Plain and bluntly

On Tuesday night we had two friends over — both colleagues of Ash’s, both midwives, one of them the midwife who delivered Ames — to eat soup and talk about Miranda July’s All Fours. All of us had read the book and had talked offhand about finding a time to discuss it, but the plan coalesced quickly last week over text. We were all free on election night, turned out: why not do it then? It would be a useful distraction.

Late Tuesday afternoon, I started to cook. I made a pot of Melissa Clark’s Red Lentil Soup (gift link) and her Pumpkin Bread with Brown Butter and Bourbon (gift link), though we’re out of whiskey so I winged it with applesauce. L and M arrived at 6:30, bringing salad and bread and wine. I’d been so anxious that afternoon, watching the clock tick past the hour when the polls would close on the East Coast and it was all barely beginning and I could do nothing but wait, whisk some mashed pumpkin into beaten eggs, and wonder if I knew our guests well enough to chance smoking a joint before they arrived, which would settle my insides but might also make me giggle at unpredictable intervals all night. (No, I decided.)