Month: February 2020

To Tradition

Deb Zuroski, , , , 4 Comments

When I was a little girl, my mom made a cake that we called fasnachtkuche (in case you aren’t familiar, it’s pronounced faa – s – naht – kook – a). It was a staple in our house, not just a food to be eaten before Lent. I have no idea where the recipe came from but it is not even a yeast-dough so it’s nowhere near authentic. Perhaps next time I’m in my grandmother’s recipe box I’ll find an earlier version that someone modified for convenience and speed. 

Imagine my surprise to see that Merriam-Webster published an article this morning on Lent and the origins of fasnacht, which is a shortened version of our beloved Pennsylvania German (at one time more commonly called Pennsylvania Dutch) fasnachtkuche. One of the rare arguments Ken and I had was over this word. I insisted on calling Mom’s cake fasnachtkuche and he insisted that it wasn’t German and that it wasn’t even a word. Turns out we were both right. It’s not German but it IS a word. 

My eldest was planning to come over on Friday to make my mom’s peanut butter cookie recipe for a party he was going to on Saturday. We made these cookies recently (and turned them into chocolate-ganache-filled sandwich cookies) as a gift for a friend. They were such a hit that he was asked to do it again.  Unfortunately, a big coding assignment interfered with our culinary plans. 

Growing up, I probably made those peanut butter cookies at least once a month. They were large — the size of a saucer — and crisp on the outside, rolled in sugar before they were baked so they’d darken to a rich, golden brown. They were sturdy enough for an ice cream sandwich, great with coffee (so my mom used to tell me), and a hot seller at every marching band and literary club bake sale.

So, anyway, on Saturday morning, I made them. My son stopped by with his friends on their way to the party and picked up the 8 dozen or so cookies (less 6 that I kept for us to nibble). It felt like we were carrying on a tradition and my mom would have been thrilled beyond words to know that she was a part of it.   

I don’t mean to sound like a cooking blog (!) but I will confess to feeling a strong connection to my family when I open Mom’s old cookbook and trace her writing on the food-stained pages or pull out her or her mom’s recipe box, looking for a specific handwritten card and maybe, too, a bit of memory. 

A few years ago, one of my cousins asked if I had the recipe for lasagne that our Italian Aunt Emilia brought to our very Irish family when she married our uncle. The garlic! The oregano! This may shock you but I didn’t learn to cook with garlic until I married my Italian husband. I have no memory of a garlic clove ever entering our house when I was growing up. For sure, we had garlic salt (sprinkled on the toasted, buttered Italian bread we ate with our Ragu-covered spaghetti) but I KNOW you aren’t going to try to argue that garlic salt is anywhere equivalent to cooking with fresh garlic. 

Unfortunately, I did not have Emilia’s recipe. My cousin thought she’d written it down for my grandmother but if Emilia was anything like my lovely Italian mother-in-law, the recipe was more like “a little bit of this, a pinch of that” than an actual recipe. My grandmother may very well have taken one look at Emilia’s recipe and given up. When my MIL lived with us, she explained her sauce recipe as I wrote. It didn’t fit on a recipe card but my husband made it many times, freezing the sauce in bags for later use. He was never quite satisfied with the recipe, though. I know, I know; partly he was trying to recapture a taste memory, which is difficult to do, but I think there’s more to it. 

The one thing that can’t be captured on a recipe card is the experience that comes with tasting and refining your recipe over generations. Margaret knew what to add if the sauce was slightly more acidic than usual or the onions weren’t quite as flavorful. It’s not on the recipe card because she probably wasn’t even aware of the little tweaks she made as she cooked.

Even if it’s not quite right, we still use that recipe. I just gave my son the last bag of sauce we had in the freezer. On Saturday, the house will smell again of spicy onions,  slightly sweetened tomatoes, oregano … and garlic, lots of garlic.

I don’t participate in Lent; but if you do, I hope you’ve had some fasnachtkuche today — authentic or not — and that your fasting brings you closer, in empathy, to Christ.

Much love. 

To Tradition

FIRED

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I got fired from my volunteer job today. 

After Ken died, I was so scared of everything — of dying, of losing our house, of losing my job, of losing my children to their own grief and loss — so scared. Sometimes, at night, I’d lie awake worrying about someone breaking in. I’d get up at 2AM and check the doors and windows. I’d re-lock the car after I got home, expecting that I’d go outside one day to an empty parking place. 

Two years ago, a year ago, in this situation, I might have shrugged and kept silent, constrained by my fear of more loss, especially after 23 years working in various capacities for the same program.

And after all these years, I was not simply a parent volunteer. I was — for the past eight years — the chair of the single biggest fundraising event at the school — the book fair. I had a lot invested emotionally and personally in the event, and now that I’m thinking of it, in the school as well. 

It’s early days for book fair planning but someone approached me with a rumor. I was surprised not to have been included but contacted the librarian to get the details and offer to help. 

Unfortunately, when we met and I learned the details, I realized that the librarian had decided to do something that I can’t support. So, yesterday I sent him a polite email, acknowledging my position of privilege as the chair and asking him to hear me out. He gave me a metaphorical head pat, told me that he was better informed than me, and warned me to back down. Instead, I made the choice to stand up politely for the kids. I told him, in writing, why I think what he is planning to do is detrimental to them. 

He fired me, via email.

When I saw my son this afternoon, I said, “I got fired.” He looked at me and said, “You got fired from the book fair. Good for you.” 

In your lives, I wish nothing more for you than that each of you has THAT kind of loving support.

Much love.

