The Season of Bleeding Feet

Spring is here and with it came the bleeding feet.

Every spring I feel like a prisoner being paroled, the wicked cold not longer keeps me trapped in the house, dreading my walks to and from work and impeding my otherwise active lifestyle. I go out and buy brand new flats to accommodate all the walking I am going to be doing.

Like said prisoner, I find my new found freedom throws me into a fit of hedonism. I walk and walk, greedily taking in all the excitement and drama of the city in bloom. I walk so much in these new shoes (which were very comfortable when I tried them on!) that my feet end of looking like they came out of a meat grinder. This all happens the first weekend of Spring, the following week of spring finds me gingerly trying to get my battered feet into whatever pair of shoes don't cause me unbearable agony!

Well, my feet are beginning to heal and the shoes will get broken in eventually. I must say it is worth it though, each passing block offers me its own story or character. For example, last week I walked to the library on my way home from work. On my way in, two young boys passed me carrying children's books. They could not have been more than 10 years old. I though little of it, assuming their parents were waiting for them outside. On my way home I pass the outdoor cafe on my corner. There they were: the two little boys were sitting at at table by themselves, sipping soda and reading their books. I found their adultness to be endlessly amusing, only in New York! Turning the corner, I give a nod to the Empire State Building, thinking how amazing it is that I have such an icon as a neighbor.

The city herself seems to be celebrating; the parks are alive with tulips and lavender, and the trees lining the streets are covered in cherry blossoms. I notice old temples nestled between the brownstones and storefronts I never seemed to see before. She is singing to me, radiant and beautiful, finally waking from her winter slumber.

Walking through her streets I feel that familiar sense of satisfaction. I feel so full inside, like there is nothing else in the world I need at that moment. I suppose I have every reason to feel that way: my professional life is about to begin, I have amazing friends who think I am capable of anything, my family adores me, I have a great apartment, a bearable job and I live in the most magnificent city in the world. I also have a deep sense that all the things I don't yet have are coming to me. Mostly though, when I wander through New York on a beautiful spring day, I don't feel loneliness is possible.

Spring is a time of change and growth, and I suppose then it is only appropriate that it comes with a little pain. The season of bleeding feet is here and I couldn't be happier.

Courting the Oven

I have likened cooking and sex before in this blog. I see them as our most basic, visceral pleasures. I suppose it stands to reason then that my interest in both has wained at the moment. I think this is due to another similarity between these beautiful things: the intimacy.

I have these thoughts bouncing around this morning because I have a cooking event coming up tomorrow night. Since "the break-up", I have not touched my stove. My appetite has returned (thank you PMS) but I have not been able to bring myself to cook. Cooking is such a beautiful, lively, exuberant thing for me. It seems that lately it has felt as inappropriate as intercourse!

The theme of this dinner party is "Favorite Ingredients". This is a challenge on my best day, there are so many things I adore! My two favorite things, in this order, are vegetables and pork! Delicate, fulfilling and under appreciated and utter decadence! I want to highlight nature's bounty: mushrooms or brussel sprouts or artichokes or spinach or collard greens, mmm! I must say though, there is very little that a few crumbles of bacon doesn't enhance.

The other challenge is a new member of our little group, a vegetarian. Many are outraged at her stance and think me mad for allowing it. Yes, my group is a passionate one! She happens to be one of the guests tomorrow, and though she insists that we cook what we like, I do feel a bit obligated to cater to her. The outrage of the group is beginning to make more sense! It is the fact that I adore vegetables that makes me feel pressure to defend her. I just didn't think about the fact that I enjoy adding the swine to most of my veggies. Hmm. Well, inspiration don't fail me now!

I just can't get into it, I was reading recipes last night (food porn) and just kept thinking, egh. The harder I try, the stronger my mental block becomes. My most recent obsession is beets, but I have been hard pressed to find one in it's natural state. Besides, I want to "wow" people with the lushness vegetables are capable of! I want people to see them as I do; as beautiful and filled with a simple, lusty decadence all their own. I suppose that may be my problem, I am still trying to coax myself back into that very state!

