Fishing in the Rain Salad

The elevator door opened slowly on the two business casual figures who stood rehearsing their lines for the day. Later this afternoon when it is time to return home their will be scenes performed here, of the casual one line "have a good day" variety, but in the morning, the elevator is a backstage green room.

The man standing next to me smelled strongly of soap. The whites of his eyes were blood red. The woman on the other side of me wore square toed shoes and had a neatly tamed Afro, she looked up to the sky, like a student trying to pull facts from her memory during an exam.

Realizing that I was violating morning elevator etiquette by playing audience to offstage actors, I fumbled with my phone to divert my attention from them. I decided to check the weather. Little icons of thunderstorms, one on top of the other, for the next three days. I stared in disbelief. It didn't feel possible. As I drove out of the parking garage, the gray blue sky seemed benevolent. I couldn't recall the last time it rained, and in that moment I believed thunderstorms a fabricated myth.

I pulled up to a red light. From a seemingly cloudless sky, a single, heavy drop of water landed in the middle of my windshield with a splat. Another followed. In slow motion I stared at the droplets in absolute awe, like a child lost in the miraculous interplay between glass, water, and light. The beaded little creatures left their landing spot and rolled down my windshield, as though it were a grassy hill, bumping and tumbling back and forth in wild and unpredictable glee, pushing with all their weight on the downward edge of the globes they rolled in. Green light cast over my imagery and signaled a Pavlovian instinct to take action. It was time to go.

I remembered myself, and then thought, how strange to forget about the naturalness of rain. After stopping the car I rejoined routine by entering the coffee shop. From his chair, a man with white hair was fishing with words of wisdom, kicking his feet like a schoolboy. He cast his lines and then looked around slowly, reeling with his eyes. He spoke about how if he really saw himself he would forget himself and carry with him a sense of wonder. I sent him a glance and then went back to my head swim. It reminded me of something one of my friends used to say, it is probably a proverb, but I am unsure of the origin. "Sell your cleverness. Buy bewilderment."

Purple kale salad:
in a frying pan, heat 1 Tbsp olive oil and 1 Tbsp toasted sesame oil. When the oil is hot, add a pinch of salt and 1 small diced yellow onion. While the onion cooks mince 1 clove of garlic and add it immediately to the onion. As the onion begins to become translucent, add 1 bunch chopped purple kale. Cook the kale for about 7-10 min. Add 1 tsp soy sauce, 1 tsp rice vinegar and a little squirt of lemon. Eat hot or cold.

Christina's vote: "This salad made me wish for a full moon"