FIRED

Bedtime

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The house is quiet
Tired dogs kennel themselves
A reminder that sleep
Should be welcome.
Legs slip slowly into a
Heated-blanket-warmed bed
Otherwise empty of
Arms and legs.
Two pillows,
Only one needs to be fluffed,
Are propped at the head.
The desultory late evening
‘I don’t want to sleep
Until we talk about
One last thing’ chatter
Is absent from the room,
Missing from the house.
The once small space, the tiny bed,
Are a million times their original size
And I am cut in half.

Happy Valentine’s Day, my friends.

Bedtime

Something Wicked This Way Came

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Something happened last week. I can’t talk about the specifics and I’m not sure I would even if I could. My thirteen-year-old saw something, he said something, and he saved someone. He responded exactly as we all hope our children will and I’m utterly amazed at his courage, his kindness, his maturity. 

My boy did the right thing, perturbed that it might violate a trust, that it would be embarrassing, that it might alienate him from his friend-group, that he might not be believed (he had receipts just in case), that it would require action in a bystander world. He doesn’t want praise or attention; in fact, he told me that he’d like to pretend it never happened. I have to agree. What I really want is for my already traumatized child not to be more traumatized. If I could erase last week, I’d have to think deeply to find reasons not to do exactly that. 

I’m so angry and sad about the whole big mess. Absolutely everyone we needed was there. Everyone responded wonderfully. Everyone helped us. So, as my daughter would say, “What’s the T?” 

What IS the T? If you’ve ever read a management book (god help you), you know that some people seem to thrive on chaos. I always hope I’m not one of those people but it seems like I live in the midst of it. A good amount of my adulthood has been teetering on the brink of catastrophe. Why should my kids’ lives be any different? We are the ball in the pinball machine, pinging from obstacle to obstacle, lights flashing, bells ringing, until we’re hit by a paddle and thrown back into the chaos.

I wonder, sometimes, if trauma begets trauma, if some individuals — unknowingly, certainly unwillingly — are drawn, like magnets, to new and different tragedies … on repeat. If you believe in a god, you’ve undoubtedly heard that old saw:  God only gives you the burdens you are strong enough to carry. Boom. Not strong enough? No worries; prayer is the answer. You can just ask god to carry those burdens for you. Boom (again). For those of us who are less confident in the weight-bearing power of prayer, the solution is far murkier. And for both groups, the outcome is the same (with apologies to all of you who believe in the power of prayer).

My mom was a terrible Catholic (according to her) but she believed very, very strongly in the Blessed Mother. I saw a sign over the weekend that condemned “Mary worshippers” to Hell (the sign listed everyone who is condemned — it was a long sign and the sign-bearer was, of course, the only one not on the list). The Mary-worshipper label was a solid fit for Mom. Her favorite prayer was the Memorare. She used to talk to me about the meaning, about it being a sort of chastisement. It’s my humble and untested opinion that Mom was expressing what many women continue to express today — that longing for a voice — and that brings me to this past weekend.

I have absolutely no interest in football, though I did stand on the field during pre-game warm-ups once. That was an experience for sure but it hasn’t made me a fan. I can’t abide the lack of representation in leadership positions. Why are there so few owners or head coaches of color? I might not have known it was Super Bowl weekend, but as a Pittsburgher, I absolutely know who Coach Tomlin is. But if you cite him as your example, I’m just going to come back at you with the total number of coaches of color — single digits, folks. Single digits! You can’t explain that without using racist tropes because there is no explanation that doesn’t include racism. Period.

Anyway, my nephew teasingly called me un-American this weekend when he had to remind me that it was Super Bowl Sunday. I didn’t watch. I didn’t even know which teams were playing and I only know who won because of that tweet (don’t pretend you don’t know what tweet I mean). If you try to tell me it didn’t happen, I’m going to throw a certain George Orwell quote at you.

After I saw that there was a controversy brewing over the half-time show, I watched it on youtube. What I saw was two powerful women performing on national television, using their voices (yes, I chose that word deliberately) to highlight issues important to them. Okay … never mind. Nothing says manufactured outrage over “sexualized” dancing and “televised porn” like being publicly called out for ignorance and racism and basic inhumanity. 

My favorite our-educational-system-has-failed-us moment is when people began speculating that JLo was wearing the Texas flag. I LOVE teachers but I am appalled by our national lack of critical thinking skills and, frankly, by our ignorant, foolish, entitled Secretary of Education. Even with a research device in each of our hands, we eagerly retweet, post, share, and like garbage because it makes us feel (better, teary, powerful, righteous, smart — you choose). No, JLo (you know, from the Bronx?) is not strutting that national Venus-shaped stage in a Texas flag. This isn’t Texas shade, BTW, which you will also understand if you are using your critical thinking skills. 

Well, clearly, I’m still angry about the trauma my boy endured. I can hear it in the words I’m typing. The problem is, of course, that I can’t unleash my mom-rage on … anyone. I want to use my not-inconsiderable verbal skills to destroy the responsible party in defense of my baby but that won’t happen. There is no person responsible for this week’s near catastrophe. 

Researchers say that we look for someone to blame because placing blame provides “resolution” and “closure.” It’s tempting to look for somewhere to place blame and I’ve veered onto that dangerous road a couple times throughout this experience. It’s wrong, though, and I’m going to fight my baser self. As with Ken’s death, there’s no closure. It was unfair and it shouldn’t have happened. Period. 

On a good note: I’m working on another book. That’s two underway in addition to the one I just finished (in case you are counting). Neil Gaiman recommends juggling about 5 projects at a time and since I’d like to be as successful as Neil Gaiman (cough), I’m modeling my writing behaviors after him (cough, cough). It’s a teen/adult book which is a nice contrast to the middle grade stories I’ve been focused on. I’m not going to talk about the plot but I will say that it’s … weird. Honestly, there’s nothing more satisfying than giving my severe weirdness an outlet. 

Next up … a short story about Pennsylvania’s favorite Phil. 

Much love.

Something Wicked This Way Came