The pool is still and perfect and blue-green, the breeze soft, easy, lazy afternoonish. The dogs (rescued mutts, smart but not always pretty) run back and forth to the deep end of the pool, drawn to the water but still nervous at the sound of the lap-lap-lap against the tile. Every now and then you feel their rough tongues on the back of your knee--working away like deer at a salt lick--and you reach out a hand to push them away and then grab the ice cold glass on the side of the pool, full of lemon slices and lots of big ice cubes (small ones melt too fast).
And if it's the eighties and you have a big sister with a big pool and a big house (and an even bigger heart) then it's snack time. And that means different things on different days: sometimes salami, baguette slices and chunks of parmesan, sometimes croissants, paper thin ham, swiss and gherkins, sometimes nothing more complicated than each of you having your own bag of salt & vinegar chips, and a communal bowl of Lipton's onion dip. And sometimes it's your favorite--cheesy & melty with black olives & curry--and so good even the dogs sit quietly, sniffing the air and respectfully waiting for something, anything, to be thrown their way. But whatever it is, it's always the snack you craved at that exact moment, without knowing it was wanted until it turned up on a plate.
Eventually, the scene poolside is going to get very, very strange (like a Val Lewton horror movie from the 40's, all weird angles, bizarre dialogue, ghost sightings and people revealing themselves to be not who you thought they were) and to stay sane, you will make inside jokes about teddy bears floating face down in the perfect pool, and you and your sister will laugh until the Diet Coke foams out your noses (even as your eyes start to tear up) and the longer you have to live with using jokes to keep the crazy at bay, the smaller and smaller the big house will feel. Eventually it will go on the market (bought by a couple as strange as the house) and you and your sister will walk by on your visits home, the pool glimpsed through the fence--forever perfect and still and blue-green--wondering what really happened back then.
But today, it's before all that: everything is hushed, breezy-soft and the dogs are waiting patiently for their turn. Your hand reaches past the beaded, icy glass to grab the plate--the small plate by the big pool in the big house--for the snack.
Curry Cheese Melts
Ingredients
1 cup black olives (not oil cured) pitted & chopped
1/3 cup green onions, chopped
1 1/2 cups shredded sharp-ish Cheddar cheese
1/2 - 1 teaspoon curry powder (or more to taste)
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/2 teaspoon salt
8 English muffins, split in half
Optional: dash of heat in the form of red pepper flakes, or Sriachi chili sauce, or sambal olek ("or" being the operative word here).
Directions
1) Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2) Combine olives, green onions, cheese, curry powder, mayo and
salt in a bowl; mix well.
3) Spread mixture on English muffins. Cut muffins into fourths,
place on cookie sheet.
4) Bake at 400 degrees
