with our current thinking is that it continues to be based on a model that prioritizes task completion above everything else. It’s a sort of one-or-zero, task-done-or-not, weight-lifted-or-not, distance-swum-or-not mentality. This is like saying, “I deadlifted 500 pounds, but I herniated a disc,” or, “I finished a marathon, but I wore a hole in my knee.” Imagine this sort of ethic spilling over into the other aspects of your life: “Hey, I made you some toast! But I burned down the house.

Do people depend on you and rely on you for guidance and help? As long as we live, this instinctual need to matter never changes. You’ve likely never heard about the specific framework of mattering, but you’ve surely felt it. Mattering occurs in life’s big moments, like being celebrated with heartfelt toasts by friends. It’s found in everyday moments, too, like when you’re sick and a friend brings over a pot of homemade soup. The feeling that hits you when you open the door is mattering, that you are deeply valued by your friend and worthy of love and support. When a teacher assigns a child a classroom chore like watering plants, that child feels like they matter, that they are counted on and capable of adding important value to their little world. Mattering has many layers. It begins with mattering to our parents and then extends outward to our community and the wider world. The more we feel valued, the more likely we are to add value, and the other way around—a virtuous cycle of interdependence that can continuously feed our sense of mattering, notes the community psychologist Isaac Prilleltensky. Mattering is what he describes as a “meta need,” or an umbrella

The first seventeen years of my life, I fasted. I kept my body clean and my spirit pure. Now, I want to feast like a glutton, spread lust on my breakfast toast, shoot violence and sip greed. And I want you to teach me, sinner man, because you’re the only man for the job,

Still-life Through the open French window the warm sun lights up the polished breakfast-table, laid round a bowl of crimson roses, for one - a service of Worcester porcelain, arrayed near it a melon, peaches, figs, small hot rolls in a napkin, fairy rack of toast, butter in ice, high silver coffee-pot, and, heaped on a salver, the morning's post. She comes over the lawn, the young heiress, from her early walk in her garden-wood feeling that life's a table set to bless her delicate desires with all that's good, that even the unopened future lies like a love-letter, full of sweet surprise.

diets, like the cabbage-soup diet, which means no one can come anywhere near you. Then, quite recently, I found I was getting indigestion if I ate too much in the evening, so I decided to give up supper. I eat breakfast—usually toast and Marmite or perhaps some porridge—and lunch, which is a good, solid cooked meal, with some fruit. I don’t eat again until the next day. I’ve lost over a stone without even trying

Lucien held his demitasse of espresso aloft and toasted his friend, who cringed at the sound of the cups clicking. “But I like brothels. My friends are there.” “They aren’t your friends.” “Yes they are, they like me just as I am.” “Because you pay them.” “No, because I’m charming. Besides, I pay all of my friends.” “No you don’t. You don’t pay me.” “I’m going to buy breakfast. On my account. Besides, I only pay them for the sex, the friendship is free.” “Don’t you worry about syphilis?” “Syphilis is a wives’ tale.” “It is not. You get a chancre on your manhood, then later you go mad, your limbs drop off, and you die. Manet died of syphilis.” “Nonsense. Syphilis is a myth. It’s Greek, I think—everyone has heard of the myth of syphilis.” “That’s the myth of Sisyphus. He spends his whole life pushing a large stone up a hill.” “With his penis? No wonder he has a chancre on it!” “No, that’s not the story.” “So you say. Shall I order more coffee?

Here at The Mecca, under pain of selection, we have made a home. As do black people on summer blocks marked with needles, vials, and hopscotch squares. As do black people dancing it out at rent parties, as do black people at their family reunions where we are regarded like the survivors of catastrophe. As do black people toasting their cognac and German beers, passing their blunts and debating MCs. As do all of us who have voyaged through death, to life upon these shores.

We have made something down here. We have taken the one-drop rules of Dreamers and flipped them. They made us into a race. We made ourselves into a people. Here at The Mecca, under pain of selection, we have made a home. As do black people on summer blocks marked with needles, vials, and hopscotch squares. As do black people dancing it out at rent parties, as do black people at their family reunions where we are regarded like the survivors of catastrophe. As do black people toasting their cognac and German beers, passing their blunts and debating MCs. As do all of us who have voyaged through death, to life upon these shores.

