Tag Archives: Life Stories

Committment

Posted on May 31, 2014 | 2 comments
Photo by Melinda Zipin Copyright 2014

Photo by Melinda Zipin Copyright 2014

 

“You are a piece of work,” my physical therapist said lovingly.

I would be a liar to deny it.

 

 

Sometimes, this phrase, this being “a piece of work” might be a put down; other times, it is a grand anointing of a strong, deep, and independent spirit.

There are many things to which I am committed. Being a piece of work is one of them. I’m committed to personal growth and to learning how to see with more than the eyes and hear with more than the ears. I’m committed to the mystery of the heart. Yet, there are areas where I have run away from commitment.

He’s a runner and he’ll run away… Woman ain’t been born who can make and stay… Woman get away while you can

Several decades ago, the late singer-songwriter, Laura Nyro wrote these words and sang them. At the time, I embraced the song as an anthem for women who fall in love with men who can’t — or won’t — make a commitment. After a while, it felt like I could apply those words to me.

Ms. Nyro’s song was at the forefront of my mind this morning as I sat with my tea to have a chat with God. Chats with the Divine work for me.

I’ve tended to see romantic commitment rather like the Loma Prieta earthquake that I experienced in the San Francisco Bay area in 1989. Well, maybe that’s a little harsh. It’s more like those subtle movements of the earth that rattled the dishes on my shelf as I sat quietly in the morning. The sounds were enough to get my attention, but not enough to force me to commit to action. In the case of the earthquakes, that would be to move the hell to another state. In relationship to people, it might be to engage in a lasting relationship.

“I just got a call from my girlfriend. I’ve known her since kindergarten.”

I stared at my friend. How on God’s earth could someone know a person since kindergarten? I felt sad. I could not think of one person I was in touch with that I knew since kindergarten. Or middle school. Or high school. Not a single person.

But I remember the kindness of teachers, vice principals, and principles; I remember the compassion of school counselors. I remember Mrs. Bowie in first grade and her kind, generous concern for children like me whose home life had some very rocky places. I remember Mrs. Gaines, the Vice Principal in my middle school. She was a dark skinned woman with short cropped natural hair at a time when such a style was unpopular. Some of the students (nope, don’t remember a single one of their names…) called her King Kong behind her back. But she was kind to me and smiled and encouraged me often. I remember these kindnesses.

And I realize, where my commitment lies. I am committed to the transforming power of kindness.

In 1985, I met a meditation teacher from India, and I found a spiritual path where my heart leaped to commitment. In one moment, everything changed for me. I became committed to meditation, singing songs to God, and offering service to myself, my community, and God. I became more anchored in my commitment to loving kindness.

29 years later, I am still on the path and experiencing commitment to the Heart. However, in order to recognize my commitment to kindness, I have had to make mistakes that were unkind. I have had to rebound, redirect myself to my commitment to do no harm. This includes loving kindness to myself with the words I use (you know, that self talk thing…) and the actions I take.

I am in physical recovery forever. Whether  I walk, run, cook, or perform, I will always be conscious of what I eat, the amount of energy I exert, and of things or people that suck my energy.  I am a piece of work. Healing takes commitment. It takes a commitment to faith and a commitment to action.

Yes, I am a piece of work in progress. I am the rock from which Michelangelo is carving David.

 

 

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Words: In not letting racism overshadow the glory of spring  

Posted on April 13, 2014 | 1 comment

Spring 2014Call me corny. It’s a beautiful morning, cool and brilliant with sun. I’ve been enjoying the mornings and wondering how it is that I still insist on believing in love.

But, there are a couple of rigid voices outside and inside my head ranting and raving about the state of race relationships in America.

Given the history of our country’s beginnings, can there be any surprise that we are both dysfunctional and symbiotic? Race is the warp and weft of the fabric.

I live with racism every day. So do you. Overt or subtle, we either give or receive pain from racist perceptions about each other moment by moment. White about black. Black about white. Black about black. White about white. Red about black. Black about red. On and on and on. Sometimes I think that racism and classicism, having existed for hundreds and thousands of years, will be, like the poor referred to in the Bible, with us always.

