The internet raves about the sunny coastal town of Newlyn in Cornwall and the long queue outside S. Jelbert’s Ice Cream, an institution in Cornwall for over 50 years. But that’s not the Newlyn or the S. Jelbert’s I know - I know a cold, rainy, 10°C day, sitting on a stone wall alone overlooking a river that feeds into Mount's Bay - my fingers freezing, my hair wet, the sound of seagulls making the first of their evening calls. It’s not the same idyllic fishing town and bustling ice cream shop I read about (I was the only customer for quite some time) but the ice cream was just as described: simple, unfussy, indulgent, reminiscent of summer simplicity. The shop is sparsely decorated. On the wall, a faded print of a poem called “An Ode to An Ice Cream” by Penny Lally in 2005: “the shop on the corner / unchanged over time / the recipe, secret / passed down the line.” One woman behind the counter and there’s one flavor: Cornish vanilla, from an 8 liter bucket in the otherwise empty freezer. The only toppings are clotted cream and flake and I got both - “flake” is like a rolled chocolate wafer that crumbles when you bite into it; the cream, ridiculously indulgent, is laced with chunks of butter. The ice cream itself is a little icy, maybe, a little bland - but there’s something I love about it. It’s all a part of the experience - the sweeping rain blowing off the water, the wet wind that moves strands of cream from my spoon to my sweater, the deep quiet that comes over a beach town in off season. The homemade sign outside the shop that reads “made daily,” even though it’s obvious this batch wasn’t. That’s what St Jelbert’s did right - beyond their ice cream - they found a spot on the quaint main drag of Newlyn, a block from the beach, and haven’t moved or expanded. They’ve stayed genuine. They don’t try too hard, they didn’t bullshit me, and they charge a more than decent price - £1 for a scoop, £1.80 with cream and flake.
Berlin
Berlin is a city in recovery, rebirth. A city that both apologizes for itself and looks wide-eyed at the future. It’s a breakup album that tops the charts; a flower growing through a crack in the concrete. I’m attracted to its nakedness. I like its long grey stretches of nothing between niche restaurants in cold buildings that are pumping out some of the best food I’ve had in a while. I don’t know that I’ve ever been somewhere with such fresh history: gold tiles on the concrete note the residents that were “deported” to concentration camps. Coffee bars move into their basements. It’s a city that attracts youth and immigrants, black sheep and bad apples; it has the room to let people reinvent themselves. It has the space for creativity. I made sure to read the names on every gold tile (a harrowing amount), to read the history of every memorial.
I'M NOT A FAN OF THESE COMPUTERS IN OUR POCKETS
I bought a bottle of French wine because the woman said it tasted like wet leaves.
It makes me miss the Fall - the smell of pumpkins, two loves ago, cutting a kabocha squash in a cramped basement, a trashcan full of parmesan rinds and purple latex gloves.
Now New York feels like a ghost town: a series of haunts, a supercut of moments that meant the world to me then.
A skateboard. A tallboy. A broken wrist. Cold hands in a cab. Pancakes and black coffee. Pink sweaters and polka dot scarves. We met for breakfast; he was sorry, I was angry. He didn't like that I lived my life back then for thrills.
Rain is Coming Soon
At a bus stop in Queens, there's a woman who thinks she can control the weather. It's a hot, sunny morning, almost oppressively, and the light reflects against the stainless steel awning. She says to me, jarringly, "it'll be raining soon." I don't remember rain in the forecast. She leaves her sunglasses on but I can tell she's looking me in the eye. "I asked God - does God exist?" I shrug. "You don't know? Well I do. I asked God to kill these people that been stealing from me - my downstairs neighbors - she be stealing from me. I've been trying to move out of here forever, but it's too expensive. I asked God to send rain, hurricanes, floods, to kill these people and let me know he's listening. The rain is coming soon."
The woman on the bench next to me sneaks me a glance and winkse. I get the feeling that crazy people are a part of her commute. I know she's crazy - but there's a part of me that doesn't, a part of me that so loosely trusts myself and my instincts and the laws of science that I believe this woman might be right.
Everyone In Arizona Has A Pool
No one has grass in their yard in Phoenix, because it dies. So people have gravel. I used to visit my Grandma in Phoenix in the 90s and I still remember all the shades of beige in her neighborhood, stucco houses with white fences and yards full of dusty pebbles. The only color in the suburbs was the electric blue of everyone’s chlorinated swimming pool.
