raða

An evening spent arranging objects in the kitchen:

A clove of garlic in a low, white, salt-fired bowl
A long-handled wrought-iron spoon
A silverplate sugarbowl (not a wedding gift but a bridesmaid's gift)
A blue-glazed bowl with Japanese proportions cradling three Bosch pears (not quite ripe)
A set of silver and cobalt glass salt and pepper shakers
A hand-thrown mug stamped with the leonine face of the Durham Cathedral doorknocker

It is pleasing to have them all in their proper places, to have assigned them proper places. Their harmony is so much more comforting than the forks and knives in the drawer, like set with like with regimented regularity.

No shred of disrespect meant to the forks and knives. There would be no kitchen without them. Only with them arrayed in their places, invisible below the counter but at the ready, can the frivolous but still necessary objects of beauty find their own places on the table, the top of the stove, the sunlit windowsills.