I still believe in love. That’s all I really think about. That’s all I care about. Human kindness. Thankfully, I also believe that most people contribute, in one way or another, to solutions towards a loving, peaceful, just, and equal society.  I believe that we make these contributions because we believe in actualizing the best of ourselves towards and with each other. I believe that our contributions are the rent we pay in exchange for the privilege of enjoying our time on this Earth.

We humans are complex and unpredictable.  As we go back and forth with legislation, it is horrifying to see freedoms given and freedoms taken away. It is infuriating to see people manipulate the system to keep others in poverty, without the right to vote, and in ignorance of the power to control their own lives.

I still believe in love. I still believe in human kindness.

I don’t do well in political debate. But I know someone will ask about race again. And I will answer. Because this is part of the discourse, and we are both dysfunctional and symbiotic.

Now about this exquisite Spring.

I have been waiting through this long, bitter winter for the soft green, succulent rebirth of the earth. I can go outside now. And I am not about to let politics or criticism steal my opportunity to wrap my soul in the joy of seeing woodpeckers, hawks, finches, geese, and robins fly; deer chase each other; fox lurk; and, yes, people explore the nature trail—that includes the guy that thought nobody could see him relieving himself among the trees.

Spring is not just the harbinger of rebirth; spring is the majesty of magic. Year after year, spring and the holy days — today is Palm Sunday— anchor me in miracles. There was my childhood Easter miracle of shiny new black patent leather shoes, white ankle socks, a new dress, gloves, and, of course, a hat. My sister and I paraded. My brothers, in their bow ties and neat little jackets were resplendent. Spring defied the reality of “lack” by bringing us together in new clothes with a larger community that believed in the power of rebirth— a miracle, considering what we lived under during those times, and proof that life is magic.

So, these days I’m awakened at six with birdsong and light. I have accepted the reality that injustice is a part of living. I acknowledge the fact that contribution to transformation, celebration of the glory of spring, and expression of gratitude for the gift of spiritual rebirth is the rent I pay for enjoying Earth.

Happy Holy Days, whatever your faith. And stay posted for a new photo in the coming months!

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A year ago today

Posted on March 5, 2014 | 2 comments

Three women gathered outside the door. One, almost 6 feet tall and broad, stood with two smaller women. One was petite with curly hair, and the other was thin with a drawn and angular face. I had seen them before. They were discussing a patient’s lunch and the fact that she hadn’t eaten. But it was not about the patient’s health.

“She didn’t eat it?” asked one.

“It’s still on the table,” said another. I was listening. I recognized the voice of the tall one.

“She ordered from outside,” said another.

They were “stage whispering.” My roommate had intestinal problems, and I had asked to have my lunch moved to another area. They had taken the tray too far away for me to retrieve it. Then, they became like “the disappeared.”

“She ordered from outside.”

Strange that I’m reflecting on those days this morning. I think it’s because I’m feeling luxuriously at ease within the sanctity of my bedroom. Maybe it’s because I’m indulging in nourishing, health giving food—green drinks, fresh fruit, foods I can enjoy now that I’m home. Perhaps it’s because I’m watching the snow melt and enjoying the morning sun at the top of the trees.

Recently, I did some minor research on skilled nursing facilities, also known as SNFs (sniffs). I was horrified to find a hideous historical link to workhouses for paupers. But, for me, it explained a strange fog of meanness that seemed to drift throughout some of these places. I’d heard stories of patients becoming ill after nursing assistants put bad medications into their food.  My attitude was like, “sleep with one eye open.”

Mean-spiritedness is a trickle-down reaction. It trickles down from families, communities, politics and religion. Remember that trickle-down theory of economics? I thought you might.

These women hated their jobs. Most were immigrants receiving the lowest wages for the funkiest work:  emptying bed pans, making beds, giving showers, and wiping up vomit or worse. I understood, but after waiting 3o minutes, I ordered pizza from a community restaurant and had it delivered to my stinky room.

