Author: 3RueSleidan

Charlie

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A name like Charlie carries with it a lot of weight.

Ten years ago in Paris, a different kind of Charlie made headlines. The blood ran from employees of the magazine Charlie Hebdo, attacked due to the intolerance of French-born Algerian brothers Saïd Kouachi and Chérif Kouachi. The satirical cartoons published by the magazine were considered offensive against Islam. People died because others were offended.

Countries like ours that not only believe in the importance and value of free speech, but have embedded that value into America’s laws and founding principles, must continue to protect it. There are those who seek to silence others through fear or intimidation. Like the Kouachi brothers. And like the assassin of another Charlie, here in our own country, an assassin who thought he could end the conversation.

That assassin, an American-born, self indulgent narcissist whose ego got the best of him, cut down Charlie Kirk on a university campus in Utah. Charlie was doing what he loved — interacting with young people who might have a different opinion than his — when the assassin’s bullet ripped through his throat. But that bullet didn’t silence Charlie, it only awakened his disciples.

The misguided assassin who took Charlie’s life, whose actions left a wife and children without a husband and father, was wrong. Neither vengeance nor violence ever wins. And fame is fleeting for a murderer. The assassin’s message gets lost in the grief of a nation, while Charlie’s voice lives on forever.

Failure to Thrive

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When I heard that my grandfather had died, the news did not surprise me. Granddaddy had slowed down for months. Whenever I visited my grandparents’ house, he was always sitting in the same, faded overstuffed chair near the front door, his spindly legs propped up on a gray ottoman. My grandmother, who everyone called Next Mama, would bring him a cup of coffee or a sandwich during the day. He got up with her help when he needed to visit the restroom, but mostly he read the Bible a lot in those last months.

Born into a Jewish family in Kentucky, Grandaddy was not very religious throughout most of his life. He must have started to worry that God would punish him if he didn’t come back around. He had married a Protestant woman, so some in his family were not happy about that. Yet his wife Mary Hayes hailed from a long line of famous Virginians, so how could his parents complain? Their three children were raised Christians and Next Mama took them to church regularly. Granddaddy stayed home on Sundays, escaping the noise of child’s play.

The day Granddaddy died, he was not at the little house on Beverly Avenue in Jacksonville, Florida, where the couple had lived since 1955, the house that their son Joe had purchased for them. Nor was Grandaddy seated in the faded, overstuffed chair. His Bible was not on the table next to him.

My younger sister Stephanie, 11, and I were playing a rousing game of bound-ball in the street in front of our house. It was nearly Christmas, but Florida was still hot and steamy. We finished several rounds and decided to go inside to quench our thirst. I was winning, so had no concerns about ending the game for the day. At 13, the real competition for me came in racing my sister to the front door. We both laughed at one another as we ran, our faces flushed with play. I arrived first and placed my right hand on the brass door handle, one of those fancy kind that you have to push your thumb down hard on the latch to open the door. My mother had special ordered it when my parents built their dream house on Whitman Street in 1960. As I was about to shove the door open, laughing and pushing my sister out of the way so that I could enter first, the dark red door appeared to open magically by itself. Standing on the opposite side of our gaiety was Next Mama.

“He’s gone,” our grandmother blurted out matter of factly, shaking her head. “Your granddaddy’s gone.” Her face motionless, void of passion, Next Mama stood there looking at us for a few seconds, then turned and walked back into the house.

The handle still resting in my hand as I half hid behind the door, I looked over at Stephanie who stood frozen just behind me. We stared at one another for what seemed an eternity before we tiptoed into the house without a word. Our cheeks still reddened from the impromptu race, we made our way down the main hallway past Mom and Dad’s bedroom and toward the kitchen. I turned my head to the left as I passed the open bedroom door and saw someone lying in my parents’ California king-sized bed. Too afraid to ask questions, we quickly moved past the bedroom doorway. My shoe slipped on the linoleum floor and I caught myself on the open shelves that separated the hallway from the kitchen. My mother’s collection of Hummel® figurines had populated those shelves for years. I could only imagine the punishment if I were to break one. Mom stood in the kitchen wiping her eyes with a tissue, then used it to blow her nose. I could tell she had been crying for a while.

“Go say goodbye to your granddaddy,” Mom commanded between sniffles. “He’s in our bedroom. He died just a little bit ago.”

