Instagram

It's not been there long, but recently I gave myself an Instagram tagline, "Square like sonnets." I doubt anyone has been wondering what that means, but if you did, you're in luck.

Up until relatively recently, the only way to post a non-square photo on Instagram was with an external app. IG became, by default, a place of square photos. Who, after all, had time to be dicking around on their phone with an extra uni-tasker app they didn't really have space for in the first place?

Well, I did. Sometimes. Every once in a while I wanted to post a photo that just had to have that extra millimeter on one side. But then IG upgraded, and now you don't need another app to post a non-square photo anymore. IG removed its own definition of what an IG photo should be. But I refuse to go along. Now that the option of non-square photos is baked in, I refuse to use it. IG defined itself with squareness, and I won't let the one social media platform I enjoy undefine itself.

This means there are limits to what I can post. That's good. No one, not even my parents, wants to see every single picture I take. I don't want to see them. So some photos don't work as squares: okay. So IG isn't the place for them. Maybe they're great photos and they belong on a wall somewhere instead (either physical or Facebook).

   

The word "limit" has some negative connotations, but I say it's limits that make things interesting and give them meaning. If anyone can do anything they want, anytime, you don't get creativity; you get a lot of people fucking around and annoying each other. Limits create focus. Focus is how the magic happens.

All communication, after all, from abstract finger painting to narrative nonfiction, has rules. (Otherwise you would spell purple "basdvio," and really mean green.) Depending on the form of expression, the rules expand or contract. Sonnets have more rules than free verse, so writing sonnets (as I haven't done since high school, but I remember enjoying) is fun and challenging in a different (not better) way than writing free verse.

    

I want Instagram to have that same sense of challenge. I want it to retain an internal consistency, a purity. I want to take a stand on all these tiny little details because taking a stand on the big things is easy; it's the niggling things that'll kill you.

(For more detailed thoughts on poetry and rhyme, see The Anthologist. While you're at it, read this poem and become a better person.)

RECIPE: Malted Milk Ice Cream. Just... yes. I bought a 2-pound can of malt powder just so I could make this ice cream over, and over, and over again. I've still never put the chunks in, but I don't see why they wouldn't be great; chocolate-covered pretzels too. (Tangentially: Always order your milkshake malted.)

Silver Bells

Two months after we were married, R was scheduled to fly here for a visit. His plane landed late afternoon on December 25th. "How will I get to your apartment?" he asked. It took me a while to understand the question. It didn't occur to him that the subway would be running; it didn't occur to me that it wouldn't.

Patience, NYPL

Just because the city doesn't grind to a halt though, doesn't mean the holiday isn't happening. For my money, NY is the best place in the world to be for Christmas. Whether you're doing it Jesus or Santa style, or at a Chinese restaurant and the movies, Christmas here is inescapable.

Where to go, exactly? Well personally, this is the only time of year I can bear to be in Midtown. I generally manage from about Central Park to Rockefeller Center, taking in the windows and light shows along the way. (Saks does a thing with projectors and Carol of the Bells that's worth standing around for.) There are also a million holiday markets, all of which are fun the first couple times but start to look extremely samey year after year.

Then of course there's ice skating, fantastic hot chocolate, tree tunnels, and just enough of a possibility of snow to keep things exciting.

Our own personal traditions involve a trip to the Grand Central Oyster Bar for oysters, champagne, and clam chowder; the painstaking selection of chocolates from a local chocolatier; stealing scraps of tree clippings from the sidewalk to strew about our apartment; sending cards; hanging ornaments; and playing the most eclectic holiday music I can find. (The Muppets, Nightmare Before Christmas, and Christmas in the Stars are a small, classic subset of this.)

Christmas Eve is tapas night. (It used to be pesto and shrimp cocktail night, but then we ended up with a regular guest who doesn't like pesto.) Christmas morning, whoever's up first plugs in the tree and makes coffee. I make french toast, as I have done since I was tall enough to reach the stove, which is served with breakfast sausages and fruit salad. (For a long time, it was the usual pan-fried version, but in recent years I've branched out to the baked, crème brûleé style. I also realized that if you're doing it in the oven, you don't have to keep the bread slices whole. Nowadays it looks a lot more like bread pudding, which... it is.)

Metropolitan Opera, Lincoln Center

Sated, we move on to stockings. I've heard tell recently that many families don't do stockings for adults, or stop entirely when the kids aren't anymore. Whatever. If we'd only ever done it for kids, it would have been me, all alone with a stocking while a bunch of adults looked on. Burdens of an only child.

The rest of the day continues in the same vein: eating, opening presents, drinking, eating, opening a few more. The main feast is in early afternoon, and it is ham. Oh, and we play with Legos. As of this year, a few rounds of Celebrity were added to the mix. And that's it. We make our weary way home, and snuggle the cat.

MAP

RECIPE: Minty Pea Dip. Serve with pita chips during any gathering requiring snacks.

BAM

Sometimes, preemtively, I miss NY. I miss the view from our apartment, Prospect Park, Mexican food (shut up, California), pizza, bagels, Red Hook, the swimming pool... and BAM.

Movies, dance, theater, music, opera. Become a member and the movies are half off, as are day-of tickets for everything else. It's within reasonable walking distance for us, with plenty of excellent food/drink/ice cream options on the way. There's even a great bookstore a few blocks away, to kill that extra twenty minutes while I wait for R to get out of work and meet me, or vice versa.

The only thing I could begin to complain about is the quality of the popcorn, and then only because I've had Film Forum's. Anyway, since we usually meet in the evenings for a 7ish show, we skip the popcorn and bring in sandwiches. Is this technically allowed? I think it makes the experience a little more civilized, eating our ciabatta-roasted-veg-goat-cheese sandwiches and sipping a hard cider. No one's ever complained.

BAM generally doesn't show blockbusters, but they're making an exception for Star Wars. (We went on Christmas Eve. The Harvey screen was the exact perfect size for my field of vision.) Generally there's a mixture of first-run films and thematic series of older films, occasionally even with musical accompaniment. Theater runs the gamut from Shakespeare to French robots; dance from ballet to modern. Opera I have no idea, because I don't like opera; I assume it's of the same generally high quality and intriguing variety.

Living where we do, we find ourselves at BAM at least once every week or two. Along with Prospect Park and Fairway, it's one of the pillars of our Brooklyn existence, and I will be sad when it's time to say goodbye.

MAP
RECIPE: Naan. R makes some amazing curries, and I'll choose this as a side over rice any day.