THE READING LIST: YOU DON'T HAVE TO LIKE WHAT YOU DO

I recorded someone recently who told me that he never reads.

Odd. Very odd. But, then is it really all that odd to have a passion for creating something of which you yourself have no interest?

I've been thinking about it since he told me, right after he finished reading an excerpt from his novel - his third, I believe. I haven't

read more of his work than the one chapter, and I must admit that the chapter knocked me off my feet, which is why I asked him to record for The Reading List. It was really fantastic - as is the rest of the book, I'm sure. It just never occurred to me that a writer wouldn't be a reader. I could understand it if it were the other way around, in fact I know a few avid readers who don't write and have no interest in writing. But to have an interest in writing and none in reading what other people are writing was like a new discovery for me. I felt as if I had found the most plump and concise answer to the greatest question that nobody ever asked.

I started trying to think of other situations that were similar, like a painter who hates paintings, or a musician who hates listening to music, or a doctor who's disgusted by sick people

I once knew a baker who wrote all his own recipes for pastries, cakes and cookies. He would tell me about his chocolate drizzled macaroons dusted in candied hazelnuts, and black forest cupcake bread pudding with whipped cinnamon cream and peach zest. When I'd walk by his shop I couldn't help but crave everything. I craved the air. The sweet, doughy smell of warm lust topped with a dusting of powdered sugar and the memory of a moment of richness. If I was lucky enough t0 pass when the rare customer was going in or out, I would slow down

and linger for a moment, basking in the waft of the little shops perfume with hopes that the scent would stick to my clothes. I would inhale deeply and lock every morsel in my lungs as a temporary souvenir that would be all mine for the time of a breath.

The baker was passionate. His ideas were delicious, his creations like sculptures, but whenever he offered a taste, a bite, a treat or a nibble I always declined. No reason. I guess it's just that as much as I like pastries, I like looking at them more than eating them. I just don't have much of a sweet tooth, I suppose.

I finally walked into the little bakery one day at the very moment his new creation was cooled and being plated to go on display under the counter: vanilla shard, peppermint bark, chocolate truffle brownies served with a fresh shot of espresso.

The baker was acting more like a crack dealer trying to hook me. He plated a brownie, and pulled a shot of espresso, and then came around to me and placed it on a small table in the window and sat down and gestured to the empty seat for me with a grand, over exaggerated sweep.

"You've got to try this, you gotta - gotta - gotta." He said. "It'll make you big and strong. Don't you want to be a big, strong boy?"

I tried to decline, but it was really no use. What was the worst that could happen, I would love it and have to have buy some to take with me? That I'd become addicted?

As I sat, the baker playfully clapped his hands. "I need your honest - HONEST - opinion, okay? You're the first to try this."

I must admit, I was flattered. And the brownie did look awfully wonderful. The baker watched me carefully with a big grin on his face as I forked a corner of the brownie. He instructed me that I needed to get more of the peppermint bark because it was homemade, and after amending the contents of my fork I placed the enlarged bite in my mouth.

It tasted as if something small and adorable had curled up on my tongue, farted and died.

For a moment I wondered if I had just eaten a turd. The grainy texture was like salty, sandy flesh, and it somehow emitted an odorous vapor that reminded me of wasabi without the sweetness, but with a tangy zip of sizzling horse shit.

I wondered how long I could sit there with the baker looking at me, waiting for me to chew so he could ask me for praise. I wondered if I could coax my face into lighting up, or if I would be able to finish the single bite at all.

The melding flavors of gasoline, burning hair and bad breath finally overwhelmed me and I was forced to expel the contents of my mouth into a napkin. I knew it was rude, but what would be worse: faking it and telling him that the brownie was as good as it looked, or telling him that something tasted ... off? And anyway, if he took it too hard I could always tell him that I have an allergy to salt - which was definitely a favored ingredient. I was doing him a good service, I convinced myself. If I let him sell these he would lose all his customers. It was then that I realized that I was the only one there, and when I saw people in the shop it was no more than one or two at a time - if at all. And in fact, the place was usually empty.

The bakers face dropped and he put his elbows on the table, mushing his face into his palm. "What? No good?" he asked. Which I guess was an obvious question, seeing as how I had just spit the contents of my mouth into a yellow, flowered paper napkin.

"It ... it tastes a little off," I said. He nodded his head.

"Hmm, how?"

"Well, I can't quite put my finger on it, but something's off," I said, shoving the plate across the table to him. "Here, try it."

He pushed the plate back, "No, I can't." He said. "I'm a diabetic."

"Have you always been a diabetic?" I asked. He said since he was a very little kid. "So, you don't actually eat any of this?"

"No, never. Can't have sugar."

"Hmmm." I said.

The two of us sat there for a moment. "Why don't you try using other peoples recipes?" I asked.

"Oh, because I don't want to be influenced," he said. "See, I'm writing my own cook b

ook."

It was winter in 2002 when I ate the vermin flavored brownie, and by the following summer the bakery had closed. I lost track of the baker, he moved out of the neighborhood and I never saw him again.

About three weeks ago I was in Borders and I came across a cookbook for sugar free baking. On the cover was the baker from my old neighborhood, his face was a little bit rounder, and his hair was shorter, but he smiled as big as he always had as he posed surrounded by mountains of baked goods.

Beneath the title, and beneath his name in bold white lettering was a little note that said: "EASY STEPS TO MAKING BEAUTIFUL TREATS THAT WILL LOOK SO DELICIOUS YOU WONT WANT TO EAT THEM!" And I couldn't help but smile, as I wandered over