It's How You Get to ‘Mmmmm...’
The Hot Hazy Days of Summer are here and it is time to relax – summer can’t possibly be anything other than time to relax, can it…? Trips to the cottage; excursions to the beach; early morning walks before it gets too warm out; late evening dining in the park…all of these amount to some seriously simple meals and even simpler desserts.
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As the moderately busy mom of a kindergartner, I tend to have a difficult time getting dinner put together most nights without someone throwing a temper tantrum (and by “someone” I mean either of us). Between work, school and social commitments, often the only time I am able to share quality time with Leith is during dinner.
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Sometimes the best recipes are those that don’t come from beautiful, well-photographed, graphically gorgeous, famous-chef endorsed cookbooks. Sometimes the best recipes aren’t those that you’ve seen used in ritzy restaurants, culinary cafes or gourmet gustatory shops. Usually — and correct me if I’m wrong here — the best recipes you will ever try are those that have been given to you by someone.
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“Life is pain, princess…anyone who tells you differently is selling something…”
I think someone pulled my plug. I feel drained. Used up. Ka-put. As though someone has sucked the life from me like Prince Humperdink did to Wesley in “The Princess Bride”…
I don’t want to feel this way; I hate feeling down. But I’m at the point of wallowing now and that is pathetic. I’m finding it hard to concentrate on one thing for any length of time and even finding it difficult to smile. It’s like it takes too much energy to do these things and it is energy that I cannot spare. I’m walking around in a sort of blue funk without really paying any attention to what is going on around me; and have been like this since last week sometime…maybe the weekend, but somehow I remember being happy on Sunday; or parts of Sunday at any rate. I don’t get like this often anymore; I used to go through this everyday. Every single day then was an effort at not crying or not just staying in bed and feeling rotten. Now it comes on, unexpectedly, rather forcefully and lasts a few days each time. It’s depression and it’s scary.
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In my life I have been extremely fortunate to have had some truly incredible friends. I can list them all by name and tell you in minute detail why they were so incredible if you want me to, but I don’t think you need me to do that. These amazing people have touched my life and my heart in ways I will undoubtedly never be capable of repaying.
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Sugar is a weakness of mine. While to you that might be a rather obvious statement, what with me being the creator of Sugar High Fridays, I don’t think I fully realized the whole truth until recently. You see, it was a closeted fetish all these years. One I harbored yet denied frequently, guiltily, shamefacedly…but vehemently.
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Everyone keeps their own guilty pleasure comfort food in their kitchen for times of need. My mom keeps hoards of chocolate and red licorice, just in reach, just in case. One friend of mine never leaves the grocery store without restocking her supply of salted, roasted nuts – she can’t live without them in the house. Another always has at least five different kinds of cookies in her cupboard for emergency situations that require sustenance. A guy I knew in University had at least two full packages of processed cheese in the fridge and white bread in the cupboard for grilled cheese, day or night. Everyone has their needs.
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Once upon a time, seemingly in a completely different life, I was an early riser. I was one of those much dreaded “morning people” actually. I would be up before the alarm had a chance to wake me, out of the house at some strange, ungodly hour and rather enjoyed being the first to arrive at work. Weekend mornings I never slept in or (God forbid!) took naps in the afternoon. I can remember myself on Sunday mornings long-ago, up drinking coffee at around 6am, planning the comings and goings of the day that lay ahead.
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It began innocently enough. Leith asked me the other day if we could have a picnic.
“A picnic?”
“Yes, mama. On a blanket. With food we can eat with our fingers.”
It made sense. We’d done it in the summer a few times on the university grounds across the street. We packed sandwiches and juice and took the wagon and a few books and a Frisbee. It had been a lot of fun and obviously something he remembered enjoying.
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My name is Jennifer and I am addicted to coffee…
For me coffee has always represented a rare species of mysterious devotion. When I was young I was not allowed to drink this bitter, warm beverage that the adults in my life sipped after dinner or with breakfast as though it were the nectar of the Gods. I recall at quite a young age, my grandfather making me toast sticks (toast with peanut butter, cut into narrow sticks that somehow tasted so much better than regular-shaped toast with peanut butter) at the breakfast table in his kitchen; him sipping coffee and me sitting right up close to him, sniffing his coffee and wanting, more than anything, to be granted just one taste.
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I truly enjoy cooking. Simply being in my kitchen makes me smile. I don’t need fancy chef’s knives or stainless steel appliances to make me happy. What I have in my kitchen these days is good enough. As long as the stove and oven are in respectable working condition, I have some small amount of counter space and good ingredients; I’m one happy camper.
Leith and I spend most of our Sundays in our cozy apartment, him on the floor in the living room with his Hot Wheels and remote control R2D2, along with a few cooking pots and Tupperware. I’m in the kitchen, with my head in the oven, or my hands in a bowl.
It’s a rather tranquil time for us, punctuated only by the noise of the Kitchen Aid whirring or every so often or the oven timer chiming. He walks around, toting a small copper pot, filling it with various impedimenta, pretending to cook, and munching on whatever I have to hand at the time.
We make up dinner as we go along, depending on what is left in the fridge and how much energy I have to expend on cooking. And of course depending on how much energy he has and how much attention and entertaining he requires. Lately dinners have been a-little-of-this and a-little-of-that, experiments that for the most part, end up as scrumptious meals.
I love dishes that use a lot of different components. When I can take a bunch of different ingredients that at first glance might not "go" together and come out with something delicious, I think I have done my job. When everyone at the table leaves happily smacking their lips, or wanting seconds I feel a warm happy sensation creep up from my own satisfied tummy.
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It started to snow on the same day we decided to decorate our gingerbread house. As I sat at the dining room table with Leith, listening to Christmas music, watching him lopsidedly pipe icing and randomly stick candies and chocolates onto the house, minute flakes of snow began their meandering, lackadaisical summersaults from the sky. I’m not sure what caught my eye first: the huge maple trees’ limbs dancing in the park across the street or the flecks of white that went whirling around those limbs. Which ever it might have been, it all made me smile.
I got up from the table and left the child (and gum drops and marshmallows and gum balls and chocolate chips) for a few minutes. Everything has been so hectic and topsy-turvy lately and those brief minutes standing with my forehead pressed against the cool glass of the window were just what my whirling brain needed. I watched as the flakes grew larger and flew with stronger and more determined force around the neighbourhood. They never touched the ground, those wee flakes — they whirled and danced and flew and went up and down but never landed. Landing would surely mean melting and they were not about to turn to spots of water on my watch. Oh no.
My breath steamed up a small, dissipating circle on the glass pane as I stood there, hugging my chest and looking outside. I don’t know why these few moments meant so much to me, but they did. Maybe it’s the tumultuousness that has surrounded our lives for this past year. Problems with family, difficulties with friends, issues with co-workers, conversations with teachers, troubles with students…all the stress and all the love and all the problems and all the work. I think for the first time in a long time I had a moment to myself — and I indulged in it — completely and utterly without the stress that has been caused by life unfolding as it wants.
Does any of this make sense? I’m not sure. Just needed to get it out, I suppose. Enjoy yourself…and if you are somewhere where it isn’t going to snow, I feel for you. I really wish you could have been there with me yesterday.
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