I Struck a Bargain

I usually fast, from before the sun rises, till at least noon.  I’ll have water and black coffee perhaps some black tea and I don’t really miss my bagels and cornflakes.  Sometimes I’ll skip the lunch too and go straight till dinner.  Alas, the impact on my waistline has been minimal.  I’ve kept it up for a year and I’ve still got a gut.  And breakfasts are certainly a bore in China, beyond jianbing and youtiao.  But here there are many choices and this morning I heard my little one stirring before 8:00AM and talked her into a ride over to neighboring village of Gardiner where they have a solid little joint, named Mio. 

I talked her into bringing our copy of Anna K along.  Jeez, were only 40 pages away from the end.  Poor Anna’s already dead.  Vronsky is shell-shocked and heading off to Serbia for a bit of combat distraction and the story itself seems to adjust the aperture squarely now over Levin who is pressing ever harder to discern just why it is he’s alive.   Al Green was on the air and though we had a nice, three-seater on the side to ourselves, I capitulated and held off on reading while we ordered and ate our huevos rancheros.  I think I like my own better, but this was tasty and the sausages and the hash browns on the side were even better than the main dish.

I got in two of our customary ten pages before I signed the bill and considered the people who were waiting for tables.  Surprisingly, my daughter asked if we might drive around a bit before she had to head over to her basketball game.  I agreed immediately.  But as dad’s do, I struck a bargain.  You can listen to K-pop the whole ride if I get to pull the car over one or two times to finish off our reading.  Deal. 

We headed up Route 44/55.  The Gunks were covered in fog and we hardly noticed that we’d quickly reached the summit.  The lookout point was looking off into a cloud bank and so we drove on into the clearing the followed around Minnewaska.  We cut off to the right around Laurel Hollow Road, which was labeled to be a “rough road.”  All the better.  There were an interesting mix of weathered farm houses and modern constructions painted purple and all the while we cranked BTS . . . now I know that “V” has the deepest voice . . . and we got to finish off Levin’s epiphany, where the farm hand points out to him that one man is a middling fellow because he cares only for his stomach and another is a good man, because he thinks of others.  This man therefore is a man of God.   This all crystalizes for Levin so that he suddenly needs no more miracle to justify his faith than all that he sees around him, the miracle of life, everywhere manifest.  My daughter let me discuss for a little while.  But no talking while the music is on.  That’s the rule. 

Saturday 02/01/20