Nosh

I am excited to sit down and have summer sausage with a good cheddar. I've bought some water crackers to go along with them. I remember building a fort, redistributing my bunk bed so the beds were perpendicular. I hung sheets over the sides, kept them in place with books. I had a lamp and the small television we used to keep in the kitchen, along with our old VCR. I was going to watch British comedies. I was a clever kid.

I went to the kitchen for a snack. My mother suggested summer sausage, cheese, and crackers. We even had a good root beer, glass bottle and all. "Ah, having yourself a little nosh?" my father asked. "What's a nosh?" "A nosh," he said, "is just another word for snack. But I think it's better."

He was right. It is better. It elevates it. Still, I wouldn't call just any snack a nosh. I wouldn't call potato chips a nosh, or a banana a nosh, or a handful of nuts. But the time it takes to put the sausage and cheese and cracker together, the time some of the items aged. You're not grabbing something out of a bag. You're making something.

So I'll sit here now and have my nosh, remembering a simpler time. A time behind blankets and sheets, wrapped in pillows, inches from the screen, hungry for more.