I remember the oppressive heat; the first flight I ever took alone was a flight to Phoenix - back when they still gave you metal airplane wings to wear on your tee shirt and a McDonald’s Happy Meal on board; in that pre-911 oasis, my mom walked me to the gate and I walked down the jet bridge feeling like an independent woman for the first time. When I landed my grandma picked me up in her silver Toyota Celica and gave me a Phoenix Suns hat; it was required by law that summer to wear a hat outdoors and to always bring water with you.
I was a chubby kid, and a Tom boy, and I can still picture the baby fat in my armpits, a baggy tank top draped over me, at the grocery store with my grandma’s Virginia slim cigarettes burning in her opposite hand, I wondered how she could possibly breathe in hotter air than we already were. A fire burning in between her fingers and filling her lungs; I can still see her face, a little rubbery from the Phoenix sun and her red-dyed hair. She smiled at me and in the moments that she smiled, she was beautiful. Our refuge was her smoke-filled kitchen, air conditioned until ice cold. The funny thing about hot places is they cool down the inside so much you need a sweater.
I ate yogurt that we’d freeze with popsicle sticks in it. Bing cherry Dannon was my favorite. The cups were large; they’d last a while. I still remember the shape of my grandfather’s hand: her second husband, his name was Harry and he always wore a cowboy hat. He had stubby fingers and dirty fingernails and I remember the way he looked at me when he was filling up the gas. It’s so hot, it always felt bleak.
This is all to say I've never properly dealt with the deaths of my grandparents, and I didn't realize that until I flew over Phoenix today. It’s funny the things we do when we get old - like move to Phoenix because it’s warm, but it’s so warm you spend your life indoors, in an air conditioned living room watching reruns of Price is Right.
Brighton Beach makes me feel like a loser
Everyone in Brighton is cool, cooler than me and cooler than the coat I bought in Cornwall. It feels jarring to be in a city again - aware of myself and my appearance in a way I never bothered with in the countryside.
The sun came out after a morning of drizzly rain but the waves are still swollen, violent, crashing on the cold beach. I’ve pictured being in Brighton for three years now. It’s amazing how anticipation taints your vision - if you don’t love it you’ve wasted three years, so you pretend to. But that’s not fair, I do love Brighton. I love the pier with its shitty blinking sign, I love the wind blowing strongly off the coast. I love Brighton like I love Coney Island, not for its vintage stores and mediocre wine bars, but for its old school seaside charm, its shit holes - the brightly colored doughnut shops and ice cream stands, overpriced and under delivered. I love the aggressive breeze, the carnival music, the crowds of children sitting on pebbles in their school uniforms.
Part of my Brighton fantasy was eating cod by the sea from a paper boat - just as a friend described it to me - the steam puffing off the fish, thick chips soaked in vinegar, a greasy paper bag that you dig into unabashedly, licking the salty, malty oil from your fingers as the ocean roars in front of you. It’s supposed to be raining, in the fantasy, but just drizzling.
So I bought fish & chips from a tourist trap on the ocean front. It was shit, I knew that, but the chips were properly soggy and the fish was surprisingly fresh-fried and it all cost me 10 quid with curry sauce and mushy peas and tartare. Walking across the street to the water I was ambushed by a flock of seagulls. I didn’t see them coming, but it was loud - one landed on my shoulders while its friends fought for my fish - and within seconds my cod was in pieces on the concrete being devoured by twenty seagulls at once. People were laughing and gawking and all I could muster, alone on the crowded street, was “there goes my fish.” An old man giggled and I walked back to the shop and ate the seagull-soiled fries and mushy peas.
Three-Cornered Leeks
The British love to talk about the weather. Especially here in Cornwall, every morning starts with a "you alright? Yeah, rank weather we've got today." When I first got here, nearly everyone I met told me about the long, miserable winter I'd missed. Maybe it's just that the weather controls so much here: the surf, the produce. Or maybe it's that it changes so often. In April, it's been warming days oscillating between thick showers and sunshine - moments of apocalyptic rain and 15' swells, followed by idyllic sunny days that make me feel like this is the best place on Earth.
Spring means the produce is going wild; in three weeks, our garden went from dormant to flourishing with baby radishes, flowering mustards, rhubarb, and lettuce. There's that pregnant feeling in the air; the mangalitsa pigs are pregnant and starting to lactate, the birds are circling their nests in the high trees. It feels exciting, new, rich with second chances like Spring is supposed to. There's wild garlic and three-cornered leeks, nettles, and fiddlehead ferns lining all the roads and footpaths - lush, edible forests growing in the hedgerows.
