Madeline Merritt

I’ve always been fascinated by frogs. Many of my earliest childhood memories are of catching them: chasing them by sound across dampened grass on summer nights; rooting them out from high places on the house siding; trying—and failing—to sneak up on the drainage pipe on our property where they nested (their croaks would always fall silent long before I got close); learning—the hard way—to wash my hands after holding one, lest I rub my eyes and cause them to burn. My interest in them never waned as I aged, though our meetings did evolve: I’d find them lounging on our porch railing in the evenings, soaking up the moisture from an afternoon rain, and leave them undisturbed save for a gentle stroke of a finger down their back; rescue them from precarious places, delivering them to safety in the warmth of two cupped palms. Once I even found one stuck to my bedroom window screen after dark and used the light from my phone screen to attract it a meal. I did all this for no other purpose than to see them up close, to simply have the chance to hold them, to say hello, and I still do it today. The last frog I saw came to me in August, stuck to my car window the morning after a warm rain, and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since…

I only eat cheese at night.

This does not mean that I don’t eat things with cheese until after nightfall; macaroni, pizza, and grilled cheese sandwiches are all part of my weekly eating habits. There is a stark difference, though, between this eating and the eating of cheese I indulge myself in after dark.

Eating cheese is a primal urge. At night, I slink to the refrigerator and fill a bowl to the rim with shaved parmesan, each piece a delicate burst of flavor. The bigger shavings I pick up piece by piece, the smaller ones I spoon in by the fingerful—as much as I’m able to pinch into my gaping mouth. In the past, my partner used to remark, “Do you want some bowl with your cheese?” Now he keeps his opinions to himself…