Slice Of Happiness Quotes

I'm suprised he doesn't send Christmas cards," Antonio said. "I can see them now. Tasteful, embossed veilum cards, the best he can steal. Little notes in perfect penmanship,"Happy holidays. Hope everyone is well. I sliced up Ethan Ritter in Miami and scattered his remains in the Atlantic. Best wishes for the new year. Karl.

Other letters simply relate the small events that punctuate the passage of time: roses picked at dusk, the laziness of a rainy Sunday, a child crying himself to sleep. Capturing the moment, these small slices of life, these small gusts of happiness, move me more deeply than all the rest. A couple of lines or eight pages, a Middle Eastern stamp or a suburban postmark . . . I hoard all these letters like treasure. One day I hope to fasten them end to end in a half-mile streamer, to float in the wind like a banner raised to the glory of friendship. It will keep the vultures at bay.

Like most things, the more we have of something, the less happiness we derive from it. The first slice of cake: awesome. The fifth slice: not so good.

What had kept me bound to life thus for had been the shallow hope that something good might happen someday.

I KNEW IT WAS OVER when tonight you couldn't make the phone ring when you used to make the sun rise when trees used to throw themselves in front of you to be paper for love letters that was how i knew i had to do it swaddle the kids we never had against january's cold slice bundle them in winter clothes they never needed so i could drop them off at my mom's even though she lives on the other side of the country and at this late west coast hour is assuredly east coast sleeping peacefully her house was lit like a candle the way homes should be warm and golden and home and the kids ran in and jumped at the bichon frise named lucky that she never had they hugged the dog it wriggled and the kids were happy yours and mine the ones we never had and my mom was grand maternal, which is to say, with style that only comes when you've seen enough to know grace like when to pretend it's christmas or a birthday so she lit her voice with tiny lights and pretended she didn't see me crying as i drove away to the hotel connected to the bar where i ordered the cheapest whisky they had just because it shares your first name because they don't make a whisky called baby and i only thought what i got was what i ordered i toasted the hangover inevitable as sun that used to rise in your name i toasted the carnivals we never went to and the things you never won for me the ferris wheels we never kissed on and all the dreams between us that sat there like balloons on a carney's board waiting to explode with passion but slowly deflated hung slave under the pin- prick of a tack hung heads down like lovers when it doesn't work, like me at last call after too many cheap too many sweet too much whisky makes me sick, like the smell of cheap, like the smell of the dead like the cheap, dead flowers you never sent that i never threw out of the window of a car i never really owned

I was on a mission. I had to learn to comfort myself, to see what others saw in me and believe it. I needed to discover what the hell made me happy other than being in love. Mission impossible. When did figuring out what makes you happy become work? How had I let myself get to this point, where I had to learn me..? It was embarrassing. In my college psychology class, I had studied theories of adult development and learned that our twenties are for experimenting, exploring different jobs, and discovering what fulfills us. My professor warned against graduate school, asserting, "You're not fully formed yet. You don't know if it's what you really want to do with your life because you haven't tried enough things." Oh, no, not me.." And if you rush into something you're unsure about, you might awake midlife with a crisis on your hands," he had lectured it. Hi. Try waking up a whole lot sooner with a pre-thirty predicament worm dangling from your early bird mouth. "Well to begin," Phone Therapist responded, "you have to learn to take care of yourself. To nurture and comfort that little girl inside you, to realize you are quite capable of relying on yourself. I want you to try to remember what brought you comfort when you were younger." Bowls of cereal after school, coated in a pool of orange-blossom honey. Dragging my finger along the edge of a plate of mashed potatoes. I knew I should have thought "tea" or "bath," but I didn't. Did she want me to answer aloud? "Grilled cheese?" I said hesitantly. "Okay, good. What else?" I thought of marionette shows where I'd held my mother's hand and looked at her after a funny part to see if she was delighted, of brisket sandwiches with ketchup, like my dad ordered. Sliding barn doors, baskets of brown eggs, steamed windows, doubled socks, cupcake paper, and rolled sweater collars. Cookouts where the fathers handled the meat, licking wobbly batter off wire beaters, Christmas ornaments in their boxes, peanut butter on apple slices, the sounds and light beneath an overturned canoe, the pine needle path to the ocean near my mother's house, the crunch of snow beneath my red winter boots, bedtime stories. "My parents," I said. Damn. I felt like she made me say the secret word and just won extra points on the Psychology Game Network. It always comes down to our parents in therapy.

I just want someone I can count on—a man who will turn the world upside down to help me find a slice of happiness because he loves me that much.

Once you become aware of your impending death, you have to make a compromise in accepting the loss of the life you wish you could have led and the reality of your imminent death. Sure, there will always be regrets and broken dreams, but you have to go easy on yourself. Over the last few days, I’ve come to realise that there is certain beauty in those regrets, they are proof of having lived. Maybe I will regrets some of my decisions when the moment comes, but that’s ok, No matter how you slice it, life is full of regrets anyway. I was never able to be myself completely or live my life exactly how I wanted to, I am not even sure if I ever figure out what exactly being myself and living out my dreams really meant. So I guess I am going to die with all those failures and regrets, all those unfulfilled dreams, all the people I’ve never met, all the things I’ve never tasted and all the places I’ve never been. I am taking all that with me to my grave, and I am ok with that. In the end, I am satisfied with who I am and the life I’ve lived, I am just happy to have been here at all.

After all, life will hand each one of us our fair share of despair and loss and suffering—and then some. That’s certain. But just as certain: It will also give us slices of chocolate cake, and sunny, seventy-two-degree days, and breezes that rustle the trees. Good things are so easy to overlook, but that doesn’t make them any less there.

Other letters simply relate the small events that punctuate the passing of time: roses picked at dusk, the laziness of a rainy Sunday, a child crying himself to sleep. Capturing the moment, these small slices of life, these small gusts of happiness, move me more deeply than all the rest. A couple of lines or eight pages, a Middle Eastern stamp or a suburban postmark... I hoard all these letters like treasure.

Other letters simply relate the small events that punctuate the passage of time: roses picked at dusk, the laziness of a rainy Sunday, a child crying himself to sleep. Capturing the moment, these small slices of life, these small gusts of happiness, move me more deeply than the rest.

I had no idea that marriage was only supposed to be between two people who wanted to get between the sheets and make more people. What ever happened to marrying for love— or to get on your partner’s health insurance policy, or for presents? No one was going to buy two people in their thirties a four-slice toaster if we just continued to live in sin.

You'll have to face it, the endings are the same however you slice it. Don't be deluded by any other endings, they're all fake, either deliberately fake, with malicious intent to deceive, or just motivated by excessive optimism if not by downright sentimentality. The only authentic ending is the one provided here: John and Mary die. John and Mary die. John and Mary die.

He toasted his bacon on a fork and caught the drops of fat on his bread; then he put the rasher on his thick slice of bread, and cut off chunks with a clasp-knife, poured his tea into his saucer, and was happy.

life is about balances. A pie chart with equal slices in all areas of life for maximum happiness.

Nothing good will happen in my life, and I could see it as a blessing

True happiness is found in the simple moments we share, where laughter comes easy and worries fade away.

A tiny butter knife slices more skin off my heart every time I think about her.

Wanna see the rest of my happy place?

It was one thing to find happiness and lose it, quite another to have someone else's happiness thrust at you like an unwanted second slice of cake. Then again, she'd never refused a second slice of cake.

I receive remarkable letters. They are opened for me, unfolded, and spread out before my eyes in a daily ritual that gives the arrival of the mail the character of a hushed and holy ceremony. I carefully read each letter myself. Some of them are serious in tone, discussing the meaning of life, invoking the supremacy of the soul, the mystery of every existence. And by a curious reversal, the people who focus most closely on these fundamental questions tend to be people I had known only superficially. Their small talk has masked hidden depths. Had I been blind and deaf, or does it take the harsh light of disaster to show a person's true nature? Other letters simply relate the small events that punctuate the passage of time: roses picked at dusk, the laziness of a rainy Sunday, a child crying himself to sleep. Capturing the moment, these small slices of life, these small gusts of happiness, move me more deeply than all the rest. A couple of lines or eight pages, a Middle Eastern stamp or a suburban postmark... I hoard all these letters like treasure. One day I hope to fasten them end to end in a half-mile streamer, to float in the wind like a banner raised to the glory of friendship. It will keep the vultures at bay.

Frankly, Olive was a bit on the fence about this whole grad school thing. Not because she didn’t like science. (She did. She loved science. Science was her thing.) And not because of the truckload of obvious red flags. She was well aware that committing to years of unappreciated, underpaid eighty-hour workweeks might not be good for her mental health. That nights spent toiling away in front of a Bunsen burner to uncover a trivial slice of knowledge might not be the key to happiness. That devoting her mind and body to academic pursuits with only infrequent breaks to steal unattended bagels might not be a wise choice. She was well aware, and yet none of it worried her.

End of an era,” I say. “Nah.” His eyes slice sideways. “Another beginning.

Joy multiplies when shared with the one you love.

The best piece of life's magnificence is your slice of internal peace.

Anytime I got too happy, I could just assume something fragile and lovely was lying in wait, ready to shower my world in glass fragments and sticky lemon slices.

She is my reprieve. My air. Spencer Locke is the one slice of happy I have in this shit pie I call life.

Don’t let some stupid what if get in the way of enjoying a little slice of happiness.

His shadow stretched out across the asphalt, a man on his way to make good an old wrong, his shadow, the dark doppelganger with stilts for legs, sliced in two by the streetcar tracks.

Until very recently, spending money and eating at a fancy restaurant wasn't an option. I'd been living in poverty for years, and I must have lost a lot of imagination in that time, too.

As children we see happiness as a thing. A toy train sticking out of a basket or the plastic film around a slice of cake. or a photograph of a scene in which we are at the centre, all eyes on us. As adults it gets more complicated. Happiness is success, work, a man or a woman. All vague, laborious things. Whether it's a word we use to describe our lives or not, it is mostly just that, a word. Childhood taught us something different about happiness, Yui thought, that all you needed to do was reach out your hand in the right direction and you could grasp it.

Happy smiles were shared between the bride and groom, but it was the cake their guests remembered - the vanilla custard filling, the buttercream finish, the slight taste of raspberries that had surely been added to the batter. No one brought home any slices of leftover cake to place under their pillow, hoping to dream of their future mate; instead, the guests… ate the whole cake and then had dreams of eating it again. After this wedding unmarried women woke in the night with tears in their eyes, not because they were alone, but because there wasn't any cake left.

And I think that if you are lucky enough to give and receive love, then you can be happy in the face of suffering. I was talking to a friend about this and we decided that maybe heaven is just that...love. And that heaven exists on a day-to-day basis within people. When they give and receive love, that's a little slice of heaven.

My cousins are hurting. My aunt is hurting. My mother is hurting. And there is no one here to help. How is this the good life, when even the air in this place threatens to wrap its fingers around my throat? In Haiti, with all its problems, there was always a friend or a neighbor to share in the misery. And then, after our troubles were tallied up like those points at the basketball game, we would celebrate being alive. But here, there isn’t even a slice of happiness big enough to fill up all these empty houses, and broken buildings, and wide roads that lead to nowhere and everywhere. Every bit of laughter, every joyous moment, is swallowed up by a deep, deep sadness.

Silas baked me a cake for my birthday. It was awful. I think he forgot the eggs. But it was the most beautiful chocolate failure I’ve ever seen. I was so happy that I didn’t even make a gag face when I ate a slice. But, oh god, it was so bad. Best boyfriend ever.

Normal was in the eye of the beholder, and sometimes the path to happiness involved bushwhacking and slicing and carving it until it yielded to individual desires. It wasn’t simple, and there was no getting through it unscathed from the bleeding prick of thorns along the way.

Small Moth... She's slicing ripe white peaches into the Tony the Tiger bowl and dropping slivers for the dog poised vibrating by her foot to stop their fall when she spots it, camouflaged, a glimmer and then full on- happiness, plashing blunt soft wings inside her as if it wants to escape again.

That’s kebben,” Tamar said, entering the room and helping herself to a slice of plum. “One of us cannot be happy if the other is suffering.

Clo was looking like the cat who got the cream, the kippers, the peanut butter, the sliced chicken and a lifetime's supply of genetically engineered slow-moving mice.

The more you attend to thin slices of joy, the more easily you can access them.

We laugh because humour assaults us with a slice of truth and we sense danger.

Amane-kun?" "Yeah?" "...I'm happy, just like this." "Me too.

There had been a slice of time, somewhere sliding away from him now and fading into the slippery past, where Walker had been a happy man. Where his life should've ended to keep him from enduring any of the suffering beyond. But he had made it through that brief bliss and now could hardly recall it. He couldn't imagine what it felt like to rise with anticipation every morning, to fall asleep with contentment at the end of every day.

The point is, Nathan, nobody knows what tomorrow’s about to bring. You have to grab onto whatever little slice of happiness while you can, and you have to fucking live in it. If your relationship with Mel is truly over, yeah, you should absolutely let it go. Things die all the time, but killing them to stop them from dying is my idea of batshit crazy. So if you’re only ending this with her in case it might cause you more pain later on down the line, well then, for all your fancy degrees and your razor-sharp brain, you’re the biggest fucking fool I ever met.

Spencer Locke is the only bit of humanity I permit myself to indulge in. She’s the one thing, the one person whose mere presence provides some sense of relief from the constant sense of asphyxiation I feel. She is my reprieve. My air. Spencer Locke is the one slice of happy I have.

I’m surprised he doesn’t send Christmas cards,” Antonio said. “I can see them now. Tasteful, embossed vellum cards, the best he can steal. Little notes in perfect penmanship, ‘Happy holidays. Hope everyone is well. I sliced up Ethan Ritter in Miami and scattered his remains in the Atlantic. Best wishes for the New Year. Karl.

In anatomy lab, we objectified the dead, literally reducing them to organs, tissues, nerves, muscles. On that first day, you simply could not deny the humanity of the corpse. But by the time you'd skinned the limbs, sliced through inconvenient muscles, pulled out the lungs, cut open the heart and removed a lobe of the liver, it was hard to recognize this pile of tissue as human. Anatomy lab, in the end, becomes less a violation of the sacred and more something that interferes with happy hour, and that realization discomfits. In our rare reflective moments, we were all silently apologizing to our cadavers, not because we sensed the transgression but because we did not.

Adelgunde and Herrmann weren't allowed to eat cake, because they couldn't digest it, their parents explained, so instead each of them had a small biscuits that the huntsman had to take out of a box they had brought with them. But Felix and Christlieb ate up the big slices of cake that their kind mother handed them, and felt happy and cheerful.

In her childhood, the grass was green. There were cleats and freshly laundered jerseys with silly team names and sliced oranges on the sideline. And to see the differences, to find these beautiful boys worthy of curiosity, of examination—it’s the core of her chosen profession but it feels like human sightseeing. A tour of others. Look at these poor boys, happy despite everything.

When I got to the waterfront, I parked the car beside a deserted warehouse, smoked a cigarette and put Bob Dylan on auto-repeat. I reclined the seat, kicked both legs up on the steering wheel, breathing calmly. I felt like having a beer, but the beer was gone. The sun sliced through the windshield, sealing me in light. I closed my eyes and felt the warmth on my eyelids. Sunlight traveled a long distance to reach this planet; an infinitesimal portion of that energy was enough to warm my eyelids. I was moved. That something as insignificant as an eyelid had its place in the workings of the universe, that the cosmic order did not overlook this momentary fact. Was I any closer to appreciating Alyosha's insights? Some limited happiness had been granted this limited life.

