When one has been very good about not eating anything dessert-like for several days, and when one has worked quite hard and thinks that to reward oneself one should take a walk to the cafe down the road and buy oneself a small, sweet treat, and when one has picked out (with glee) what one thinks is a slice of banana-chocolate-walnut cake, carried it over to the park across the street, and opened it up to enjoy it next to one’s husband (who is happily consuming a luridly colorful Rice Krispies treat with Froot Loops), and when, in the midst of one’s joy, one discovers that what one has purchased is not, in fact, a delicious banana-chocolate-walnut-cake, but a foul and pestilential fruit cake, then what one is tasting in one’s mouth is not only the cloying tang of candied cherries, but also the ashy, gunmetal flavor of disappointment.

A few years ago, Ross and I used to have one particular fight over and over. It would take place after we’d just spent some time with other folks, usually folks who were my friends first and therefore people Ross didn’t necessarily know very well. The fight would be about how when we were out he didn’t seem to be having a good (or good enough) time, and how it showed because he’d go all quiet and his eyes would drift upwards and to the side. I’d tell him how I didn’t want to have to worry about his well-being and sociability while I was trying to enjoy the company of my friends, and how it made me feel bad that he either was, or seemed, uninterested in them. I’d also talk about my fear that he came off as uninteresting to them. And Ross would usually say that he’d felt fine, if perhaps a little on the periphery of the conversation, but that my shooting him looks of concern and asking him how he was made him totally self-conscious and even less inclined to participate in what was going on.

I’d retort that I loved the smart, silly, storytelling person he was with me, and that it drove me nuts when my friends couldn’t see that side of him. Once I talked to Michael about this fight, and he used a phrase I’d never heard before and haven’t forgotten since: Ross, Michael said, was “hiding his light under a bushel.”

It was not a fun fight to have. It was as much about my insecurity over (not) being naturally sparkling and shiny in front of others as it was about Ross. I wanted everyone else to see the light I saw, because I wanted them to know how lucky and special I was for having that light in my life. The fight always ended with both of us feeling frustrated and sad, with that bitter dark feeling you get in your chest when there’s no good way to resolve a problem because the way you’ve got it framed is all wrong in the first place.

Ross and I haven’t had that particular fight in a long time. I thought about that fact this weekend, when as you know I had my friend Steph visiting for four days, and as you may or may not know, we had some new friends over for dinner on Saturday. Ross hadn’t met any of these people before. And it is not easy for anybody to handle that many unfamiliar social situations in a short span of time, especially when their somewhat highly-strung wife is herself worrying about being a good host and making a good impression on people who have traveled many miles to come and see her. So Ross was, understandably, on the quiet side of things. He wasn’t antisocial by any means; he was just a more subdued version of himself. He didn’t make too many funny faces or speak in too many fake accents or crack too many nerdy jokes. He didn’t tell too many stories. But he was calm, sweet, and thoughtful, just like he always is.

And I wasn’t worried.

Okay, part of me knew, of course, that he had a million faces, accents, and jokes hidden behind a bushel, so to speak, and that other people weren’t going to see those things right away. But by now I’ve come to realize that whether or not anyone else knows about that light Ross has tucked away inside him, it’s still there. And I know about it. And it’s going to come shining right out the moment he feels like showing it. That may be the next time he meets these folks, it may be months down the road (I’m very happy to say that Ross is just about as comfortable—and therefore funny and smart and storytelly—with my family, for instance, as he is with me) or it may be never.

It doesn’t really matter. I know who he is. And I also know how lucky and special I am to have his light in my life.

The weekend I’ve had has been full of stories and silly accents. The weekend I’ve had was marked by hugs on both ends. It involved more beer than I usually drink, more photographing than I usually do, and many more beautiful women than my weekends are usually privileged to contain. The weekend I’ve had has taught me a lot about people. It’s made me wonder, think, and stare hard at everything. The weekend I’ve had looked a lot like this.

