Eulogies are as much about cementing and memories as anything else. Some of our strongest memories that hold are those that are captured with multiple inputs – bright colors with vibrant sound; salt air on a stiff wind with the roar of the ocean, the sound of the birds, and a salmon-pink cloudy sunset. Some of my memories of my mother are like this. I want to take a few moments to share – from the only perspective I know – a few mental/sensory picture memories of the woman who was my Mom, and how I carry her in my heart and mind.
One way to traverse the threads of memory in the “heart” of a boy or a man is to pass nearby the circulatory system and – if you will – examine the gastronomic imprints of significance – the moveable feast – those tastes and times that bring to mind the greater (and lesser) moments where table and sustenance intersected with pleasure (or suffering) and other soul-ish nourishments (or disappointments). These are things – if one is as lucky as I was, to have his devoted mother with him throughout his childhood – that one’s mother is intimately involved and instrumental in, and because of that, they are some of the primary ways in which I remember her. I’ll try to keep it simple, and let the sensations speak for themselves in your imagination. Close your eyes and try to taste, smell, and feel along with me.
On the plus side, we have:
- Baby food (the Gerber cereal), and applesauce, and milk (really… try it sometime… it’s amazing comfort food, for the gluten-tolerant)
- Crumbled ginger snaps and banana slices in a bowl with milk (okay, so some of the credit on that may go to Dad, but they’re going to have to share)
- Fresh-baked bisquick shortcakes in a bowl with milk, sugar, and fresh strawberries
Contrast that with:
- Liver and onions – how could something that smelled so enticing be sooooo disappointing?
- Boiled turnips – a taste and texture nightmare
- Experimental eggplant extravaganzas of inexplicable origin
- Tofu and textured vegetable protein: even the CIA or the NSA could not disguise this stuff
Then there were these bright spots:
- Ciopinno
- Baked ham dinners (because Ham corrects for any other coincident culinary sin)
- The follow up to ham: split pea soup
- The world’s best meatloaf (I never knew why people made fun of meatloaf until I left home)
- The world’s most heavenly turkey stuffing
- Beef stew or Ox-tail soup
- And at the risk of grossing everyone out, the delicacy of beef tongue
These pleasures were balanced out with the tortures of:
- Cooked spinach of any kind (Let’s face it: Popeye’s creators were some really warped people)
- Sauerkraut, or any form of cooked cabbage or abused Brussels sprouts
- Creamed corn, which if I remember right, Dad was fond of, but I never understood
- Tuna casserole (sashimi lovers out there, I give you permission to weep wasabi-laced tears with me)
- Various adventures in squash: boiled, steamed, or pan-fried, in any of a dozen varieties
- Canned veggies (can we say, “LIMA BEANS”, or “sufferin’ succotash”, anyone?)
- Kohlrabi, beet, or kale greens
And who can forget the ever-popular “burn-and-serve” rolls?
Of course, sometimes mindset and setting played a large role in perceptions of this sort; the otherwise unremarkable can become very special in certain circumstances. For the majority of my young life, our family had a cabin, located northeast of Georgetown, in a “town” called Quebec; up there, in the quiet, pine-scented air, with an appetite heightened by play (in the woods and the dirt), Mom would serve us butter-and-bologna sandwiches that inexplicably were to die for. And on the trip down the hill to home, she would often lobby for a stop for soft ice cream cones at the frosty stand, or instigate a stop at a foothill orchard, which would set in motion a feast on fresh, local Golden Delicious apples (while our three German shorthair retrievers drooled in our laps, waiting to scarf down the resultant cores).
And sometimes special occasions combined with special sights, sounds, smells, and tastes. Mom and Dad were Bridge aficionados and were members of a club; this meant that a few times each year, the club would meet at our home, and three or five or more couples would come to our home to partake in an evening of socializing and gaming. Mom would enlist help for the clean-up and the set up, and then she would dress up, and then the sound of mixing adults would blend with the taste sensations of an endless supply of 7-up, OJ, & pretzel sticks to be snuck from the kitchen while the games were afoot. Or, once every year or two, there was the fresh cracked crab and sourdough bread, perhaps taken on a blanket in the grass of Golden Gate Park, either as our own nuclear family, or with aunts, uncles, cousins, or other guests. These were memorable family times, and Mom was always right in the middle of them all.
Are your eyes still closed? Good. Listen to this in your “minds ear”.
Another way I remember Mom is by her sounds – the inflections in her voice, and in the mannerisms of her speech. Some of my earliest recall is – with my head resting against her bosom, perhaps being coaxed into nap mode, or being cuddled for no particular purpose – the sounds of her mellifluous alto voice resonating inside her chest. I can also remember standing next to her in church, and hearing her sing. In my early teen years at St Stephens, she was always singing a harmony part rather than the melody, probably partially as a result of her tenure with the small choir there.
Another place I often heard her voice was on the phone. Not that I was talking to her, mind you. I, like my father, don’t do particularly good phone. What I meant was, I often spent periods of time as a child listening to her talk to others on the phone. What I recall in particular were long periods where she would be mostly quiet, punctuated by the periodic “yeeal… yeeal… yeeal…” Is that a mid-western/Pennsylvania thing? Like “warsh”? …….. The peculiar thing about that is, while I was held to a strict ten minute rule for phone conversations, it didn’t seem like the same rule applied to Mom. But I guess we all know that life’s not fair.
I’m sure all of her children clearly recall the sounds of Mom in the Christmas Eve readings of “The Night Before Christmas”. This was without doubt our first (and annually repeated) exposure to the woman who longed to entertain others with the dramatic, live presentation of stories. She was, in this, like few other things I recall, a relaxed natural, effortlessly in her element.
To close, I have a few, far-too-brief posthumous thank you notes to express:
I have to thank my Mom for her foresight and diligence in ensuring that we were at least acquainted with manners, etiquette, and culture. To this end, she took the time to train us in formal dining, with Sunday afternoon dinners with the fine china and silver deployed. She also saw to it that we were exposed to the theater (several trips to the music circus come to mind), to music (we all learned at least one instrument to some extent), and dancing (for the girls – thankfully I escaped this particular avenue of training, and I’m certain that the collective ballet world is heaving a sigh of relief because of it).
I thank her for introducing us comprehensively to the concept of value, and in helping our father to train us up well in a strong work ethic and mindset that assumed a pursuit of excellence accompanied by individual responsibility and perseverance.
Finally, I thank her for inculcating within my soul an ever-present, ever-playing recording that brings to life within me an ever-present abundance of caution, and makes me ask, virtually, in one form or another, as I leave the house, that one, all important final question: “Did you check the coffeepot?”