His mother had always mothered him—she insisted on coming by once a week and ironing for us, and when she was done ironing, she’d say, “I’ll just help tidy,” and after she’d left, I’d look in the fridge and find she’d peeled and sliced his grapefruit for him, put the pieces in a snap-top container, and then I’d open the bread and discover all the crusts had been cut away, each slice returned half naked. I am married to a thirty-four-year-old man who is still offended by bread crusts. But I tried to do the same those first weeks after his mom passed. I snipped the bread crusts, I ironed his T-shirts, I baked a blueberry pie from his mom’s recipe. “I don’t need to be babied, really, Amy,” he said as he stared at the loaf of skinned breads. “I let my mom do it because it made her happy, but I know you don’t like that nurturing stuff.

my mind switches to what it would be like to be with her, to lose my way with her, to whisper longings into her ear, to devour and be devoured. To wake up in the same bed and talk and laugh and be in comfortable silence with her. To give her breakfast. Toast. Blackcurrant jam. Pink grapefruit juice. Maybe some watermelon. Sliced. On a plate. She would smile, and I see it in my mind, the smile, and I would dare to feel happy with another human being.

The Chinese ideograph for forbearance is a heart with a sword dangling over it, another instance of language's brilliant way of showing us something surprising and important fossilized inside the meaning of a word. Vulnerability is built into our hearts, which can be sliced open at any moment by some sudden shift in the arrangements, some pain, some horror, some hurt. We all know and instinctively fear this, so we protect our hearts by covering them against exposure. But this doesn't work. Covering the heart binds and suffocates it until, like a wound that has been kept dressed for too long, the heart starts to fester and becomes fetid. Eventually, without air, the heart is all but killed off, and there's no feeling, no experiencing at all. To practice forbearance is to appreciate and celebrate the heart's vulnerability, and to see that the slicing or piercing of the heart does not require defense; that the heart's vulnerability is a good thing, because wounds can make us more peaceful and more real—if, that is, we are willing to hang on to the leopard of our fear, the serpent of our grief, the boar of our shame without running away or being hurled off. Forbearance is simply holding on steadfastly with whatever it is that unexpectedly arises: not doing anything; not fixing anything (because doing and fixing can be a way to cover up the heart, to leap over the hurt and pain by occupying ourselves with schemes and plans to get rid of it.) Just holding on for hear life. Holding on with what comes is what makes life dear. ...Simply holding on this way may sound passive. Forbearance has a bad reputation in our culture, whose conventional wisdom tells us that we ought to solve problems, fix what's broken, grab what we want, speak out, shake things up, make things happen. And should none of this work out, then we are told we ought to move on, take a new tack, start something else. But this line of thinking only makes sense when we are attempting to gain external satisfaction. It doesn't take into account internal well-being; nor does it engage the deeper questions of who you really are and what makes you truly happy, questions that no one can ignore for long... Insofar as forbearance helps us to embrace transformative energy and allow its magic to work on us... forbearance isn't passive at all. It's a powerfully active spiritual force, (67-70).

And with these thoughts came a realization of how unimportant to the life and happiness of the world is the existence of any one of us. We may be snuffed out without an instant's warning, and for a brief day our friends speak of us with subdued voices. The following morning, while the first worm is busily engaged in testing the construction of our coffin, they are teeing up for the first hole to suffer more acute sorrow over a sliced ball than they did over our, to us, untimely demise.

You came all this way for a whore?” Albert asked, and Royce shot him a harsh look. “Don’t call her that if you want to live a long and happy life,” Hadrian said as they dismounted. “But this is a whorehouse—a brothel, right? And you’re here to see a woman, so—” “So keep talking, Albert.” Hadrian tied his horse to the post. “Just let me get farther away.” Gwen saved our lives,” Royce said, looking up at the porch. “I beat on doors. I even yelled for help.” He looked at Albert, letting that image sink in. Yes, I yelled for help. “No one cared.” Royce gestured toward Hadrian. “He was dying in a pool of blood, and I was about to pass out. Broken leg, my side sliced open, the world spinning. Then she was there saying, ‘I’ve got you. You’ll be all right now.’ We would have died in the mud and the rain, but she took us in, nursed us back to health. People were after us—lots of people … lots of powerful people—but she kept us hidden for weeks, and she never asked for payment or explanation. She never asked for anything.” Royce turned back to Albert. “So if you call her a whore again, I’ll cut your tongue out and nail it to your chest.” Albert nodded. “Point taken.” Royce climbed the steps to the House and rapped once. Albert leaned over to Hadrian and whispered, “He knocks at a—” “Royce can still hear you.” Hadrian stopped him. “Really?” “Pretty sure. You have no idea how much trouble I got into before I learned that. Now I never say anything I don’t want him to know.

My daydream of being adopted or escaping turned to nightmares where I would stab him and slice off his penis, and I enjoyed it. The dreams terrorized me with their viciousness and brutality, but they also calmed me. I felt at peace watching his blood flow. Not a night passed that I wasn't haunted by those dreams. But how could someone feel so happy and serene at the sight of another person bleeding to death? I felt like a monster. I hated that I was so vicious, and I was angry at myself for feeling such relief wash over me as I had those wicked thoughts.

At the edge of Saint-Michel is the Wildwood. The wolves who live there come out at night. They prowl fields and farms, hungry for hens and tender young lambs. But there is another sort of wolf, one that's far more treacherous. This is the wolf the old ones speak of. "Run if you see him," they tell their granddaughters. "His tongue is silver, but his teeth are sharp. If he gets hold of you, he'll eat you alive." Most of the village girls do what they're told, but occasionally one does not. She stands her ground, looks the wolf in the eye, and falls in love with him. People see her run to the woods at night. They see her the next morning with leaves in her hair and blood on her lips. This is not proper, they say. A girl should not love a wolf. So they decide to intervene. They come after the wolf with guns and swords. They hunt him down in the Wildwood. But the girl is with him and sees them coming. The people raise their rifles and take aim. The girl opens her mouth to scream, and as she does, the wolf jumps inside it. Quickly the girl swallows him whole, teeth and claws and fur. He curls up under her heart. The villagers lower their weapons and go home. The girl heaves a sigh of relief. She believes this arrangement will work. She thinks she can be satisfied with memories of the wolf’s golden eyes. She thinks the wolf will be happy with a warm place to sleep. But the girl soon realized she’s made a terrible mistake, for the wolf is a wild thing and wild things cannot be caged. He wants to get out, but the girl is all darkness inside and he cannot find his way. So he howls in her blood. He tears at her heart. The howling and gnawing –it drives the girl mad. She tries to cut him out, slicing lines in her flesh with a razor. She tries to burn him out, holding a candle flame to her skin. She tries to starve him out, refusing to eat until she’s nothing but skin over bones. Before long, the grave takes them both. A wolf lives in Isabelle. She tries hard to keep him down, but his hunger grows. He cracks her spine and devours her heart. Run home. Slam the door. Throw the bolt. It won’t help. The wolves in the woods have sharp teeth and long claws, but it’s the wolf inside who will tear you apart.

Asked me what?” Just the sound of his voice twists my stomach into a knot of unpleasant emotions like guilt, sadness, and fear. And longing. I might as well admit there’s some of that, too. Only it has too much competition to ever win out. I watch as Peeta crosses to the table, the sunlight from the window picking up the glint of fresh snow in his blond hair. He looks strong and healthy, so different from the sick, starving boy I knew in the arena, and you can barely even notice his limp now. He sets a loaf of fresh-baked bread on the table and holds out his hand to Haymitch. “Asked you to wake me without giving me pneumonia,” says Haymitch, passing over his knife. He pulls off his filthy shirt, revealing an equally soiled undershirt, and rubs himself down with the dry part. Peeta smiles and douses Haymitch’s knife in white liquor from a bottle on the floor. He wipes the blade clean on his shirttail and slices the bread. Peeta keeps all of us in fresh baked goods. I hunt. He bakes. Haymitch drinks. We have our own ways to stay busy, to keep thoughts of our time as contestants in the Hunger Games at bay. It’s not until he’s handed Haymitch the heel that he even looks at me for the first time. “Would you like a piece?” “No, I ate at the Hob,” I say. “But thank you.” My voice doesn’t sound like my own, it’s so formal. Just as it’s been every time I’ve spoken to Peeta since the cameras finished filming our happy homecoming and we returned to our real lives. “You’re welcome,” he says back stiffly. Haymitch tosses his shirt somewhere into the mess. “Brrr. You two have got a lot of warming up to do before showtime.” He’s right, of course. The audience will be expecting the pair of lovebirds who won the Hunger Games. Not two people who can barely look each other in the eye. But all I

My life in the kitchen began with my grandmother in the village of Champvert in the Tarn-et-Garonne department of southwestern France, the town so small you'd need a magnifying glass to find it on the map. I'd sit on a tall wooden stool, wide-eyed, watching Grand-mère Odette in her navy-blue dress and black ballerina flats, her apron adorned with les coquelicots (wild red poppies), mesmerized by the grace with which she danced around her kitchen, hypnotized by all the wonderful smells- the way the aromas were released from the herbs picked right from her garden as she chopped, becoming stronger as she set them in an olive oiled and buttered pan. She'd dip a spoon in a pot or slice up an onion in two seconds, making it look oh so easy, and for her it was. But my favorite part was when she'd let me taste whatever delight she was cooking up, sweet or savory. I'd close my eyes, lick my lips, and sigh with happiness. Sometimes Grand-mère Odette would blindfold me, and it wasn't long before I could pick out every ingredient by smell. All the other senses came to me, too- sight (glorious plating), taste (the delight of the unknown), touch (the way a cherry felt in my hand), and hearing (the way garlic sizzled in the pan).

Once we went to a family picnic back when my mother was still speaking to her family. We ate hot dogs and hamburgers that my mom’s dad cooked on the grill, and my mom’s stepmom, a woman she insisted was evil but seemed nice enough to me. She made apple pie for dessert. We ate big, warm slices with rivers of vanilla ice cream melting into the crust. The pie made me feel good inside: warm and full and happy. Then my mom said her stepmom probably made those pies from poisoned apples, and I spent the rest of the night thinking of Snow White eating the poisoned apple and sleeping for years. I was afraid to go to sleep that night.

Phoenix Blood There are only two things I am sure of in this world: the first is, one day, this life will come to its final destination in death The second: people will try to obliterate you, and believe me, even the ones that once promised you forever will betray you, it never fails to happen when love turns dark. Do yourself a favour when this happens; reclaim yourself from them. I know you have been taught to slice out your own heart, hand it over again and again to selfish hands, because it is all you have known since you were a child. You are an open wound looking for someone to cure you. And when they see that, they will scratch at it, steal your voice, thinking your magic will go with it, hoping your core swallows itself up. This is where you remember the lava of the volcano you come from, your ancestors were made from fire and it runs like hum that sings through your own vein-rivers of blood. You are not an open wound, they just want you to think you are. They have done this to every woman before you, yet women were made to endure; they become the earth, they adapt like water, they turn into diamonds to survive as who they are. This is how we become magic, we walk through fire and become more holy. They try to break us, we do not accept defeat. They try to devastate us, we still discover how to be happy. They banish us to the depths of hell, we just absorb and master the heat.

...I drag the kids to the farmers' market and fill out the week's cheap supermarket haul with a few vivid bunches of organic produce...Once home, I set out fresh flowers and put the fruit in a jadeite bowl. A jam jar of garden growth even adorns the chartreuse kids' table...I found some used toddler-sized chairs to go around it...It sits right in front of the tall bookcases...When the kids are eating or coloring there, with the cluster or mismatched picture frames hanging just to their left, my son with his mop of sandy hair, my daughter just growing out of babyhood...they look like they could be in a Scandinavian design magazine. I think to myself that maybe motherhood is just this, creating these frames, the little vistas you can take in that look like pictures from magazines, like any number of images that could be filed under familial happiness. They reflect back to you that you're doing it - doing something - right. In my case, these scenes are like a momentary vacation from the actual circumstances of my current life. Children, clean and clad in brightly striped clothing, snacking on slices of organic plum. My son drawing happy gel pen houses, the flourishing clump of smiley-faced flowers beneath a yellow flat sun. To counter the creeping worry that I am a no-good person, I must collect a lot of these images, postage-stamp moments I can gaze upon and think, I can't be fucking up that bad. Can I?

In her imagination she was somewhere dry and sunbaked, with a drink in her hand and the smell of cut flowers close by, filling her with happiness and tranquility. The dream faded as a blade of saw grass sliced her forearm just aft of her glove, bringing her back to the reality that she was wading through a god-awful-smelling canal full of snakes, leeches, and vermin. She’d spent almost an hour up to her neck in the slimy ditch, pushing a large clump of water hyacinth along with her to break up the outline of a human head. Her body felt like it would never dry out once she climbed out of this dank water, and even if it did, she was convinced she’d never be able to wash the smell of rotten vegetation off her skin

Not long ago I saw a slice of watermelon on the table. And, there on the naked table, it looked like a madman’s laugh (I don’t know how else to put it). If I weren’t resigned to living in a world that forces me to be sensible, how I would scream in fright at the happy prehistoric monstrosities of the earth. Only an infant isn’t shocked: he too is a happy monstrosity repeated since the beginning of the history of man. Only afterwards does fear come, the pacification of fear, the denial of fear — in a word, civilization. Meanwhile, atop the naked table, the screaming slice of red watermelon. I am grateful to my eyes that are still so frightened. I shall yet see many things. To be honest, even without watermelon, a naked table is also a sight to see.

I thought of my friends of the outer world, and of how they all would go on living their lives in total ignorance of the strange and terrible fate that had overtaken me, or unguessing the weird surroundings which had witnessed the last frightful agony of my extinction. And with these thoughts came a realization of how unimportant to the life and happiness of the world is the existence of any one of us. We may be snuffed out without an instant's warning, and for a brief day our friends speak of us with subdued voices. The following morning, while the first worm is busily engaged in testing the construction of our coffin, they are teeing up for the first hole to suffer more acute sorrow over a sliced ball than they did over our, to us, untimely demise.

When I got to the waterfront, I parked the car beside a deserted warehouse, smoked a cigarette and put Bob Dylan on auto-repeat. I reclined the seat, kicked both legs up on the steering wheel, breathing calmly. I felt like having a beer, but the beer was gone. The sun sliced through the windshield, sealing me in light. I closed my eyes and felt the warmth on my eyelids. Sunlight traveled a long distance to reach this planet; an infinitesimal portion of that energy was enough to warm my eyelids. I was moved. That something as insignificant as an eyelid had its place in the workings of the universe, that the cosmic order did not overlook this momentary fact. Was I any closer to appreciating Alyosha’s insights? Some limited happiness had been granted this limited life.

Troops caught nibbling their emergency D- ration chocolate bars were dubbed Chocolate Soldiers and punished by forfeiting two meals. This was a happy penance. The galleys served so much fatty mutton that derisive bleating could be heard throughout the convoy and the 13th Armored Regiment proposed a new battle cry: 'Baaa!' Crunchy raisins in the bread proved to be weevils; soldiers learned to hold up slices to the light, as if candling eggs. The 1st Infantry Division on Reine de Pacifico organized troop details to sift flour through mesh screens in a search for insects. Wormy meat aboard the Keren so provoked 34th Division soldiers that officers were dispatched to keep order in the mess hall. When soldiers aboard Letitia challenged the culinary honor of one French cook, he 'became quite wild and threatened to jump overboard.