1. been so long, 2. barely breathing, 3. aggie, unguarded, 4. dreaming of a hero, 5. Everyone Wanted These Bottles, 6. Thou Shalt Not Covet, 7. don’t kick back, 8. Argentinian Primitive Log Stools, 9. pathological flickring, 10. two of a kind, 11. you corner me, 12. Where In the World is Elizabeth Taylor?, 13. When In Vosges, 14. Elizabeth Taylor, 15. Elizabeth Taylor Has It Down to a Science, 16. The Back Of Stephanie’s Head

The monarchs are here. Ross said he saw a beautiful specimen a few days ago, and this morning as I walked back from the farmer’s market and the liquor store (equally essential errand stops) with beautiful finger-sized purple eggplants in my bag and a six-pack of India Pale Ale in my hand, another fluttered over my head. I know the winter is hard, but friends, when summer brings fireflies, crickets, and monarch butterflies, it’s hard not to love where you live.

On Tuesday night, the city gave us another gift. After an anniversary dinner whose highlights were a plate full of incredibly creamy scallops and polenta and an intoxicating lemongrass-scented crème brûlée, we walked over to Grant Park and laid out our blanket under the deep indigo sky. There we watched Felix Ungar and Oscar Madison whistle, wheeze, and weep on a screen at the other end of the grass. The night was not only cool, but actually cold—and sweet with summer wind. The sounds of the movie bounced off the tall circle of buildings behind us, creating a faint echo which would have been annoying if the fact of it wasn’t so amazingly neat. Every now and then we’d turn our heads to watch the spire of the Sears Tower pierce the liquid clouds.

It all quite made up for the gigantic plaguey clouds of tiny flies we had to pass through in order to arrive in the park. I wish I could say I was an equal-opportunity insect-lover, but plaguey clouds of tiny flies don’t really move me (except in that they make me jump and go “Arrrgh!”).

Anyway, up to and, frankly, including the part where the second toe on my right foot went completely numb from the cold (did you know this odd bodily malfunction could happen during the summer? I did not, but now I know how extreme my lack of healthy circulation is), it was pretty wonderful. So thanks again, Chicago. I might need to keep saying that as much as I can until you turn on me at the end of the year.

Dear Asher,

I know it’s almost 7 in the morning on the day after your birthday in Singapore, but over here the sun is still shining on the afternoon you officially turn four years old. Weird how that happens, huh? Because of the way the world rotates and where your spot on it is, you live in the future. But then again, you’re four years old. You would live in the future no matter what your address was.

It’s a little sad for me to be here, living in the past and several thousand miles away from your silly jokes, your lengthening legs, and your inherited stubbornness. I wish I could watch all of that every day, because whenever I see you I feel like we are the greatest of friends, but when we are apart I know it is hard for you to remember just how awesome your Aunty M. is and how much you ought to miss her. But I love my home, and I hope you get to see it one day soon. I’ll talk to the people in charge of your flight arrangements (you have a secretary, right?) and make sure they book your flight right in the middle of a grand Chicago winter, so you can have all the snow and snowmen you dream of.

In the meantime, please enjoy making as much trouble and mischief as you like. It makes for better stories when I talk to your official biographers on the phone every Sunday. Also, just so you know, you have a really cute girlfriend. I approve.

Love,
Aunty M

P.S. I feel bad that your birthday present was not the Megatron action figure I kind of promised I would get you. Can I offer you some cucumbers harvested by trained monkeys instead?

No?

Maybe next year, then.

I greet all

Sincerely your friend Oleg

I can’t help it, I’m a sucker for elegantly incorrect English and names like “Oleg.” I may have to begin my next work email with “I greet all.”

Since we discovered today that we’re already having a hard time remembering what we did on on our two previous wedding anniversaries (and since we used my blog as a time capsule, thus enabling us to recall the wonder that is duck tataki,), I thought I’d state for the record that today we

1) ate leftover seitan curry sitting by Botany Pond on the university grounds, feeding tiny sparrows grains of rice and enjoying the heatwave we’re having at the moment,

2) drank extraordinarily strong vodka-limoncello cocktails on the back deck,

3) plan on cooking lamb tagine and couscous with the organic meat we bought at the farmer’s market several weeks ago and have been saving in the freezer for a special occasion, and—

4) well—did this: