Wandering Child

Growing up on the edge of town, in a neighborhood tucked between cornfields and public housing, I spent a lot of time floating in and out of other peoples houses. Looking back, I feel like I was a wandering spirit, often quietly observing the patterns, sounds, behaviors and even smells of other families.

I have been trying to write a short story lately about that experience.

And a tangent has popped in my head about my relationship with food in this context.

I can remember how when I was in black homes, the smells and the heat from the kitchen would produce smokey warm fumes often bristling to the nose no matter where you were in the house. Sweet and spicy flavors, crispy and strong flavors, energizing and invigorating, that one would also imagine were filling and satisfying. The kitchens were bustling, like their homes, with more than one cook, throwing in food in stages, taking turns making sure things “got done”.

In the Vietnamese and Cambodian homes, I think of the mothers, with frying pans swinging in their hands, like martial arts chefs. Quickly rushing home and producing food within seconds where moments before, there was none. Noodles and sauce and fishy pungent odors quickly permeating the house. Unfamiliar fragrances that would push me, the little stringy blonde haired ghost, back onto the street as the family gathered for their quick stop meal.

For a few of my white friends, they had (what were in my admittedly midwestern and ethnocentric view) the classic "American" staples; these were the families that wouldn't live in our neighborhood long, their parents were graduate students, or were buying starter homes and would move to a better school in a year or two; their dinners were cooking in the oven, lasagna, chicken and rice, meat and potatoes. Perhaps bland at times, but ubiquitously balanced. I remember sitting quietly hoping for the dinner invitations that never came in those houses.

But for most of my white friends, those staples they were not there. Like me, we saw those mostly in sitcoms on our black and white 12 inch televisions. We were poor. The meals usually came from cans and frozen boxes. Or greasy fast food bags. With mothers that worked long hours and came home too tired. Or, didn't work, and were just, too tired.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am learning how to cook again. For my children. For their smiles, and their warm happy bellies. I try. It is not always great.

But

I am a work in progress

Like my cooking.