measure by the meter

Madeline Muller

baking with my grandma was always odd

and not just because she lived far away

she would instruct me that i should measure things 

not by cups and tablespoons 

like the cookbooks and recipes stated

in standard clean font

but that i should do it by the gram 

she would say to me

in her thickened accent, tinged with fatigue

that it doesn’t change the cake you make

but it changes the way you make it

and that makes the whole dessert sweeter

i came home today and sat in the stands of my cousin’s game

and saw all the people who i’d grown up near

they were the people who told me 

how well i was doing

how proud they were of me

how successful i’d be if i kept going the way i had been

and i knew 

if i told them i had decided to do things a bit differently

they would try to convince me to turn it all around 

it is odd to grow up

measuring happiness with the community yard stick 

only to find out you need to use the meter 

i thought i didn’t have the capacity to be happy and successful 

that i had to choose one or the other

it turns out i was trapped by imperial measurements

strangling the way i meted out my choices

i have been drinking cups of milk all my life 

not knowing it poisoned me

when i came home, my neighbor offered me a glass

and when i turned them down

they looked at me like an oddity 

but i know myself now

and i know what i measure myself by

it would be hard to translate 

to explain to the people i grew up with 

that i am happy, that i am my version of success 

i promise, i swear, i know

but if they did ask, if they said to me

why do you do things this way

don’t you know it won’t work out

we have all measured by the yard 

and weighed ourselves by the pound

and look how happy we are

so if they did ask, i would turn and say

well, i measure by the meter

and weigh by the gram 

and look at me, look at me

look at how much happier i am

i was strangled before and now i can speak

for them, success and happiness might be measured 

in buying a jacket whose price is just high enough to warrant discussion

mine is measured in knitting a deeply warm sweater 

out of yarn my partner gifted me

i changed the terms of what made my success

and i wonder, if everyone who measures by the yard 

and weighs by the pound 

all those young people who stayed

in our community and say they are happy

perhaps

just perhaps 

might like the meter stick a bit more