everything living runs from the rain

On rainy days I watch overcast movies like The Goonies. It’s the ultimate rainy day movie; the way grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato soup are the rainy day meal. That’s just the way it is. I love how dark it gets in the middle of the day, the blankets and the cracking outside. I love when thunder scares Linus. He drapes himself across my body and stares out the window, on guard, his ears erect as if he has seen a pigeon. When it’s miserable out, thunderstorms and flood warnings, I sometimes get a call from my father, “It’s disgusting out. You must be in your glory.” Everyone who really knows me, knows I’m happiest on rainy days. They mean Otis Redding on repeat, devouring cookbooks for menu ideas, and an entire afternoon of seex and sloth. They’re an excuse to be lazy and indulgent. I double my socks.

Rainy days at fat camp meant way less exercise, since the entire camp couldn’t fit in the gymnasium and weight rooms. Rainy camp days were for letter writing, playing jacks, making mix tapes, and watching movies with the boys of our division. It smelled like cedar and grass, and I’d watch Meatballs beside a boy as we held hands and he made me randy by stroking the palms of my hands hard. I get excited just thinking about it. Palms are erogenous.

Growing up, rainy weekend days meant time with my father. He wouldn’t play golf in a downpour, which left him home with the paper and a carton of eggs. The smells of the kitchen on a Sunday afternoon woke me: sweet onions saturated in golden bacon fat, fizzling, crackling, popping. Eggy batter of milk, liquidy whites, and shimmering yolks were beaten to a frothy milk shake, hitting onions, covering them. Running water in the kitchen sink couldn’t find the drain, splashed puddles in eggy bowls, and saturated Mother’s coffee filters. Metal forks scraped porcelain plates; plates cleared off into the garbage on top of left over parmigiana everything. The aluminum tins with white cardboard covers supported waste. It was my childhood, in a moment, in that kitchen, watching my father cook for us, in his leather boat shoes and fraternity t-shirt, asking how we wanted our bacon. I wanted mine the way he had his. I wanted to be just like him. I still do. Except now, I don’t care for bacon. I go the sausage patty route, with maple syrup please.

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COMMENTS:

  1. I like rainy days mostly because it means temporary relief from the intense heat. However, it also means terrible humidity around the corner.

  2. I always eat sausage with syrup :-D I'm not alone.

    Rainy days are all about sitting around in pajamas all day, unwashed, un-made up, and surrounded with foods to nibble :)

  3. You should go for the pork trifecta sometime — bacon, ham AND sausage.

  4. Yes, indeed, a fine post. My favorite aspect of the raining day is right before the rain starts. When you can smell it coming, and the leaves on the tres turn over. Glad you dig on swine, in whatever form, from the rooter to the tooter.

  5. You should move here to Seattle and spend 200+ days a year living in bliss… :-)

  6. your a genius.

    “One is not born a genius, one becomes a genius” (Simone de Beauvoir).

  7. oooh, i love breakfast meats with syrup.
    come to seattle – you would be happy all the time ! on second thought, if you were happy all the time, your writing wouldnt be as interesting. keep up the good work !

  8. Check your grocery stores freezer section, I found these at Pathmark in Brooklyn, not sure if everyone has them. They're like corn dogs, but it's sausage wrapped in a pancake. Yummy.

  9. What is it with Dad's and the boat shoes? Held together to this day with duck tape where its needed. As the son of a boat shoe wearer, I also have my 10 year old boat shoes, but I can only wear them when the wife isnt around. i think i will wear them today.

  10. Seems we all adore the pork fat with maple syrup. Why do I always comment on the food and ignore what you're reall trying to convey?

  11. your website is one of my top five favorites. your writing, it's deep with rhythm, messy and involved, details carried on a talcum-coated wave and your reader just goes with it, loving it, little words dropping on top of him/her, not wanting it to stop. the pictures you paint are lush and driven and alive and a bit addictive. please continue with your talented self, i continue to want more.

  12. Since I am currently in Phoenix, I sooooo look foward to moving back to NJ in Dec. I def miss rainy days. Your descriptions are just alluring. I also prefer sausage to bacon. Oh, and none of that turkey sausage. Just amazing sausage.

  13. So a friend wanting me to read this and I realize I must have ADD. Please take your site down or at least remove the boring society pictures with some porn.

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