Somewhere in the back of her disaster brain--the brain that is firing the wrong signals, that tells her she is not running from a bear but already being devoured by it--she is learning something important. And the lesson is this: There is something in the world far more terrifying than humiliation or failure or death. And it is just like FDR said: Fear itself. And if she doesn't murder the bastard, this archvillain called Fear, she's going to be toast for real. She doesn't yet have a plan for vanquishing him. She has yet to learn about psychiatric remedies. She doesn't yet know why Fear has chosen this moment in her life to make his sudden entrance, licking his chops. For the early twenties, a particularly cruel age to be struck down by fear, is a stage in life when tremendous bravery is required of a woman -- the bravery to discover what she wants, what she cannot abide, what she needs to make a living and be among the living. But she knows this: A million times more than any other emotion or experience, fear has the strength and ability to mangle her into something different from what she truly is, something phony and fake and cowardly. And now, surprised and twisted and disoriented and broken as she is by fear's sudden arrival, she realizes that she needs to fight it, fight for her life.

Cards on the table, girls? Karl has served a sentence at Exeter prison for assault; Antony for theft. Karl was merely sticking up for a friend, you understand, and – hand on heart – would do the same again. His friend was being picked on in a bar and he hates bullying. Me, I am struggling with the paradox – bullying versus assault, and do we really lock people up for minor altercations? – but the girls seem fascinated, and in their sweet and liberal naivety are saying that loyalty is a good thing and they had a bloke from prison who came into their school once and told them how he had completely turned his life around after serving time over drugs. Covered in tattoos, he was. Covered. ‘Wow. Jail. So what was that really like?’ It is at this point I consider my role. Privately I am picturing Anna’s mother toasting her bottom by her Aga, worrying with her husband if their little girl will be all right, and he is telling her not to fuss so. They are growing up fast. Sensible girls. They will be fine, love. And I am thinking that they are not fine at all. For Karl is now thinking that the safest thing for the girls would be to have someone who knows London well chaperoning them during their visit. Karl and Antony are going to stay with friends in Vauxhall and fancy a big night to celebrate their release. How about they meet the girls after the theatre and try the club together? This is when I decide that I need to phone the girls’ parents. They have named their hamlet. Anna lives on a farm. It’s not rocket science. I can phone the post office or local pub; how many farms can there be? But now Anna isn’t sure at all. No. They should probably have an early night so they can hit the shops tomorrow morning. They have this plan, see, to go to Liberty’s first thing because Sarah is determined to try on something by Stella McCartney and get a picture on her phone. Good girl, I am thinking. Sensible girl. Spare me the intervention, Anna. But there is a complication, for Sarah seems suddenly to have taken a shine to Antony. There is a second trip to the buffet and they swap seats on their return – Anna now sitting with Karl and Sarah with Antony, who is telling her about his regrets at stuffing up his life. He only turned to crime out of desperation, he says, because he couldn’t get a job. Couldn’t support his son. Son? It sweeps over me, then. The shadow from the thatched canopy of my chocolate-box life –