We have a legal system that is a flop — a laughingstock,” says Professor Langbein. “We have a legal system which encourages people not to want to do business in this country.” The American legal system isn’t even working for the lawyers. Even though law is now the highest-paid profession, the lawyers aren’t happy. Many say they went to law school hoping to do good, but now find themselves working incredibly long hours doing tedious work that’s often more about money than justice. A survey of California lawyers found most would change careers if they could. Something’s very wrong when America’s brightest young people are choosing a profession many won’t like, where they’re not building something, not making the economic pie bigger, just fighting over who gets which slice, making each slice cost more, and taking our freedom in the process.

Here’s what the Encyclopedia Galactica has to say about alcohol. It says that alcohol is a colorless volatile liquid formed by the fermentation of sugars and also notes its intoxicating effect on certain carbon-based life forms. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy also mentions alcohol. It says that the best drink in existence is the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster. It says that the effect of drinking a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster is like having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick. The Guide also tells you on which planets the best Pan Galactic Gargle Blasters are mixed, how much you can expect to pay for one and what voluntary organizations exist to help you rehabilitate afterward. The Guide even tells you how you can mix one yourself. Take the juice from one bottle of the Ol’ Janx Spirit, it says. Pour into it one measure of water from the seas of Santraginus V—Oh, that Santraginean seawater, it says. Oh, those Santraginean fish! Allow three cubes of Arcturan Mega-gin to melt into the mixture (it must be properly iced or the benzine is lost). Allow four liters of Fallian marsh gas to bubble through it, in memory of all those happy bikers who have died of pleasure in the Marshes of Pallia. Over the back of a silver spoon float a measure of Qualactin Hypermint extract, redolent of all the heady odors of the dark Qualactin Zones, subtle, sweet and mystic. Drop in the tooth of an Algolian Suntiger. Watch it dissolve, spreading the fires of the Algolian Suns deep into the heart of the drink. Sprinkle Zamphuor. Add an olive. Drink…but…very carefully… The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy sells rather better than the Encyclopedia Galactica.

...he cleared his throat and said aloud: You know, when I fucked my hand up earlier, the first thing I thought was, I bet Alice won’t be happy about this. She turned back to him before replying: And I wasn’t. Yeah, he said. And it’s nice to have someone who would care about something like that. I get sliced to bits every other week out in that place, and it’s not like I have a lot of people saying, oh, that must have hurt, what happened? And look, maybe there is certain things about you I can’t appreciate, and sometimes I don’t like the tone you put on with me, I’ve admitted that. But say you were above in your house on your own and you weren’t feeling well, or you hurt yourself or something, I would want to know about it. And if you wanted me to come up and look after you, I would. And I’m sure you’d do the same. Is that not enough to be going on with? Maybe for you it’s not, but it is for me.

The maze reappeared, in ghostly blue this time, the pellets punctuated by countless miniature foods--- not only fruits but pixelated pizza slices, tiny sushi rolls, petite hamburgers. Ms. Pac-Man faded onto the screen, not in the bottom half, where she usually started, but in the central box, where the ghosts usually did. Instead of her trademark yellow, she appeared blinking, in blue. "She's--- she's one of the ghosts?" Maura took up the controls again. Kostya watched her move through the maze, eating everything in sight. "It's a secret level," Maura told him. "Only available in the 1983 rerelease of the Japanese cabinet. It's called the Hungry Ghost Maze." "So it's a bonus round? The point's just to... get more points?" "The points don't matter in the ghost realm. To clear this level, you have to find the Happy Meal. Hidden in one of these fruits is a portal that gets you back to the real world.

I grabbed a handful of tarragon and closed my eyes, inhaling its sweet fragrance. I could almost feel my grandmother next to me, smell the aromas embedded into her poppy-print apron, taste her creamy veloutés. Thanks to her, my skills in the kitchen started developing from the age of seven. I'd learned how to chop, slice, and dice without cutting my fingers, to sauté, fry, and grill, pairing flavors and taming them into submission. Just as I'd experienced with my grandmother's meals, when people ate my creations, I wanted them to think "now this is love"- while engaging all of the five senses. For me, cooking was the way I expressed myself, each dish a balance of flavors and ingredients representing my emotions- sweet, sour, salty, smoky, spicy-hot, and even bitter. My inspiration as a chef was to give people sensorial experiences, to bring them back to times of happiness, to let them relive their youth, or to awaken their minds.

Happy birthday, Kya,” he said. “You’re fifteen.” A two-tiered bakery cake, tall as a hatbox and decorated with shells of pink icing, rose from the basket. Her name scripted on top. Presents, wrapped in colorful paper and tied with bows, surrounded the cake. She stared, flabbergasted, her mouth open. No one had wished her happy birthday since Ma left. No one had ever given her a store-bought cake with her name on it. She’d never had presents in real wrapping paper with ribbons. “How’d you know my birthday?” Having no calendar, she had no idea it was today. “I read it in your Bible.” While she pleaded for him not to cut through her name, he sliced enormous pieces of cake and plopped them on paper plates. Staring into each other’s eyes, they broke off bites and stuffed them in their mouths. Smacking loudly. Licking fingers. Laughing through icing-smeared grins. Eating cake the way it should be eaten, the way everybody wants to eat it.

I think it would go a long way if you were to join me tomorrow—to teach what you know.” “You realize I’m in this chair.” “And? Your mouth still works.” Tart, crisp words. He blinked again. “They might not find me the most reassuring instructor—” “No, they’ll be swooning and sighing over you so much they’ll forget to be afraid.” His third and final blink made her smile slightly. Grimly. He wondered what that smile would look like if she ever was truly amused—happy. “The scar adds a touch of mystery,” she said, cutting him off before he could remember the slice down his cheek. “You would truly like me to be there tomorrow?” “We’ll have to figure out how to get you there, but it should not be so difficult.” “Stuffing me into a carriage will be fine.” She stiffened, glancing over her shoulder. “Save that anger for our training, Lord Westfall. And you will not be taking a carriage.” “A litter carried by servants, then?” He’d sooner crawl. “A horse. Ever heard of one?” “You need legs to ride.” “So it’s a good thing you still have both of them.

Only art matters, for each work of art is eternal. Those who claim ownership of art are of little importance in the end, since no one can outlive it. Don’t you find that to be a delicious little slice of humility? One of the reasons I love and admire you so deeply is that you have never shown even the smallest amount of pride in having works of art within your possession. Like me, you have nothing but love and respect for art and art alone, so it is high time that you reap the rewards for all you have given. “In no way should you feel indebted to me, Hanna. You have been a source of light and joy in my life, not to mention an ample source of amusement, as I’ve always delighted in your many moods—the good and the bad, your uncontrollable laughter and your fits of rage alike. One could say I’ve led a charmed life. I’ve met scores of art dealers in my time, but none have ever measured up to you, my dear. From this point forward, I wish to have your name and your name only adorning our New York gallery. The pride I have in my pupil far eclipses how proud I am to have once been her teacher. May your life always be full of all the happiness and beauty that you deserve, my dearest Hanna. Yours sincerely, John Glover.

The Sandwich Maker would pass what he had made to his assistant who would then add a few slices of newcumber and fladish and a touch of splagberry sauce, and then apply the topmost layer of bread and cut the sandwich with a fourth and altogether plainer knife. It was not that these were not also skilful operations, but they were lesser skills to be performed by a dedicated apprentice who would one day, when the Sandwich Maker finally laid down his tools, take over from him. It was an exalted position and that apprentice, Drimple, was the envy of his fellows. There were those in the village who were happy chopping wood, those who were content carrying water, but to be the Sandwich Maker was very heaven. And so the Sandwich Maker sang as he worked. He was using the last of the year’s salted meat. It was a little past its best now, but still the rich savour of Perfectly Normal Beast meat was something unsurpassed in any of the Sandwich Maker’s previous experience. Next week it was anticipated that the Perfectly Normal Beasts would appear again for their regular migration, whereupon the whole village would once again be plunged into frenetic action: hunting the Beasts, killing perhaps six, maybe even seven dozen of the thousands that thundered past. Then the Beasts must be rapidly butchered and cleaned, with most of the meat salted to keep it through the winter months until the return migration in the spring, which would replenish their supplies. The very best of the meat would be roasted straight away for the feast that marked the Autumn Passage. The celebrations would last for three days of sheer exuberance, dancing and stories that Old Thrashbarg would tell of how the hunt had gone, stories that he would have been busy sitting making up in his hut while the rest of the village was out doing the actual hunting. And then the very, very best of the meat would be saved from the feast and delivered cold to the Sandwich Maker. And the Sandwich Maker would exercise on it the skills that he had brought to them from the gods, and make the exquisite Sandwiches of the Third Season, of which the whole village would partake before beginning, the next day, to prepare themselves for the rigours of the coming winter. Today he was just making ordinary sandwiches, if such delicacies, so lovingly crafted, could ever be called ordinary. Today his assistant was away so the Sandwich Maker was applying his own garnish, which he was happy to do. He was happy with just about everything in fact.

The path of what was to come was awful. It was the enormous dying, a sea of blood. From it the new sun arose, awful and a reversal of that which we call day. We have seized the darkness and its sun will shine above us, bloody and burning like a great downfall. When I comprehended my darkness, a truly magnificent night came over me and my dream plunged me into the depths of the millennia, and from it my phoenix ascended. But what happened to my day? Torches were kindled, bloody anger and disputes erupted. As darkness seized the world, the terrible war arose and the darkness destroyed the light of the world, since it was incomprehensible to the darkness and good for nothing anymore. And so we had to taste Hell. I saw which vices the virtues of this time changed into, how your mildness became hard, your goodness became brutality; your love became hate, and your understanding became madness. Why did you want to comprehend the darkness! But you had to or else it would have seized you. Happy the man who anticipates this grasp. Did you ever think of the evil in you? Oh, you spoke of it, you mentioned it, and you confessed it smilingly; as a generally human vice, or a recurring misunderstanding. But did you know 1 what evil is, and that it stands precisely right behind your virtues, that it is also your virtues themselves, as their inevitable substance?7! You locked Satan in the abyss for a millennium, and when the millennium had passed, you laughed at him, since he had become a children's fairy tale.72 But if the dreadful great one raises his head, the world winces. The most extreme coldness draws near. With horror you see that you are defenseless, and that the army of your vices falls powerless to its knees. With the power of daimons, you seize the evil, and your virtues cross over to him. You are completely alone in this struggle, since your Gods have become deaf You do not know which devils are greater, your vices, or your virtues. But ofone thing you are certain, that virtues and vices are brothers. 73We need the coldness of death to see clearly. Life wants to live and to die, to begin and to end.74 You are not forced to live eternally; but you can also die, since there is a will in you for both. Life and death must strike a balance in your existence.75 Today's men need a large slice of death, since too much incorrectness lives in them, and too much correctness died in them. What stays in balance is correct, what disturbs balance is incorrect. But if balance has been attained, then that which preserves it is incorrect and that which disturbs it is correct. Balance is at once life and death. For the completion of life a balance with death is fitting. If I accept death, then my tree greens, since dying increases life. If I plunge into the death encompassing the world, then my buds break open. How much our life needs death!

Prayer for the Dads Enduring the Epic Winter Rains Along the Muddy Sidelines at Pee Wee Soccer Games Brothers, I have stood where you stand, in ankle-deep mud, trying not to call instructions and warnings to my child, trying to restrict myself to supportive remarks and not roars of fury at the gangly mute teenage referee who totally missed an assault upon my beloved progeny; and I have also shuffled from leg to leg for an entire hour in an effort to stay warm; and I have also realized I was supposed to bring snacks at halftime five minutes before halftime, and dashed to the store for disgusting liquids in colors unlike any natural color issued from the Creator; and I too have pretended not to care about the score, or about my child’s athletic performance, but said cheery nonsense about how I did not care; and I too have resisted the urge to bring whiskey to the game in a thermos, and so battle the incredible slicing wet winds; and I too have resisted the urge to bring the newspaper or a magazine and at least get some reading done during the long periods of languor as small knots of children surround the ball like wolves around a deer and happily kick each other in the shins; and I too have carefully not said a word when my child and six mud-soaked teammates cram into my car and bang out their cleats on my pristine car floor and leave streaks of mud and disgusting plastic juice on the windows; and I too know that this cold wet hour is a great hour, for you are with your child, and your child is happy, and the Coach of all things gave you that child, and soon enough you will be like me, the father of teenagers who no longer stands along the sidelines laughing with the other dads in the rain. Be there now, brothers, and know how great the gift; for everything has its season, and the world spins ever faster. And so: amen.

Slowly, Tamlin's head lifted, his unbound golden hair dull and matted. 'Do you think she will forgive me?' The question was a rasp, as if he'd been screaming. I knew whom he meant. And I didn't know. I didn't know if her wishing him happiness was the same as forgiveness. If Feyre would ever want to offer that to him. Forgiveness could be a gift to both, but what he'd done... 'Do you want her to?' His green eyes were empty. 'Do I deserve it?' No. Never. He must have read it on my face, because he asked, 'Do you forgive me- for your mother and sister?' 'I don't recall every hearing an apology.' As if an apology would ever right it. As if an apology would ever cover the loss that still ate at me, the hole that remained where their bright, lovely lives had once glowed. 'I don't think one will make a difference, anyway,' Tamlin said, staring at his felled elk once more. 'For either of you.' Broken. Utterly broken. You will need Tamlin as an ally before the dust has settled, Lucien had warned my mate. Perhaps that was why I'd come, too. I waved a hand, my magic slicing and sundering, and the elk's coat slid to the floor in a rasp of fur and slap of wet flesh. Another flicker of power, and slabs of meat had been carved from its sides, piled next to the dark stove- which soon kindled. 'Eat, Tamlin,' I said. He didn't so much as blink. It was not forgiveness- it was not kindness. I could not, would not, ever forget what he'd done to those I loved most. But it was Solstice, or had been. And perhaps because Feyre had given me a gift greater than any I could dream of, I said, 'You can waste away and die after we've sorted out this new world of ours.' A pulse of my power, and an iron skillet slid onto the now-hot stove, a steak of meat thumping into it with a sizzle. 'Eat, Tamlin,' I repeated, and vanished on a dark wind.

I look over the recipe again. It sounds very simple. You boil some rice in water like pasta, I can do that. You cook some onion in butter, stir in the rice, pop it in the oven. Add some cream and grated cheese and mix it up. And voila! A real dinner. I pull out a couple of the pots Caroline gave me, and began to get everything laid out. Grant always yammered on about mise en place, that habit of getting all your stuff together before you start cooking so you can be organized. It seems to make sense, and appeals to the part of me that likes to make lists and check things off of them. I manage to chop a pile of onions without cutting myself, but with a lot of tears. At one point I walk over to the huge freezer and stick my head in it for some relief, while Schatzi looks at me like I'm an idiot. Which isn't unusual. Or even come to think of it, wrong. But I get them sliced and chopped, albeit unevenly, and put them in the large pot with some butter. I get some water boiling in the other pot and put in some rice. I cook it for a few minutes, drain it, and add it to the onions, stirring them all together. Then I put the lid on the pot and put it in the oven, and set my phone with an alarm for thirty-five minutes. The kitchen smells amazing. Nothing quite like onions cooked in butter to make the heart happy. While it cooks, I grab a beer, and grate some Swiss cheese into a pile. When my phone buzzes, I pull the pot out of the oven and put it back on the stovetop, stirring in the cream and cheese, and sprinkling in some salt and pepper. I grab a bowl and fill it with the richly scented mixture. I stand right there at the counter, and gingerly take a spoonful. It's amazing. Rich and creamy and oniony. The rice is nicely cooked, not mushy. And even though some of my badly cut onions make for some awkward eating moments, as the strings slide out of the spoon and attach themselves to my chin, the flavor is spectacular. Simple and comforting, and utterly delicious.

