Strawberry cheek

Thinking about my first return to Santa Cruz since I packed my house three years ago, I started planning what food I would eat when I was in town. Surely the Spartacus Salad at the Saturn Cafe: lettuce, tomatoes, onion, fake chicken cutlet cut into tiny bits, feta cheese, pieces of pita bread all awash in what I think is ranch dressing. I have never been able to properly reproduce this salad, so that most of the time I try not to think about the Saturn -- neither about the Spartacus nor their perfect soy burgers with sautéed mushrooms and skinny fries on the side. I forget about their vanilla shakes and even the glasses of beer which I could in fact reproduce if I wanted to. I wanted, too, to go to Tacos Morenos for carnitas tacos or even to Tacqueria Jallarta which I find to be very very bland, even while I love their tostadas piled high with cheese and sour cream. I wanted to go to Zachary's for breakfast for Mike's Mess (indescribably delicious mound of potatoes, fried eggs, bacon, scallions, more sour cream) or their French toast (round!) or their sourdough pancakes (as close to my grandma's as I've ever had) or their coffee cake of the day (please, let it be cinnamon or chocolate chip).

But somehow I hadn't thought about my friends' cooking, neglecting to imagine Nancy's Noodles or breakfast at Irene's. I hadn't thought of the possibility of oatmeal: the thickest, creamiest oats I'd ever had, the grains opened as wide as possible. Irene added a dab of yogurt and jam (strawberry-rhubard, handmade of course). Why hadn't I thought of adding yogurt to oatmeal myself, I wondered. Two hours earlier I had awakened to Chad mixing something that looked quite horrible in the blender: a smoothie which, as it turned out, was made of bananas, strawberries, apple juice, yogurt, and kale. "It looks disgusting," I told him, but I had a glass, and of course it was delicious, sweeter than I could have imagined given that it was bright green. What is gastronomically more virtuous than starting the day with kale? Sunday night, while I was snuggling with her six-year-old son Max, Irene finished a batch of apricot jam. Monday morning I awoke to the green smoothie again, this time followed by a fresh crepe with the fresh jam. Chad makes these crepes almost daily; Max's was filled not with jam but Nutella. I kept insisting he finish his breakfast before going to school, but I was told, "My parents are not the kind of parents who say that I have to eat all of my snacks." "I honestly do not think that's true," I responded (secretly hoping, in fact, that he would not finish his crepe so that I could steal it after he left; I would have to time it right so that Chad wouldn't toss it before I had the chance. This kind of worry is borne of the fact that, as I've been told, my sense of food is based on a model of scarcity; it's as if I'm an ex-con, guarding my plate "on the outside" with my arm crooked around it). Crepes, fresh jam, green smoothies, Nutella in the cupboards -- this house was awash with the possibility of happiness.

I had tacos and the Spartacus salad my first day in town. On my last I had polenta and eggs at Kelly's Bakery, where Nancy convinced me to take a box of food for both the plane and home (a chicken sandwich, two toralfa chocolate cookies, a chocolate crimpy, a tiny quiche) and then loaded me with a box to open when I got to the airport (full, I found then, of fresh macarons, which I doled out one day at a time in Northampton). As with the Saturn, I try not to think about Kelly's; I surprised myself to realize I'd forgotten about the crimpies (shaped like a brioche, but denser, as if made with milk, and filled with delectables like chocolate or almond or olallieberry jam) and the toralfas (a subtle chocolate cookie with slivered almonds on top; it occurred to me that recently I had been trying to reproduce these with a Swedish recipe, forgetting why I craved them in the first place). I try, too, not to think about Max too much, as I worry he will forget me someday soon. But when I saw him that Friday afternoon, he leapt into my arms, as he has every time we've greeted each other after a long absence (except the first time, after I'd left Santa Cruz and didn't see him again until three months later; he sat in a corner at his aunt's house in Queens, where he ignored me until he couldn't help it any longer). Saturday morning after his dad left and his mom was still in bed, I made him bread with strawberry jam and a side of goldfish crackers. Now when I think of this child I love, I see him with a strawberry thumbprint on his cheekbone. He was running on the streets when suddenly he stopped in his tracks and burst into tears for a reason I can't remember. I saw the strawberry stain then -- just beyond the tears streaking down. All I wanted in that moment was to kiss that little patch of pink on his cheek. Instead I stood at a distance while his mom tended to his tears, picking him up into her arms.