In my 25 years on this great big earth, I have attempted to cook less than a half a dozen proper meals. That's not to say I can't boil a mean egg or that my Ramen Noodles aren't the best around, but to be honest I gave up cooking, in the conventional sense right around the time puberty hit.
But I do have two distinct memories of myself in the kitchen. Both events revolve around my very favorite person in the world, these memories are, not surprisingly, surfacing now for a very specific reason....
Age 6 (or perhaps 7-that part is fuzzy), my mom's birthday, very early in the morning (back when getting up was fun and Sunday morning cartoons still stimulated my soul). I must have heard of breakfast in bed from a movie or soap opera my mother watched, and was convinced that all women, young and old, really wanted was breakfast in bed and a handsome man to serve it to them (I'm not wholly unconvinced at the age of 25 that it's not what most women still want-but I digress).
I couldn't conjure up a handsome man for her, but I thought that me + breakfast in bed would be sufficient. I wasn't old enough to use the oven, microwave or handle sharp objects...so that left me with very few options for my elaborate birthday present.
The finished product was white bread, un-toasted (wasn't allowed to use the toaster oven either) very thickly spread butter, using a spoon that left giant holes in the bread, tomato juice (it's all i could find), banana, cut using my teeny little fingers and a hard boiled egg, minus the boiled (at 6 I hadn't figured out that eggs didn't come ready made).
My mother had tears in her eyes when I showed up in her bed with my present. Whether the tears stemmed from realizing she had the most thoughtful little girl in the world, or (the more likely) realization that not only would she have to eat this atrocious mess in front of her little girl while she sat watching, overcome with pride, but she would also have to clean up the mess her little monster had undoubtedly created in the kitchen. Happy Birthday Mom! ;)
Fast forward 7 years to my second and last recollection, where all my hopes of being a chef were eliminated (exaggerate much?).
It was my attempt to cook dinner for my exhausted over-worked mother. I decided to play house by cleaning and cooking dinner, so that we could have a proper family meal. No one mentioned that you had to boil the pasta and cook the beans before making lasagna. You can fill in the blanks, needless to say-the food was inedible. But she ate it. And told me it was delicious. It wasn't until about 2 years later, when the jokes about my cooking started that I realized that she had eaten raw pasta and uncooked beans to appease me.
Unconditional Love
That was her.
Til the very end.
But now, she is gone.
There are days when it still doesn't feel real. Days when the idea that she won't laugh at my silly statements, my colossal messes and ridiculous observations seems impossible...She's not here to tell me to stop swearing, quit jangling my keys or that I am the most precious being on this earth...
In her absence..I have curbed my foul language, I am now the one telling other people not to play with their keys...and I'm working on the latter.
This whole trip down memory road was spurred by my return to the kitchen...I have actually started making things that don't come with directions or require a can opener...and might I say, objectively of course, that I'm not half bad at it!
Your little girl is officially growing up....
*I hope you're proud*
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