I had never seen a dead person. One of our kittens was killed once when Mom accidentally backed the car over it. She didn’t know the kitten was under the wheel seeking shelter from the rain. Watching its once vibrant body turn lifeless was devastating. Then there was the time that Lady, our blond cocker spaniel, gave birth to ten beautiful puppies and they all died. We never knew what caused that tragedy, but my dad buried all the puppies in the backyard. Lady tried to dig them up.

Seeing my grandfather dead was totally different. I mean, he was a person, a living, breathing person who sat at the dinner table with us and walked us to the Five and Dime store and taught us lessons about life. Granddaddy was someone I loved.

Stephanie and I both folded our hands together and held them up close to our chests as though we were about to pray.

“You go first,” Stephanie whispered as she poked my arm. I looked at her, my eyebrows furrowed, and said, “Chicken.”

Mom’s eyes were still filled with tears. She sat down at the cluttered kitchen desk, an extension of the counter-top, a space built for sitting and planning menus. She took the yellow wall phone off its rocker, fingered the pages of her telephone directory and began dialing. The sound of each spin of the rotary dial, one number after another, told me that she was making a long distance call. The arduous process of informing others had begun.

I began my slow walk back down the hall toward my parents’ bedroom, my sister just behind me. As I got closer to the door, I could hear Next Mama’s soft whimpering and the sound of my older sister Anita, 16, speaking in low tones. I was glad Anita was there. She was level headed and would help Mom and Next Mama with all that lie ahead. Not only would they have to inform countless family and friends, but they had to notify authorities, call a funeral home to pick up Granddaddy’s body, make arrangements for a burial, order flowers, plan a reception. Then my parents would have to deal with the fact that Mom’s father had died in their bed.

But at this moment, they just had to grieve.

When I arrived at the bedroom doorway, I could see that the curtains were drawn. Next Mama was standing at the foot of the bed. Anita had gently positioned her arms around her grandmother’s shoulders. Granddaddy’s eyelids were shut. His cheeks already appeared ashen and he lay so very still. He looked like he was taking a nap. Yet nothing about him suggested the man I had known growing up — gone was the twinkle in his eye, the soft smile, the gentleman’s hat that he had always tipped to ladies who walked past him. His cane was propped in the corner of the room; it was the last day he would ever use it. I remembered fetching it for him once when he needed help. I searched around looking for his Bible.

“Did Granddaddy have his Bible when he died?” I asked in a low voice. Anita shook her head no. Next Mama’s head moved back and forth, as well, but more as a kind of disbelief than a response to my question.

“I know he was thinking about those words he read, though,” I said to offer some comfort to Next Mama. “He loved what the Bible said. He used to quote it to us all the time.”

Grandaddy’s family roots were in Germany. His father Levi and his two uncles Silas and Karl had immigrated to the United States as young men in the 1870s, leaving behind sisters Pauline, Bertha and Lena to continue the family’s German heritage. The brothers were adventurous and entrepreneurial, making their way from New York City to the South where they opened a general store in the small town of Olive Hill, Kentucky. Some of Levi’s children remained true to their Jewish faith. Others, like my grandfather, married Christian women. America was different from Germany and mixed faith marriages were more readily accepted. My mother had told me stories about her German cousins, the descendants of Levi’s sisters. Most of them had perished in the 1940s in concentration camps. Mother kept in touch with the only survivor she knew, Clara, who lived because of the kindness of a stranger in Amsterdam. I was reminded of those stories as I watched Grandaddy lie in my parents’ bed, his soul now drifted away from his body. I felt lucky that my great-grandfather had chosen to take a boat to America. Grandaddy’s death was so much more peaceful than the German side of his family had experienced during the Holocaust. His passing was still painful, nonetheless. Painful for those of us who loved him.

I could no longer bear to look at Grandaddy’s body. I knew I would never forget what it looked like. I knew that some day, I would look like that, too. Most teenagers think little about death since everything is ahead of them in life. That day, I was reminded that life is not forever, but that faith and love are everlasting.

Why we need our Fathers

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America celebrated Father’s Day on Sunday. We celebrated all that fathers do to raise honest, hardworking and responsible children. It’s not easy to be a father, and yet their role has become ever important. We need fathers to guide us, teach us, and love us.

