Make Your Own Light
Brush your teeth in the shower
[Grazina is an elderly widow who becomes a companion to nineteen-year-old Hai, who nearly jumps off a bridge in the beginning of the story, before she calls out to him from across the river.]
Scene:
She gestured at the bowl of raw carrots. “Those are for you. Eat up.”
Hai took a bite from a carrot, then picked up his fork, eager to try the latke.
“No, eat the carrot first. Please.” She leaned forward, knife and fork on each side of the plate, a paper towel tucked in her collar. “It’s important.”
He finished the carrot, then picked another from the bowl and put the whole thing in his mouth.
“They’re good for you, believe me.” She cut into her latke like it was a steak and ate.
“…Carrots,” she paused for effect, “give you the will to live.”
...
“It’s a root. And roots prevent you from getting the blues.” She picked one from the bowl; it gleamed under the kitchen light. “You see, carrots become bright orange because it’s so dark in the ground. They make their own light because the sun never reaches that far- like those fish in the ocean who glow from nothing? So when you eat it, you take in the carrot’s will to go upward. To heaven.” She tucked the carrot back in the bowl, gently, as if it were a tiny person.
He had never heard this before, but somehow it made sense.
-Quote out of chapter 2, Emperor of Gladness, Ocean Vuong
I can’t promise that my Substack isn’t turning into Jeannie’s Precious Moments with Ocean Vuong. Just kidding, we all know it’s just another one of my phases.
I was over-glorifying Taco Bell on Friday, and by Sunday I’m obsessing about root vegetables.
Today, I made a pasta sauce out of sweet potatoes, cherry tomatoes, a bulb of garlic, and shallots. They roasted all together in some olive oil, paprika, oregano, salt, and pepper until everything was soft enough to blend with some water and milk. The final touch that the recipe called for, which I didn’t have, was some sprinkled feta cheese on top. That would have been the perfect little ‘zing’ against the sweetness of the sauce.
As I made this for lunch today, I thought about what Grazina says about roots. If nothing else, I appreciated the placebo effect, because I’m not feeling well. Allergies morphed into a broader compromised state of my immune system, so I’ve been laying low.
Yesterday, after going back and fixing a few typos on my last post, a friend’s face popped up in the corner my mind. Thinking it was random, I just blinked it away and carried on. A little later on, while I was doing some yoga, there she was again, smiling. This time, I gave the thought a second thought. It led me to a strong feeling to text her, say hi, and share the link to my post. I resisted it for another hour or so. I initially didn’t want to because we haven’t really stayed in touch.
Eventually, I followed the feeling, and it didn’t steer me wrong. She gratefully responded that the post resonated with her, even to tears. She told me it reminded her of a quote from Joan Didion’s book On Keeping a Notebook.
It all comes back. Perhaps it is difficult to see the value in having one’s self back in that kind of mood, but I do see it; I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind's door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were.
Selfishly, I’m so glad I decided to text her. Little did I know, she would be the one to bless me. That excerpt she shared gifted me the inner knowing that I am exactly where I’m supposed to be.
I had a pretty big “vulnerability hangover” after my last post, but I don’t regret letting you see me. That quirky side of me is there, and I’ve learned she grows thorns if she’s not included. I love her too much to continue pretending like she doesn’t exist. The better part of me took care of her today.
I was so thankful for my mom this afternoon, who was with me in spirit from Colorado, all the way out here in Tennessee. She was invisible to the eye, but definitely in the kitchen with me while I made pasta. She reminded me of the magic of preparing fresh foods. Still not feeling great, I slept on the couch for a while after eating. Almost every time I wake up from a nap, I have a sweet tooth. I mustered up a bit of new energy the rest gave me to make some cookies. After letting them cool enough to spread on the buttercream frosting, I took the first bite, washing it down with a sip of hot coffee. As clear as day, I heard my mom’s giggle, the one she does after she tastes something delicious.
It was as if she read my last post and conspired to come over and calm my raging seas. Even with the distance between us, it worked mom. Thank you.
After proudly sharing a list of things I crave that are bad for me, I can’t help but laugh at all the healthy cravings I’ve had the last couple days too. Fast food is good and all, but have you had fresh cantaloupe? I cut one up on Saturday, and it has been hitting the spot.
I let myself keep going down that hole of the “bad” things because that’s where the writing flow took me. I ended up so far down that I found some potatoes. They brought me back up, and we made lunch. If I am what I eat, maybe I’m like them and the carrots, making “their own light because the sun never reaches that far- like those fish in the ocean who glow from nothing?”
Speaking of mysterious water creatures, about every fifth shower, my husband Dominick and I keep the main bathroom lights off for desensitization. We’ll click on the night light plugged into the outlet by the sink, which allows us to still see where the bottle of shampoo is. As if this isn’t TMI already, we also often brush our teeth in the shower (why not?!).
He gave me a deep belly laugh as his electronic toothbrush pierced through the steamy darkness into a bright ring of light around us. I looked to my right at the droplets of water trailing down the shower liner. I looked to my left at the squares of tile, neatly separated by grout. Finally, I looked straight ahead, into Dom’s iridescent, smiling eyes, peering back at mine over his buzzing, glowing toothbrush.
I couldn’t help but feel like a couple quirky fish, or maybe a couple clams, happy to be lost in their weirdness on the bottom of the ocean floor.
This is the life.