All this and more

An evening of slinky jazz, butter-fried scallops, and an exceedingly lovely vodka tonic with mint and chile

I dropped my brand new, work-issued iPhone 13 on the pavement today. I wasn’t too worried because I’ve dropped it several times since receiving it from my company, and it’s always been fine, surrounded as it is with a protective buffer of navy blue rubber. This time, however, I was unlucky. I picked it up to find a crazed pattern of broken glass spiking this way and that across my screen, beneath the privacy filter. I felt a shock of sorrow, then the obvious (and appropriate) self-recrimination.

I was unable to don a bra this morning because of my frozen right shoulder. Almost any movement causes pain. So, I carefully pulled on my daughter’s Guess button-down shirt with the pattern of little brown squares filled with intermittent mustard and white dots. I drove out to my massage appointment with Amir, my masseuse, in Richmond, California.

On the way, I called TD Ameritrade, the “financial services” company, to try to get help for the family in Turkey that is still awaiting money left to them by our mutual friend who died last summer. They are a poor Kurdish family being taken advantage of by “a man who asked for $1000” to help them. They reached out to me today on WhatsApp. I said, Do not pay him anything. I will help you.

I was still on hold with TD Ameritrade after 15 minutes when it was time to enter the yurt situated in the verdant front yard of a house in the Richmond hills. I hung up after keeping Amir waiting two minutes.

Amir offered me a hug, as he always does, as he has for the 22 years I’ve been seeing him, on and off, for massage therapy. In these two decades, he returned to Israel, where he is from, and then fled back to the U.S. I raised two children, who are launched.

I laid face down on the massage table, and Amir did the best he could with my “frozen” right shoulder. It’s, of course, the mouse hand. It’s also the hand that types on the iPhone. The hand the reaches into the air above me in the middle of the night when I’m in bed reading the New York Times. Because, you see, I just can’t seem to get enough of Trump’s antics. To translate, I’m dying to see him carted away in hand- (and ankle-) cuffs and can’t seem to quit obsessively scrolling. (How’s that for self-abuse?)

In other words, life is a little crazy for me. I’m not acting as I ought. I’m a little erratic, a little fly-away, being led this way and that, distracted, frenetic. I need to calm down. Way down.

A covey of birds are squawking in the garden. I wish I could call the sounds they’re emitting chirps, but they’re too obnoxious. My neighbor’s roses need water. I watch them out the window, calling for water. I can feel it. I will need to wait until the next time they go to Lake Tahoe. Then, I will creep over and water the roses and the fig trees, and the blood orange, the way I’ve been doing since last summer. They would be mad if they knew.

In other words, I have trouble minding my own business.

In other words… I’m bored. I’m lonely. I’m sad.

But, is that really true? The truth is, I’m LOVING having my house to myself. My kids launched. My retriever always at my feet. I’m loving working from home, avoiding the commute, listening to jazz all day.

Take this evening. It was a kind of perfect evening. It is still unfolding. Light remains in the sky, although the rosy fingers of sun have been retracted from the hillside behind me, which is deepening to black.

I made myself a single lovely cocktail: a Vodka Tonic with Mint. It’s a keeper. I saved it.

Here’s the recipe (I knew you were patiently waiting):

Vodka Tonic with Mint
Recipe from Ismail Merchant
Adapted by Elaine Louie
Yield: One serving

INGREDIENTS

2 ounces vodka
8-10 mint leaves (this is where you get to traipse out to your garden, put your hand to your little spearmint grove, and pull a bunch of fragrant leaves from a single stalk)
Pinch of red pepper flakes (or, in my case, pulverized chile mixed with Gusanos de Maguey from Oaxaca, Mexico)
4 ounces tonic water
Juice of one-half of a lemon

PREPARATION

Step 1
Fill an 8-ounce glass with ice cubes, add all ingredients, and stir gently, taking care not to bruise mint leaves (what? I thought that was the point: bruised mint leaves. I took no such care.)

From New York Times Cooking

It was delicious, this cocktail. Not too strong, spicy, balanced, refreshing, complex. In a word, fantastic. A new favorite.

Now, of course, I listen to my lovely jazz station: KCSM, Jazz 91.1, a top-tier jazz station with listeners all over the world, and type to you, my audience. :)

My point is, I’m actually relatively happy.

But, there is a caveat. I’m dimly aware that I’m a tad lonely. I know this because when I have an actual, in-person interaction with another human, I feel… transformed. It’s sublime. I saw the doctor at Kaiser Permanente today, after my massage. (Yes, work was a wash today.)

I drove straight there. The young lady behind the giant plexiglass shield asked me if I’d been exposed to Covid. I said, “Not to my knowledge.” She said, “I need a ‘yes’ or a ‘no.’” I hesitated, then said, “Not that I’m aware of.” She backed off.

But, the interaction put me in a dark mood. The shields, the masks, the inability to see anyone’s face, the dumb question. It’s boring, annoying, terrible.

The doctor, a new one for me, entered the room. He was small, short, slightly furtive and rodent-like, but I liked him anyway. Something about his voice, his straightforward tone. But maybe what I liked best of all was the way he gave me his shoulder and asked me to push against him with my right arm. Then, the way he turned and gave me his body again, asking me to push the other way.

I’m not sure if that’s what brightened my mood, but it occurred to me it may have been. A little physical contact.

I need to return to tango.

My point is, the days go by. They unfold, as they do, as they will. The jazz oasis plays nightly on my little fridge-top radio. Daisy sleeps on my left foot.

I sauteed sea scallops in butter, and rapini in olive oil and garlic, tonight. I dipped torn pieces of levain bread into the warm, salty butter scented by the sea. I chomped down a farmer’s market salad of baby greens with a handful of basil from my garden and slivers of garlic thrown in (macerated first in a tablespoon or two of lemon juice) and fragrant olive oil, and fermented white pepper (any pepper will do wonderfully).

It was a great dinner, with slinky jazz playing, marked by a Hammond B3 organ. The setting sun singled out individual leaves on the two ficus trees in my living room, one after another. Then, it turned the whole house rosy. It flamed the hills with a purple-red light that will only deepen as we near October.

Soon, the little cricket that’s taken up residence in my garden will begin to trill.

Life is good. The task at hand is Cultivate Gratitude.

And make vodka tonics with mint and chile for the neighbors.