It’s the time of the year that I’m reading a bunch of short stories for the Nashville Review’s next issue. One story in particular made me laugh and I hope it will be among the ones published. Otherwise, it’s a reading week where I feel “behind” on the newsletters I usually read right away and read a few pages here and there from the piles next to the couch, my desk, my bed.

I’m almost done editing my interview with Julia Hannafin, whose novel CASCADE is publishing in less than two weeks. I’m learning from Julia about writing and research as I read (and re-read) the interview — I’ll share it when the interview is live!

For Easter with my family I made roasted zucchini and eggplant with marinated red peppers. I roasted one pan of each vegetable with olive oil, salt, and fresh rosemary, and then flopped the pan of eggplant on top of the zucchini. I sprinkled on some Acid League Meyer Lemon Honey Living Vinegar and thought, “This is looking…brown.” So I opened a bag of roasted red peppers and sliced them and some green onions to brighten up the tray. The peppers I bought impulsively and are quite delicious, very convenient, and I really need to remember to roast peppers myself more often.

“There is plenty of food, it’s just being withheld. Food is a tool for control and in Gaza we’re seeing it at its most extreme and evil. Food is also used for control in more discrete ways – in the service of ideas like efficiency and convenience.”

“Food's symbolism having little to do with the food itself can be a beautiful thing: People can gather over meager (in every sense of the word) provisions and still feel warmth, connection, and satisfaction. But the powerful systems that control food in the US and globally have noticed this and how it can be used to make money off food that is low quality and nutritionally poor.”

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