Something occurs to me. The mean-spiritedness I experienced with the nursing assistants is the same and equal to the mean-spiritedness of religious extremists — of all faiths. Only the environments have changed.

Religious extremists fight – even crazily to the death — for control of our personal lives. Is it because these extremists’ lives are so rabidly out-of-control? Is it because they feel powerless in the face of their own human nature — just as the nursing assistants feel powerless in the face of their jobs?

Is it because they fear something within themselves that they advance racist fears, the persecution of homosexuals, and a hatred of women? Is it because their own human urgings are out of control?

I’m just asking.A year ago

When people can’t control their own lives, they try to control the lives of others.  When people aren’t happy, they try to make others even less happy.

We’ve heard that “if they knew better, they’d do better.” Hmm.

I’m watching the snow melt and enjoying the morning sun at the top of the trees. I’m so happy to be home.

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F-Word

Posted on February 8, 2014 | 4 comments
Photo by Melinda Zipin Copyright 2014

Photo by Melinda Zipin Copyright 2014

While you’re thinking about a word that can’t be used on television, I’m diving into an eloquent chocolate cake with butter cream frosting — and wondering how to Forgive myself for using food the way I do.

Forgiveness. The other F word.

About 12 years ago, my half-sister and I had a fight. I wanted more help supporting my mother who had some health issues. Asking a sibling to help with an elderly family member can stir up a lot of, well, shit. I was driving, on weekends, from upstate New York to Washington DC. She was in North Carolina. I had the expectation that since we had long distances to drive, we’d share responsibilities. Wrong.

After three minutes of her yelling about her finances and other limitations, I became frustrated and, yes, I dropped the F bomb — the one you can’t use on television. She has not communicated with me since. Has she forgiven me? I don’t know.

I‘ve found forgiveness to be vaporous in nature. All of the scriptural directives, scholarly studies, church sermons, and secular workshops that are intended to guide us, the unenlightened, don’t erase the pain that harsh words can create. Still and all, isn’t forgiving for the forgiver and not the forgiven? Forgiving lowers the blood pressure and opens the heart. I remember summers on the farm with my half-sister. All of my farm memories are blissful. So how is it that sometimes I feel like I’m walking blind along a beautiful beach and can’t see a thing? I will never know my half-sister’s pain, but I can forgive her behavior.

Where do I begin? With self.

I begin my self forgiveness with food because it is my most prominent vice. I forgive myself for indulging in chocolate or almond croissants, large bowls of egg salad, and ice cream laced with caramel. No,I cannot do it alone. After my CIDP diagnosis, support appeared from all around. Support made forgiving myself easy and is a part of the miracle of my not being obese. What did the song say? “Pick yourself up. Dust yourself off. Start all over again.”

Many years ago I had a dream. You know how dreams are sometimes. They’re so real that you wake up surprised. Why am I not what I experienced on the other plane? In this case, I was grateful that it was a dream. I was cold and shivering, standing in snow and ice and banging on a door. I pushed, it wouldn’t open. I pounded, no one came. I woke up completely unnerved, knowing— without doubt — that the door was a metaphor for my heart, and that if I wanted to be warm, I would have to open that door. Forgiveness is one of the keys.

But back to the beginning. I’m grateful for my relationship with food that leads me to the path of self forgiveness. Self forgiveness opens that door in my dreams and allows me to come into the warmth. If I don’t forgive myself, I won’t forgive others. If I don’t forgive others, I cannot be forgiven.

Forgiveness through food makes it easy. At sometime, probably in the near future, I’ll hear myself saying, “I’ll take fries with that.”

And that will give me a moment to forgive myself and create a moment to pay it forward.

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Show and Tell

Posted on December 1, 2013 | Leave a comment

“I love you.”

Spiritual texts tell us that love is all around. We must show it, not tell it.