Eat, woman,” he bellowed, leaning over her, prepared to force the remainder of her meal into her opened mouth. “I would,” she said in a strained voice, “But there is a giant attached to my chin. Perhaps if he would be so gracious as to remove the cured pork from my pack, I would share it with him.” Rautu’s eyes blazed in senseless joy. He released his companion and hastened toward her effects, rummaging through them with great anticipation. He found a small brown parchment parcel and assumed that this was the source of his happiness. He sniffed the outside of the paper and hummed in delight for the exquisite scent. He tore open the barrier between him and his prize and he was compelled to smile when remarking the numerous slices of meat in his hands. He began eating them immediately, leaving no time between one slice and the next to savour that which he had longed to again taste. The superior fare of Frewyn had been the chief of his consolation during the war, and if he was to remain on the islands with all its splendor, all its comforting familiarity, all its temperate climate, and all its horrendous food, he would relish this last ember of bliss before being made to suffer a diet of steamed grains again. “I did say share,” the commander called out. “I am responsible for securing your life,” he replied with a full mouth and without turning around. “And I thanked you accordingly.” The commander’s remonstrations were unanswered, and she scoffed in aversion as she watched the voracious beast consume nearly all the provisions she had been saving for the return journey. “I know you shall not be satisfied until you have all the tribute in the world, but that pork does belong to me, Rau.” “You are not permitted to have meat while taking our medicines,” he said, dismissively. She peered at him in circumspection. “I don’t recall you mentioning that stipulation before. I find it convenient that you should care to do so now.” The giant paused, his cheeks filled with pork. “And?” he said, shoving another slice into his mouth. “And,” she laughed, “You’re going to allow me to starve on your inedible bread while you skulk off with something that was meant for both of us?” “Perhaps.” “Savior, indeed,” the commander fleered. “You have saved me from one means of death only to plunge me into another.

The phone rang and Chassie excused herself to answer it. Silence hung between them as heavy as snow clouds in a winter sky. Eventually, Edgard said, "She doesn't know anything about me. Not even that we were roping partners. Not that we were..." He looked at Trevor expectantly. "No." Trevor quickly glanced at the living room where Chassie was chattering away. "You surprised?" "Maybe that she isn't aware of our official association as roping partners. There was no shame in that. We were damn good together, Trev." The word shame echoed like a slap. As good as they were together, it'd never been enough, in an official capacity or behind closed doors. "What are you really doin' here?" Edgard didn't answer right away. "I don't know. Feeling restless. Had the urge to travel." "Wyoming ain't exactly an exotic port of call." "You think I don't realize that? You think I wouldn't rather be someplace else? But something..." Edgard lowered his voice. "Ah, fuck it." "What?" "Want the truth? Or would you rather I lie?" "The truth." "Truth between us? That's refreshing." Edgard's gaze trapped his. "I'm here because of you." Trevor's heart alternately stopped and soared, even when his answer was an indiscernible growl. "For Christsake, Ed. What the hell am I supposed to say to that? With my wife in the next room?" "You're making a big deal out of this. She thinks we're friends, which ain't a lie. We were partners before we were..." Edgard gestured distractedly. "If she gets the wrong idea, it won't be from me." "Maybe I'm gettin' the wrong idea. The last thing you said to me when you fuckin' left me was that you weren't ever comin' back. And you made it goddamn clear you didn't want to be my friend. So why are you here?" Pause. He traced the rim of his coffee cup with a shaking fingertip. "I heard about you gettin' married." "That happened over a year ago and you came all the way from Brazil to congratulate me in person? Now?" "No." Edgard didn't seem to know what to do with his hands. He raked his fingers through his hair. His voice was barely audible. "Will it piss you off if I admit I was curious about whether you're really happy, meu amore?" My love. My ass. Trevor snapped, "Yes." "Yes, you're pissed off? Or yes, you're happy?" "Both." "Then this is gonna piss you off even more." "What?" "Years and miles haven't changed anything between us and you goddamn well know it." Trevor looked up; Edgard's golden eyes were laser beams slicing him open. "It don't matter. If you can't be my friend while you're in my house, walk out the fuckin' door. I will not allow either one of us to hurt my wife. Got it?" "Yeah." "Good. And I'm done talkin' about this shit so don't bring it up again. Ever.

Stoic ethics is a species of eudaimonism. Its central, organizing concern is about what we ought to do or be to live well—to flourish. That is, we make it a lemma that all people ought to pursue a good life for themselves as a categorical commitment second to none. It does not follow from this that they ought to pursue any one particular version of the good life, or to cling tenaciously to the one they are pursuing. … Living virtuously is the process of creating a single, spatiotemporal object—a life. A life has a value as an object, as a whole. It is not always the case that its value as an object will be a function of the value of its spatiotemporal parts considered separately. But it is always the case that an evaluation of the parts will be incomplete until they are understood in the context of the whole life. What seems so clearly valuable (or required or excellent) when we focus on a thin temporal slice of a life (or a single, long strand of a life) may turn out to be awful or optional or vicious when we take a larger view. And it is the life as a whole that we consider when we think about its value in relation to other things, or its value as a part of the cosmos. … In our view, a focus on the parts of a life, or on the sum of its parts, obscures some important features of ethical inquiry. One such feature is the extent to which an agent’s own estimate of the value of his life is necessarily inconclusive: others will have to judge his life as a whole, because its character as a whole is not likely to be predictable while he is around to judge it, and because many important holistic considerations, such as its beauty, excellence, justice, and net effect, are things that he is either not well situated to judge or at least not in a privileged position to judge. Another feature obscured is the range of ways in which a single event or characteristic, without wide causal connections to other elements of one’s life, can nonetheless ruin it; for example, the possibility that a monstrously unjust act can indelibly stain a whole life. A third, related obscurity introduced by ignoring a whole-life frame of reference is the extent to which both aesthetic criteria and the notion of excellence have clear roles in the evaluation of a life. The whole-life frame of reference, together with a plausible account of the variety of ways in which a life can be a good one, keeps Stoicism sharply distinct from Epicurean doctrines, or their modern “welfarist” offshoots. How well my life is going from the inside, so to speak, in terms of the quality of my experience, is only one of the things that enters into a Stoic evaluation of it. We hold that there is a single unifying aim in the life of every rational agent, and that aim, guided by the notion of a good life (happiness, eudaimonia), is virtue, understood as the perfection of agency.

I want you to be happy. Eat it.” A wry smile curved Rose’s lips. “Am I to find happiness in a piece of chocolate cake?” Eve already had a forkful en route to her mouth. “I stake my reputation on it.” “Oh,” she replied dryly. “Surely heaven is just a bite away.” “Speaking of heaven,” Eve said a few minutes later when Rose thought she might expire from the bliss the dessert inspired, “tell me about your evening at Saint’s Row.” “Shh!” Her paranoid gaze darted around to see if anyone had overheard, but there was no one standing close enough to their whitewashed bench. “Don’t shush me, Rose Danvers. I’m your best friend and you’ve kept me waiting four whole days! I demand details.” Cheeks flushed, Rose stared at the half-eaten cake on her plate. Eve’s timing might leave something to be desired, but at least she’d stopped Rose from eating the entire slice. “What do you want to know?” Eve’s expression was incredulous. “Everything, of course.” Then, as though realizing who she was talking to, she sighed. “Did you find him?” Rose nodded. “I did.” The fire in her cheeks burned hotter, and she looked away. “Oh, Eve!” Her friend grabbed her wrist, clattering fork against plate. “That arse didn’t hurt you did he?” “No!” Then lowering her voice, “And he’s not an arse.” Using such rough language made her feel daring and bold. The scowl on Eve’s face eased. “Then…he was good to you?” Rose nodded, leaning closer. “It was the most amazing experience of my life.” The blonde giggled, bringing her head nearer to Rose’s. “Tell me everything.” So Rose did, within reason, looking up every once in awhile to make sure no one could hear. Afterward, when she was finished, Eve looked at her with a peculiar expression. “It sounds wonderful.” “It was.” Eve’s ivory brow tightened. “So, why do you sound so…disappointed?” Rose sighed. “It’s going to sound so pathetic, but when I saw Grey the next day he didn’t recognize me.” “But I thought you didn’t want him to know it was you.” Rose laughed darkly. “I don’t. That’s the rub of it.” She turned to more fully face her friend. “But part of me wanted him to realize it was me, Eve. I wanted him to see me as a woman, not as his responsibility or burden.” “I’m sure he doesn’t view you as any such thing.” Shaking her head Rose set the plate of cake aside, her appetite gone for good. "I thought this scheme would make everything better, and it's only made things worse." Worse because her feelings for Grey hadn't lessened as she'd hoped they might, they'd only deepened. Eve worried her upper lip with her bottom teeth. "Are you going to meet him again?" Another shake of her head, vehement this time. "No." "But. Rose, he wants to see you." "Not me, her." This was said with a bit more bitterness than Rose was willing to admit. He might have whispered her name, but it wasn't her he wanted to meet. Eve chuckled. "But you are her." She squeezed her wrist again. "Rose, don't you see? You're who he wants to see again, whether he knows it was you or not." Rose hadn't looked at it that way. She wasn't quite convinced her friend was right, but it was enough to make her doubt her own conclusions. She shook her head again. Blast, but she was making herself lightheaded. "I just don't know." "You'll figure it out," Eve allowed. "You always do.

Luit never came out of the anesthesia. He paid dearly for having stood up to two other males, frustrating them by his steep ascent. Those two had been plotting against him in order to take back the power they had lost. The shocking way they did so opened my eyes to how deadly seriously chimpanzees take their politics. Two-against-one maneuvering is what lends chimpanzee power struggles both their richness and their danger. Coalitions are key. No male can rule by himself, at least not for long, because the group as a whole can overthrow anybody. Chimpanzees are so clever about banding together that a leader needs allies to fortify his position as well as the greater community’s acceptance. Staying on top is a balancing act between forcefully asserting dominance, keeping supporters happy, and avoiding mass revolt. If this sounds familiar, it’s because human politics works exactly the same. Before Luit’s death, the Arnhem colony was ruled jointly by Nikkie, a young upstart, and Yeroen, an over-the-hill conniver. Barely adult at seventeen, Nikkie was a brawny character with a dopey expression. He was very determined, but not the sharpest knife in the drawer. He was supported by Yeroen, who was physically not up to the task of being a leader anymore, yet who wielded enormous influence behind the scenes. Yeroen had a habit of watching disputes unfold from a distance, stepping in only when emotions were flaring to calmly support one side or the other, thus forcing everybody to pay attention to his decisions. Yeroen shrewdly exploited the rivalries among younger and stronger males. Without going into the complex history of this group, it was clear that Yeroen hated Luit, who had wrested power from him years before. Luit had defeated Yeroen in a struggle that had taken three hot summer months of daily tensions involving the entire colony. The next year, Yeroen had gotten even by helping Nikkie dethrone Luit. Ever since, Nikkie had been the alpha male with Yeroen as his right-hand man. The two became inseparable. Luit was unafraid of either one of them alone. In one-on-one encounters in the night cages, Luit dominated every other male in the colony, taking away their food or chasing them around. No single one of them could possibly have kept him in his place. This meant that Yeroen and Nikkie ruled as a team, and only as a team. They did so for four long years. But their coalition eventually began to unravel, and as is not uncommon among men, the divisive issue was sex. Being the kingmaker, Yeroen had enjoyed extraordinary sexual privileges. Nikkie would not let any other males get near the most attractive females, but for Yeroen he had always made an exception. This was part of the deal: Nikkie had the power, and Yeroen got a slice of the sexual pie. This happy arrangement ended only when Nikkie tried to renegotiate its terms. In the four years of his rule, he had grown increasingly self-confident. Had he forgotten who had helped him get to the top? When the young leader began to throw his weight around, interfering with the sexual adventures not only of other males but also of Yeroen himself, things got ugly. Infighting within the ruling coalition went on for months, until one day Yeroen and Nikkie failed to reconcile after a spat. With Nikkie following him around, screaming and begging for their customary embrace, the old fox finally walked away without looking back. He’d had it. Luit filled the power vacuum overnight. The most magnificent chimpanzee male I have known, both in body and spirit, quickly grew in stature as the alpha male. Luit was popular with females, a mighty arbiter of disputes, protector of the downtrodden, and effective at disrupting bonding among rivals in the divide-and-rule tactic typical of both chimp and man. As soon as Luit saw other males together he would either join them or perform a charging display to disband them.

I had a dream where I was in a place that served steak and mashed potatoes and the soup! The pasta soup was heavenly even better than my mother’s homemade recipe. Every spoonful of the soup reminded me of the sun. The mashed potatoes were so smooth that they could slide down my gullet. The steak was medium-rare, my favorite, and every bite reminded me of the steak my mom made but it was one hundred and one times better.  And there was also iced tea and every sip of it felt refreshing like a cold, winter morning with the sun shining merrily and my mom and I throwing snowballs at each other. I  ate and drank until I could eat no more. I felt as if my stomach was about to combust. But then in came the tiramisu. It was better than anything I had ever tasted. The rich smell of coffee wafted up from it. It reminded me of the coffee shop my mom went to when I was little. Despite the fact that my stomach was about to explode I managed to fit in three more slices of tiramisu before I could eat no more. But then came the Ice cream. It was my favorite flavor, mango. The ice cream was silky and sweet. It was like I was on a sunny June morning, a ray of sunlight shining in my face. The sensation intensified as mango juice dribbled down my chin like sunlight itself. I managed six scoops before I was sure my belly would explode. Every moment of eating the ice cream was sunsational. Finally came the float. It was vanilla ice cream on top of some Fanta even though my mom insisted root beer was one hundred times better. It tasted amazing. It was like the early spring making our ice crack in the pond on which my mother and I go ice skating every winter. It was happy but also sad at the same time as if my old life called back for me.

No matter what anyone in North Star thought of my mom, everyone agreed on one thing: she was the best cook in the Texas Hill Country. She was known for her barbecue and fried pies. But she was most famous for one particular dish. The dish people people would drive hundreds of miles for was simply called the Number One. I imagine Momma was going to make a list of specials. The trouble was, she never got past the Number One. So there it sat at the top of the menu, alone, all by itself. The Number One: Chicken fried steak with cream gravy, mashed potatoes, green beans cooked in bacon fat, one buttermilk biscuit, and a slice of pecan pie With Brad's words ringing in my head about my vague culinary vision, I decide to make the Number One for tonight's supper. After leaving the salon, I drive to various farm stands, grocery stores, and butchers. I handpick the top-round steak with care, choose fresh eggs one by one, and feel an immense sense of home as I pull Mom's cast-iron skillet from the depths of Merry Carole's cabinets. My happiest memories involve me walking into whatever house we were staying in at the time to the sounds and smells of chicken fried steak sizzling away in that skillet. This dish is at the very epicenter of who I am. If my culinary roots start anywhere, it's with the Number One. As I tenderize the beef, my mind is clear and I'm happy. I haven't cooked like this- my recipes for me and the people I love- in far too long. If ever. Time flies as I roll out the crust for the pecan pie. I'm happy and contented as I cut out the biscuit rounds one by one. I haven't a care in the world. Being in Merry Carole's kitchen has washed away everything I left in the whirlwind of being back in North Star.

He wanted his little slice of happiness so much that he sacrificed the whole pig for a slice of ham.

