“Jamais les crépuscules ne vaincront les aurores
Etonnons-nous des soirs mais vivons les matins.”
– Guillaume Apollinaire

“Once upon a time there was an old woman. Blind but wise.

One day the woman is visited by some young people who seem to be bent on disproving her clairvoyance and showing her up for the fraud they believe she is. Their plan is simple: they enter her house and ask the one question the answer to which rides solely on her difference from them, a difference they regard as a profound disability: her blindness. They stand before her, and one of them says, ‘Old woman, I hold in my hand a bird. Tell me whether it is living or dead.’”

Once upon a time, a king in France found himself alone one night, in a cold hunting lodge with a few onions and butter (Some versions include champagne. Why not? He was a king. And French). He boiled the onions, added the butter (and champagne?), and turned a peasant’s meal that had existed since broth in Ancient Rome, for thousands of years,

creamy,
indulgent,

into a national treasure, with Comté cheese and bread (Champagne also, incidentally, was born of a cold, harsh winter.)

Once upon a time, a world found itself alone one night, in a cold lockdown; to love was to stay in isolation. Children learned to touch screens, not hands; wear masks like gloves, scarves; smile with their eyes only, and never hug. Grownups unlearned certainties and the meaning of certain words, like freedom; certain skills, like confidence, spontaneity; and how to measure time, their time, and space, and wealth. Kings and queens and paupers, in icy, echoey rooms in yet another winter,

“and the question is repeated. ‘Is the bird I am holding living or dead?’

Finally she speaks and her voice is soft but stern. ‘I don’t know’, she says. ‘I don’t know whether the bird you are holding is dead or alive, but what I do know is that it is in your hands. It is in your hands.’” – Toni Morrison

Once upon a time, a boy in France found himself sick, alone one night with… onions and butter? A cat? A book, guitar, dog, lover? (There are so many versions of this story. Why not? A care package containing lemon cake, gougères, sixty-four chocolates, compote, jam, bread, a board game, and the best Astérix had to offer…). In isolation, indoors, and made,

onion soup,
art,
poems,
gluten-free cookies with bananas and oats,
last-of-the-champagne risotto,

whatever was on hand, in his hands, and turned a cold, harsh reality beautiful.