Children of the Corn

I've talked many times in this blog about the things that are important to me. More and more, I focus on permanent things...on things that are of the heart and of truth...on things that are not of this world.

Still, I live here too and while I hope to graduate one day from this exam...there are a few things in this material world tht make my time in this school enjoyable. Of course there's sex (and women, generally); there's the times spent with good friends; Oh Yeah...and there's FOOD. I have often been accused of having a "hollow leg". People use this as way of joking about the way I can attack a good meal. I'm fairly thin and I guess they figure it must be going somewhere.

Some of my best memories of the places that I've lived revolve around the local foods. I can still taste the Cuban Sandwiches and black beans from my boyhood home in Florida...The grilled pork marinated in Spiedie sauce from my time in Upstate New York...and here in my home in Pennsylvania, I wait every year for the coming of late summer and the arrival of the Sweet Corn.

Pennsylvania is thick with rich cornfields that produce the most wonderful sweet corn in the world. The first of the corn arrives in late July and it lasts through early September. Late summer means watermelon and grilling...hot dogs, hamburgers, and steak...but more than anything (in this part of America), it means the incredible sweet corn that grows all summer in the fields that surround the towns and mountains of this state. Some may find this post silly, but sometimes it's the small things that make this life enjoyable...bearable.

I'm not where I want to be. I feel if I had passed this test...if I had found the truth in some earlier time, then I would not have to suffer the cruelty and hatred of this world...but I'm a happy man. There is much here that is beautiful...that feeds the soul. The taste of the corn, still steaming from the pot, smothered in butter and Old Bay seasoning...well, that's one of those pleasures that make me look forward to tomorrow...to next summer. These are the memories that bring a smile to my face. I hope you can find the things that make you smile and hold them in your heart to sustain you when the injustice of this world weighs on you.

Love! Norm.