January 9, 2011
XXI

Thank you for being you, Green Truck Pub.

I moved to Savannah last March with a pep in my step and a vigor in my stride.  I wanted to eat, sleep, breathe Savannah.  I wanted to walk Forsyth Park every morning and take in the local pubs by the afternoon.  I wanted to soak up the sun and sink my teeth into peaches and and pluck magnolia blossoms by the bushel-full because there were plenty to go around.

Three months later…

I discovered Savannah is hot.  Like, punch in the face hot.  I took morning jaunts around Forsyth for about a month until I couldn’t bear the heat anymore.  I told David: “It is so hot outside it hurts to breathe”.  And apparently, every old, retired, hawaiian shirt wearing tourist wants to “eat, sleep, and breathe” Savannah too.  I was heart broken. 

I love food.  I was thrilled about getting to know the city’s hot spots and dives and gems only the locals knew about.  But… where were they?  These places I would get referred to were ok for a tourist, but nothing was great.  I wanted real, heart and soul food.  I moved from Charleston where David and I often frequented places like, Zia Taqueria, Rue de Jean’s, and our favorite Evo, the brilliant brain child of Ricky Hacker and Matt McIntosh.  It boasts local ingredients, an ever changing menu, and love.  They have a painfully good choclatier that constructs the most delicious chocolate morsels, an enticing beer menu, and all of their food is made on site, locally, with a bit of dash and daring.

So, after a while I felt like I was crazy.  I mean, is Paula Deen’s restaurant honestly among the best in the city??  Because if it is, I’m not ok with that.

Then, there was Green Truck Pub.

David and I figured that perhaps the really good food was out of our price range.  I guess we have to pay up if we want to have something decent. 

I can’t remember how I discovered Green Truck but I like to think that it was sent to me by some foodie gaurdian angel. 

Heaven.  The Green Truck Pub is heaven.

They have a small but delightful selection of craft draft beers and everything they do and are about is doing it themselves.  Hand made pickles and ketchup, local veggies and breads.  The place is small and quaint and has the same turn of employees bustling about every other night.  I adore it.

Among other places we have found (Sentient Bean, Sammy Greens, Taca, Local,  the bbq couple at Polk’s every Sunday, and Back in the Day Bakery to name a few) Green Truck is the king in my book.  Try the hot ham and swiss, or revel in the quesadilla that features whatever local seasonal veggie that’s about, or try a slice of the cheese cake that’s baked just a few blocks away and made from a Grandmother’s close kept and cherished recipe.

Love Green Truck Pub and spread its love.  Hooray for eating well and living well.  Cheers to that.

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September 26, 2010

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September 26, 2010
XX

Scrunchie face.

I don’t know.  Harrummph.

I’m watching trash tv at 11:00 on a saturday night.  And not even HGTV fluff tv that’s pointless but still constructive and informative, I’m talking We TV trashy trash trash tv.  The kind of tv you snap-to a half hour into watching and check the room to make sure you’re still alone because it is that embarrassingly pointless and shallow.  It’s just such an indulgent thing to do though… so inexplicably entertaining.  I caught myself watching Jerseylicious yesterday and enjoying it.  Don’t you dare repeat that.

Our good friends Chas and Liz are getting married this upcoming weekend in Columbia, SC.  It should be a good time, I’m actually pretty excited about it.

I went and had a dress hemmed for it.  That’s huge.  That’s adult talk there-getting something hemmed- next thing you know I’ll be talking about filing my own taxes and making dentist appointments.  Maybe.

David gave me the dress a while ago but I haven’t worn it yet.  Not because I don’t love it, don’t get me wrong, the dress is gorgeous.  Truth be told I tried it on when I had long hair and since I hacked it off shortly before he gifted the dress to me, I just haven’t felt it looks as pretty as it did when I tried it on with long hair.  

Silly vanity.

I’m ready for October.  

October reminds me of pumpkins and dry leaves and my Mom and Dad.  It reminds me of playing soccer with my cousins in their backyard and slipping on those bizarre fat crimson berries that fell from whatever tree it was that littered them about the yard.  Little mines to slip on.  My family has a carve off competition each year.  I always wanted my pumpkin design to look awesome but it usually ended up as a huge cut out because I would get too frustrated with my hack-job attempt at the eiffel tower or something equally complex and end up with a simple crescent moon motif.  Go figure.

I have a feeling it’ll be a while until it feels Octobery and orange and sweatery and cool here in Savannah but I’m looking forward and trying to appreciate it everywhere and anywhere it is trying to peek out.  I see you Autumn!


Boo!

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September 15, 2010

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September 15, 2010
XIX

I need a good low spell every once in a while.

I feel much better this morning, a little puffy eyed, but much better.  In acknowledging where and why I hurt, I can see what it is and understand it rather than wallowing and drowning in it all.

Whew.