Even as a child, I wanted to be told. But, love, in the pragmatic world of poverty, extreme racism, and fear revealed itself as a practical thing, woven into the daily life of meals, clothes, and housing. During the summers we experienced love in visits to the south where hot days in the fields, riding the backs of cows, and filling buckets of clean, tasty water from an underground spring left us tired and happy. Eating freshly slaughtered chicken and meats, farm grown veggies and fruit— figs, grapes, and peaches were my favorites — left us feeling supremely cared for and nourished.

Those things were evidence of love, and for the adults in the world around me this evidence was proof enough. My father would say “show me, don’t tell me” and he was no hypocrite. He lived his life showing through baseball games, circuses, and rides on his back after Thanksgiving dinner.

I embraced the apparent truth that love was show, not tell.  And yet, as I grew into womanhood, I began yearning for the words. Perhaps it was because some of the folks that came into my life did not know how to show. They did not come from families of evidence.

In this world where I pray to see a do-nothing Congress get past the extraordinary racism buried in attacks against the president so that they can show some compassion for those who are less fortunate, I think that many of those people do not come from families of evidence. I want to be shown that they have an ounce of feeling for those without insurance, without food, and who have placed their lives on the line to defend them and now need support. Show me; stop the flapping lips.

But I’m getting off track.

Evidence, of course, is mixed. I also experienced evidence that love was far from our door. My mother was not one to exhibit as much as one millionth of an inch of sentimentality. Except for anger, which was constant, she kept her feelings sacredly locked within her until women came together to can fruit and vegetables, cook holiday meals, and talk about their husbands. Only once do I remember her exhibiting sorrow — it is the only day in my memory — and that was when my father pushed her to the floor. Show, don’t tell. The day remains in my mind like a photograph that cannot be destroyed.

Why, sometimes, do I want to hear the words?

I am blessed with a view of the campus park across the street. The leaves have dropped from the trees, and I have a full view of the trail that winds through the college. Parents with toddlers, dog lovers, boys holding girls, and boys holding boys; future track stars in heavy coats force their tired legs uphill. The setting sun presses fat fingered rays through empty branches, covering the brown shrubbery and happy hikers like dripping paint. It’s like a drawing that revals my memories of past walks in forests where I was shown, not told, about love.  Show me, I would insist, don’t tell me.

Yet.

I’m open to thoughts…

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On: Listening to Words From My Ancestors

Posted on August 31, 2013 | 6 comments

“She was so proud of you. That’s what she told me. ‘Sala wrote this play. I’m so proud of her.’  Yes she was. She was very proud.”

Hearing these words was startling. So much so that for the next several nights I woke with a zillion questions. Among them:

Would I have made different choices had I known how she felt? Would those words have encouraged me to work harder, be more focused? Would I have had more faith in myself and continued to write plays?

The first question could have been about how long it took for me to get these words. But it wasn’t. It’s been almost three decades since my Grandmother Hattie’s death. It’s been probably longer since I talked with my cousin in New York. But does it really matter when I received the words? My grandparents — all four of them — would say, “God is on time, all the time.”

Still, when my cousin shared my grandmother’s words about my creative work, I was surprised. My grandparents were solid, God-fearing, Southern folk. It never occurred to me to share my work in the theater with them. And when I heard that this was her response to the first piece I had written and staged, I rejoiced. So what if it was decades later.

“I didn’t always agree with what your father did as a boy and young man,” my Grandfather Julius said about daddy. “But when you see what a child has grown up to be, you feel proud.”

It feels like it’s always been this way in my family. Pride in another’s accomplishments exists but is not always expressed.

Sigh.

I wish I could have heard her words back then. But if I had, would my rocky imperfections have resulted in the dollop of wisdom I see in myself today? “God is on time, all the time,” say my ancestors.

I try to remember this when I have challenging days. Well, this and the fact that words have color, power, and vision.

“He was very proud of you,” a friend told me after my father’s funeral. “He just couldn’t tell you himself.”

More encouragement.

These folks’ words bring  light to me. Brilliantly healing and erasing an overshadowing need for approval and periods of self-doubt. I sit here snacking on tortilla chips and thinking about meals to come. It’s one of the things I do when the nerves in my hands are ultra sensitive. And I’m hearing my own voice inside saying, “better late than never.”