Ten Things I Need to Know" The brightest stars are the first to explode. Also hearts. It is important to pay attention to love’s high voltage signs. The mockingbird is really ashamed of its own feeble song lost beneath all those he has to imitate. It’s true, the Carolina Wren caught in the bedroom yesterday died because he stepped on a glue trap and tore his wings off. Maybe we have both fallen through the soul’s thin ice already. Even Ethiopia is splitting off from Africa to become its own continent. Last year it moved 10 feet. This will take a million years. There’s always this nostalgia for the days when Time was so unreal it touched us only like the pale shadow of a hawk. Parmenedes transported himself above the beaten path of the stars to find the real that was beyond time. The words you left are still smoldering like the cigarette left in my ashtray as if it were a dying star. The thin thread of its smoke is caught on the ceiling. When love is threatened, the heart crackles with anger like kindling. It’s lucky we are not like hippos who fling dung at each other with their ridiculously tiny tails. Okay, that’s more than ten things I know. Let’s try twenty five, no, let’s not push it, twenty. How many times have we hurt each other not knowing? Destiny wears her clothes inside out. Each desire is a memory of the future. The past is a fake cloud we’ve pasted to a paper sky. That is why our dreams are the most real thing we possess. My logic here is made of your smells, your thighs, your kiss, your words. I collect stars but have no place to put them. You take my breath away only to give back a purer one. The way you dance creates a new constellation. Off the Thai coast they have discovered a new undersea world with sharks that walk on their fins. In Indonesia, a kangaroo that lives in a tree. Why is the shadow I cast always yours? Okay, let’s say I list 33 things, a solid symbolic number. It’s good to have a plan so we don’t lose ourselves, but then who has taken the ladder out of the hole I’ve dug for myself? How can I revive the things I’ve killed inside you? The real is a sunset over a shanty by the river. The keys that lock the door also open it. When we shut out each other, nothing seems real except the empty caves of our hearts, yet how arrogant to think our problems finally matter when thousands of children are bayoneted in the Congo this year. How incredible to think of those soldiers never having loved. Nothing ever ends. Will this? Byron never knew where his epic, Don Juan, would end and died in the middle of it. The good thing about being dead is that you don’t have to go through all that dying again. You just toast it. See, the real is what the imagination decants. You can be anywhere with the turn of a few words. Some say the feeling of out-of-the-body travel is due to certain short circuits in parts of the brain. That doesn’t matter because I’m still drifting towards you. Inside you are cumulous clouds I could float on all night. The difference is always between what we say we love and what we love. Tonight, for instance, I could drink from the bowl of your belly. It doesn’t matter if our feelings shift like sands beneath the river, there’s still the river. Maybe the real is the way your palms fit against my face, or the way you hold my life inside you until it is nothing at all, the way this plant droops, this flower called Heart’s Bursting Flower, with its beads of red hanging from their delicate threads any breeze might break, any word might shatter, any hurt might crush. Superstition Reviews issue 2 fall 2008

Because for all my massive appetite, I cannot cook to save my life. When Grant came to my old house for the first time, he became almost apoplectic at the contents of my fridge and cupboards. I ate like a deranged college frat boy midfinals. My fridge was full of packages of bologna and Budding luncheon meats, plastic-wrapped processed cheese slices, and little tubs of pudding. My cabinets held such bounty as cases of chicken-flavored instant ramen noodles, ten kinds of sugary cereals, Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, and cheap canned tuna. My freezer was well stocked with frozen dinners, heavy on the Stouffer's lasagna and bags of chicken tenders. My garbage can was a wasteland of take-out containers and pizza boxes. In my defense, there was also always really good beer and a couple of bottles of decent wine. My eating habits have done a pretty solid turnaround since we moved in together three years ago. Grant always leaved me something set up for breakfast: a parfait of Greek yogurt and homemade granola with fresh berries, oatmeal that just needs a quick reheat and a drizzle of cinnamon honey butter, baked French toast lingering in a warm oven. He almost always brings me leftovers from the restaurant's family meal for me to take for lunch the next day. I still indulge in greasy takeout when I'm on a job site, as much for the camaraderie with the guys as the food itself; doesn't look good to be noshing on slow-roasted pork shoulder and caramelized root vegetables when everyone else is elbow-deep in a two-pound brick of Ricobene's breaded steak sandwich dripping marinara.