I drove out to Porthcurno Beach today, the most Southwestern point of England, in a storm, and watched the waves crash into the jutting cliffs; three-cornered leeks were growing all over the cliffs, and beginning to blossom: the white flowers, growing at the top, were seasoned by the sea breeze: salty and garlicky.
The blossoms, if you catch them before they flower, make an amazing pickle. Pick them and salt them overnight in a jar. You can eyeball this, or if you want to be more precise - add 2% salt to the weight of the leek blossoms. Then cover them with apple cider vinegar and let them sit at room temperature until they're as fermented and pickly as you want them to be.
Soliman Bay
I woke up in Tulum, Mexico today jet lagged as sin, to the sounds of birds chirping above me, in a house with a few palm leaves strewn together into a roof. Somehow it keeps the rain out even though I can stick my fingers through it. I booked the ticket to Cancun two days ago, from a friend's apartment in Lyon, France. It was criminally cold there, and the Yucatan heat feels accosting but good.
I like it here. This part of Tulum is still separate from the overwrought eco-chic resorts and white-washed bars and restaurants on the "strip." It's quiet and the bay is calm and Luis comes by to open coconuts, and we eat soft-scrambled eggs and tortillas together. Nearby there's a cafe called Chimico's where a couple guys fry the fish they catch every morning in a deep pot over a fire. It's that kind of sexy, carnal food that reminds you you're human, the sound of fish flesh hitting golden oil, coals crackling, water lapping onto the sand.
In town, near the bus stop that takes you to Cancun, there's a taco stand that's casually serving the best food I've ever tasted: slow-cooked pork marinated in citrus, spices, and annatto seed. It's called cochinita pibil and at Taqueria Don Beto, it's served on fresh-pressed corn tortillas with bowls of pickled onions, hot salsa, and loose guacamole. They're 8 pesos each and genuinely transformative - go there.
Thanksgiving
Every Thanksgiving I think about all the turkeys roasting in New York City - millions of turkeys inside the millions of ovens stacked on top of each other. Millions of people basting birds in millions of tiny kitchens. Although that's assuming everyone makes their own turkey. The more realistic story is that most of the turkeys are in restaurants, grocery stores, corner stores. When I worked at the Spotted Pig, we made at least fifty. I remember walking to work through the West Village and the smell of poultry roasting was palpable. Overpopulation, lack of ventilation - but I liked it. The city, a little quieter than usual, a passive coming together, the brief uniting of people through a shared meal.
This year I was in Colorado with family, which is something I relish after years of working in the restaurant industry. I remember the nights on the line, 23 years old, basting turkey legs while hurriedly eating family meal, a little nicer than usual. I used to try to force all the line cooks to sit down together but it rarely worked.
This year, my mom & I dry-brined our bird, poached leeks in Meyer lemon vinaigrette, mashed red potatoes with buttermilk, roasted squash and apples. We put wild mushrooms in the turkey pan, a few cloves of garlic, and some thyme - the shrooms confit in the turkey fat and the turkey picks up some of the earthiness.
New York is Eating Me Alive So I Made Squash
When I started writing this post two days ago, there was a car alarm going off on my block for what felt like an hour. Now there's another - and I don't know if I'm stuck in some sort of Groundhog Day cyclical pattern or if this is just New York City, and there's a lot of cars and thieves and car alarms.
I'm working a part-time job where I do a lot of remedial tasks and it feels good. Yesterday I chopped kale for over two hours and watched my fingers turned green and then greener. It's meditation - the only time this week I've felt my mind relax.
It's been cold - the farmers are bundled up at the market. I bought an acorn squash today and he handed it to me with thick gloves. I roasted the squash with curry powder, a recipe from Missy Robbins, pasta legend and badass woman. She just put out a new cookbook, Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner...Life and I'm been using it a lot. Curry powder isn't something I often think to use - and something I was surprised to see in her book. In this recipe it melts into the fleshy squash until it's flavorful but not heavily spiced. The best part is the garlic cloves - they confit in the olive oil, get slightly scented with curry, caramelize from the sugar in the squash.