I am not rueful. I still have words to write.

When I started blogging I had a concept about words. With a reluctant nod to Merriam-Webster, I would choose a single word and match it with a color. It was a brilliant idea, but too much work. Anyone who has tried to express her truth in writing knows that the craft is anchored in the practical. I am faced with the reality of the limitations in matching a galaxy of words to a small palette of colors.

And again, there is the reality of CIDP. Anchored down by my commitment to stay as positive as possible, I stay away from words that dwell on negative emotions. Words have color, power, and vision.

Perhaps this has never felt more true than when I hear words that come from folks whose physical light has gone out.

God is on time, all the time.

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On: Tenderness

Posted on August 2, 2013 | Leave a comment

Dignity

What was it that Otis Redding said? Oh yes.

Try a little tenderness.

Tenderness.

Why is it so challenging to bask in the love that we all desire? I believe that it is everyone’s intention to surround themselves with the softness of life. By that I don’t mean the softness of material things, the silks and satins and cashmere of life. I mean the softness that comes with peace of being… Soft. Tenderness.

It’s a quiet summer afternoon. I’m looking out the window and watching butterflies circle the backyard. They seem completely at ease. Is it because, amazingly, the black cat with the strange green eyes is at ease? Is she practicing cat tenderness?  She doesn’t move from her perch as the butterflies and birds flit around her. Only the gray squirrel raises a racket. There is no threat. Softness abounds.

Sunlight fills crevices like liquid. My soul is filled with tenderness. And I, who thrive on seeing the world through rose-colored glasses, want to believe that every human being loves the sun.

The poets, romantics, musicians, spiritual teachers — even scientists — testify to the healing power of tenderness. Go ahead, say it isn’t so. But you’ll find yourself in some very isolated company.

I’m reminded of mornings on my grandparents’ farms. Both maternal and paternal grandparents knew the power of tenderness and peace. My own memories allow me to understand why my mother, in her dementia, retreats to a place of softness and safety.

Not too long ago, I was asked by a health practitioner to remember what that tenderness feels like in my body. I was happy to revisit that glorious childhood experience. Vacations were watercolor mornings, filled with strolls amid the corn, watermelon, and tomato fields with paternal and maternal grandfathers. For me, our small farms and communities played in my mind as barricades against treacherous white men whose daily bread filled them with the hatred required to circle the south looking for unarmed black men and boys.

“Remember what that tenderness felt like,” they say. It’s because currently my life requires the wondrous gift of tenderness: regular rest, naps, real food and more proteins (did I tell you I now eat poultry as well as fish? Gone, gone are those days of self-righteous food Puritanism!) I eat vigilantly, and monitor my emotions. “Get eight hours sleep,” said my dear physiatrist Dr. J.

For 40 years when I thought of South Carolina away from my grandparents’ homes, I thought of a place contaminated with murder and the blood and bones of enslaved black people. With my maternal grandparents gone, their home and land sold, and my estrangement from the conservative religious views of the South, there was no reason to return to that place. History suffocated tenderness.

Then I attended a family reunion in Myrtle Beach and the feelings flooded back. The signs on stores, restaurants, and bathrooms and drinking fountains — “colored” and “white, ” placed there to kill the human spirit while threatening the physical body — were gone.

Those signs had pitted my tender heart against my gentle maternal grandfather. When I was about 10 years old, he took us into the city of Sumter to run errands and buy sweets. As if in slow motion, I found myself bowing my head to drink from a fountain clearly marked “white only.” My grandfather did what he had to do to protect me.

He grabbed me by the collar with such force I thought I would choke. My lips never touched the water. Later on, sitting on the porch in his arms, surrounded by the night songs of frogs and crickets in a dark so black you could not see the outline of trees, and the smell of the forest so sweet I wanted to wrap it around my skin, I came to understand three things:

the incredible love and tenderness in the heart of the man forced to take such action;  the incredible love and tenderness in the heart of the man saddened by his own action and; the incredible love and tenderness in my own heart that allowed me to keep loving him.

