Heartbreak Salad

-Lettuce
-Tomatoes
-Cucumbers
-Carrots
-Chopped almonds
-Craisins

First, Dad is going to pull the lettuce from the salad drawer in the fridge, the one that sticks. He'll unwrap it, wash it, and pull it apart. The heart of  it crunches and crisps as it breaks.

Then, he'll rinse a couple waxy tomatoes, glowing like embers. Dad will place them on a pink, glass plate, scratched from use. He'll cut them, the seeds squirting here and there. But the wedges are small and perfect.

Next, he'll peel the cucumbers, filling the sink with green confetti. Translucent, bare-as-baby cucumber halves will leave the kitchen smelling like spring and cut grass and maybe mint.

Soon, Dad'll select two or three brilliant carrots. He'll peel them too so that their rough skins stick to the sides of the stainless steel kitchen sink, curling like ribbon, making a party of the cucumber peels.

When he tosses it all together, he'll sprinkle chopped almonds and craisins on top. He'll be the first to eat salad, the first to offer it to the rest of us. All the while, he'll lean forward and raise his eyebrows with each bite. He loves earth, food, life.



He did so much that when the salad sits on the kitchen table now, untouched, my heart lurches. Hiccups. I want to devour the entire thing, but I don't. I leave it for lunch tomorrow instead, when it won't taste so strongly of loss drenched in a dressing of brimming eyes and aching chest.