white apples . a blog

seven months

I am watching the morning light
squint through the blinds,
a brief flurry of dust settling,
a little body breathing,
unselfconsciously.  I want to
give thanks correctly for such a gift,
hands folded with humble devotion,
bent slight as a reed towards the glass,
sending this soft song outward
and away.
I want to remember how fragile
and perfect a moment is,
how all of life's frenzy and storm can slip
into stillness,
how days pass like clouds, airy and unnoticed,
how my heart can curve into the small comma
of her body, echoing warmly the sea that we came from,
the velvet of cheek against cheek,
the gaggle of eyelashes and earlobes,
how the smallest bud can be
bigger than anything that ever came before it

On a roll or A burgeoning friendship

I guess it was only a matter of time.  The kid is mobile.  Turn your back for two seconds and you will find her on the other side of room, grabbing at something breakable or drooling on something delicate.  Yes, she has mastered the art of rolling across the floor in the blink of an eye, taking out anything in her way - a chubby little steamroller.  That is, until she happens to encounter a large roadblock - for instance, in the form of sleeping dog.  She tries for minutes to roll up onto poor Sydney, knocking into her over and over again like some defective wind-up toy.  Finally, frustrated and exhausted, she gives up and moves onto tugging and squeezing big chunks of puppy fur/fat rolls.  Get used to this, Syd.  She's here to stay.

Where the heart is...

At some point last week, amidst a frenzy of signatures and notaries and large burps in my savings account, Charlie and I become first time homeowners. My head is already swimming with paint colors and bookshelves and clusters of photographs on the walls, but I still have three more days left at my current job, along with mountains of packing and organizing and purging before Juni and I board our one-way flight back East.

scenes from a day at del mar beach

#BBA Bread No. 6: Holla for Challah!

The bread in the BBA Challenge lineup is challah (Holla!).  In my previous bread experiences, I have never met a challah that was particularly memorable.  I have never been a fan of their egginess and their fancy shapes and their strange brown crusts.  I was not excited about this one.  But, my sense of order and rightness wouldn't allow me to skip ahead just because I didn't think I would like this one.