what's good, all kinds of love edition

music, poetry, bread + some bonus stuff

In music: I have a YouTube Music account [like an old person, I’m told] and on one of My Supermix playlists Stephen Sanchez popped up recently, and I have become properly-but-not-weirdly obsessed. He is a darling cross between Ritchie Valens and Reeve Carney (I have to use words like “darling” because he is *under 21* at the time of this post and it would be supremely creepy of me to say anything suggesting “sexy”). Darling precious young Stephen discovered crooners like The Ink Spots and Frank Sinatra on vinyl in his grandparents’ barn and decided he had to buy a guitar and risk becoming That Guy in high school. You know That Guy. But good for all of us with taste that he would be so bold. Now I just have to stop myself from becoming a stalker spending too much money on trips + tickets to see him in concert.

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In poetry: I love Kim Addonizio for many reasons - obviously the spare beauty and occasional brutality (that is still heart-shatteringly beautiful) of her writing but also her raising of a very cool & talented daughter [Aya Cash, recently as the troubled/troubling Stormfront on The Boys - poem about her in the paid bonus section today]. Oh and I adore her for reaching out during the early pandemic days to kindly offer signed work to anyone who sent her birthday wishes, which I did and got this in return:

A dark bright spot in isolation.

This particular poem is at once a love story about friends (and the waiter? And the food?) plus a solid breath-stealing gut punch. I feel the tenderness & sadness but also the fierce devotion to staying in the moments. And staying alive.

Eating Together by Kim Addonizio

I know my friend is going,
though she still sits there
across from me in the restaurant,   
and leans over the table to dip
her bread in the oil on my plate; I know   
how thick her hair used to be,   
and what it takes for her to discard
her man’s cap partway through our meal,   
to look straight at the young waiter   
and smile when he asks
how we are liking it. She eats
as though starving—chicken, dolmata,   
the buttery flakes of filo—
and what’s killing her
eats, too. I watch her lift
a glistening black olive and peel   
the meat from the pit, watch
her fine long fingers, and her face,   
puffy from medication. She lowers   
her eyes to the food, pretending
not to know what I know. She’s going.   
And we go on eating.

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In food: It felt like my grandma Minnie was always baking banana bread, though I’m pretty sure that’s not true. She did a lot of sewing & crafting and some gardening, along with watching All My Children and Wheel of Fortune daily. I do know that whenever she did bake, my grandparents’ whole house smelled like warm delicious comfort. One of my favorite things about growing up next door to them was walking in anytime to eat something delightful [that I probably couldn’t get at home]. At my wedding shower in 1993, my mom wrote the Banana Nut Bread recipe on a card for me that I still have propped in my kitchen, even though I can now make it without needing to look at the card (yet I still do, because perimenopausal memory loss + it’s in my mom’s handwriting). Once, in a fit of misguided inspiration after my grandma died, I added cinnamon to the batter while making a loaf for my grandpa; he ate it dutifully but said it wasn’t like hers. I never strayed again. Except that I use more bananas, because they’ve gotten smaller and less flavorful since the 80s. And I will also sometimes add chocolate chips, but none of those ‘fancy’ spices. #DutchSensibility

Fully baked love

I wonder if my kids think of me as ‘always’ baking banana bread? It’s easy and hugely satisfying to make, especially on a chilly grey Sunday when I need something that a) I’m effortlessly good at and b) is delicious and c) makes other people happy. Maybe if I play Stephen Sanchez on my old-people YouTube Music app while making it, I will dissolve into a haze of perfect joy for an hour. Must experiment.

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Bonus includes more love: extra videos & poems, plus my grandma’s illustrious banana bread recipe.