WeWork’s core business was simple. It leased space, cut it up, and rented out each slice with an upcharge for hip design, flexibility, and regular happy hours. Other companies had risen, and in many cases fallen, by offering more or less the same service, which amounted to a straightforward arbitrage: lease long, rent short, and collect the margin.

Leo bit a cheese slice into the shape of a smile. He held it up to his mouth. “Leo is happy when he’s not being tortured to death.

The first sign that something had gone wrong manifested itself while he was playing golf. Or rather it was the first time he admitted to himself that something might be wrong. For some time he had been feeling depressed without knowing why. In fact, he didn't even realize he was depressed. Rather it was the world and his life around him which seemed to grow more senseless and farcical with each passing day. Then two odd incidents occurred on the golf course. Once he fell down in a bunker. There was no discernable reason for his falling. One moment he was standing in the bunker with his sand-iron appraising the lie of his ball. The next he was lying flat on the ground. Lying there, cheek pressed against the earth, he noticed that thinks looked different from this unaccustomed position. A strange bird flew past. A cumulus cloud went towering thousands of feet into the air. Ordinarily he would not have given the cloud a second glance. But as he gazed at it from the bunker, it seemed to turn purple and gold at the bottom while the top went boiling up higher and higher like the cloud over Hiroshima. Another time, he sliced out-of-bounds, something he seldom did. As he searched for the ball deep in the woods, another odd thing happened to him. He heard something and the sound reminded him of an event that had happened a long time ago. It was the most important event of his life, yet he had managed until that moment to forget it. Shortly afterwards, he became even more depressed. People seemed more farcical than ever. More than once he shook his head and, smiling ironically, said to himself: This is not for me. Then it was that it occurred to him that he might shoot himself. First, it was only a thought which popped into his head. Next, it was an idea which he entertained ironically. Finally, it was a course of action which he took seriously and decided to carry out. The lives of other people seemed even more farcical than his own. It astonished him that as farcical as most people's lives were, they generally gave no sign of it. Why was it that it was he not they who had decided to shoot himself? How did they manage to deceive themselves and even appear to live normally, work as usual, play golf, tell jokes, argue politics? Was he crazy or was it rather the case that other people went to any length to disguise from themselves the fact that their lives were farcical? He couldn't decide. What is one to make of such a person? To begin with: though it was probably the case that he was ill and that it was his illness - depression - which made the world seem farcical, it is impossible to prove the case. On the one hand, he was depressed. On the other hand, the world is in fact farcical. Or at least it is possible to make the case that for some time now life has seemed to become more senseless, even demented, with each passing year. True, most people he knew seemed reasonably sane and happy. They played golf, kept busy, drank, talked, laughed, went to church, appeared to enjoy themselves, and in general were both successful and generous. Their talk made a sort of sense. They cracked jokes. On the other hand, perhaps it is possible, especially in strange times such as these, for an entire people, or at least a majority, to deceive themselves into believing that things are going well when in fact they are not, when things are in fact farcical. Most Romans worked and played as usual while Rome fell about their ears.

I believe that we shocked each other by how swiftly we went from being the people who knew each other best in the world to being a pair of the most mutually incomprehensible strangers who ever lived. But it was vital to my survival to have a one bedroom of my own i saw the aprtment almost as a sanatorium a hospice clinci for my own recovery I painted the walls in the warmest colors i could find and bought myself flowers every week as if i were visiting myself in the hospital is this lifetime supposed to be only about duty why are you studying Italian so that just in case Italy ever invades Ethiopia again and is actually successful this time? ciao comes from if you must know it's an abbreviation of a phrase used by medieval venetians as an intimate salutation Sono il Suo Schiavo meaning i am your slave. om Naamah Shivaya meaning I honor the divinity that resides whin me. I wanted to experience both , I wanted worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence the dual glories of a human life I wanted what the Greeks called kalos kai agathos the singular balance of the good and he beautiful I'd been missing both during these last hard years because both pleasure and devotion require a stress free space in which to flourish and I'd been living in a giant trash compactor of nonstop anxiety , As for how to balance the urge for pleasure against the longing for devotion. four feet on the ground a head full of foliage looking at the world through the heart. it was more than I wanted to toughly explore one aspect of myself set against the backdrop of each country in a place that has traditionally done that one thing very well. same guatemalan musicians are always playing id rather be a sparrow than a snail on their bamboo windpipes oh how i want italian to open itself up to me i havent felt so starved for comprehension since then dal centro della mia vita venne una grande fontanana dolce sitl nuovo Dante wrote his divine comedy in terza rima triple rhyme a chain of rhymes with each rhyme repeating here times every five lines. lamor che move il sole e laltre stelle we are the masters of bel far niente larte darrangiarsi The reply in italy to you deserve a break today would probably be yeah no duh that's why I'm planning on taking a break at noon to go over to your house and sleep with your wife, I walked home to my apartment and soft-boiled a pair of fresh brown eggs for my lunch i peeled the eggs and arranged them on a plate beside the seven stalks of the asparagus (which were so slim and snappy they didn't need to be cooked at all,)I put some olives on the plate too and the four knobs of goat cheese I'd picked up yesterday from the fromagerie down the street tend two slices of pink oily salmon for dessert a lovely peach which the woman at the market had given to me for free and which was still warm form the roman sunlight for the longest time I couldn't even touch this food because it was such a masterpiece of lunch a true expression of the art of making something out of nothing finally when i had fully absorbed the prettiness of my meal i went and sat in apatch of sunbeam on my clean wooden floor and ate every bit of it with my fingers while reading my daily newspaper article in Italian happiness inhabited my every molecule. I am inspired by the regal self assurance of this town so grounded and rounded so amused and monumental knowing that she is held securely in the palm of history i would like to be like rome when i am an old lady. I linger over my food and wine for many hours because nobody in

Dear me, you're like the grand champion of awesome sauce! Your wit is so sharp it could slice through ice cream without melting it, and your charm could make even a rock swoon. I mean, seriously, you're so incredible; you make unicorns jealous! So keep on being your fantastic self, 'cause the world needs more of your wit-tastic brilliance!

There's no messing with perfection. (Okay, a little messing, just for fun.) A few crystals of coarse sea salt, a drizzle of local olive oil, and a sprig or two of purple basil. Sliced and layered in a white ceramic dish, the tomatoes often match the hues of the local sunsets--- reds and golds, yellows and pinks. If there were such a thing in our house as "too pretty to eat," this would be it. Thankfully, there's not. If I'm not exactly cooking, I have done some impromptu matchmaking: baby tomatoes with smoked mozzarella, red onions, fennel, and balsamic vinegar. A giant yellow tomato with a local sheep's milk cheese and green basil. Last night I got a little fancy and layered slices of beefsteak tomato with pale green artichoke puree and slivers of Parmesan. I constructed the whole thing to look like the Leaning Tower of Pisa. I love to think of the utterly pretentious name this would be given in a trendy Parisian bistro: Millefeuille de tomate provençale, tapenade d'artichaut et coppa de parmesan d'Italie (AOC) sur son lit de salade, sauce aigre douce aux abricots. And of course, since this is a snooty Parisian bistro and half their clientele are Russian businessmen, the English translation would be printed just below: Tomato napoleon of artichoke tapenade and aged Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese on a bed of mixed greens with sweet-and-sour apricot vinaigrette. The sauce abricot was a happy accident. While making the dressing for the green salad, I mistook a bottle of peach/apricot syrup for the olive oil. Since I didn't realize my mistake until it was at the bottom of the bowl, I decided to try my luck. Mixed with Dijon mustard and some olive oil, it was very nice--- much sweeter than a French vinaigrette, more like an American-style honey Dijon. I decided to add it to my pretentious Parisian bistro dish because, believe it or not, Parisian bistros love imitating American food. Anyone who has been in Paris in the past five years will note the rise of le Tchizzberger. (That's bistro for "cheeseburger.") I'm moderate in my use of social media, but I can't stop taking pictures of the tomatoes. Close up, I've taken to snapping endless photos of the voluptuously rounded globes. I rejoice in the mingling of olive oil and purply-red flesh. Basil leaves rest like the strategically placed tassels of high-end strippers. Crystals of sea salt catch the afternoon sun like rhinestones under the glaring lights of the Folies Bergère. I may have invented a whole new type of food photography: tomato porn.

Setting aside commitments, we are left with the small slice of the day that embodies our daily freedom. You must strive to grow this slice of time.

Apple Kuchen In the story, Jace and Grant both love sweets. This apple kuchen is something Cora Lee would have made that they both enjoyed. Happy baking! Apple Kuchen Cake 1 cup flour 2 tablespoons sugar 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/2 cup butter, softened Blend together with a fork, or pastry blender, until crumbly and well mixed. Pat into a greased 9” x 9” or 8” x 8” square pan. Set aside. Filling 4 cups apples, peeled and sliced (Granny Smith works great) 1/2 cup sugar 1 teaspoon cinnamon Mix apples with sugar and cinnamon. Layer over cake batter. Topping 1/3 cup flour 1/2 cup sugar 1/4 cup butter, softened 1 teaspoon cinnamon Use a fork to combine. Sprinkle on top of apples. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake for 45-50 minutes, until edges are lightly browned. Serve with lightly sweetened whipped cream or ice cream. Refrigerate leftovers – if you have any!

Her limbs function, and she finds this miraculous when she dwells on it. In fact, she finds plenty of things miraculous. Forcefully, she summons her best memories. That time on a red-eye bus when the driver used the intercom to contemplate, in campfire baritone, the wonder of his grandchildren, the way they validated his life as time well spent. As he lulled the passengers with stories, someone began to pass around a Tupperware of sliced watermelon, and a drunk man offered to share the miniature bottles of whiskey from his bag, and Joan felt such overwhelming affection for her species, she feared she would sacrifice herself to save it. A bad summer storm. Green sky, tornado warning, violent winds. Joan was downtown, leaving work early, briskly walking toward the parking garage where her station wagon waited. On the opposite end of the sidewalk, a large woman in her sixties collapsed. Immediately, two people rushed to the woman's side, gingerly tending to her, touching her shoulders and face, speaking to her as though she were their mother -- a cherished one -- and Joan understood that human tenderness was not to be mocked. It was the last real thing. Dining alone on a blustery Easter night at the only Chinese restaurant in town. When she asked for the check, the waiter said, "It just started to rain. You're welcome to stay a little longer, if you want." Miraculous. Joan recalls the existence of dogs, craft stores, painkillers, the public library. Cream ribboning through coffee. The scent of the lilacs near her childhood home. Brown sugar on a summer strawberry. Her father's recovery from the tyranny of multigenerational alcoholism. The imperfect but true repossession of his life. The euphoria of the first warmth after winter, the first easy breath after a cold, the return of one's appetite after an anxiety attack. Joan has much to be happy about. She thinks: I am happy, you are happy, we are happy. These thoughts -- how she can force herself to have them. Miraculous.

It’s absolute chaos, but we’re all happy.

Rural Free Delivery (RFD) Home, upon that word drops the sunshine of beauty and the shadow of tender sorrows, the reflection of ten thousand voices and fond memories. This is a mighty fine old world after all if you make yourself think so. Look happy even if things are going against you— that will make others happy. Pretty soon all will be smiling and then there is no telling what can’t be done. Coca-Cola Girl Mother baked a fortune cake pale yellow icing, lemon drops round rim, hidden within treasures, a ring—you’ll be married, a button—stay a bachelor, a thimble—always a spinster, and a penny—you’re rich. Gee, but I am hungry. Wait a second, dear, until I pull my belt up another notch. There that’s better. So, you see, Hon, I am straighter than a string around a bundle. You ought to see my eye, it’s a peach. I am proud of it, looks like I’ve been kicked by a mule. You know, dear, that they can kick hard enough to knock all the soda out of a biscuit without breaking the crust Hogging Catfish This gives you a fighting chance. Noodle your right hand into their gills, hold on tight while you grunt him out of the water. This can be a real dogfight. Old river cat wants to go down deep, make you bottom feed. Like I said, boys, when you tell a whopper, say it like you believe it. Saturday Ritual My Granddad was a cobbler. We each owned two pairs of shoes, Sunday shoes and everyday shoes. When our Sunday shoes got worn they became our everyday shoes. Main Street Saturday Night We each were given a dime on Saturday opening a universe of possibilities. All the stores stayed open and people flocked into town. Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds set up a popcorn stand on Reinheimer’s corner and soon after lighting a little stove, sounding like small firecrackers, popping began. Dad, laughing shooting the breeze with a group of farmers, drinking Coca Cola, finding out if any sheds needed to be built or barns repaired, discussing the price of next year’s seed, finding out who’s really working, who’s just looking busy. There is no object I wouldn’t give to relive my childhood growing up in Delavan— where everyone knew everyone— and joy came with but a dime. Market Day Jim Pittsford’s grocery smelled of bananas ripening and the coffee he ground by hand, wonderful smoked ham and bacon fresh sliced. He’d reward the child who came to pick up the purchase, with a large dill pickle Biking home, skillfully balancing Jim Pittsford’s bacon, J B’s tomatoes and peaches, while sniffing a tantalizing spice rising from fresh warm rolls, I nibbled my pickle reward.

strawberry sunrise Though its name is somewhat evocative of a sweet elderly couple holding hands as they watch the sunrise, this drink is rather bold in its combination of prosecco, white wine, and tequila. In other words, this beautiful farm-to-table beverage has a bit of a sneaky bite. It’s best enjoyed, I’d say, with a lover, though it goes down just as easily with friends over brunch, during an at-home happy hour, or when alone on a Saturday afternoon with your cat/dog/pig/opossum. TIME: 5 MINUTES SERVES: 1 2 strawberries Ground pink peppercorns 1 ounce tequila 2 ounces sauvignon blanc 1 ounce Strawberry Syrup 1½ ounces Strawberry Mint Lemonade 1 ounce prosecco Splash of fresh orange juice Cut the stem out of each strawberry with a “V” cut, then slice each strawberry from top to bottom into ¼-inch-thick slices so that each slice resembles a heart. Take the prettiest slice and cut a small notch in its narrow end. Spread the pink peppercorns on a small plate. Dip one edge of the strawberry slice in the pink pepper until the edge is coated. Set aside, reserving the pink pepper. Fill a wineglass with ice and add the remaining strawberry slices. Add the tequila, sauvignon blanc, strawberry syrup, lemonade, prosecco, and orange juice to the glass. Sprinkle a pinch of pink pepper on top of the drink. Stir with a barspoon. Secure the notched strawberry garnish to the rim of the glass. Serve and enjoy.

Imagine that the whole universe is squeezed into one train: every galaxy, star, and planet and every grain of sand and living being. This train sets off on a journey, not from one city to the next but rather on a journey through time. As a passenger on that train, you can move anywhere you choose, but you can’t change the train’s direction or speed, which is restricted to a track that is the arrow of time. You just go for the ride with no control over its position or orientation, hopping from a slice of “now” to the next along the time dimension.

Dear Boundaryless Client, We certainly love working with you. (This is the first slice of graciousness.) Squeezing this important request in over the weekend won’t work for us. (This is the no. Just get it out.) Your deliverables are very important, and we want to make sure they get the focus they deserve. (Second slice of graciousness. This sentence shows good intention and some effort at gentle repair for their disappointment.) We would be happy to give this our full attention early Monday morning and have some numbers to you by end of business. Best, Chris

This is his very last trick, and now, here, tonight, he will slowly, carefully, meticulously, slice by slice and piece by piece, pay the toll to the happy bridge keeper with the bright blade, and slowly cross that final span into an unending darkness that he will soon be very willing, even very anxious, to join, because by then he will know that it is the only way out of the pain. But not now, not yet, not too soon; first we have to get him there, get him to the point of no return and just beyond it to where it is oh-so-clear to him that we have arrived at the edge and he can never go back. He must see that, understand that, absorb that, accept it as right and necessary and immutable, and it is our happy task to take him there and then point back to the border at the edge of the end and say, See? This is where you are now. You have crossed over and now it all ends.