I was going to bring you breakfast in bed.” “I don’t like crumbs in my bed,” she said. “Or people who don’t pay rent here.” “You want rent?” He smiled as he finished the toast. “How much?” She went to the kitchen, grabbed his big arm, and tried to pull him out. He leaned back and wouldn’t budge. “Get out of here,” she said. “You’re banging into everything with your crutches.” “I’m not going,” he said. “Go sit on the couch. I’ll make you some eggs.” “Nope,” he said. “I might be a jerk, and I might make mistakes, but I don’t make the same one twice.” She was still pulling on his arm when he let go of the counter. He fell against her, wrapping his arms around her. “Oops,” he said. “Clumsy me.” “What are you doing?” Her voice was muffled from having his shoulder against her mouth. She felt the rumble of his voice in his chest as he spoke. “You’re not pulling me or pushing me out of your life again. I shouldn’t have left you that night.” “I want you to go.” “If you really want me to go, I will, but I don’t think you do. Look at yourself. You’re hugging me.” “If I let you go, you’ll fall down and break everything in my kitchen. Again.” She squeezed her eyes shut and tensed her body, rejecting his hug while still being in it. “When did I break everything in your kitchen?” She didn’t answer. “You mean I broke your heart when I left,” he said. “You did.” “What about you? You didn’t come to my grand opening. You sent me those boring funeral flowers and a generic card. You might as well have stuck an ice pick in my chest.” “That was different.” “You broke my heart,” he said. “I barely made it through the night. I’ve been barely making it through a lot of nights.” Tina relaxed into the hug. There was a lump in her throat. She managed to choke out, “I don’t understand what happened with us.” He reached up and stroked her upper back. “We had our first fight,” he said. “That’s what happened. And I didn’t know how to apologize. My bookkeeper quit helping me with my text messages, and I couldn’t go see my favorite florist for advice.” She pulled away and poked him in the stomach with two fingers. “Don’t make jokes, Luca. Don’t make me laugh.” “I shouldn’t have left you here that night,” he said, gazing down into her eyes. “But I was stubborn, and I thought I was right and you were wrong. Or maybe I was scared.” “Why would you be scared?” “My wrist hurts.” He kept looking into her eyes. “I know I only broke my foot last night, but when I fell, I reached out to break my fall. I’ve been thinking about this all morning, and the same thing must have happened with us.” “Are you saying I hurt your wrist?” “I think I realized I was falling, and I freaked out. I tried to stop my fall, but I only made it worse.” He leaned down and gently kissed her. “I tried to stop my fall, but then I broke both of us.” She pulled away, slipped out of his arms, and took three steps back, until she was against the back of the sofa, with nowhere to go. Luca said, “Don’t you dare run. I’ve got crutches, and I’m not afraid to use them.” “Where would I go?” He grinned. “I knew there was a reason I loved this house.

The accordion player now began to play a jaunty little melody reminiscent of an English carol. Taking this as his signal, the Count indicated that he would like to make a toast. “It is a sad but unavoidable fact of life,” he began, “that as we age our social circles grow smaller. Whether from increased habit or diminished vigor, we suddenly find ourselves in the company of just a few familiar faces. So I view it as an incredible stroke of good fortune at this stage in my life to have found such a fine new friend.

Smoked Trout Gloria YIELD: 4 SERVINGS GLORIA BECAME PASSIONATE about trout fishing when we lived in Hunter. She would go to the river at an ungodly early morning hour, usually with Pierre Larré, and arrive back home, wet and exhilarated, with a bunch of fresh trout at about 9:00 A.M., when I was getting up. She liked them best smoked and served with creamy scrambled eggs on buttered toast, a dish that is a welcome treat for breakfast, brunch, lunch, or even dinner. You can, of course, buy smoked trout, but we smoke our own. I first soak the trout for 2 hours in a brine made of 1 cup of kosher salt, 2 cups of water, and 2 tablespoons of sugar; then I wash and pat it dry. I spread a handful of hickory chips or sawdust in an old roasting pan and add some crumpled pieces of aluminum foil to the pan to support a wire rack, on which I arrange the trout. I cover the pan tightly with a large piece of foil and place it on a small electric burner over medium heat for 10 to 15 minutes, until the trout is golden. After it rests for an hour or so, I remove the skin and head, and the moist, fragrant flesh slides off the central bone. Smoked trout is best served lukewarm or at room temperature. 8 large eggs ½ teaspoon salt ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 4 large slices country bread 4 tablespoons (½ stick) unsalted butter for cooking the eggs, plus extra for spreading on the toast 2 to 3 tablespoons cream or milk 4 smoked trout, 6 to 10 ounces each, with skin and head removed and the flesh separated from the bones Beat the eggs in a bowl, and add the salt and pepper. Toast the bread, and coat it with butter. Heat the 4 tablespoons of butter in a sturdy saucepan. When it is hot, add the eggs, and mix them gently and continuously with a whisk to create a creamy mixture with small curds. Keep cooking for about 2 minutes, until the eggs are thick and creamy but still slightly runny. Do not overcook. Remove the pan from the heat, and add a few tablespoons of the cream or milk to stop the cooking and keep the mixture from becoming too tight. Place a slice of toast on each of four plates, spoon the eggs on top, and surround with pieces of smoked trout. Serve immediately.

