It is late afternoon a few days after Christmas. The pale gray sky is rapidly dimming. It is cold out and damp. It will freeze tonight, lightly. Not enough moisture to make ice or snow. I have some fish marinating, tomatoes sliced, and some garlic asparagus ready to broil. It is late at night, end of year, time to think things over, quiet. There is much to consider today.

I had a heart monitor put in place today. It is exterior, taped to my, now, shaved and sandpapered chest. It will stay with me for two weeks unless the adhesive gives in and the monitor falls off. There have been heart rate ups and downs for a while, and so the doctor wanted to track them. Having this transmitter taped to my chest makes the issue real. It is disturbing that I might have heart problems. The idea has been in the background of my thoughts for a while, now it is in the forefront.

I have always cooked. I learned from my father, who raised himself. His oldest brother was thirty years older than him. Between them eight other brothers and one sister. He had to cook and sew. As I grew up, he was often in the kitchen; he worked rotating shifts as a cop and because my mom worked also, he often made dinner, or a big breakfast. He frequently made beans and ham, which he had for breakfast the next day. Apparently, while he was in the navy during the war, beans for dinner automatically translated into beans for breakfast (it was WWII and rationing was on, even in the service if you were stationed stateside, which he was). He put sugar on them.

Between his teaching, if only by my observation of him doing it, my many years as a Boy Scout, and my one summer on my own, I became a fair cook. By the end of our first week of marriage, it was silently acknowledged that I would do the cooking. Hence (I love to use that word), I was often in the kitchen helping Lydia’s mom, when we were invited over for dinner. Early in our marriage, Lydia’s mom, Virginia, gave me her copy of The Joy of Cooking. It had been given to her in 1954. I still have it and still use it. When I take it down, it automatically falls open to “gravy”.

I don’t need a cookbook to tell me how to make gravy. I make it for dinner and breakfast. I make brown gravy, sausage gravy, milk gravy, pepper gravy, and redeye gravy.

What I want on that page is a hidden gem from Irma Rombauer, the author. On page 426 of my copy, Irma offers words of advice that speak to the self sufficiency of the young, the struggling, the beginners of this life. Speaking of gravy, she says “if it is not good, make it so.” That is the instruction, the guidance she offers. My wife, the green thumb of the family, says “grow where you’re planted.” Damn, women just know stuff.

So, here I sit, a heart monitor on my chest, an old cookbook in my hand, knowing that it is time to get up and go cook supper. There isn’t any gravy tonight. It won’t need any. It will be good, because I made it so.

Blessings

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