Dai precedenti vent'anni di esperienza, l'istinto mi suggeriva che per riflettere su un problema a cui non si trovava una soluzione valida, la cosa migliore era camminare senza sosta.

The battle raged, the blood, gore and the stench of death of hundreds of the fallen, of both Saxons and Vikings permeated the air around her. With Every move Her chest guard dug painfully into her side from a gouge from a broad sword. Her helm obscured her peripheral vision as it had been her brothers, and sat awkwardly on her head due to its size. No time to catch her breath as the huge Saxon assaulted her, her shield fending off the vicious blows of his claymore. Being nearly half his size, she needed to be nimble and smart, a swift upper cut to his jaw with her shield caught him off balance, followed by a slice from her modified broad sword. The Saxon fell to his knees, allowing just enough decrease in stature for Brynhild to finish him off with a jab to the neck, arterial spray covered her face and chest. No time to rest, the next Saxon was upon her, hacking forcefully at her shield she was sure it would splinter. It took all her strength to maintain her footing. His attack was merciless, forcing her to careen backwards, steel crashed against steel in a maddened melee. She feinted left, then put all her velocity in shouldering him in his midsection, momentum taking him swiftly to the blood sodden ground. In the distance a call to retreat was heard from the Saxon Lord, the battle broke, the Viking horde was victorious, Brynhild slumped down a nearby tree, too exhausted and weak to move her last conscious thought was to wonder who the strong Shield-maiden was that gently picked her up and carried her forward. The next thing she knew, she was in a magnificent Hall, filled with raucous laughter and the scent of roasted boar. The sound of sword play was also heard from a nearby doorway. Warriors sat with horns filled with mead, in earnest discourse of the battles they had fought. A clearing of a throat brought her eyes to the great table at the head of the hall, there stood a heavily muscled bearded, one-eyed Man, the hall was moved to silence as the great man strode toward her. “Welcome to Valhalla Brynhild,” he clapped a hand on her shoulder “You have fought bravely, Please take your place among the warriors and enjoy the feast.” Shouts of Skal! filled the hall. Happiness assailed her, resurrected, to one day fight again for Odin in the twilight of the Gods, The Battle of Ragnarök.

sliced at me like razors. It was like my heart was split down the middle—I had one half and Sloan had the other. I knew without a doubt that from this point forward I’d have to care for her better than I cared for myself—because I could never be okay if she wasn’t.

Moist cake, fresh blueberries, and melt-in-the-mouth frosting. "Best ever." He understood her slow savoring and the licking of her lips. "I could eat blueberry butter cake for breakfast, lunch, and dinner," she confessed. She tapped her fork on the plate, encouraging him. "There's plenty; have a second bite." He shook his head; she was his indulgence. All happy, uninhibited, and turned on by cake. "I enjoy dessert now and again," he conceded. "But I'm more of a meat-and-potato guy." "There's steak and eggs on our breakfast menu," she said. "Gram makes amazing home fries. Sliced potatoes, chopped onions, and sweet bell peppers cooked in bacon fat. Don't get me started on her buttermilk biscuits.

But it will feel more true than it is, for sin can never deliver on its promise to make us happy. Vomit will always be vomit even if drizzled with chocolate, sliced almonds, and a cherry on top (2 Peter 2:21–22). When the temptation to see sin as what it is not arrives, the Scriptures are our light, our final truth, our escape out of the shadow moving toward our feet. The Word of God and not the word of the enemy is where we see the true identity of sin.

Do what lights up your soul like a disco ball in a dark room. Chase after joy like it’s the last slice of pizza at a party. Life’s too short for anything less than belly laughs, spontaneous adventures, and dancing like nobody’s watching. So, crank up the music, grab your sparkly shoes, and strut through life with a twinkle in your eye and a skip in your step. After all, the best moments happen when you follow the rhythm of your own happiness.

Luperón Papaya Salsa There is no such thing as a small papaya in Luperón. I created this salsa to take advantage of the half we regularly had left after breakfast. Serve it alongside grilled chicken or fish—or with cream cheese on crackers, as a happy hour snack. 1⁄2 large ripe papaya, diced (about 2 cups) 1⁄2 cucumber, peeled, seeded, and diced 1⁄2 small red onion, thinly sliced and separated into rings, and rings cut in half 3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh cilantro 1⁄2–1 small hot red or green pepper, seeded and finely chopped (or to taste) 1 lime, juiced 3 tablespoons fruity olive oil Salt and freshly ground black pepper 1. Combine the papaya, cucumber, onion, cilantro, and hot pepper. Set aside. 2. Whisk together the oil and half the lime juice, and season to taste with salt and pepper. Toss with papaya mixture. 3. Taste before serving and adjust flavor with additional lime juice. Serves 4 Tips • This salsa works equally well with ripe mango, or a combination of mango and papaya.

today’s moneyed crowd, mainly black politicians, own all the glitzy palatial dwellings, surrounded by security gates and electric fences and are watched vigilantly by minimally paid guards. Sometimes there are even walls topped with slices of broken glass, in case anyone wishes to shred their hands and feet trying out that particular route in to steal whatever it is the wealthy Kikuyu bigwigs are protecting so fiercely.

He’s like that one extra slice of chocolate cake, another drink when you know you’ve already had too much, a hit—just a small bump, just something to tide you over until the next thing comes along and sweeps you off your feet. When his charm is on full blast and I’m wedged beside him in a happy alcoholic haze, he’s almost impossible to resist. I know I shouldn’t, he’s bad for me, but I can’t help it.

Matt, who was quite happy about his sandwich, thought fast. It would never do to let Maude know he found the sandwich not just delicious, but positively divine. How could two simple slices of bread with a few slices of chicken and a bizarre yellowish sauce make him crave more with each bite? He just needed to convince Maude he was taking no pleasure whatsoever in swallowing the best sandwich he’d eaten in a long time. “I

Eventually, Edgard said, “She doesn’t know anything about me. Not even that we were roping partners. Not that we were…” He looked at Trevor expectantly. “No.” Trevor quickly glanced at the living room where Chassie was chattering away. “You surprised?” “Maybe that she isn’t aware of our official association as roping partners. There was no shame in that. We were damn good together, Trev.” The word shame echoed like a slap. As good as they were together, it’d never been enough, in an official capacity or behind closed doors. “What are you really doin’ here?” Edgard didn’t answer right away. “I don’t know. Feeling restless. Had the urge to travel.” “Wyoming ain’t exactly an exotic port of call.” “You think I don’t realize that? You think I wouldn’t rather be someplace else? But something…” Edgard lowered his voice. “Ah, f**k it.” “What?” “Want the truth? Or would you rather I lie?” “The truth.” “Truth between us? That’s refreshing.” Edgard’s gaze trapped his. “I’m here because of you.” Trevor’s heart alternately stopped and soared, even when his answer was an indiscernible growl. “For Christsake, Ed. What the hell am I supposed to say to that? With my wife in the next room?” “You’re making a big deal out of this. She thinks we’re friends, which ain’t a lie. We were partners before we were…” Edgard gestured distractedly. “If she gets the wrong idea, it won’t be from me.” “Maybe I’m gettin’ the wrong idea. The last thing you said to me when you f**kin’ left me was that you weren’t ever comin’ back. And you made it goddamn clear you didn’t want to be my friend. So why are you here?” Pause. He traced the rim of his coffee cup with a shaking fingertip. “I heard about you gettin’ married.” “That happened over a year ago and you came all the way from Brazil to congratulate me in person? Now?” “No.” Edgard didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands. He raked his fingers through his hair. His voice was barely audible. “Will it piss you off if I admit I was curious about whether you’re really happy, meu amore?” My love. My ass. Trevor snapped, “Yes.” “Yes, you’re pissed off? Or yes, you’re happy?” “Both.” “Then this is gonna piss you off even more.” “What?” “Years and miles haven’t changed anything between us and you goddamn well know it.” Trevor looked up; Edgard’s golden eyes were laser beams slicing him open. “It don’t matter. If you can’t be my friend while you’re in my house, walk out the f**kin’ door. I will not allow either one of us to hurt my wife. Got it?” “Yeah.” “Good. And I’m done talkin’ about this shit so don’t bring it up again. Ever.

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.

Jude smiles and explains things much more personably than I, slicing and toasting thick pillows of cinnamon-coated raisin and offering that to people, topped with a pool of melted cultured butter, fresh from the farm down the way. The day tourists find this quaint; the green eaters, sustainable and local; and the rest happy to have something sweet now that the sticky buns are gone. Everyone is smiling, and I wonder if Jude can also turn water into some sort of fermented beverage.

Superintelligence, Nick Bostrom estimates that 1058 human lives could be simulated with more conservative assumptions about energy efficiency. However we slice and dice these numbers, they’re huge, as is our responsibility for ensuring that this future potential of life to flourish isn’t squandered. As Bostrom puts it: “If we represent all the happiness experienced during one entire such life by a single teardrop of joy, then the happiness of these souls could fill and refill the Earth’s oceans every second, and keep doing so for a hundred billion billion millennia.

Just before they reached Happy Jack’s corner, they passed a bake shop, and Sara said, “How would it be if we brought him a little something for his tea?” “You do get ideas, don’t you?” said Andrew. “Let’s.” They went in and, after some discussion, passed up the penny buns and jam tarts and ended up with a slice of lardy cake, all sugared and stuffed with raisins and heavy enough to sink a man-of-war.

Caviar is formed from gray-green boulders that have been eroded by the weather and exposed to frequent rainstorms. This occurs in the mountains. When the stone grows soft, the individual particles, happy to be able to move at last, set out on the double and swim down the torrential streams to the valley. There a joyful village population awaits them, having prepared for the event by erecting walls and defenses against which the caviar will be dammed (not: damned). Anyone who wants to can safely skim it from there and spread it on a slice of bread. The stony taste goes away if you chew long enough. The caviar for sale in stores is excreted from fish and cannot in any way be compared with the original caviar, described above.

It was still quiet at the bar, early afternoon, before the happy-hour crowd arrived with their after-work bonhomie, and even as the barkeep kept himself busy wiping bottles and slicing limes, he had no choice but to nod and listen. He liked it busy at the bar, he liked it when the crowd was three deep and the calls for drinks came from all sides like a rising tide of feverish chants, when there wasn’t time to take in the stories and the gripes and he was able to lose himself in the work. That was the quest in everything he did: the work, the meditation, the exercise, the sex. To lose himself. And as the barkeep would be the first to tell you, it was not without reason.

Nerissa, Jade was murdered.”               The gasp caught in my throat and I had to rub at the pain in my chest that was suddenly there. “H..how?”               “She was stabbed.”               “Stabbed?” Sudden flash backs whirled through my head. My father’s face came into view. His voice and the sounds and the smells of that night were everywhere.               Ian nodded. “I thought you knew because of your brother’s research…”               “No, he was protecting me…” I tasted bile in my mouth and felt a little dizzy.               “Liam nearly died trying to save her…his scars…Nerissa? Are you okay?”               “I thought you weren’t giving away his deepest darkest?”               Dark! It was dark but the snow that night! The snow was stained in red…blood, my father’s blood!               “Nerissa?”               I slumped onto Baxter’s neck. “You told me his darkest…” I heard hooves pounding toward us now. Who was coming? Why were they in a hurry? The hooves faded as a ringing began in my ears.               “That is not his darkest! I thought you knew about the murder…how it had happened. The scars…your own story…Nerissa?”               I gripped Baxter’s mane with weakening fingers. Murder…stabbing. The sound of a blade slicing, my father’s scream, pain, fear…loss. My sight blurred.               Ian cried out to someone. I had cried out that night. No one had heard me. No one had come! Not until it was too late!               I heard someone jump to the ground. I felt hands at my waist and strong arms surrounding me. I smelled him. A wild sense of comfort surrounded me. Liam! Why was he here? Did I care? I was happy he was here. I needed him here. “Ian, what did you say to her?” His voice rumbled through me. “Were you following us?” Thoughts of my father were fading a bit until Ian barked in anger. “I told her about the murder! Why?” Liam growled. “Never speak to her of it again!” “Because her father was…” I buried my face into the sweet comfort of Liam’s scent and let the world go dark.

Broccoli, Zucchini and Blue Cheese Soup Serves 6 Ingredients: 2 leeks, white part only, sliced 1 head broccoli, coarsely chopped 2 zucchinis, chopped 1 potato, chopped 2 cups vegetable broth 2 cups water 3 tbsp olive oil 3.5 oz blue cheese, crumbled 1/3 cup light cream Directions: Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Sauté the leeks, stirring, for 5 minutes, or until soft. Add bite sized pieces of broccoli, zucchinis, potato, water, and broth and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 10 minutes, or until vegetables are just tender. Remove from heat and set aside for 5 minutes to cool slightly. Transfer soup to a blender. Add the cheese and blend in batches until smooth. Return to the saucepan and place over low heat. Add cream and stir to combine. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

The inexorable search for a stanza of meaning hangs like a thundercloud over the troposphere of humankind’s prosaic existence. A dithering sense of loss engulfs us. Humankind’s unattainable desire to achieve a slice of perfection generates a suspenseful haze of doom. A lingering stab of incompleteness coupled with the tantalizing riddles of fate are inalterably interlinked and imbued in all thinking people’s tormented soul. This cross coalescence of unattainable longing melds with the mystic tinged edges of uncertainty, spawned by the unanswerable questions posed by fate, fomenting a dialectical dissonance that distinguishes and ultimately exemplifies the arc of humankind’s plaintive subsistence.

Iain?” His sudden smile was blinding, and he held her hands in his. “You’ve already taken the first steps, a chara. Without even realizing it.” She had. For the first time in months, she’d managed to take two steps. Unbidden came the tears over her cheeks, while a shaky smile broke through. “I don’t even know how this happened.” Lord Ashton shook his head. “I can’t say how it did. But I watched you take two steps away from me.” Certainly, it was because he’d embarrassed her, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Joy flooded through her. “Can you take a step toward me?” he asked. She sent him a sidelong glance. “I’m not sure I should. Especially with the way you’re looking at me now.” A knowing grin slid over his face. “And how am I looking at you?” “Like I’m a slice of cake.” She sent him a wry look, but he only appeared amused by her observation. “Perhaps I was wanting another taste of you.” He reached out to her shoulders, and she laughed at him. “Oh, no.” At that, she took a step away, suddenly realizing why he was teasing her. “Is this a ruse, meant to make me run away from you?” She faltered but took another step. Her body swayed out of balance, but with her bare feet upon the grass, it was easier to steady herself. “Is it working, then?” Iain reached out to her, pretending that he wanted to snatch her back into an embrace. “Yes.” Rose stopped walking and gave up trying to hold back her tears of happiness. She didn’t care if she was sobbing like a small child. These first few steps were nothing short of miraculous. Her cheeks were wet, but she was smiling so hard, they ached. Iain closed the distance and brought her back into his arms, holding her tightly. She no longer cared, but dampened the front of his shirt with her tears. He rubbed her spine, his arm around her waist. “Don’t cry, a ghrá. Else, I’ll have to kiss your tears away.” She wiped at her eyes, and a laugh broke free. “Then I suppose I’ll have to run.