Well, I am on my way. My beautiful city smiled down at me yesterday, I have Dean Martin crooning to me on Pandora (while my sad record player looks on in horror!), the familiar sense of excitement is returning to my mornings and the usual sly smile is playing on my lips at this very moment! It will come to me. I will don my pearls and some semblance of my summer vintage wardrobe, go out into my city and let it come to me.

If not, I suppose I could re-work one of my classics; stuffed braised artichokes, stuffed mushrooms, eggplant Parmesan stacks, spinach-tomato-garlic pizza. I really want to do something new! Create something amazing....

I think I have a back-up plan though, I will perfect a classic. I can make eggplant Parmesan sliders. I will saute beautiful little slices of fresh bread, top them with the parm and slice them into lovely bites. Perhaps not the most original idea, but I swear, they could make even the most vigilant carnivore question his ideals! Yes, perhaps that is what I will do.

There are more dinner parties to come, countless dishes to be created, life is long and I have plenty of time. You can't rush inspiration anymore than you can turn the clock forward or back. For now, I will relax in the knowledge that spring comes after winter every year and I can see glimpses of new growth even now.

The Gray Waiting Room

Waiting rooms can be places of anticipation, of fear, of boredom, of detachment.
The gray waiting room, with mere sadows pacing back and forth offers little joy. Looking out the window for a glimmer of beauty I see only gray clouds, no sunlight or signs of life to distract me. Distraction, that is the order of the day.

I move to another waiting room some days, this one is beige. There are a few distractions here; a joke, a smile, meaningless banter. Between these rooms, I search for signs of life beyond the walls,but those here with me seem to have found their home here. Even their dress reflects the monotone palate of the space. They are here and they aren't going anywhere.

I come to this place in the shadow of darkness and leave after the sparse rays of light have gone. My hours are good, much more limited than I have ever had before, but the weariness I feel seems to lengthen my days and steal my time away from this place.

I have been working here for a month now. I paint on a smile like a warrior puts on camouflage; just part of the uniform. I am good at my job, but I always am. My heart is not here though, it is too busy doing somersaults inside my chest. Watching the parade of sick old men come through my office affects me in ways I never expected.

I have never been squeamish before. I spent time in the hospital in Mosul, Iraq. Never was I taken aback or nauseated. The young wounded and ill, my brothers and sisters, they did not frighten me. The deteriorating lives I see on the wards and the infectous disease warnings that flash across my computer screen make my stomach jump. My compassion is stronger than my reservations, I touch the patients- a reassuring hug or pat on the shoulder, but this is always followed by a large dose of hand sanitizer when I am back in the confines of my little office.

I help them as best I can, but in a large bureaucratic organization, I am just one tiny piece of the machine. Reading the files I am filled with sorrow and rage as I read about men who destroyed themselves and who were destroyed by others. My job is not hard but it is heavy. I am just so tired.

I built my new life this year on the knowledge that your job does not define you, that life can be lived around your 9-5. I am struggling though. I need the life, the beauty, the hope that springs from my pretty past-times, but the gray exhaustion has consumed some of that. I find it hard to come home sometimes. I work a second job, make plans and go out, the gray exhaustion waits for me when I enter my apartment, throwing me into bed and pinning me down for anxious sleep.

My glimmer, my shining star on the horizon is starting school at NYU in January. Yesterday, as the impatient admissions aid told me that I had been wait listed, I felt my heart drop into my stomach and I felt my hands begin to shake slightly. For some reason, through all the little sorrows of the last few months, tears have not come for me, and yesterday was no different. How I long for tears, but my eyes are like deserts, instead re-routing all the anxieties in my life to the pit of my stomach.

Wait listed is not a no, I know that. I need this so badly though, I want to cling to it like a life raft when the gray walls begin to close in on me! I need a place in my life where intellect, creativity and passion can take me out of this waiting room, help me soar above it and see it as merely a tiny piece of my world, not the hulking megalith that stands before me now. But it is not a no. I will move forward as though it WILL happen. There is always a sweetness to painful longing, it is the knowledge that you have found something to desperately desire, kind of like being in love.

Perhaps it is not the room but the season. Winter is a gray bitch indeed. For now I will cling to my sweet distractions, continue to paint-on a smile and pray for the warm sun of springs yet to come.