Cut an acorn squash in half, take out the seeds (then make pumpkin broth with them), and place it in a roasting pan. Pour a little bit of water in the bottom of the pan, then pour some olive oil and a pat of butter in each squash half. Add a couple cloves of peeled garlic and a few thyme sprigs. Season the squash evenly with salt and curry powder. Roast at 375 F until tender and fragrant (45 mins-1 hour). I omitted the butter to make it vegan and it was great.
Pumpkin Broth
For the last 2 months, I craved the cold and resented the heat. I felt like the city was resisting the Fall and it annoyed me. But now that the cold's set in, it feels abrupt (even though it came slowly), pestering (even though I begged for it). But that's okay because there's a time I'll miss these drizzly Autumn days and find myself complaining about the heat again.
The Greenmarket is at its peak right now. It's in transition, the most colorful time of the year - the tomatoes are dwindling but still there, their skin a little tougher; peppers and eggplants are hanging on, though barely; carrots, kale, cauliflower, and pumpkins are thriving. I love pumpkins. I'm happy to see them. Not pumpkin spice but pumpkins (and hard winter squashes) - bright orange and fleshy. I love the smell of cutting one open.
When my mom came to town last week, I took her to Mission Chinese Food. It was an incredible meal: rice fried in chicken fat, chewy pieces of dried pineapple and thinly shaved limes, thick spicy noodles. But the dish that stood out most was a quiet side dish we almost didn't order - Pea Leaves in Pumpkin Broth. The pea leaves were delicately poached and tasted like Spring. The broth was light, creamy, aromatic and deeply pumpkin-y. I've never heard of pumpkin broth and as I ate it I became more and more obsessed with how to make it.
Here's what I came up with: take all your pumpkin or squash scraps (innards, seeds, tops, odd ends) + some big chunks and some aromatics and bring it to a boil with water (As you would make chicken stock). You can add more depth by toasting garlic and ginger in a little oil then adding the chunks of pumpkin (I used Red Kuri squash) along with all the innards. Then fill the pot with water, bring it to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and let it sit for a long time, slowly bubbling until it's richly flavored. I blended a little bit of the pumpkin flesh into the strained broth to make it creamy, and topped it with poached pea leaves, pumpkin seeds, & fermented chiles.
a Citrus Salad for days that feel cold, damp, and lonely
I couldn't sleep last night. I woke up disoriented at 5am, wondering whose bed this is, whose room and mirror and off-white curtains. It took me time to realize it was mine - that the city was still sleeping. I stayed awake and watched the streetlights dim and the sun slowly flood the streets. I listened to the first bus squeal its tires, the advent of the morning rush.
Later this morning my friend texted me to tell me a mutual friend's husband died. Out of nowhere, he passed. I was walking into the hurried, crowded subway when I read it, on my way to work. A dark-haired woman pushed the crowd into the train. She touched my hand and pulled me in. My cheeks were pressed against the window and I was sweating through my shirt. The woman called out to us and said, "Jesus is coming soon." As if she knew I needed good news.
Last night there was a shooting in my hometown near Colorado, the day after the attack in NYC. I knew my family was safe, but that familiar feeling lingered - the fear that this stroke of bad news, this act of violence, this natural disaster, will finally be the one to get me. The news these days is dizzying. Nothing feels certain anymore, and today I felt it more than ever.
I wanted to hold everyone I know and kiss their cheeks. I was heartbroken for my friend who's experiencing the kind of loss I've never had to deal with. I was terrified of what else could happen today. And so I went to work, disoriented, and cooked - because that's what I'm paid to do and because it feels good to nourish people... to support a life, at the risk of sounding hyperbolic.
I've been reading Alice Waters's new memoir, Coming To My Senses, which is really, really great by the way, and spending a lot of time with her cookbooks. I made a few salads from The Art Of Simple Food today, but this one was especially bright and lovely on a day that felt damp - just supremes of grapefruit, slices of avocado, and watercress. I topped my salad with seeds - poppy, toasted sesame, and hemp. Would be fun topped with everything bagel seasoning, too, like a dish I had at Roister in Chicago - avocado & grapefruit on toast with everything butter (dried garlic, onion, poppy, sesame).
soup for an indian summer
It's still summer in New York. Or at least it's not the Fall I remember. The subways are still warm and wet; there's a slight breeze but the air is resisting going cold. Every day we all talk to each other like it's the last nice day of the year - "I'm gonna enjoy this one, Fall is coming" and every day it's warm again. I keep taking out my sweaters and then folding them back up again.
