Spaghetti

Eastside Road, March 23, 2010—

SPAGHETT', MY FATHER always used to call it, with a mock Italian accent; God knows where he'd picked it up. One of the many things it never occurred to me to ask. When we had it in my childhood it invariably came from a cardboard box bearing the exotic name Chef Boyardee. Haven't seen it in decades, but damned if it doesn't still exist, these days brought to you by ConAgra. (There's even a considerable online discussion of the Chef's original, an Italian immigrant named Ettore Boiardi, but you'll have to research that yourself.)

We rarely eat spaghetti, for some reason; but it's a favorite pasta of mine, though to be sure it poses difficulties to a bearded man, especially when eaten in public. I like it for its lissome body and its embrace of sauce, and forgive it its tendency to spill. Before it, tonight, some raw fennel — Spring is certainly here! — and afterward the usual green salad.

dribs and drabs of wine, white and red, left from Sunday's dinner party.