Tag Archives: writing tips

My favorite meal…

Writing Prompts, , ,

Offering up samples of writing prompt exercises, I have done. This series is from Chris Brogan’s book – Find Your Writing Voice. These are mostly unedited not meant for publication. The title reflects the writing prompt. Do you want to join in? You can buy the book and share your samples.
Or just create your own prompts to share.

My favorite meal…

Should I write about my favorite meal of all time? Well, that would not be possible – I have enjoyed so many. Sometimes I like take shoestring French fries out of the freezer, slicing up garlic and bake them until crispy with a little-added salt and pepper. Yummy. Or roast chestnuts and have them for dinner.
I enjoyed the Sunday after church meals I used to have when I lived in NYC and attended the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine. A loose group of us would gather like shards of metal to a magnet and thru some equally loose consensus, we would decide on a place to eat. Chris (not Brogan) would always demand a place where alcohol was served. I think that meant he was not so secretly in charge. So that left out cheaper locations to eat. But it didn’t matter because from 3 to 10 or more of us would traipse out to a local West Side eatery. There used to be an inexpensive Chinese restaurant across the street, that served nice food at a good price and had the long tables to accommodate us all. Or, we would go the local Greek eatery, where you had to go downstairs to get there. The place was overly painted and the menus were drawn by the same artist and hard to read. John was only and ever the only waiter there. He took excellent care of us. He knew to get coffee right to me and Hal, the others could wait. One time I went there with brother-in-law, sister, and niece for an after service B-day lunch for me. My sister who suffers from the very bad effects of a stroke was gently cared for by John. My brother-in-law lived in Astoria and was half Greek chatted with John amicably in Greek forever cementing John’s love for me. Even now, three years after my move to NJ he asks after me. And a couple of times I have gone back to visit and eat, he hugs and kisses me asks about my sister. And of course, the coffee comes served with love.
Really how can you hate a meal when the waiter caters to you with love? The best part of these expansive group meals is the sharing of food with people… we laughed, we fight, we roll our eyes and sigh, but each week we would glom together for our meals. Moving to a car town I sorely miss these meals. Me, carless and living alone feels the deep void of not having a shared meal. I find people just don’t go out to eat in the same way. There is very little of the spontaneity of let’s go and eat. I find that sad and lonely for me. Don’t get me wrong I have tried. Let’s go eat? Emails go out – but people have their lives. Sigh.
When I lived in Queens, every Thursday the local Irish market would make Pot Roast. Now they had food every day, but Thursday was Pot Roast day and I loved it, craved it and miss it so much now. The meat was fork tender, served with a big side of mashed potatoes a soggy vegetable and rich dark gravy. I would bring it home adding butter, of course, onions and salt and pepper. An $8 container would last me for a couple of meals and I can tell you I was in frigging heaven. Pot Roast was Sunday dinners and all the best of my childhood rolled into metal containers with a cardboard top.
I can’t forget Japanese food, or Indian food or the spiciness of Thai food. The place down the block serves a mean burrito. And I love Turkish food with my whole heart and soul.
I am a squeamish cook, squirrelly about handling meat or hacking a raw chicken down the middle. I am also a cook that can make a decent soup out of leftovers and can fold a mean omelet.
However, if you invite me over I will bring cookies, and offer to clear the table. My favorite meal (s) invoke the joys of companionship, the delight of frolicking conversation and the pleasure of my taste buds snapping like the synapse of my brain. I cannot help but offer up clichés on a bed of crisp lettuce with a side of well-done fries. Food is life. And you can enjoy it all, and I do, but eating a meal with friends and family can be a memorable and delightful experience.

Books link to my Amazon Associate account. I may get five cents, but hey, five cents adds up. Buy me lunch…. someday.

My childhood home

Writing Prompts, , ,

Offering up samples of writing prompt exercises, I have done. This series is from Chris Brogan’s book – Find Your Writing Voice. These are mostly unedited not meant for publication. The title reflects the writing prompt. Do you want to join in? You can buy the book and share your samples.
Or just create your own prompts to share.

My childhood home

My childhood home was a dark and scary place. The building was segmented into three sections. Two sections faced the main street and had ground floor apartments. My section was at the end with a store on the ground floor and the entrance on the side street. The building was so old it was without bathrooms. They were added later as columns to the ends of each section of the building. The bathroom windows opened to the clotheslines. You had to stand in the bathtub to hang your clothes. I often dream of climbing out that window and drop to the ground from the second floor.
The building originally had gas lighting and a fireplace in the main room – a very scary thought for a home made entirely of wood and tinder. We lived in a matchstick ready to be lit. During the winter the ice would form inside our windows in long stalactites. My mother, sister and I would put layers of clothes on and climb under a massive number of blankets to keep warm.
Most of the apartments were filled with Italian immigrants that the landlord advertised for in the Italian papers. The section I lived in had the remnants of German immigrants- the first wave that lived here.
Mr. Becker lived above us on the third floor. He never spoke to you. If you ran into him the hallways, he just stared out you his beady dark eyes framed by wild salt and pepper hair and a scraggly beard. He smelled of sweat and cigars and the staleness of a lonely life. He would sit at his window and spit gobs of revolting things down at you. You would hear the hack and run for your life to avoid disaster. Later a dark station wagon came and took Mr. Becker down the narrow curvy stairs to his resting place. My mother hid my face in her bosom, but I still saw the dark bag and the solemn men in suits sweating the curve of the stair.
His neighbor raised and trained pigeons on the roof. You could see him waving a large pole in circular motions causing the pigeons to fly in large swaths that would litter the sky with feathers and bird poo that landed on you, clothes drying on the line, and whatever else was in the path. One day the pigeon man, his family, and the birds just went away. On occasion, lost birds would fly solo circles under the empty skies. I still run from the sound of hacking and the flap of errant wings.
Later a woman with two young boys moved into Mr. Becker’s place. She had a thing with Satanists who would have little visits to her place. One man who wore devil horns on a large chain, and had sharp teeth he was intent on beating her, the sound of her tears could be heard landing on the floor.
When I went back to visit my old home the lot of it was turned into rubble. Not a tree or flower was left. I am sure some nice little overly priced apartment building will take its place – and if a pigeon flies by in remembrance no one will be the wiser of the ghosts that linger still.