Here comes the hard part… We’re just guessing. When we slice out a bunch of software functionality and call it a minimum viable solution, we don’t really know if it is. The problem with outcomes is that you can’t really observe them until things come out. When you slice out a release, you’re forced to hypothesize what will happen. You might have to guess about what customers will buy your product, what users will choose to use it, if they can use it, and what’s feasible to build in the time you have. You’re forced to guess at how much will make them happy. That’s a lot of guessing.

IT WAS FULL DARK OUT NOW AND THE FIRST RUSH OF THE FREE night air roared into my lungs and out through my veins, calling my name with a thundering whisper of welcome and urging me on into the purring darkness, and we hurried to the car to ride away to happiness. But as we opened the car door and put one foot in, some small acid niggle twitched at our coattails and we paused; something was not right, and the frigid glee of our purpose slid off our back and onto the pavement like old snakeskin. Something was not right. I looked around me in the hot and humid Miami night. The neighborhood was just as it had always been; no sudden threat had sprung from the row of one-story houses with their toy-littered yards. There was nothing moving on our street, no one lurking in the shadows of the hedge, no rogue helicopter swooping down to strafe me—nothing. But still I heard that nagging trill of doubt. I took in a slow lungful of air through my nose. There was nothing to smell beyond the mingled odors of cooking, the tang of distant rainfall, the whiff of rotting vegetation that always lurked in the South Florida night. So what was wrong? What had set the tinny little alarm bells to clattering when I was finally out the door and free? I saw nothing, heard nothing, smelled nothing, felt nothing—but I had learned to trust the pesky whisper of warning, and I stood there unmoving, unbreathing, straining for an answer. And then a low row of dark clouds rumbled open overhead and revealed a small slice of silvery moon—a tiny, inadequate moon, a moon of no consequence at all, and we breathed out all the doubt. Of course—we were used to riding out into the wicked gleam of a full and bloated moon, slicing and slashing to the open-throated sound track of a big round choir in the sky. There was no such beacon overhead tonight, and it didn’t seem right somehow to gallop off into glee without it. But tonight was a special session, an impromptu raid into a mostly moonless evening, and in any case it must be done, would be done—but done as a solo cantata this time, a cascade of single notes without a backup singer. This small and wimpish quarter-moon was far too young to warble, but we could do very well without it, just this once. And

I’m happy for you. You deserve a big slice of happy in all this crazy.

The pizza was thin and biscuity – different from the thick crusts she enjoyed in Bombay. Iqbal’s Aberdeen Angus steak looked almost alive, raw and juicy as he sliced it. Neither had room for dessert, and once they had wiped their plates clean, they ambled back to the Murphys’ in a happy stupor. ‘Right then, Fiza Sahiba. I’ll climb my lonely tower in desperate need of rescuing. See ya,’ Iqbal said, giving her a quick hug. ‘You smell of … steak,’ Fiza said. ‘Yes. I’m manly that way,’ Iqbal replied, walking towards the wooden staircase.

MacKerron and Dolton sliced the data further. They found that the sports fan’s brain adjusts to how good their team is, limiting how much pleasure they can get from the wins of a great team. In particular, the researchers found that a sports fan, when his team is expected to win the game, will get only 3.1 points of pleasure from a win and will lose 10 points of happiness from a loss. In other words, the better the team you support is, the more the team has to win to give you any pleasure.

Abruptly, Gloria Fulbright stood up from the table and announced, “That’s it, we’re going.” Alan looked up at her sharply. “Going? But I was going to have another slice of pie!” She removed his coffee cup from his hand and said, “You’re done. You can’t play nice. Get your coat.

Nesta ate until she couldn't fit another morsel into her body, helping herself to thirds of the soup. The House seemed more than happy to oblige her, and had even offered her a slice of double-chocolate cake to finish. 'Is this Cassian-approved?' She picked up the fork and smiled at the moist, gleaming cake. 'It certainly isn't,' he said from the doorway, and Nesta whirled, scowling. He nodded toward the cake. 'But eat up.' She put down the fork. 'What do you want?' Cassian surveyed the family library. 'Why are you eating in here?' 'Isn't it obvious?' His grin was a slash of white. 'The only thing that's obvious is that you're talking to yourself.' 'I'm talking to the House. Which is a considerable step up from talking to you.' 'It doesn't talk back.' 'Exactly.' He snorted. 'I walked into that one.' He stalked across the room, eyeing the cake she still didn't touch. 'Are you really... talking to the House?' 'Don't you talk to it?' 'No.' 'It listens to me,' she insisted. 'Of course it does. It's enchanted.' 'It even brought food down to the library unasked.' His brows rose. 'Why?' 'I don't know how your faerie magic works.' 'Did you... do anything to make it act that way?' 'If you're taking a page from Devlon's book and asking if I did any witchcraft, the answer is no.' Cassian chuckled. 'That's not what I meant, but fine. The House likes you. Congratulations.' She growled, and he leaned over to pick up the fork. She went stiff at his closeness, but he said nothing as he took a bite of the cake. He let out a hum of pleasure that traveled along her bones. And then took another bite. 'That's supposed to be mine,' she groused, peering up at him as he continued to eat. 'Then take it from me,' he said.

Shep World, a perfect slice of happiness. The greatest destination on Earth.

I wish I could time-travel to thirteen-year-old chubby Josh and tell him, “One day we’re going to be able to pass for John Stamos’s offspring, so don’t worry so much, and also put down that fifth slice of pizza while you still can.

He’s not just using me for my body,” Megan said. “He’s also using me as Prozac. Yesterday morning, Drew basically told me his life was all bleak like a black-and-white movie, and then I came into the picture and started rocking his world in Technicolor.” “That’s not using someone,” Rory said. “That’s happiness.” “No. It’s like a drug. I’m like a drug. But the effect on a guy only lasts for a while. When the drug high wears off, where does that leave me?” “I don’t think that’s…” Rory trailed off, confused. “You’ve never had a boyfriend, and you’ve never done drugs, so this is all a foreign concept to you. How can I put this in a metaphor you can understand?” Megan thought about it then went with the first idea that popped into her head, as she usually did. “I’m like cheap birthday cake. I’m the corner slice with all the icing. Drew is the greedy kid at the party. He wants me, the chunky corner piece with all the icing, but he’s going to get a stomach ache, and soon, he’s going to want his plain sandwiches again.” Rory looked down, and there was only the sound of the washer and dryer. Finally, she looked up, her eyes sad and hopeful at the same time, and said, “You’re not cake.” “But I’m not exactly Tina, am I? I’m not the marrying kind. I’ll never get a guy as good as Luca. Nobody’s going to sell out the flower shop just to take me on a date. I’m the girl they call to help them fix a flat tire.

Why do you think my life matters more than your life?” “Because it does!” he barked. But if his anger was smoke from a burnt pan, that truth—that simple truth that he cradled in his hands—had the same effect as throwing open a window next to the stove. All of the smoke, all of the fight left him in a rush. In a soft, choked voice, he said, “It matters more to me.” Esther settled back onto her heels. “Hank….” Hank took a deep breath. “I have felt more like myself in the last month since meeting you than I had for seventeen years. Seventeen years, Esther! Do you know what it feels like to be a ghost in your own house? In your own life?” She bit her bottom lip and Hank watched her top teeth make a dent in the soft pink peach slice of her mouth. He went on. “And then you came along. And you… you made me hope. You made me hope that things could change. That they could get better. That I could have a life again.” He stopped and rubbed a hand down his face. And then his hoarse voice cracked with emotion as he said, “You made me hope that I could be happy again.

Wyn releases his hold on me again, and when my gaze slices up toward his, I see my own misery reflected on his face. We’re trapped here.

That feeling usually passes pretty quickly and I remember why I love my singleness so much. The thing I try to remember in those vulnerable moments is this: I don’t know whether I’ll ever have someone there to grab my hand in the park, but I can’t let that stop me from reaching out my hand to grab on to other things. There’s so much joy and possibility and life to grab on to that has nothing whatsoever to do with finding love or romance. I can grab my friends’ hands. I can grab my nieces’ hands. I can grab the opportunity to speak life and hope and love into the hearts of others. I can even grab a pair of designer shoes if I want, because I have no one to answer to about how ridiculously expensive they are! And I can grab happiness. It’s there. It’s a different sort of happiness than the couple in the hammock—but happiness is still happiness, any way you slice it.

He orders an expensive bottle of Rioja and we begin our tapas extravaganza with plates of dates wrapped in bacon, langoustines in garlic and butter, chorizo in a tomatoey sauce, and a miniature Spanish tortilla (potato, egg, and onion). Our medium-rare steaks are set before us along with a basket of thinly sliced, golden crisped fries. I'm happy to see that Frank enjoys food- with no mention of any weird hang-ups or allergies. "I was hoping they'd have sweetbreads on the menu," Frank says. "You like sweetbreads?" I ask, my heart expanding at the mention of calf thymus. "I'm an organ man," Frank says, taking a sip of wine. "I know a place where they make great sautéed sweetbreads," I say. "You?" he asks, a look of pleased astonishment spreading across his face. "Love 'em," I say. This mutual infatuation with organs bodes well. Cutting into the steaks with sharp knives, we put morsels in our mouths, close our eyes as if we've died and gone to heaven, chew, and groan, the salty, bloody juices trickling down the backs of our throats.

When I was little, I had a children’s book called ‘Guldhjerte’ [Goldheart], which I had very clear and happy memories of. It was a picture book about a little girl who goes into the forest with some slices of bread and other stuff in her pockets. But at the end of the book, when she’s gotten through the forest, she’s standing there naked and with nothing left. And the last line in the book was: ‘But at least I’m okay,’ said Goldheart. I read the book several times, in spite of the fact that my father thought it was absolute rubbish. The story of 'Breaking The Waves’ probably comes from that.

Mudita recognizes that life is not a zero-sum game, that there is not just one slice of cake in which someone else’s taking more means we get less. Mudita sees joy as limitless.

She might be right. All this time I’ve been feeling guilty about wanting my best friend’s girl, but I think what I really wanted was my best friend’s relationship. Someone to spend time with. Someone who turns me on and makes me laugh. Someone who makes me…happy. Like Grace? The mocking thought slices into my mind like a damn lightsaber. Shit.

Then she replenished her medical bag and headed for Our Daily Bread. As soon as she entered the nondescript building, she grabbed an apron from one of the hooks on the wall. She called out greetings to the regular volunteers. Entering the bustling kitchen, she did a double take when she noticed a man slicing tomatoes for a huge container of salad. “Tanner?” “Hi, Kaitlyn,” he said with a friendly wave. “Happy Monday.” A few of the other volunteers exchanged glances but said nothing. “What are you doing here?” “Volunteering,” he said. “I called earlier to see if they needed help today, and it turns out that Evelyn couldn’t make it. So here I am.” “But why?” “Because I had some free time, and it’s a good thing to do,” he explained in a matter-of-fact way. “And I wanted to see you again.

Often Alfred’s meetings began again at six. Two or more business associates would come and closet themselves in the study for almost an hour. Sometimes I’d join them, bringing in a tea tray and a few things to munch on—because no man with low blood sugar ever comes to a happy agreement about anything. With either tea or cocktails I like to give a busy man something hearty, like slices of salami or sausage. Or peanut butter and bacon on black bread slipped under the grill until it sizzles.

Mudita recognizes that life is not a zero-sum game, that there is not just one slice of cake in which someone else’s taking more means we get less.

You did me right when it mattered. I return the favor. Always. That being said, you compromise my happy home in any way, I’ll slice off your balls and feed them to you.” I love Wrath, Qhuinn thought.

Well, you’re doing a damn fine job in there, boy,’ he said. WHAT IS IT CALLED WHEN YOU FEEL WARM AND CONTENT AND WISH THINGS WOULD STAY THAT WAY? ‘I guess you’d call it happiness,’ said Harga. Inside the tiny, cramped kitchen, strata’d with the grease of decades, Death spun and whirled, chopping, slicing and frying. His skillet flashed through the fetid steam. He’d opened the door to the cold night air, and a dozen neighbourhood cats had strolled in, attracted by the bowls of milk and meat – some of Harga’s best, if he’d known – that had been strategically placed around the floor. Occasionally Death would pause in his work and scratch one of them behind the ears. ‘Happiness,’ he said, and puzzled at the sound of his own voice.

how mudita works: If someone has somethingthat we want, say, a bigger house, we can consciously take joy in theirgood fortune by telling ourselves: “Good for him. Just like me, he, too,wants to be happy. He, too, wants to be successful. He, too, wants tosupport his family. May he be happy. I congratulate him and want him tohave more success.” Mudita recognizes that life is not a zero-sum game,that there is not just one slice of cake in which someone else’s takingmore means we get less. Mudita sees joy as limitless.

EASY FIRST FINGER FOODS FOR BABIES • steamed (or lightly boiled) whole vegetables, such as green beans, baby corn, and sugar-snap peas • steamed (or lightly boiled) florets of cauliflower and broccoli • steamed, roasted or stir-fried vegetable sticks, such as carrot, potato, egg plant, sweet potato, parsnip, pumpkin, and zucchini • raw sticks of cucumber (tip: keep some of these ready prepared in the fridge for babies who are teething—the coolness is soothing for their gums) • thick slices of avocado (not too ripe or it will be very squishy) • chicken (as a strip of meat or on a leg bone)—warm (i.e., freshly cooked) or cold • thin strips of beef, lamb or pork—warm (i.e., freshly cooked) or cold • fruit, such as pear, apple, banana, peach, nectarine, mango—either whole or as sticks • sticks of firm cheese, such as cheddar or Gloucester •breadsticks • rice cakes or toast “fingers”—on their own or with a homemade spread, such as hummus and tomato, or cottage cheese And, if you want to be a bit more adventurous, try making your own versions of: • meatballs or mini-burgers • lamb or chicken nuggets • fishcakes or fish fingers • falafels • lentil patties • rice balls (made with sushi rice, or basmati rice with dhal) Remember, you don’t need to use recipes specifically designed for babies, provided you’re careful to keep salt and sugar to a minimum.

In comparison to this world, our time is incalculably brief, and of that limited slice, there will only be a small section in which we are truly happy. Do not take it for granted, do not let it be pried easily from your grasp, and never assume our time with anyone or anything is endless.

circumstances, like finances or relationship status, generally account for a smaller slice of the happiness equation than our deliberate behaviors.

It is a shame that Mama doesn't use the hundreds of other fruits and vegetables and spices available from around the world. If it isn't Indian, according to her, it isn't good. I think she stared so long at the blueberries that they shriveled. The butcher gave me three whole breasts of fresh free-range chicken. All of a sudden I have become very particular about ecological vegetables and free-range chickens. If they've petted the chicken and played with it before cutting it open for my eating pleasure, I'll be happy to purchase its body parts. Even if I have a tough time understanding this ecological nonsense, I feel better for buying carrots that were grown without chemicals, and I can't come up with a good reason to deny myself that happiness. I marinated the chicken breasts in white wine and salt and pepper for a while and then grilled them on the barbecue outside. The blueberry sauce was ridiculously simple. Fry some onions in butter, add the regular green chili, ginger, garlic, and fry a while longer. Add just a touch of tomato paste along with white wine vinegar. In the end add the blueberries. Cook until everything becomes soft. Blend in a blender. Put it in a saucepan and heat it until it bubbles. In the end because G'ma wouldn't shut up about going back right away, I added, in anger and therefore in too much quantity: cayenne pepper. I felt the sauce needed a little bite... but I think I bit off more than the others could swallow. I took the grilled chicken, cut the breasts in long slices, and poured the sauce over them. I made some regularbasmatiwith fried cardamoms and some regular tomato and onion raita.I put too much green chili in the raitaas well.

