So I was just in Washington D.C. and was feeling a little knot of dejection forming. The provenance of such pessimism was, as usual, my irrational fears; this said ragged little ball of worry was, in manner of form, similar to the thick tangle that appears in comic balloons above the neurotic Peanuts characters' heads. My solipsism is such that I turn this ball over and over in my head, very much like a snowball in snow, until this accretion of anxieties is packed more tightly and has increased in circumference. What is worst about all this, perhaps, is not the unjustified enlargement of this knotty ball, but the wince of familiarity that accompanies it; my pessimism has become predictable.
But all this, predictably too, dissipated. A few minutes later I was sharing a pitcher of Sam Adams with Bulletproof Vest and his better half, with garlic naan and lamb and saag paneer, and suddenly all was right with the world; nothing a good meal and drinks with good people will cure.
Speaking of good meals: a little over a week ago I had a sumptuous dinner -- a big Thanksgiving spread, featuring almost exclusively food from the Old World that made it to Asia -- over at Big J and his better half's house. My meager culinary (or even dish-drying) talents weren't tapped, which was probably for the better; I ended up babysitting Maia, though that only really entailed sitting with her while she watched The Princess Bride (a movie I'd thought would have been too intense for someone her age, but apparently not).
And speaking of more good food: J-Lu baked me delicious apple pie last week as a Thanksgiving surprise! (I told her she could make money off of it: just the right amount of crumble to the crust and "give" to the apple.)
And more good meals: dinner with the Porkchop in DC Thursday night!
Baudrillard once (rather fatuously) wrote in America that eating alone was "the saddest sight in the world. Sadder than destitution, sadder than the beggar is the man who eats alone in public. Nothing more contradicts the laws of man or beast, for animals always do each other the honour of sharing or disputing each other's food." Whatever -- but "good," as you can see, is the operative word all week. There is something simple and uncomplicated and wholesome about the act of sharing and eating food.
And today: while I was cooking in the kitchen, Izzy danced to the Vince Guaraldi Trio's "Skating" theme, from A Charlie Brown Christmas. Didn't I say everything was right with the world, at least for that moment?
Posted by the wily filipino at December 4, 2005 11:39 PM