Salad Christina

I knew her artwork long before we ever met. Her paintings first entered my psyche in the coffee shop we both used to frequent. They haunted the walls there for a spell. The beautiful abstract figures unlatched themselves from the walls and crept in through the corners of my eyes, and then directed my attention beyond the every day caffeinated stories in my social huddle. They were textured and flat, bright and dark, they were brilliant. They appeared to be fishing for something. They could be everything to everyone, or to the someone who got hooked. I noticed them, and then I noticed her. With the pull of her rod I was reeled in.

Later, when we hung art together, we were without bickering. We were both giddy, like two children building a fort. My job was to stand back and call for her to turn the painting this way or that. Her job was to hold the hammer and climb up on impossible shaky ground, balancing on her toes and stretching her body long. We probably would have been more efficient if we had switched jobs. I watched quietly as she hobbled down ladders in cowboy boots, and when she got down from the ladder the painting was never anywhere near straight.

It never occurred to us that hanging art as a couple was supposed to be stressful until the man at the coffee shop walked by and remarked about how wonderful it was that the two of us were able hang art without it ending in divorce. He had the scruffy beard of a 30 something bachelor, and it was clear that love was fog that settled higher than he had ever dared to climb.

Her paintings now surround the walls of our home. When I stare into them I can allow myself to be pulled into the moment uninterrupted. Like a child writing symphonies I am delivered to a space in my mind that continues to build upon itself.

Salad Christina
3 small cucumbers, locally grown
1 cup cherry tomatoes, sliced
1 cup Greek yogurt
1/2 cup chopped cilantro
1 cup green onions, sliced lengthwise (white part only)
salt and pepper to taste
3 cloves spicy garlic
Mix together and serve!

Christina's vote: "This salad danced down my throat"