the luxuries my privileged life brings me in solidarity with everyone out there who is having a hard time? I used to think so. I used to feel so bad about all the wrongs in this world that I couldn’t enjoy the rights. The beauty. The loveliness. The shallow superficialities that make my life pleasant. It made me miserable, it made me feel guilty about how lucky I was. The misery and guilt I experienced though—did it make life better for anyone else? I now think that not enjoying the good things that come my way would be inexcusable ungratefulness. This makes sense to me because whenever I, myself, have been through a rough patch, I get so confused by people who have succeeded in reaching their goals, but are unable to enjoy it for fear of seeming stuck up, spoiled, or full of themselves. What’s the point of working your ass off to make something out of yourself, if you’re then not allowing yourself to enjoy it? I want to be grateful, and I want to be humble. I want to do my bit to make this world a better place. But I also want to experience it all—devour as much of this life as I possibly can. I want to dress in beautiful things and taste all the gorgeous flavors the world has to offer. I want to dance with the most beautiful man alive, whom I have the luxury to call my own. I want to carefully put on makeup and make my bed neatly every morning, put flowers in my windows and toast the beauty I see. I want to walk down the street feeling like a stunning creature. And I want to nod my head in recognition to all of you other stunning creatures out there. To you who make an effort, who give a damn. To all of you who are grateful and appreciate. And who want to experience it all. This might be shallow—it probably is. I might be shallow—I probably am. But you know what? I’m ok with it.

To me novella is a stupid word. It’s too much like Nutella. And goodness knows, I do love a chocolate hazelnut spread that advertises itself as a respectable breakfast food (part of this healthy breakfast). And do we really want to read a type of book that is similar to a sweet spread for toast? I think not!

sightlessly at the television. Was this what he truly wanted out of life? Endless nights like this one? Alone, bored. “But free,” he muttered, and lifted his can in a mocking toast to freedom. It was that damned Jessi, making him feel restless and frustrated and itchy. Her and all her suggestive glances. Her and her hot kisses. Her and her talk about the clinic and the house and the family she’d have there one day. He didn’t want that, dammit. But he did want her. His shower that night was a cool one. He dived into bed still wet, hoping the dampness would keep the oppressive heat from smothering him. And after a third beer, he fell into a jerky, restless sleep. But she didn’t leave him alone then, either. She was there, haunting his dreams, touching him, kissing him, teasing him, as he lay there paralyzed and unable to reciprocate. He thrashed in agony, his

There was on existence where Nora had kept up the fiction writing she had occasionally toyed with at university and was now a published author. Her novel The Shape of Regret received rave reviews and was shortlisted for a major literary award. In that life she had lunch in a disappointingly banal Soho members' club with two affable, easy-going producers from Magic Lantern Productions, who wanted to option it for film. She ended up choking on a piece of flatbread and knocking her red wine over one of the producer's trousers and messing up the whole meeting. In one life she had a teenage son called Henry, who she never met properly because he kept slamming doors in her face. In one life she was a concert pianist, currently on tour in Scandinavia, playing night after night to besotted crowds (and fading into the Midnight Library during one disastrous rendition of Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 2 at the Finlandia Hall in Helsinki). In one life she only ate toast. In one life she went to Oxford and became a lecturer in Philosophy at St. Catherine's College and lived by herself in a fine Georgian townhouse in a genteel row, amid an environment of respectable calm. In another life Nora was a sea of emotion. She felt everything deeply and directly. Every joy and every sorrow. A single moment could contain both intense pleasure and intense pain, as if both were dependent on each other, like a pendulum in motion. A simple walk outside and she could feel a heavy sadness simply because the sun had slipped behind a cloud. Yet, conversely, meeting a dog who was clearly grateful for her attention caused her to feel so exultant that she felt she could melt into the pavement with sheer bliss. In that life she had a book of Emily Dickinson poems beside her bed and she had a playlist called 'Extreme States of Euphoria' and another one called 'The Glue to Fix Me When I Am Broken.