As a woman, I know that my father played an important role in my relationships today with men. In all honesty, I was much closer to my father than to my mother. Mom had four kids running around under her feet all the time as she busied about feeding us, wiping our noses and getting us off to school. Dad always made sure our bicycles were in working order, that we got up on time, and that we did our homework. He also vetted our boyfriends, waited up until we got home from a date — even flicking the outdoor lights on and off if my boyfriend and I lingered too long in the driveway, and he took us to church on Sundays.

I have some great memories of my dad. He died in 1983 when my daughter was only two years old. I so wish he could have watched his red-headed granddaughter grow up and to meet his two great grandkids. They would have loved his humor, his patience and his kindness.

My dad grew up on a farm in Missouri; but he longed to fly airplanes. The US Navy eventually gave him that chance. When he retired to Jacksonville, Florida, after 30 years in the military, he became a schoolteacher sharing his own experiences in his history and geography classes – the life he had led in the Navy. He had survived the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and 14 hours in the water off the coast of Japan when his plane went down during World War II. My dad was a strong man.

When I was in 5th grade, I remember my dad playing nursemaid to our dog Lady who was struggling with delivering her puppies. Sadly, every one of those ten puppies died that day. My dad ceremoniously buried the ten lifeless pups as we kids grieved along with Lady. Dad was gentle in that way.

I also remember the day when Lady had puppies that did survive their birth. Cute, little blond cocker spaniels squirming and yelping in their cardboard box. When the puppies were only a few days old, Dad arrived with a large butcher knife in his hand, and we were horrified as to what he was about to do. One by one, he chopped off the puppies’ tails. Cocker spaniels, as you know, have cropped tails.

One of my best memories of dad was the day I wed in 1972. I was decked out in the white satin wedding dress I had made, my left arm resting on my dad’s strong forearm. I looked up at him – he was quite tall and handsome — just before we were to walk down the long aisle of the church. He turned to whisper something in my ear. “You don’t have to go through with this if you don’t want to,” he said. At that moment, I loved him even more. Ever the protector, my dad was there for me that day. Of course, I did go through with that wedding and dad celebrated along with everyone else.

After I had been married a few years, my parents and my younger brother came to visit us one weekend. My younger sister was living with us temporarily, having moved to South Florida to start her life post-divorce. We all had dinner together at home. My sister had a date later that night, so she left the dinner table early to get ready. When my dad learned his youngest daughter was abandoning us for some fellow, he became upset and demanded that she not go out, but instead stay home with the family. He spoke as though my sister were 14 years old.

At that moment, I reprimanded my father. I reminded him that he was in my house now. His rules did not apply. After all, I was 30 years old, and my sister was 28. It took a lot of guts for me to speak so firmly to my father as I had a healthy respect for him.

What surprised me that evening was that my dad later apologized. “You’re right,” he said. “You’re both grown adults and can make your own decisions. I was wrong to suggest otherwise.”

Those words have never left me. My father’s unexpected apology recognized me as an adult, and yes, always his daughter, but an adult. It also reminded me what a great dad he was.

It’s tough for parents to transition from changing their babies’ diapers to having a beer together with their grown kids. We need our dads at all stages of life.

Happy Father’s Day to all the dads out there.

Thanksgiving 2023

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The planned menu started out great. A simple Thanksgiving dinner to share with friends.

We decided to serve:

◦ Mimosas & cheese platter with crackers

◦ Oyster Stuffing

◦ Steamed green beans

◦ Mashed potatoes with skins

◦ Cranberry sauce

◦ Turkey – 13.26 lbs.

◦ Gravy

◦ Tossed salad

◦ Baguette + butter

◦ Pinot Noir

◦ Pecan pie with vanilla ice cream

The real Thanksgiving dinner was harder to create than we expected…

Wednesday…

The day before Thanksgiving, my husband Khalid agreed to help me with the menu preparations. I needed help chopping vegetables and retrieving heavy items from the cabinet. I dislocated my shoulder a month ago and am still not operating at 100 percent.

I asked Khalid to get the sugar canister down as I needed it for the cranberry sauce. I keep it on the second shelf of an upper cabinet. He reached for it and I could tell something was going awry. I begged him to move other things out of the way first, or perhaps use a step stool, but he was stubborn and proceeded as usual. As he pulled the canister filled with five pounds of sugar toward him, the lid popped off and showered him, the shelves, countertop, floor, even the tiny crevices on the cabinet doors with sugar. For the next 20 minutes, as our feet crunched around on sugar, we cleaned up sticky crystals from the cabinet shelf to the floor to the counters to below the trash compactor to even the small ledges on the cabinet doors and the folding door for the bread storage hideaway. The sugary mess just added to our prep work. Sigh.