It’s beautiful outside today.  I think I can smell October in the air.  Come on Autumn, I’m ready for pumpkins and leaves on the ground.

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September 14, 2010
XVIII

On my jog yesterday morning, I started to cry.

I was listening to the song called “A Wavin’ Flag” by Knaan.  The lyrics go as follows: “when I get older, I will be stronger, they’ll call me Freedom, just like a waving flag… I heard them say, love is the answer, love is the way… but for now we say, ‘when I get older I will be stronger, they’ll call me Freedom, just like a waving flag… and they all will be singing it, we all will be singing it…”

I’ve always wanted and strived to be “older” and “stronger” in my life.  The words in that song make my stride surer as I jog past the Forsyth crowd.  I raise my chin, quicken my pace, straighten my shoulders and I start to cry.

I’m 25 and I would love to say that now, my life is easy.  I would love to say that I have passed my youth and am capable of surviving on my own.  I wish I were wiser and braver and tougher.

The truth is, I miss my Mom… I see pictures of friend’s weddings I knew nothing about and it hurts… I miss my friends, I wish I weren’t so lonely, I wish a good night’s sleep could mend nights of heartache and homesickness.  I wish I could wake up to smiling faces of dear friends surrounding me like a sea of teddy bears and I could sweep them close to my heart and bury into them and hug them until I slept, quieted and calmed, knowing when I awoke, they would be there, waiting, keeping me warm, letting me sleep, so we could smile together in the morning.  I wish, I wish, I wish.

…when I get older I will be stronger, they’ll call me Freedom, just like a waving flag…

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August 17, 2010

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August 17, 2010
XVII

Holy Souffle.

I. Made. A. Souffle.

Thank you Martha Steward online.  

I wasn’t expecting anything magnificent.  I was raised on Stouffer’s Spinach Souffle, which I can say pretty confidently I wouldn’t enjoy now, but as a child, it was the best thing I had ever tasted and felt that any souffle I would ever make wouldn’t have a chance at standing up against my memory of Stouffer Souffle.

En Garde.  My souffle was souffleriffic!  Oh my god it was so good.  It was light and fluffy and golden brown and eggy and sweet and salty and rich and warm and delicious and complex and nutmeggy and made the rest of my plate envious.  Mmm, mmm souffle.

Now, from what I hear, souffles are impossible to perfect so something tells me my next seventeen attempts are going to be tearful atrocities, but, from the way this one turned out, it’ll be worth the wait.  We had potato curry with sweet grape tomatoes, red pepper, and yellow onion over jasmine and parsley rice alongside warm garlic naan and the victor of the evening, spinach souffle.  Yes.

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August 16, 2010

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August 16, 2010
XVI

To you.  Friend from a distance and a lifetime and a tick ago.  Hi.  It seems just yesterday, last week, we ran around the same circle in the same season on the same timeline.  How life’s pages turn.  We’re in different chapters from the same edition now.  I still smile thinking about when we had the luxury of laughing together among friends.  Once I told you that you reminded me of apples, flushed and vibrant.  I always think on that, how silly the comparison but how it still feels like the right way to describe you.  I feel like I’ve come to know you better and love you more as the years have passed, though I don’t know how or why.  But, you are a dear friend and among my closest without knowing it.  I thought you should know.

I hope you are well.

There is a girl who walks her dog in the morning on my running path.  Her behind is shaped like an upside-down heart and I can’t help but stare at it.  There is also a young man who wears an orange reflective vest and rides a bike around the park every morning.  He introduced himself as D’Angelo.  I try not to run at that time anymore.  He makes me uncomfortable.  There are two older women who hustle-walk in bright colored polos and capri casual walking pants.  They gossip the whole time and the one who usually walks on the right side struggles to keep up with the one on the left.  There is a group of three older black men who walk together and always bid me a good ole southern “Good Mo’nin” as I pass.  An overachieving well-to-do man jogs with his fru-fru designer dog most mornings I’m out and must live along the park because I often see him start out with his dog and then finish out the morning jogging solo.

It’s comforting to see these people each day.  I look forward to seeing, or not seeing, them each morning, whatever the case may be.  I hand wash my jogging “costume” each day and I enjoy the routine of it.  I lay each item out to dry on our little sun porch walkway and check on my little basil plant as I go in.  Charlie cat likes to hang out by the door, as if she were brave enough to try to escape.  She’s terrified of whatever lies beyond the door jamb, I can see it in her hesitant attempts to pass it.  

I have felt really introspective lately.  Frustrated by the day-by-day blah and angry at myself for not getting out of it.  I find comfort in the characters I meet, creating profiles and descriptions and a place for them in my life.  I wonder if I’m a character in their morning run stories…  

Maybe I should get myself some tulips, they always make me happy.  In fact, if I ever give flowers, they are almost always tulips, as a gesture of, “I hope these make you as genuinely sunny as they do me”.

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