Gladys loved Mama's red devil cake with chocolate icing, but what I always begged her to fix for my birthday was her rich hummingbird cake with pineapple and bananas and pecans and a real sweet cream cheese icing. Daddy adored that cake too, and I can still hear him telling me before he'd go to work to be sure and cut him a thick slice and wrap it in plastic and put it in the fridge for him. To this day, I don't know how the cake got its crazy name, and when I finally asked Mama not long ago if she knew, all she did was twist her mouth and frown the way she does when she's exasperated, and tell me not to ask dumb questions, then say, "maybe it's because hummingbirds love red sugar water and the nectar in flowers and anything else sweet. But I can tell you one thing, and that's that I'm not about to put a cake outside to see if hummingbirds'll peck at it.

All I can say is the bubbling pizza tasted as spectacular as it looked, and I didn't even fool with fixin' a salad to go with it. Since Sugar and Spice were begging and whining, I picked off a few pieces of sausage and pepperoni and tossed them to the dogs while I kept watching Emeril roll out and stretch some dough and trying not to think about Vernon and Sally and the way they'd deceived me. What I really wanted to do was scream at Emeril that his dough was too thick and more like the Chicago style than the crisp classic Neopolitan one I was eating. But, instead, I finished munching on the slice, and looked at the meatballs and pieces of bacon and golden mushrooms and shiny olives and onions nestled in all the melted cheese on the next slice, and started nibbling on that one. By now, Emeril was chopping herbs while he sautéed onions and garlic in olive oil, and when I wasn't concentrating on him, my thoughts shifted again to Vernon and Sally, and the humiliating stunt they'd pulled on me, and how I'd really like to take my gun and blow both their brains out. Then I wondered why in hell Emeril would dog up his pizza with so much tomato sauce, and Sugar was driving me crazy begging for more meat, and before I realized it, I was sinking my teeth into a third slice loaded mainly with red peppers and sausage that had a wonderful fennel taste and telling myself how much better this pizza was than the one Emeril was fixin'.

After more sake, we dipped into salmon roe for fecundity, followed by salmon and kelp rolls. We also had slices of rare beef that had been seared in a drip of soy, plus grilled duck and pickled lotus root rounds, representing the root of the lotus flower that blooms in the lake of the Land of Happiness where Buddha lives. Each morsel lay nestled in separate sections of the various lacquer boxes. "Have some tai (sea bream)," said Tomiko, passing me a container holding several slices of the coral-red fish, eaten because it sounds like medetai, meaning "auspicious.

My favorite idea to come out of the world of cultured meat is the 'pig in the backyard.' I say 'favorite' not because this scenario seems likely to materialize but because it speaks most directly to my own imagination. In a city, a neighborhood contains a yard, and in that yard there is a pig, and that pig is relatively happy. It receives visitors every day, including local children who bring it odds and ends to eat from their family kitchens. These children may have played with the pig when it was small. Each week a small and harmless biopsy of cells is taken from the pig and turned into cultured pork, perhaps hundreds of pounds of it. This becomes the community's meat. The pig lives out a natural porcine span, and I assume it enjoys the company of other pigs from time to time. This fantasy comes to us from Dutch bioethicists, and it is based on a very real project in which Dutch neighbourhoods raised pigs and then debated the question of their eventual slaughter. The fact that the pig lives in a city is important, for the city is the ancient topos of utopian thought. The 'pig in the backyard' might also be described as the recurrence of an image from late medieval Europe that has been recorded in literature and art history. This is the pig in the land of Cockaigne, the 'Big Rock Candy Mountain' of its time, was a fantasy for starving peasants across Europe. It was filled with foods of a magnificence that only the starving can imagine. In some depictions, you reached this land by eating through a wall of porridge, on the other side of which all manner of things to eat and drink came up from the ground and flowed in streams. Pigs walked around with forks sticking out of backs that were already roasted and sliced. Cockaigne is an image of appetites fullfilled, and cultured meat is Cockaigne's cornucopian echo. The great difference is that Cockaigne was an inversion of the experience of the peasants who imagined it: a land where sloth became a virtue rather than a vice, food and sex were easily had, and no one ever had to work. In Cockaigne, delicious birds would fly into our mouths, already cooked. Animals would want to be eaten. By gratifying the body's appetites rather than rewarding the performance of moral virtue, Cockaigne inverted heaven. The 'pig in the backyard' does not fully eliminate pigs, with their cleverness and their shit, from the getting of pork. It combines intimacy, community, and an encounter with two kinds of difference: the familiar but largely forgotten difference carried by the gaze between human animal and nonhuman animal, and the weirder difference of an animal's body extended by tissue culture techniques. Because that is literally what culturing animal cells does, extending the body both in time and space, creating a novel form of relation between an original, still living animal and its flesh that becomes meat. The 'pig in the backyard' tries to please both hippies and techno-utopians at once, and this is part of this vision of rus in urbe. But this doubled encounter with difference also promises (that word again!) to work on the moral imagination. The materials for this work are, first, the intact living body of another being, which appears to have something like a telos of its own beyond providing for our sustenance; and second, a new set of possibilities for what meat can become in the twenty-first century. The 'pig in the backyard' is only a scenario. Its outcomes are uncertain. It is not obvious that the neighbourhood will want to eat flesh, even the extended and 'harmless' flesh, of a being they know well, but the history of slaughter and carnivory on farms suggests that they very well might. The 'pig in the backyard' is an experiment in ethical futures. The pig points her snout at us and asks what kind of persons we might become.

Something as simple as how you slice your food can dramatically change the experience.

Rachel reappeared with a wooden peel holding a free-form pizza heaped with vegetables, its edges blackened by the flame. Melody's mouth practically watered at the sight of it. The moules on Saturday had been amazing, but after the day she'd had, pizza and wine and butterscotch bars- hopefully with good coffee- would feed her soul as much as her body. Her friend cut the pizza into diagonal strips with a dangerous-looking mezzaluna, and then it was a free-for-all to grab the crispiest slices. Melody closed her eyes to savor the perfectly tender vegetables on top of the crisp pizza crust and sighed with happiness. "You did a garlic Parmesan cream sauce." "I figured I was allowed to deviate from traditional primavera since it's pizza." "It's good Parmesan." "Local. Makes up for the fact it's not Italian.

PROTEIN one serving: ¼ egg, 2 thin strips of chicken, ½ meatball, 1 ounce fish, or 2 table-spoons purée. Good protein choices include meat, fish, poultry, eggs, tofu, or beans and lentils. grain one serving: ½ cup oatmeal or cooked rice, quinoa, pasta, or couscous; 2 slices baked oatmeal; or ½ slice toast, cut into sticks. fruit or vegetable one serving: 2 pieces, such as 2 slices of soft pear or steamed apple, 2 steamed carrot sticks, ¼ medium avocado, 2 small steamed broccoli florets, or 2 tablespoons purée. dairy one serving: ½ cup (4 ounces) full-fat yogurt; ¾ ounce full-fat cheese, shredded or cut into thin sticks. Cow’s milk is not recommended as a main drink for infants under 12 months. 4 to 6 months FIRST THING IN THE MORNING: Breastmilk on demand or 6–7 ounces formula BREAKFAST: 1–2 tablespoons cereal • 1–2 tablespoons fruit or vegetable MIDMORNING: Breastmilk on demand or 6–7 ounces formula LUNCH: 1–2 tablespoons cereal • 1–2 tablespoons fruit or vegetable OR breastmilk on demand or 6–7 ounces formula

Capturing the moment, these small slices of life, these small gusts of happiness, move me more deeply than all the rest.

I don’t believe in fate. I believe in music. I’ve heard there is one person out there for everyone. One missing half to complete your whole. The fates will magnetically pull the two halves together through some orchestrated coincidence, and that’s it. You’re all set. Bollocks, that. I met my other half three years ago, and as far as I know … she has no idea. I don’t have time to wait on fate to make its move. For the fender bender, or the missed lift to the roof, or the swapped locker combination. It’s the end of senior year, and I can’t afford to leave things to a happy accident any longer. I need music. Give me angsty lyrics, the heartfelt plucking of strings, passionate and world-weary pleas. Give me the banging of keys, the staccato of backbeats, the gift of swing and swoon. If I slice open my heart and put the rhythm to song, will she hear it? The fates can get fucked. I’ve got to try.

How is it that bad memories can slice through time so easily while happiness evaporates the moment it’s experienced?

If you're close to this girl, then she would be happy with anything you give her.

& so I bring my journal writing & sit amongst / the ferociously chic at Cafe Flor (which I call / Cafe Voyeur) in an era when everyone has a therapist & no one has a lover. and I have a slice of carrot cake / and a frothy mochachina, sprinkled generously with nutmeg / & cinnamon, sitting there pondering "The Convolution of Desire / & Terror that is the paradigm of human sexuality." And I write / it down completely impressed with myself, smug with the glow, / wondering if anyone-man or woman, or middle aged transsexual / with bad makeup from the nether twilight world of the Tenderloin-- / would stop by to cruise me. YES, EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE / I HAVE AN OUTSTANDING MOMENT OF OBSOLETE HAPPINESS.

In the way of a reflection of my family and friends I mused at the number of people that I encountered during the past 85 years. Everyone here has played an important part but there have been others, many of whom have now passed across the horizon of life, however the purpose of my reminiscing is to share happy thoughts while at the same time take a peek into the future. I can look back to those first few glimpses of my life and find my grandmother Ohme, Gertrude Thieme standing at what I perceived to be a high kitchen counter making sandwiches using a slice of almost not eatable German black bread they called schwartsbrod. With great care she laden it with lard, blootwurst or sometimes liberwurst, topped with the half of a crusty Keiser roll. I always got the heel of the roll, with a quarter lengthwise slice of a crunchy dill pickle. It was the first and last time I remember seeing her before she returned to Germany and the war. My sister Trudy had died a few years prior leaving a collective hole in my family. Her short life and subsequent death was devastating to my mother and father and I constantly felt the sorrow it brought into our home. My father unsuccessfully tried to make a success of a small delicatessen at 11 Nelson Avenue in Jersey City and we moved to 25 Nelson Avenue when my father started working as a chef at Lindy’s Restaurant on Broadway in Manhattan. At home we exclusively spoke German which was a hindrance during World War II. My mother and father never lost their German accent and the only one of my family that made a real effort to speak English without an accent was my Onkle Willie. My parents refused to associate with my Onkle Walter and his wife Tante Wilma although they always treated me kindly and I sometimes talked with my cousins Klein Walter und Norma. The neighborhood treated us as NAZI outcasts until Italy entered the war on the Axis side and suddenly we all had to prove that we were patriotic. Eventually I joined the tin can army and learned enough English to be accepted. As my accent faded I truly became an American.

Most of us have moments, no matter how big or tiny, that affect us greatly in life. It's inevitable that we will all make mistakes and experience things we wish we hadn't. These good and bad memories will always live and breathe in our minds but it's how much we let them affect our everyday lives that is important. Do we let these thoughts and stories define us? Or can we see them for what they are: moments. Slices of time that occurred, had a directional purpose in our lives, then moved and changed into a new moment.

Dipping into a previous slice of your life is a joy, and is harmless as long as you remember that the version of you then is no better or worse than the one now.

I think there are no best moments in life. We’re all just lucky to be alive, period. And if we’re happy here, in this little corner of time, this slice of forever, then that’s enough.

The Clauses that Can Screw You Having worked with a lot of investors over my last few startups, and having completed an exit as well, I can attest at first hand to the importance of understanding all the major legal and contractual details that will directly affect you, the control you have of your company and how much you will earn in the event of an exit. Here is a list of the most contentious clauses, what they mean and what to watch out for. It’s all quite legal – but you’ll be a happy person if you get these negotiated in your favour. •   LIQUIDATION PREFERENCE. This is one of those clauses you don’t need to get stung by. It’s standard for investors to get a 1x liquidation preference. •   ANTIDILUTION RIGHTS. Investors will ask for this in the Series A funding round. Basically it means that an investor has the right to maintain the same percentage ownership of your company automatically if the value of the company goes down. This is really tough on the founders. It means losing more of your company’s equity automatically in a down period. It’s unlikely that you will be able to remove this provision – but you need to be aware of it. •   NON-PARTICIPATING LIQUIDATION PREFERENCE. Liquidation preference determines how the pie is shared in a liquidation (or exit) event. A founder should always seek to have a non-participating liquidation preference for investors. Without going into too much detail, a ‘participating’ liquidation preference allows an investor to double-dip in terms of the slices of pie that they are entitled to. You’ll find a more detailed explanation on mybilliondollarapp.com. •   DRAG ALONG RIGHTS. This provision grants the investors the right to compel the founders (and other shareholders) to agree the sale, merger or liquidation of the company or block a sale, merger or liquidation. As a founder you do not want to be dragged along in this case. Ideally you should be able to negotiate that investors would only have the right to block the sale if the return was below a certain level. •   WARRANTIES. In investment agreements in Europe it is very common for founders to personally give basic assurances that everything the company is doing is proper and correct, these are known as warranties. In other countries, like the USA, founders don’t give warranties at all. Again, do check out mybilliondollarapp.com for more details, because this is definitely a complex area. That said, there are always going to be numerous details that are specific to your company and situation. The best possible advice here: make good friends with a few lawyers so that you always have someone to call on with a specific question.

We all deserved a slice of happiness, even grumpy Sinclair Priest.

So,” John said, “I’ll meet you at your place at eight, and we can walk over together?” “What? For what?” “The vigil.” “I’m not going to that.” I tried to ignore his surprise, his dogged faith. “Of course you are.” “I don’t know this person.” John continued to stand there, arms hanging down. The knife skidded so much I lost my grip and had to pick it up again. “It could’ve been you,” he said finally. “No,” I said, chopping bluntly, breaking more than slicing the lettuce, “it couldn’t. I’ve worked my whole life so that it couldn’t be me.” White flash of a face. Where did they go, those boys, after they left us behind? “Last night,” John began. He paused, still looking wounded. “You were so happy.” I gathered the lettuce into a bin and held it against my stomach like a barrier. “If it had been me, it would’ve been your fault.” John reeled as though I’d struck him. “You’re a coward,” he said. “You’ve worked your whole life because you’re a coward.” “What do you know? What do you know about anything?” His family moved for him. The hormones. The surgery he was allowed to accept or reject. I waved my arm around the kitchen, at the stunned cooks watching us. “Nobody has to know about you! You can blend in whenever you want!” “You honestly believe that? You think my life’s been easy?” “Yes, I think it’s been fucking easy!” I screamed. “They don’t know! I didn’t know! I wish I still didn’t know!” I tried to shove past him. He touched my back. I remembered Humphrey Bogart’s hand, I remembered dancing, I remembered the gown twirling, I remembered the boy who complimented my ass, I remembered being told I was beautiful. I remembered the woman staring back at me in the Métro windows, her wink. I tried to pull away. John embraced me with my arms pinned to my sides, the lettuce bin between us, its raw, wet smell pushed toward our faces. In full view of the entire kitchen, he kissed me. A kiss that made me think of the woefully few people I had kissed in my life. A kiss that reminded me I had never been loved. A kiss that said I could not be John unless I risked being Dana.   My

SUNLU Coupon Code – Get 20% OFF on All Plans

SUNLU Coupon Code – Get 20% OFF on All Plans

Laughter is love's symphony echoing through the years.