Cleaning up sugar distracted me, thus, I allowed my cranberries to boil over leaving a sugary cranberry juice mess hardening to a smooth candy-like skating rink glistening on the stove top. One more difficult cleanup job.

Wednesday night, we unwrapped our fresh turkey and prepped it for brining overnight, plucking out any stray remaining feathers and washing, salting and thanking it for gracing our table. We carried it downstairs to our second refrigerator which had more space and poured the brine water over it there. Not one drop spilled as Khalid lifted the heavy pan onto the upper shelf of the refrigerator. Finally, after a quick kitchen cleanup, we could get some sleep.

Thursday…

On Thanksgiving day, I awakened with a severe foot cramp, no doubt from standing on our wooden floors in the kitchen all day. Not a great way to begin the holiday. Thankfully, I had dill pickles at the ready since they work well to diminish a cramp.

I awakened Khalid to help me with making the various dishes we had planned to serve. Our guests were due to arrive at 5 pm and there was still a lot to accomplish. We lay in bed another 15 minutes just talking about the day to come and then I finally got up to face the day.

Out of bed yet still in my nightgown, I started moving Christmas wrapping paper out of the kitchen. The last week or so, ribbons and tissue paper and smiling Santas had taken over our kitchen and dining room as I feverishly wrapped gifts to send family and friends.

I noticed my phone and had a missed call from Kate. She left a Thanksgiving greeting. There were also Thanksgiving texts from Stephanie, David and Dalila. As I read and responded to texts, my phone rang— Anita was calling to wish us a Happy Thanksgiving. We spoke briefly of pies and Aunt Sara. Then I was once again focused on my cooking and cleaning.

Khalid eventually got up to start on his assigned tasks, but not before sipping his usual cup of coffee and munching a peanut butter smeared croissant. He cleaned a pile of Russet potatoes for mashing, leaving skins on as he prefers them. He snapped green beans and chopped onion and celery for the stuffing.

The big menu item was the turkey! My dislocated shoulder still limits my range of motion. I can’t carry anything as large as a 13.25 lb. turkey, especially when it’s in a large pan sloshing around in a bag filled with 12 cups of brining liquid. Khalid managed to carry the heavy pan laden with sloshing brine and turkey from the downstairs refrigerator to the bottom of the stairs, but then the stairs proved daunting. So I took one side of the pan with my good arm and he took the other side, and we sloshed up the stairs to the kitchen without disaster. Whew!

But wait … we still had to dump the brining liquid into the sink and get the turkey prepped for roasting. Fortunately that occurred without incident.

I turned on the oven to heat to the required temperature.

We had done the math and knew how long our turkey needed to bake. I melted butter and mixed it with the seasonings, then gently brushed the hot liquid all over the turkey, making sure to cover every nook and cranny on the big bird’s body. Khalid assisted me in trussing the turkey, leaving both of us with buttery hands.

The oven was ready. We washed the butter from our hands. All looked well to put the turkey in the oven where it would roast until it was ready for its next basting. I couldn’t lift the pan due to the turkey’s weight, so Khalid carried it from the counter adjacent to the sink over to the counter in front of the oven in preparation. I opened the oven door and felt the heat flow out. The temperature was perfect for the big bird. Khalid again picked up the heavy pan, but this time our beautiful, buttered and brined turkey suddenly slid out of the pan and onto our wooden kitchen floor. With one hand, he swooped up the buttery turkey and plopped it back into the pan and into the waiting oven. The look on his face was one of pure terror. He started cleaning up butter and assuring me that all was well.

What had just happened? I stood there in disbelief.

It appeared that Khalid had grabbed one side of the pan with its normal handle and then accidentally grabbed the wrong handle on the other side — the one attached to the rack upon which the turkey sat. So when he picked up what he thought were the pan’s handles, one side fell free releasing our buttery turkey to fly through the air and land itself and all that buttery sauce on the floor, cabinets, oven door, drawers and anything else within a certain radius of the flying bird.

The good news is that our guests never knew.

Khalid and I cleaned up butter for the next half hour. Khalid was worried that he would face my wrath. I could see it on his face as he mopped the floor. I suppose I was still in shock, but suddenly I burst into laughter and I couldn’t stop giggling. Our Thanksgiving turkey had just ended up on the floor.

