The rest of today ONLY, workwear at Igigi is greatly reduced. Check it out here.

I have a pretty great life. It’s glamorous and fun and all-around enviable.  I’m happy (pretty much) and healthy (pretty much) and I own a lot of very shiny, very expensive things, some of which are made out of snake skin.  My kid brother, on the other hand, has cancer and a scar like a giant zipper running down the entire length of his torso. The only thing made out of snake skin he owns is an actual snake, and honestly it’s not even that great of a snake. My brother has been in and out of hospitals for a year and is currently winning his fight with cancer.

Yesterday a young friend of mine lost hers.

I’m not going to tell you what it’s like to grieve or that my friend’s death affected me in a way no one could ever know. That’s just not true. We’ve all known grief and we’ll know it some more before we’re finished with this pony ride. Mine isn’t any more special or poignant than yours. Life is damn precious, precious and short. Even when it’s bad, and it’s bad a LOT, it’s still precious.

I’m not a motivational speaker when it comes to important things. Hell, my gardener doesn’t even listen to me unless I’m holding money and a lemon popsicle. I know full well that what I’m about to say –if you even read it– will most likely go one eye and out the other, never to be thought of again.

I’m fine with that. I’m just going to ask you to think.

My brother didn’t do anything to “earn” his cancer and my friend didn’t do anything to deserve hers. Cancer, like most things bigger than ourselves, is unjust.

We can’t do much to stop the random mutation of cells in our bodies but we can do something about the metaphysical cancers we put on ourselves; cancers that grow through laziness, anger, fear and our own brokenness.

Fix it.

I don’t care what it is or how you do it. Just fix it. We are all living with something inside of us that is a cancer. Lord knows I am. It could be anger or jealousy or a stinginess of spirit.  It could be something that’s as easy as a phone call or something as difficult as changing brain patterns. Maybe you started it, maybe you were left with the psychic aftermath of someone else’s bad choices. Doesn’t matter. Fix it.

And as a special aside to my friends with depression: Y’all. you are my people.  I suffered from severe depression when I was younger and I almost didn’t get older because of it. You have the toughest row to hoe and are the best liars on the planet when it comes to pretending everything is fine.  If you’re not getting proper treatment, fix it.

I know from my experience working with folks who suffer from depression that I can’t tell you you’re worth more than you think, or that people love you. Even if I could say it, you’d probably think you were the exception. You’d think there’s no way I could know how you feel, how bad you really have it. How far from redemption you really are.  Besides, even if you were worth it, you’re beyond fixing.

Bull.

You can’t hear me saying you’re worth it, but maybe you’ll hear this:

Show a little damn respect.

My brother has been in the hospital for most of the past year getting shot full of poison and he WANTS to live. He’s fighting to live.  My friend who just died wanted to live too, but she wasn’t given the choice.  You have the choice. There are therapy programs, medications, books, classes, support groups…all available for you. If money is a problem, you can email me and I will personally help you find low-cost services in your area, anywhere in the English-speaking world.

That’s about all I’ve got to say, or at least all I can say right now. Tomorrow we’ll go back to your regularly scheduled faffery. I’m much more comfortable discussing the external than the eternal, but we can’t forget about the eternal.  You can call it God, or community or the human spirit. It doesn’t matter it’s bigger than us, and if we don’t live fully into it, it doesn’t matter what shoes we’re wearing, because we’ll never be ready for the party. So that’s it. That’s all I’ve got to say. We’ll have a big question tomorrow and probably some hot guys and expensive shoes too,  but for right now I’ll leave you with this passage from Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town”:

“We all know that something is eternal. And it ain’t houses and it ain’t names, and it ain’t earth, and it ain’t even the stars . . . everybody knows in their bones that something is eternal, and that something has to do with human beings. All the greatest people ever lived have been telling us that for five thousand years and yet you’d be surprised how people are always losing hold of it. There’s something way down deep that’s eternal about every human being.”

Honor that, and fix it.

Despite the recent hullabaloo surrounding her weight, Big(ish) Girl Sonia Sotomayor has been nominated by President Barack Obama for the Supreme Court of the United States.

Now when someone equates fatness with stupidity, we can point them here.

(PS Francesca thinks that Sotomayor bears a striking resemblance to Francesca’s friend Judi, except older and more serious and lawyer-ly. Hi, Judi! Hi!)

Is your collection of intimates frankly blah?

Roaman’s has extremely adorable cotton panties (for hips up to 73 inches!), and if you order today you can use code RDMemorial for 30% off your entire order (on anything from the site).

Francesca also recommends checking out the cute collection of undies at Lane Bryant (Francesca loves their hipsters on her Apple shape: they are comfortable and covering without being as grandma-ish as briefs).  If you click through to their site from their ad at the right (over there ———->) you will receive 20% off your purchase! Also, they currently are providing free shipping on orders of $100 or more.

