Nothing says summer like the smell of a campfire. Watching a fire burn is incredibly mesmerizing: the rapidly licking flames disappearing into the ether in a jumble of colors that turn from neon blue to deep red. Campfires were special occasions on the farm: we'd have our cookouts down by the first pond. My dad set up a small circle of weathered stones, and we’d trek down from the kitchen holding plates of burgers and homemade buns and squeeze bottles of ketchup.
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This weekend it snowed: fat, heavy flakes that pelted downwind and hit my car windshield with a satisfying splatter. I drove from New York to Philadelphia, and the sky turned from a faded gray to a darkly ominous slate to complete white-out. The rain started somewhere in New Jersey. Driving in the rain can be soothing, the rhythmic swooshing of the windshield wipers, the cozy cocoon of warmth in your car. I put on quiet music. My sister slept in the backseat, her hair rumpled, waking up every few minutes to watch the towns tick by: Edison, New Brunswick, South Orange.
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I’m sitting out here on my terrace, high above the street. Four stories below, the backyards of ground-floor apartments form a mosaic, dotted with outdoor grills and brick-bordered gardens. A man across the street sits in a lawn chair, reading a book. I can hear a girl talking on the phone. The couple next door is outside watering their geraniums in the waning sunshine. A pair of fat bumblebees twirl lazily overhead. From the street, the scent of warm chocolate chip cookies wafts up on the breeze.
Read moreOATMEAL CACAO NIB COOKIES
I'm sitting here with a big mug of steaming tea. As it steeped, I stood, leaning with my hip against the counter. I held the honey over the mug, letting the amber liquid stream in for a beat too long, and my tea is sweeter than usual. Opening the fridge, I discovered that I was out of both cream (!) and whole milk (!). Sighing as if to say why must I endure such cruel deprivation, I poured in equal parts skim and almond milk. Let it be said: This does not taste as good as cream.
Read morePIZZA CHEESE TWIST BREAD
I like to be alone. Or, to be more candid, I need to be alone pretty often. Growing up in a house with three sisters, a veritable menagerie of animals, and two parents, you get used to fiercely guarding your own independence.
It's funny how sometimes a day alone can make you melancholy, or it can feel like a gift. When it's the latter, the hours stretch out ahead of you, deliciously empty, waiting to be filled with any passing whim. You can put your phone away. You can take a long walk, and stop when you want to stop. Run when you want to run. You can willfully ignore lines of a recipe at dinnertime, leaving out the garlic because you don't really want four entire cloves in your chicken, thankyouverymuch. You can fast-forward through the parts of the movie you don't like.
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