RACHELLE ABELLAR
The big, blown-glass globe sat on a shelf at a Cost Plus World Market. It looked perfect. It was supposed to be a vase for flowers, but in my altered state (I was high), I could only see it as the Platonic ideal of a fish bowl.
Though the $40 price tag would blow my entire home decor budget, I had to have it.
A tiny fish swimming around a great big bowl would add a note of humorous sophistication to the big party house I was preparing to move into with a bunch of my college friends, a home that would otherwise be plastered with beer posters. A small sticker indicated that artisans had fashioned the bowl in Poland. My great-grandfather was a glassblower from Poland, so the bowl was mine by birthright.
