The eighth exercise...

had three parts. First, Harry asked us to take 5 minutes and write out an erotic fantasy or memory. Again, he said not to be literary, not to use "the brush of a dove's wing" metaphors and such. Be direct.



No, you funky monkeys, I'm not going to post my fantasy here, but I will say that we all seemed surprisingly comfortable writing at a shared table by this time, and nobody really balked about thinking sexy thoughts in a small classroom, though a few people I peeked at blushed a little as they wrote. (Meanwhile, the holiday madness was beginning to ratchet up outside...we were a few doors down from 6th Ave at 11th Street--right in the Halloween parade path.)



The second part of the exercise was another automatic list, with the constraint that all the words should relate to cooking or eating food. I think we had 3 minutes for this.



Food-related list



spatula

bacon

bake

broil

smother

tender

fork

bite

mouthfeel

degrees

grease

degrease

cookie sheet

wrap

fridge

grocery

broccoli rabe

pasta

olive oil

peel

scrub

prick

foil

slice

crush

mince

purée

sea salt

ladle

soup

season

spices

herbs

basil

rosemary

chiffonade

julienne

deglaze

reduce

sautée

pan sear

cast iron

brick oven

pizza stone

yeast

starter

sugar

wheat

grind

wash

stemmed

steamed

turned

carved

sharpened

loaf

leavened

tasty

spoon

table

placemat

coaster

wine glass

rioja

pinot noir

salmon

scallop

oysters again!



Besides making me realize that I was getting hungry and the at the cocktail hour was quickly approaching, this list had an sensual feeling to it that Harry manufactured by having us do the fantasy first. After having written what we had written, some of the words packed an extra charge. Context.



Now, what happens, asked Harry, when one lexicon is replaced with the other? The combination of these first two parts resulted in a true translexical translation. He asked us to take the erotic fantasy or memory and replace every word that had even the slightest erotic charge for us with a word from our food-related list. We borrowed the list of one classmember and added its words to our own, so we'd have more options.



Check it.



It is daylight and we are not alone. People aren't deglazing, but they could, if they knew what we were about to eat. You're here, but it isn't you. The kitchen pizza stone. The silicon spatulas have left burn marks on our vegetables, steamed in the pan. A hot bacon dressing to warm a cool salad as yeast is warm after a rise. A white apron over your chest and my ladles there, but I mostly notice our chewing. We are sautéeing in the flames, which lets us keep our eyes open and still smell the garlic. Who wants to eat, but sniff--let's sniff the oysterbed, our mouthfeel toasty. I think of high school when sausages were thin and brown and smacking was so curious. No longer curious in the bright kitchen but delicious. Out here over this stove and this blender and this cast iron sear. I rip the white apron and am stirring now. I tap the whisk on the bowl and all the waitresses are wearing chef's hats and they want two desserts a piece, but I have all the desserts. I have a chocolate cake and the new fork is like a silver keychain. The crumbs on our napkins in our laps or our mouths in your mustache and everything is reducing.



So yeah. People laughed aloud the whole way through this exercise. When we were all finished, Harry asked us to read over both versions and decide which was more erotic. Almost everyone chose the food-related version. He said we were perfect, and that was the end of the first day.