When Khalid saw me doubled over in laughter, he was at first perplexed, but then relieved. It truly was one of those unforgettable moments that will remain forever a part of our Thanksgiving lore. It reminded me of the scene in the movie “A Christmas Story” when dogs come in and eat the freshly roasted turkey and the family ends up eating at a Chinese restaurant.

The year when my mother had surgery, my father roasted his first turkey with the bag of giblets left inside. I have told that true Thanksgiving story many times. This year’s flying buttered turkey story will be retold, as well.

In between all the cooking and cleaning up sugar and butter messes, I kept checking up on my senior cat Gypsy who has now lost control of her bowels. She often misses the litter box in favor of the floor, or if I am lucky, she used the pee pads I put down in the mudroom where I keep her. I can’t trust her to wander the house freely anymore. Poor thing is skin and bones, but still hungry and begging for food. Her thyroid condition requires medicine in her ears twice daily. Despite my focus on cooking on Thanksgiving day, I still had to care for Gypsy.

As if that wasn’t enough, the dining room was still filled with Christmas wrapping paper that got moved just prior to our guests’ arrival and, with Khalid’s help, a fresh tablecloth added to the table with plates and silverware set just in the nick of time.

Khalid had told me that our two young guests would arrive at 5 pm; yet he told them to come at 4 pm. So when the doorbell rang earlier than expected, I was still in my nightgown just about ready to shower and dress. Khalid was downstairs about to step into the shower himself.

Sparky started barking, her usual alert to me when someone is at the door. I ran to my room to don a robe and opened the door to welcome our guests, apologizing for my inappropriate attire. We all laughed at the miscommunication. Khalid heard their voices and wandered up the stairs … himself not yet showered or shaved … and entertained our guests while I showered and dressed. Then we switched places and I continued cooking while he got ready.

Despite the arrival time mixup, our evening progressed well serving Mimosas and cheese as appetizers. Our young guests helped chop things as I continued to cook.

The oyster stuffing still had to be made. My recipe called for cornbread which I didn’t have, so I substituted regular stuffing cubes.

I asked Khalid to carve the turkey, another interesting experience. I assumed he would be skilled in that task, but he cut huge hunks of meat, a whole leg on the platter, a huge hunk of breast … instead of neat slices. As he carved, he’d stop to gobble down some of the meat, caveman style. The turkey tasted great anyway, nice and moist despite all its trauma.

We finally sat down at the table an hour past the planned 6 pm dinner time.

Khalid’s mashed potatoes were great, skin and all. The turkey was juicy. Cranberry sauce was perfect. Green beans were amazingly simple and delicious with no seasoning whatsoever. The oyster dressing was yummy even without cornbread. My pecan pie was a frozen one I had purchased, but it tasted great topped with Breyer’s vanilla ice cream. No one wanted coffee, so we chatted over dessert until our guests departed.

After they left, Khalid found his way to the couch and stretched out. I released the cats and dog from their laundry room prison and then plopped down in the chair next to him. In minutes, he was snoring. Our cat Buddy wanted to jump in my lap, so I got up to change clothes back into my nightgown given that I didn’t want cat fur on my nice dress. I sat down again in my nightgown, finished my glass of Pinot Noir, and released a sigh of relief. Thanksgiving was over for another year. But not quite. A messy kitchen awaited me. Pans needed to go in the dishwasher. My good china and silver required handwashing. Leftovers needed to be repackaged and refrigerated for tomorrow’s soup.

The day was a reminder of how thankful I am to have a loving husband, friends and family who care, and a good sense of humor.

