On my kitchen counter is a pound cake, sitting on a pedestal, beneath a glass dome.
Pound cake is the food of summer. It can make or break the entire season. A summer without pound cake is like church without singing. Or Monet without color. Or Andy without Barney.
When I was a younger man, my soon-to-be wife and I went through mandatory marriage counseling at our church. It was miserable. The minister was so uptight that he could have carried a corn cob without using his hands.
The pastor asked me what my “love language” was.
“My what?” I said.
“Your love language,” he said. “How do you receive love?”
“Come again?”
“Food,” my wife interjected. “Sean’s love language is pound cake, and so is mine. We speak Food.”
That preacher looked at us like we had june bugs crawling out our noses. And I never forgot that.
Because my wife was right. We speak Food. Food has always helped me
through life. I use fried chicken to fend off existential doubt. Pimento cheese gives me courage. And pound cake restoreth my soul.
And yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of High Cholesterol, I will fear no egg yolks, for Thou art with me.
Speaking of food, right now I smell steaks cooking on a grill. My neighbor, Tom, is having a holiday cookout and he is speaking my “love language” fluently.
It’s Fourth-of-July week and every house on our street has a driveway full of cars. There are American flags flying on every post, mailbox, and car antenna.
People linger on porches, holding bottles and aluminum cans, eating ridiculous amounts of goodies and laughing a lot.
The sun is low. I hear firecrackers in the distance. They sound like bottle rockets.
If you are, or you have ever been a boy,…