Avenue, too, has incredibly cute panties, many of which are on sale. Note also that they have introduced plunging bras with adjustable straps, one of which can be worn strapless! Click through from our ad at the right, and receive $20 off a purchase of $100 or more.

For something traditionally a little spicier, Francesca turns you to Frederick’s of Hollywood plus-size panty collection, where the undies can be had up to size 3x (and two models are selling for 4 for $15). Through May 31, receive $15 off orders of $100, and $30 off orders of $150.

I don’t think it comes as any surprise to you that my people have been fighting and dying for this country since well before it was a country.  It is not true, however, that my great great ancestress in the Jamestown Settlement gave the Mayflower bad directions because she didn’t want “tacky neighbors”. Well, okay, probably not true.

Like all grand old families we are rich in two things: Generals and crazy people, and my people are just lousy with both. But Memorial Day isn’t about the Generals, it’s about the folks without the history books or the counties named after them.  It’s about the men and women who went to war and came back in a box, or didn’t come back at all.

In a few moments it will be 3 p.m. on the eastern coast of America. Please observe a moment of silence in honor of those who died so we might live.

 In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

— Lt.-Col. John McCrae (1872 – 1918)

Being European, Francesca does not have any family members who have died fighting for America.

However, she very much appreciates America and the opportunities it has afforded her, and therefore appreciates the bravery of those who have fought for it.

Francesca is spending her Memorial Day Weekend curled up with John Updike’s Gertrude and Claudius, a fun little novel which anyone can enjoy whether they have studied  Hamlet or not (but especially if they have). It is the “prequel” of Hamlet, told from Gertrude’s point of view. Francesca is enjoying it very much.

May you all have a meaningful holiday, full of gratitude for those who made it possible.

Dinner alone is one of life’s pleasures. Certainly cooking for oneself reveals man at his weirdest. People lie when you ask them what they eat when they are alone. A salad, they tell you. But when you persist, they confess to peanut butter and bacon sandwiches deep fried and eaten with hot sauce, or spaghetti with butter and grape jam.

So says Laurie Colwin in the title essay of Alone in the Kitchen With an Eggplant, a glorious compilation celebrating just the sort of culinary madness and culinary joy that come from dining solo.

Of course, not everyone lies when they say they eat something nice when by themselves. Several of the food professionals who contributed to the book actually take extra care when cooking just for themselves, while others share their deepest culinary peculiarities in these pages.

Jeremy Jackson awkwardly turns down a dinner invitation because he’d already picked out the can of black beans he intended to eat for dinner that night. Marcella Hazan confesses that she has no interest in cooking if there’s nobody to feed but her. Steve Almond explains that the only reason he cooks really good food when he’s alone is in hopes that someone will come along to share it.

Another theme that comes out is repetition/ritual in eating alone. Beverly Lowry’s essay, Making Soup in Buffalo, speaks wistfully of how in each place she moved to, she would start eating the same thing in the same way every night:

There was nothing I could do. The fact was, I wanted the same thing again and again. And so I yielded, bought the goods, took them home, cooked, and ate, accompanied usually by music, preferably a public radio station that played music I liked. And I am here to tell you, the pleasure never diminished. I was happy every time.

Even though it’s not how I eat alone, that bit of prose hits a chord with me. I think, perhaps, it’s the contentment.

I love cooking for others. I like to share what I like to cook. On the other hand, there’s a tiny part of me that lives for the times when I’m utterly alone; when it’s just me and that eggplant in the kitchen.

When I’m eating alone, I careen madly between Colwin’s freaky cuisine for one and the cooks/writers who speak of taking extra care when cooking for one. Some nights I’m contented with leftover Chinese take out, others I throw together a random platter of crackers, fruit, cheese, and lunch meats. Yet other nights, I’m in the kitchen from the early afternoon creating something spectacular for dinner, complete with carefully paired dessert. Most nights, though, I look for something that won’t take too very long, but that I would never serve up for Mr. Twistie.

There are dozens of things that Mr. Twistie either cannot or (more often) will not eat that I happen to love. Nights when I’m eating alone, I bring in fresh fish or game meats. I race for the prettiest eggplant I can find or a nice squash…or Brussels sprouts…or collard greens…or, well, about two thirds of the goodies waiting for me in the produce aisle.

Once dinner is ready, I do, however, have a ritual. I curl up on the sofa with my plate and watch either a movie or a couple episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (What? I love Buffy! Call me, Giles! We’ll have shepherd’s pie…or perhaps a rather interesting moussaka), and watch while I eat.

Next time, though, I may have to break with tradition and pull out this book at dinner time. In it, I’ll have more than two dozen sparkling dinner companions.

And they will also be eating alone.

How about you? Do you have solo cooking/dining rituals? If so, would you mind sharing?