Mask

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Another year, pages

Of smiling faces, family members

Arms wrapped around shoulders

Hugs so tight you can’t breathe

Of better times when we laughed, ate cake

Together

When Uncle Jim would play Santa

And Aunt Wilma forgot tags on gifts

Slippery ice made walking paths dangerous

Between cabins warmed by gathered crowds 

sipping cocktails or beer

Together

Popcorn strings a merry substitute

For the finer tree décor back home

No lights except those we imagined

But no one cared because

We were happy to be there

Together

In an alpine setting far from town

Smoke billowed from our chimneys

Leaving just enough room for a sleigh

The sound of carols filled the kitchen

Joyous and merry on the outside

Together

A name drawn from a red cap

Decided who would go next 

To choose a gift to open

From the annual exchange

Of unknown donors

Together

Merrymaking clarified life then

Created a mask of perfection

Family, love and joyous times

Reason to live, reason to sing

Because we were

Together

What became of the laughter

Can only be surmised by time

Hardships of life

People disappear from the photos

Year after year, no more

Together

Busy lives lost in a tv screen

Talking to no one and everyone

With hopes of notoriety 

Influential words that no one 

Reads or wants to

Together

Impossible flights to nowhere

Century storms keep us alone

Destined to never repeat

What is obvious in those pages

Of smiling faces, family members

Together


—Victoria Emmons, ©2022

Out of Place

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The speck of something, I don’t know what, lingers in my head, refuses to go away, rests happily atop the left-hand corner of my place mat next to a bowl of cherry yogurt with milled brown flax seed sprinkled on top. Is the intruder to my breakfast a random flax seed? Or is it left from last night’s dinner plate, perhaps a kernel of dried baby broccoli undiscovered until now? Whatever it is, the light-colored speck on the forest green placemat is ruining my place setting, ruining the order in my meal, the order I have created in my life. Yet another distraction that must be eliminated.

I lick my pointer finger — no particular flavor detected — and press down on the speck of whatever. It sticks to my skin, only to be released a moment later into the tiny succulent that adorns our small, round table. A table designed just for two, not for a speck of something to break the order.

The speck now gone, I can proceed with my thoughts free of clutter, free to create, dream, imagine myself elsewhere, perhaps with waves lapping gently at the side of my boat as I float in warm, clear water. No summer smoke. No chaos. No demands.

My granddaughter awakens and interrupts my reverie, tiptoes out to the kitchen like a hungry mouse. In her tiny pink pajamas with the laughing unicorn emblazoned on the front, she greets me with her own cheery face. She tosses her blonde curls to one side as she slips into the chair across from me without a sound.

Ready for breakfast? She shakes her head yes.

I gather up my dirty bowl and empty glass to take to the kitchen sink. Her favorite pancake batter awaits as I heat the griddle. It is the third morning in a row for pancakes.

What shape today? Kitty, she cries.

The batter to make a cat head, body, ears and tail is poured with care. I flip the cat pancake until both sides are golden brown and slide it onto a small, red plate. I place the cat and a bottle of Minnesota, tourist-size syrup in front of her, warning her to be careful with the sweet syrup. It pours easily.

She reaches for the pancake, then folds it in half as though it were a sandwich, with the cat ears flattened together and the tail hanging out from the folded edges. I realize I have forgotten to give her a fork. She holds the pancake in mid-air with her left hand, then reaches with her right for a speck of something, a speck resting on her forest green placemat. She picks it up and deposits it into the plant on the table. I hand her a fork and breakfast proceeds in an orderly fashion, followed by an orderly life, a penchant for everything in its place, poor girl.

Crumbs

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The trail you leave behind

in the kitchen

tells me

you want to be found,

not yet lost, but

still searching

 

I consider

my future with you

a morning ritual of baguette crumbs

from our favorite shop

scattered on the counter and floor

crunching under my feet

 

I wait in line

to buy the last loaf

standing tall in its bread basket

fresh in the early morning

still warm from the oven

the way you like it

 

I know there will be crumbs

and the trail that remains

after your midnight feast

of peanut butter and honey

on a toasted slice

yet I buy the baguette anyway

 

I carry my own crumbs

remnants of a life before you

a different time, different goals

hope, fear, love, disappointment

greatest joy and deepest sadness

challenges that we both faced

 

I didn’t know I was searching for you

we were both lost

in our thoughts, in our grief

As life proceeded with little consequence

as though everything was normal

So we normalized life

Together

 

I stand here for you

knowing that a life

of eloquent words

and a trail of bread crumbs

left behind in the morning

has captured my heart

Victoria Emmons, ©2019

Mom’s Scrambled Egg Casserole

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Twelve dozen. 

Maybe just one.

Crack each open. 

Open each crack. 

Careful. 

Mindful. 

No shells in the sink. 

Just think. 

You are her. 

Then stir. 

No denial. 

On trial. 

Recipe fits, try it.  

Topping too fat. 

Think of that.

Push. 

Shape eggs into mush.

Cheese sauce on top. 

Stop.

Bake ‘til done.

—Victoria Emmons, ©2017