How About Now?

How to make anything from scratch

She is three years old and in her mind nothing separates the apple that grew on a tree and the one she has made me from twelve multicolored LEGO pieces, one of which has an eye. She tells me “that’s the handle part.” She asks if we can go to the park. Not until I have figured out what to make for dinner, I say. Then we can go buy groceries and maybe stop at the park. How about now? Not yet. I stand in front of the open refrigerator surveying leftovers and imagining reincarnation with minimal effort. She dismantles the apple and builds a banana that she is using as a microphone to remind me that she wants to go to the park. How about now? Not yet. I write breadcrumbs, cheese, and butter on the the margin of the crossword page and tear it off, watching as she patiently takes her banana microphone apart making a colorful block on the kitchen floor. I ask what she is going to make now.

Dinner, she says.