Just The Way We Like It

Just The Way We Like It

In the kitchen heat, I think of you as I peel the bacon strips cool from the fridge. I carefully place each of them in the pan.

I love you more than bacon. Really, I do.

There’s always bacon at our house.  Together, we’ve eaten more than our share of black pepper, and hickory smoked bacon rashers.  Long before it was a fad, we stuffed ourselves with the sweet saltiness of chocolate covered strips—we even made our own.

I love making your favorite, bacon and liver fried, equally crisp with sliced onions in the drippings.  Dousing it with catchup and Worcestershire sauce, and eating it with rice is your go to dish when you’re feeling down.  Your mama made that for you.  You know I am happiest when my bacon is crisp, piled between soft white bread with Best Food mayo, Kunia beefsteak tomatoes, and lettuce.  It’s even better when you make it for me.

Today will be a good day, I say to myself, while you’re still curled up in bed.  You’re dreaming, I think, of mangos…its sticky juices running between your fingers as you chew on the bone.   Your love of mango is legendary.  When we walk by neighbors’ drooping mango trees, I know you’re thinking of a life of crime as you gaze at the green common mangos.   You see yourself dipping slices in shoyu vinegar or eating pickled mangoes that stain your fingers red.   Like my love for bacon and you, I know you love me more than mangos. Really, I do.

I hear you stir as you smell the bacon.   Its slow sizzle builds with a passion to a burnt crisp, just the way we like it.