THE ISOLATION JOURNALS - DAY FIVE - FORBIDDEN FRUIT
Today’s prompt:
Find a good spot in front of your favorite window. What do you see? Write about the view—this can be a description of what’s unfolding right now, or you can branch off into a fictional reality. Maybe the window is open and sounds, smells, and a breeze are slipping in; maybe there are people in the street, maybe it’s empty. Either way, record the moment.
Forbidden Fruit
My neighbor has a lemon tree. I can see it from my window. I’m pretty sure it’s a Meyer.
I’d never heard of Meyer lemons until I moved to Berkeley for law school. It was love at first encounter. The rich golden color of the peel. The heady Bergamot-like perfume. The delicate balance of sweet and sour, so different from the mouth-puckering lemons of my former life.
A botanically naïve east coaster, I remember being thrilled and even a little disbelieving that people had these incredible treasures just growing in their yards. (Cue: Buddy the Elf finding “free candy” on the streets of New York.)
Most people seem to take their lemons for granted, leaving them hanging heavy on the branch, full of delicious promise, until they fall in a muffled thud and self-compost back into the earth. (I know this could be interpreted as a metaphor for life, or Western civilization, or the shitstorm we’re going through right now, but it’s not. I’m just talking about lemons.)
As a poor grad student who loved to cook and eat, I was sorely tempted to trespass into strangers’ yards to help myself to some forbidden fruit. Think about what I could make: lemon curd bars, glazed lemon pound cake, lemon meringue pie, roasted chicken with lemon and garlic. Ever the diligent rule-follower, though, I resisted.
Today, as I gaze forlornly out my rain-streaked window, entering week 4 of god knows how many more weeks of self-quarantine, I think about all the rules we have to follow. Stay inside. Wear a mask. Keep six feet distance. Don’t touch your face. Wash your hands for 30 seconds. Don’t hoard TP. Don’t hoard anything.
I’m tired of rules. I’m tired of the rain. I’m tired of my apartment. I’m tired of checking the TP aisle and seeing it completely empty. (Two-package limit? I wish!) I’m tired of singing that stupid happy birthday song.
Andrew Zimmern has a recipe for creamy lemon pasta in Food & Wine that I’ve been dying to try. It calls for Meyer lemon zest, juice, and supremes. I’m thinking I’ll need two lemons, maybe three, to make it right. I look out the window again at my neighbor’s laden tree. The rain is finally letting up.
I pull on my rain slicker and boots and head outside. Meyer lemons were $2.99 a pound at Safeway the last time I checked. And I haven’t seen Ivy in nearly two weeks.
(Seriously, you thought I was going to trespass onto my neighbor’s property and steal his lemons? For a lousy bowl of pasta? C’mon people: follow the rules.)