Tenderness in its myriad forms — family, church, and community — ensured our survival. Tenderness has contributed, in spite of the traumas of living, to the person that I am.

It is a tender summer day and I wonder: If every person, politicians especially, accessed a single memory of tenderness, would the world be a very different place? I, who thrive on seeing the world through rose-colored glasses, would like to think it so.

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On… Sound and Silence

Posted on December 4, 2012 | 4 comments

 Super bitch. It was intended as a term of endearment from a friend who observed that being ill has not stifled my feistiness. I guess others were shocked, but I recognized the love intended in the label.

Words and sounds have power according to the listener, I suppose. The wrong sound, innocent as it may appear, can easily catapult me into a “pity pot.” Take a squawking crow for instance.

“Caw!”

I was physically uncomfortable and only wanted to sleep. There are dozens of telephone lines on this block, but clearly, the one outside my window was special.

“Caw! Caw!”

Such a loud sound from such a small creature. The super bitch (that would be me) whispered, “Go the [bleep] away!”

As the daily racket of trucks, cars, trains, and my neighbor with the bells on her door revved up, the sounds became more vibrant, larger, and rakishly colorful. Super bitch was frustrated; she just wanted some rest.

The neurologist had diagnosed my condition as Guillain-Barré syndrome. It’s a condition I had never heard of that, for me anyway, brings with it a great deal of anxiety and the need for a gargantuan exertion of will to follow my daily routine.  But I’ve had a series of IVIG treatments and am encouraged by my increased energy and ravenous appetite. Carpal tunnel surgery suddenly seems like a common cold.

“Do you know what caused it?” asked my brother.

“I think my immune system was compromised by the surgery.”

But no one really knows for sure. I pray for miracles like: I wake up one morning and my hands and feet function fully, and the tightness around my rib cage is gone. Oh yeah, that part is supposedly connected to the hiatal hernia.

I both fear the silence and at the same time look for the peace within syllables, the silence within the music, the balance in conversations, and the laughter in silly words like “super bitch.” My intention today is to write: my work and my creative words. And yet, I awoke understanding that I had to follow the natural order of things. The crow was doing what crows do: they caw.

I once had a  beautiful experience of silence. One early morning, the city of Oakland, California was brilliant with activity:  cars that were stalled in traffic blared their horns, folks chattered and shouted in the streets on their ways to wherever, and buses with bad brakes made their usual stops. I had just completed my morning meditation and was staring out the window.

In spite of the activity, it seemed as if everything had lowered its volume and moved in slow motion. I felt content, and at ease with the movement of things. Birds and squirrels danced their morning minuet on the telephone lines, and it made no difference to me.

I have been caught off guard. So, the question I’m asking myself is “How do I reclaim the hidden silence in the sounds?” The sounds will not stop; nor should they. How will I experience the healing color, power, and vision in the words?

It comes as no surprise. The answer lies in a single word: gratitude.

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On… The sweetness of a name

Posted on November 10, 2012 | 3 comments

This blog is quivery and yellow–  like pineapple Jell-O.  It shimmies and shakes as I struggle through what has become an extraordinary array of challenges.

From carpal tunnel to feet that require the use of a cane or walker, I have been traveling the road to patience and health. It hasn’t been easy, but I have the support of friends and a basically happy outlook. I am also inclined to whine a bit.

With that said, I recognize the need to keep jabbering away. Silence is not acceptable for a blog. This week in particular was an ecstatic one for me as my choice for the American presidency won the race. I am thrilled that President Obama won his second term. And now, we can get to work, the real work, of equal opportunity for all.

Now for this week’s word: names.

I, for one, am intimately connected with the experience of names, having spent years accepting or rejecting several of my own. I was my father’s firstborn, and as such, my birth name reflected his joy and prayers. My birth name meant “gracious gift of God,” and both the name and its meaning lifted me up in good and trying times. I never abandoned the name — not really. Its meaning allowed me to, at least inside my head, recognize myself as a beloved daughter of God, a belief that has revealed itself to me in good times and been hidden away in times of stress or fear.

