food ...

Though my life is quite scary, I return, at intervals during the day, to a kind of bedrock in food. My life may be barely holding together, maybe, but I can have a very civilized meal.

There's a certain art in putting that together. I'm not saying I'm such a master, I'm not saying it's the only way, it's just the way I'm approaching it ... and it gives me a sensation of having succeeded.

I'm not even saying I completely succeed. There were some flaws in the meal we just had. I see evidence of people doing better. But, I partly succeeded. I can record the merits of the meal, and its shortcomings.

We had bagels and lox for breakfast. Except, I neglected to buy bagels. Instead, I bought rolls. So we had rolls and lox, or, as the girl said, lox and rolls, baby.

The rolls was a part I got right, though. So, OK, I'm out on errands the other day, and I'm at the starbucks on, what is it, 56th and ray?, and there's a fancy grocery there, so I decide to go in for a couple of things. I asked the guy at the bakery counter (who hates my guts) to put four rolls in a paper bag for me. $1.45, or something.

So, what's right about that is, they're rolls, simple, straight up, bakery baked crusty rolls ... and they've never been touched by anything made of plastic. They came home in a paper sack. That is proper.

True, the fancy food store uses a heavy sack, which is heavy on paper, heavy on pulp, heavy on the forest. In my ideal world, my fantasy world, maybe they'd use a very light sack for something like rolls ... or ask if I've got my own. I do have my own sacks, and I use them over and over. I'm talking about paper bags, here. There's a funny thing about that: while plastic bags get slimy, and you have to wash them, the paper in a paper bag kind of absorbs the oils and whatever from the food, and becomes like an oiled paper ... remaining basically, and profoundly, clean and nice.

In my fantasy world, we have delis that ask if you brought your own bags. They ask if you brought your own paper sacks for baked goods.

By the way, sometimes a bag gets sticky or otherwise too grody stuff on it. Then it goes in the compost. And, by the way, a light bag would be easier to compost than a heavy one is. But, a heavy one is literally infinitely better than a plastic bag.

Next, I went to the deli counter, and got lox. But they only had plastic bags. Drat. Maybe I can bring my own paper bag, next time. Then they'll truly hate me! (I can also go to the real deli, where they do wrap the lox in paper. I should do that. But it's a bit out of the way. In my fantasy world, there's a real deli just up the street. I can walk there, and get everything, bagels, lox, cream cheese, sliced vegetables, all wrapped in paper.)

The thing is, I'm out on errands, and, though I don't really want to go into a store, the store is there, so I'm thinking, "what can I do, that's just a little thing, but it makes a contribution. I'll get some baked goods, and some lox." And, as a result of taking that small step, we had lox and eggs yesterday, and lox and rolls today.

I bought the cream cheese a couple of weeks ago. I don't go to Trader Joe's very much, any more, even though I love them, because everything is in plastic. But I decided to try their cream cheese. It's in a box, but, inside, the wrapper is aluminized plastic. Yuk. Very disappointing.

So, that's my imperfect pantry for the morning. Proper rolls, improper lox (but nice, in paper inside its plastic bag), and improper cream cheese - but at least I have it. I got up first, this Saturday morning, and got some stuff together. Put the lox on fresh parchment paper on a plate, and back in the fridge, made a pot of tea, washed the table on the gazebo, and put the salt and pepper out there.

See, there's proper and not proper for something simple like making tea, even, and for washing the table, and for salt and pepper. I boil the water in a simple, stainless kettle, a classic form, out of Arabia, or India. Now whistle ... you've just got to watch it. Then I make the tea in a Chinese pot that we've had for ever, and drink it from a cup with a saucer ...