Late Summer Soup: fresh cranberry beans, roasted wild mushrooms, swiss chard, a broth of caramelized late summer tomatoes, garlic, and thyme.
Shell the beans. Clean the mushrooms and roast them with a little oil and salt in a high oven (450 F). Clean the leaves of the chard from the stems and blanch in salted water. Sauté garlic in a pan until brown, add chunks of tomatoes and cook until the water evaporates and they start to caramelize. Add a thyme sprig, water, and fresh beans. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer until beans are tender. Add swiss chard stems, greens, and mushrooms. Season with salt and lemon juice, top with olive oil and maybe grated cheese.
Black Tar
There's stains on my curtains from where they touch the A/C unit, because the A/C is pulling in all the black soot that sits in the air. It's moments like these that I remember how disgusting the air is. It's raining, the soot is being pushed to the ground into black puddles and flowing black rivers on the sides of the streets.
The dirt is getting to me lately. It happens now and then - my romance for the city dies and I see it as it is: a literal concrete jungle, expensive overcrowded filth. Maybe it's because I'm dog sitting - it's weird to see dogs piss on garbage, not grass. When he finds trees he plays in them and rubs his face against the leaves and I see myself in him - desperate for some nature, some oxygen.
If there's one thing about Nature, I've noticed, it's persistent - obsessed with life, with growth, with progress. Even here, tree roots crack the concrete, weeds grow through the sidewalk panes, vines coat the sides of buildings. My downstairs neighbor built a garden and I thank him every day for it. He tends it to it tenderly. He gave me a speckled pink orchid. I bought some plants for my bedroom, but they barely get enough sun. I've been craving California - that coastline, those year-round farmer's markets...
Okra
September came without warning. The temperature didn't change and the leaves didn't rustle and maybe that's because the temperature never climbed too high to begin with this year. Every Autumn I do this - expect it to come sooner than it does. Last night as the sun was setting, the water was warmer than the air. I felt grateful to feel it crashing onto my legs, watching the sun reflect in the clouds. September is a pensive month, a slowing down, an in-between.
I cooked okra today at a house in the Hamptons. The flame was hot, the air temperate, the sun bright and reflecting loudly from the metal grill. A fall breeze was blowing, the ocean roared, the okra sang like a tea kettle. Grilled from raw, until crispy and a little charred -they were flavorful and didn't get slimy. I served it with a creamy salsa verde.
A Dream of You and Me
On the beach today I fell asleep and dreamed about a dive bar in New Jersey. I was alone, open and innocent, running my feet across the sandy floor. The wind blew through a curtain behind the bar. The bartender (she had red curly hair) smiled from the corner of her mouth. I was skinnier, lighter on my feet. I was sipping Campari, or was it a Shirley temple? Maybe I was younger than I thought. Maybe I'd finally quit drinking. Seagulls flew violently past the windows, the air buckled, the smell of day-old fish soaked into my skin. I ordered raw clams, but didn't eat the cocktail sauce. Just the raw fish and some lemon, flavorless flakes of black pepper. I was meeting someone. They were late. I stayed until the day ended and waited. As the sun set, the light hardened and turned red like the color of tail lights. Passing shadows on the old wood bar.
i heal my heart with mangoes
I took a plane to Thailand last night, my friend and I, on a whim. We have vague, almost non-existent travel plans for the next 3 weeks and it feels good. My heart is healing from a devastating breakup and it feels good to be on the other side of the world. I'm eating again and moving my feet.
We flew through Beijing and I watched the sun rise over the city from the plane - just behind the wing, black fading into orange and pink. Everything they told me is true: the sun is different in Asia. It's larger, more orangey, like a thick free-range yolk. We stepped into the airport and the sun was shining strongly through the windows, making long dramatic shadows. It felt warm and new, an embrace.
Beijing was cold and almost post-apocalyptic, too clean. A stark contrast to Thailand - intensely colorful, atrociously hot. We landed late and the streets were still alive after midnight. Fried fish and green papayas, corn milk, coconuts, bins of ripe fragrant fruit. We bought mango & sticky rice from a woman on the street and ate it in our air-conditioned hotel. Delirious and exhausted, my eyes sinking into my head, it's the best thing I ever remember eating. The ripe mango, floral, sweet and juicy (it's nam dok mai mango season); salty-sweet sticky rice soaked in coconut milk.