Given that, in so many cultures, the child’s name describes a dominant personality trait, and with cousins that had nicknames like Cunning or Bossy, I figured I lucked out.

Still, over the years, I have tried on new names like a judge at a dessert tasting contest. How I started the journey is unclear, but there was this point in my development where I felt that my name was restrictive, a sentence to an impenetrable goody-two-shoes life. By the time I moved into a small apartment (and I mean small!) in San Francisco in 1969, I had decided to try out the name of Susan.

Right.

“Susan” was the name of business and surety and normalcy. But anyone who knows me will tell you that I am not a Susan, and that shirt would not fit. So, I abandoned Susan when I returned to the East Coast, started working in theater, and eventually met a troop of African-American actors where we all took African names. The name Sala came out of that experience. My father said “you will always be what I named you.” This was significant because there were times when I felt he did not like me. But his statement said that, to him, I would always be a gracious gift of God.

What was I looking for? What identity did I feel was missing? In India, I asked a meditation master to give me a new name. She told me to keep my own name. This began the inner work of trying to know who I am beyond the labels I use to describe myself: a woman, African-American, creative. I was the pound cake waiting to be drenched in the liquid lemony frosting of my own nature. After several years, I received a name from the meditation master. And, in the end, I discovered that all the names I lived with had essentially the same meaning. And the river of God ran through every single one of them.

Sala meant gentle or peace. Gloria Jean, my birth name, meant gracious gift of God, and the blessing I received from my teacher was the name of Gopi, which meant that I was to be a lover of God in all his forms. I had been bathed in the lemony frosting of my nature for my whole life, but couldn’t taste its sweetness.

Finally, I am enjoying the taste of my own nature. There’s more to come.  Yum.

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On Pie

Posted on October 27, 2012 | 3 comments

There were a couple of comments about the sweet potato pie. The exact recipe? By now, I have forgotten. What I remember is the creamy, comforting richness.

Disclaimer: you try this at your own risk.

Mom would cook the sweet potatoes, add a pinch of salt, then mash them until not a lump could be found. She added the other ingredients one at a time. When I was a child, we did not have electric mixers. We used those hand held rotary beaters to create those stiff peaks from egg whites and cream.We developed strong arms from using those beaters.

So, we’d beat the whole eggs. Was it two or three? We’d add them to the potatoes; then, we’d add about a stick of butter. Mind you, there were a lot of sweet potatoes. Mix ’til smooth. Now comes the cream. I call it cream because that was when real milk came with cream settled on the top. Shake the bottle (yes, milk came in bottles). It was better than half and half.

Whatever happened to milk bottles?  True, they were heavy; but you could see the cream gathered on top of the milk like a thick icing. And there was no concern about the landfill. Bottles went back to the dairy and were sterilized and refilled.

The milk/cream was added and then the brown sugar and — corn syrup? To tell you the truth, I can’t remember. But, I’ll tell you this: it was sweet.

By now, our mouths were drooling over the pudding like consistency. Cinnamon. Nutmeg. Vanilla. Am I missing something?

We children were such pigs. We’d stick our fingers in the bowls and get chased away.  “Get your dirty hands out of here!” It didn’t matter what kind of pie. Peach. Blueberry. Apple. Pear. Hovering like humming birds and annoying as ants, we’d taste and get chased away.

Now when it comes to the crust, you’re on your own. That’s because when I was growing up, we used lard. For me, that’s not an option anymore. So once you have made your crust — and it will probably  be two or three — fill the pie plates with yummy stuff.

And that’s it. A chilly autumn evening or bright summer afternoon becomes more than alive…

All times are better with pie. On days like today, as we anticipate hurricane Sandy, and I begin to understand the importance of patience in the healing process,  pie is a gift and a sweet comfort.  Baking pie takes patience; savoring pie takes time.

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