Dear Wigleaf,

I'm going to take credit for the salsa. Okay? Because you may consider it little, my effort. The effort made to grow the tomatoes; the constant watering and plucking of the yellowed leaves that look like the belly of a sickened frog and the monitoring of the ripeness, which took both several weeks and about half a second.  

And then I stood in the kitchen and dumped them in boiling water and waited for the skins to start peeling, and plunked them in iced water that turned the same color of my great-aunt's ginger hair. Don't get me started on the squeezing of the seeds and my obsession with collecting every last bit of unwanted tomato gunk for the compost bin.

I know, I know, that I'm not supposed to cheat, but I did, because I fluctuate between wanting to be that superwoman who can make her own salsa from scratch and the lazy ass who believes that convenience is what separates us from the primates. So yes, I bought the flavoring mix that was manufactured with dried peppers and onions and God knows what else. Let God know. I don't want to.

Finally, it was me, and me alone who sanitized those glass jars, and it was me alone who waited patiently as the water bath processed the jars of salsa so that upon eating said salsa my friends and family will not suffer the  agonizing symptoms from botulism, including nausea, vomiting, respiratory failure and eventual death.

Because you know what? It tasted really, really good.

Love,

Ann






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Read AR's "Milk."

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