Agricultural Checkmate

POTATO: For years, it is true, I have enlisted your loyal service. Ample, steady, steadfast, you have been at the lead of my line, front and forward in the charge. With you as the spine of my army, you should be called no mere pawn but indeed the faithful and courageous foot soldier, rooted to the earth and the truest member of my delicious nation. The game begins, and with the onset of a Julienne Defense, you are my protector, my sustenance, my friend.

ONION: Layered and complex, but straightforward in application, you are the cornerstone of my board: you are my castle, my rook, and I could seal myself within you. Unshakably strong, it is your power that amplifies the aroma of the meal, and one could not consider a proper stew without you. Fear not, you shall not be forked by some fried liver attack, I shall assure you that any cut upon you will result in the tears of my nemesis.

TOMATO: O!, poet of the battlefield, my forces kneel before you and rest easy in your presence. Versatile and varied, your many uses are the fantastic grace which make you my knight. Be it raw, cooked, stewed, or diced, it is you that the world has ever looked upon as the great strategic warrior. As you at once seem both fruit and vegetable but also neither, you are different as you hook through the fields and wind your way to the vineyards of victory.

CARROT: The pointy-headed papacy, the pious knife, I am faithful to you, and you have guided my eyes toward glory, you are my Bishop. Teach the ways of the savior and the savory, and together we shall run those angles into the brutal fields of our enemy and carve out an orange-hued conquest no less than the Kingdom of God itself.

PEPPER: Oh Queen, my Queen at last. You are the true master of this agricultural checkmate. From Holland to Habañero, Bell to Scotch Bonnet, it is your gentle crisp crunch which calms us or your great fiery passion which lights this battlefield aflame. Without you at the king's side, what would he be but some rotund, pointed buffoon? It has been long known that behind every great man is a greater woman, and behind every great meal there can be nothing less than the finest ingredients. And my queen, you are fine.

DURIAN: There is little I can say that has not been said of the King of Fruits. You may be slow and uneasy to move, but your spines and odour will surely shake any which dares to sneak and make a cut into you. Durian, king of fruits, rest on your golden pillow and let your forces do your bidding. It is in your reign that we shall whet our appetites, and in our luck, we may have the chance to gaze upon you, god willing, from a distance.

Happy Bastille Day

It's been a good summer.

MIND MEAL

I will make you a dinner.

The Borderlands

It looks like I'm home again.

A few weeks ago, and I have made minor mention of such things but never quite so overtly, I found myself a new home. It was time to let Whitney have her couch back, and time for me to get motivated and out on my own. This, also paired with the end of my engagement, and the growing drive to further myself and choose my own adventure in New York City pushed my to look hard. I now have the biggest room I've ever had since I lived at home with my parents as a kid, and I'm doing it on my own. I'm working on starting my own independently-run business, one which functions inside the community in which I live. Nothing subservient. I have my own place. My own time. My own home, here on the borderlands between Queens and Brooklyn.

For me, this marks the end of a two-year long trial, which started with my suffering of a never-discussed misfortune. I spent the time dealing with, living with, experiencing the fallout and doing everything I could to conquer it. I took myself around the world, at times in the most raw of circumstances; I stayed home, at times in circumstances worse. This isn't to say there was no joy. Most of the time was joyful. The great, great majority. But there was an underlying problem from which it has taken time to recover.

I will never, ever forget any of the people that played a role in bringing me through. I could name you all, but you already know who you are.

I've ended a chapter and started a new one. I want you all to know that my door is open to you. Just for reading this. In any situation, my home is yours. Just be here when you need to be.

Istanbul from Galata

Snow Fields of Transilvania

14.01.08 "I am riding to SIGHIŞOARA. The snow gets thicker on the ground. CLUJ, and Romania in general, has this incredible light, air thick and hazy even with the clear sky. From the train window WHITE GRADIENTS TO LIGHT BLUES, with a DISC OF YELLOW OBSCURED IN THE FOG. There are SHEEP AND SHEEPDOGS AND SHEPHERDS in the field, and Transilvanian crows flying across barren farmland like Van Gogh's last painting." (from personal journal)



Transitions

May or may not have saved a life

After a great many pleasantly unsleeping hours and joys, I decide to walk home across a long stretch of town. Two blocks from home. A man is standing in my path and I cross the street to avoid him.

MAN: Hey! Hey! HEY!
JON: (ignore)
M: HEY! Don't you see me?
J: (I glance as I continue forward.)
M: I'm bloody. Do you see? (The man is shirtless. Blood streams down from his face, I think, from a wound above his left eye. The blood runs down his chest, unsmeared, in rivulets that blend together around his waistband. He is smoking a cigarette.)
J: Do... you need a doctor?
M: No, I'm strong.
J: You are.
M: I'm too strong!
J: I know.
M: ...I'm strong.

I cross the street. I can see behind me at in front of me at once, minding him while walking forward and home. He takes a long drag of his cigarette. I call a doctor.

Man soon enjoys a sushi

Guest writer, Dad

Hey Jon:
In keeping with your funny store incident stuff:

I'm in Rite-Aid Drug store purchasing a few things and converge simultaneously at the front check out area with a young Huntington yuppie lady and a stooped over old woman struggling with a quart of milk and a quart of soda that she is carrying. The old lady looks plaintively at the yuppie lady and says "oh were you first on line?"

The yuppie lady quickly dismisses her and says "Yes I was first" and moves ahead of her in the next to be served position. The old lady continues to struggle holding on to her stuff and after a minute or two the yuppie lady begins to feel guilty about what she had done and looks back to the old lady and says "aah.. why don't you go ahead of me."

The cashier calls out "Next please!" and the old lady steps up to the cash register and orders 2 packs of Marlboros!

I thought you might like that.

Dad