Divide and Conquer
I feel like the tradition of the 4th of July is based on some dicey situations and some not so friendly history that this great country has been a part of. Regardless, the present celebration is a time where friends and family get together, grill tons of meat, and watch fire explode in the air. Whatever the history and international relations of our wonderful USA, good outdoors cooking can easily make us forget our problems and bring harmony all over the rooftops.
Sausage, sausage, everywhere.
Well, not exactly. Or at least not for me. My roommate and I decided to have a grill-out on our roof and we each invited all of our friends. This quickly led to my inner-self becoming divided into four chambers of my stomachheart. If you thought I got stressed out about having just one guest over for dinner, imagine 20 guests. I felt divided between:
1)entertaining my friends
2)entertaining my roommate's friends
3)making sure the food was coming along
4)and worrying about paying enough attention to my ongoing Dinner Guest (14 and 15).
Homemade guacamole and bottomless sangria.
I suppose it's not that bad, but when you are the host (or co-host, rather) there is a lot of pressure to make sure all of the above things are mixing and getting along well. There is only so much a host can do, but I feel a responsibility for at least trying to get people to talk to each other because I know that I can't be around to do it all the time. The hardest part is balancing friends and new boyfriends. Admittedly, I am not too good at it. I feel like I either have to ignore my friends (while the boy and I have some private time) or shut the boy out of the conversation because my friends and I go way back and always talk about the same thing: writing.
My first ever strawberry-rhubarb pie. I have craved this for years and finally made the recipe from the classic, Joy of Cooking.
So, by the end of the night, we were all on the roof in the cold, cold, fog, watching the fireworks explode all over the city, and I felt totally uncomfortable and drunk. My friends were on one side chatting, but I wasn't able to say much to them because I was pre-occupied with the boy on the other side who seemed to be in a bad mood and whether I was responsible or not, I definitely felt responsible. He wanted to go downstairs because of the cold and then I ditched my friends entirely. And even the rest of the night with the boy was awkward.
I can't even take the credit for this one. My roommate made this amazing flour-less chocolate cake.
Luckily, there is clean up. I ditched
everyone to help my roommate put everything away and wash all the dishes. There is something soothing about cleaning. Not only did I wash away all my anxieties about the day, but I cleaned off all the soot that came off of Mission St. and deposited itself on the furniture, food, dishes, and my body. It may seem impossible, but most things that are divided can be glued back together (maybe sometimes in a different configuration) and washed off.