Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Hors D'Oeuvres and Human Rights

Recently the great love of my life and I had the good fortune to be together to witness an historic event. We watched Melissa Etheridge and others in discussion on Logo with leading Democratic presidential candidates on the subject of LGBT rights in America, and in particular gay marriage. The painful and seemingly hopeless struggle to be together faced by same sex bi-national couples (such as ourselves) was mentioned at least once; the upshot of that unprecedented public acknowledgement of our long and lonely struggle brought about large salty tears which added a splash of seasoning to my thinly sliced sourdough bread topped with Vermont goat cheese, smoked salmon and dill. Not that salt was needed of course but what would an historic little banquet be, I ask you, without the odd tear or two in the hors d’oeuvres.
If I may meander in my thoughts at this point; the great love of my life and I are not asking America for the right to marry. We simply ask for the right to be together long enough to watch one season roll fully on through another. Long enough to attend to much needed repairs in our little house in the woods and, for that matter, in our hearts where they have become worn down by too long spent apart. Oh and how we would love to attain the right to watch each other grow old. Freely and without fear of being torn asunder.
Now where was I? Ah yes , my hors d’oeuvres and a relative newcomer to the kitchen of my soul; dill! While I love the liquorice-like hit offered up by the crunchy dill stems (here the large and much loved black aniseed balls of my childhood!) I am enamoured with the featherlike leaves; the ones that seem as suited to tickling one’s skin as they are to eating! The journey of this herb across my palate begins as a burst of clean green grass and thence follows splashes of anise that fall like summer rain, awakening and animating all in their presence. Oh how dill makes salmon dance and far be it for me to understand this glorious mystery! But it is fitting, in my opinion, for little hors d’oeuvres and all that embellish them to dance upon the palate at such an historic televised event. Should we not all join in the dill and salmon dance wherever and whenever human rights are championed?!

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