The streets smell like durian, jasmine flowers, roasting bananas, sewage, and sweat. It makes the states feel so sanitary (in a bad way) - everything in plastic, boring, watered down.
the world ends often
I was standing outside my restaurant in the West Village, asking my coworker about a scallop dish, when a woman walked up to me on the street and told me there's been another shooting in San Bernardino. Another senseless act of domestic terrorism. Another 20 lives lost on a seemingly normal day. I'm working a private party and cooking way more food than is reasonable for a group of belligerent overpaid real estate agents. I think about this poem I read in college, the world ends often. This is the world ending, isn't it? Me flipping fish and turning turnips, while "hallelujah" plays hauntingly? While the earth churns and boils from the inside out? While everyone walks around happily in tee shirts and rain jackets in the middle of December? While the food supply slowly weakens? While buildings are bombed? While the parents of the developmentally disabled children shot today in San Bernardino mourn? The world ends everywhere and often. It is the end of the world today for all of those families and that community. It is the end of the world for someone whose mother just passed. It's the end of the world for people every day who are killed in the street from gang violence and drug addictions and poverty and hunger. It is the end of the world all the time. I can't comprehend it. I don't understand it. I'm grateful that the people I'm serving right now are safe and happy and gracious, albeit annoying. And I'm angry that we all can't be. I'm grateful and I'm angry that I've been so lucky. I'm terrified that I won't always be. I'm terrified that the world will fall apart before I can live the dreams I've been building lately. That something will happen to me or to him before I get to hug my nephew next. And isn't that what they want?
Welcome (Back) To NYC
Que Taylor Swift's "Welcome to New York." I've been trying to imagine that song is playing over loudspeakers as I navigate my first week back here. It adds an ironic cheer to my exhausting, abusively hot days of interviews and street meat and Starbucks bathrooms, blow-drying the sweat stains from my clothes. I imagined the bass kick in after a random man attacked me on 14th Street and 7th Avenue - he spit on me, screamed "Get the f*^$ out of my face, and then whipped me with a dirty tee shirt. And I walked away singing it, "Welcome to New York. It's been waiting for you."
I'm remembering what it's like to live here. I've been gone long enough that my shoulders relaxed, my neck unwound. Now my shoulders are rising to my ears again. My feet are starting to callous and blister. You must always be on guard here. I'm remembering. It's still summer and the heat has a tight grip on the city. The sun beats down through the buildings, reflects on the metal, warms the streets like an oven. It feels stale and also wonderful -- thinking of the bitter cold that's coming faster than we think. I crave the chill in the air and I also resent it. Every year I hold desperately onto the freedoms that come with Summer and early Fall - the feeling that anything is possible nothing out of reach.
Still, the air feels like a moist womb. I'm remembering not to walk too close to the buildings because the air conditioners drip down like rain clouds. I'm remembering to relish the breeze that comes from the train passing through the subway platform, sweet relief. The subway tunnels are sweaty and suffocating but also bright, loud with the colors of what everyone's wearing, Palpable energy. People are alive. Many of them are visiting, experiencing New York for the first time. A trip they planned for years, maybe. They help me remember not to take this for granted. What's a lifetime worth of planning for someone is a 20-minute train ride for me, for us, for the crazy people that live here. In many ways we do have it all. And that's what we pay for, isn't it?
Yesterday I put my roommate's electric kettle on the stove. Here's where I admit I've never used an electric kettle before. I didn't flinch when it was smoking and starting to smell like burning plastic. I just took a shower and then came back to the stove on fire.
Salt
I've been on a road trip with a good friend of mine. We took my stepfather's van from Colorado to California and tonight I'm falling asleep in the top bunk of this VW Eurovan. We're in wine country, parked by the dumpsters of the Fremont Diner. It's cold outside and stuffy inside but we're too afraid to keep the vents open. My feet are stuffed inside the short end of the pop-up tent. We drove from Denver, up into Wyoming, through Utah to downtown Salt Lake City, where we ate breakfast from mason jars on the edge of the lake: the dry salty lake that extends all the way to the road. We walked ten minutes over salty wet sand, skipping over hundreds of dead birds. The water was filled with brine shrimp, tiny little shrimp, the only thing capable of living there. Then we drove through the salt flats, stopped the van and jumped out onto the vast fields of thick crystalized salt. We ran in circles on the salt beds, tried to carve lines through it. The sky was a perfect blue with white fluffy clouds, like a painting in a child's room.