I’m a writer.
It’s how I think, how I process life and what I love to do.
Back in 2010 I started this essay, We Cook. My girlfriend had been battling multiple myeloma for a long while and was in a rough patch, so I was making her the things she loved to eat. And while I cooked, I began this essay.
And then, she survived. And I forgot about the essay.
Five years later, she died and the morning after, I remembered it. I don’t know how it came to mind after years buried but it did and I decided to finish it.I sat at my computer in the quiet before dawn and began to add copy. Suddenly, a wicker basket jumped off the shelf above my desk and into my lap.
Did we have an earthquake? Quickly, I checked to see if anything was moving. No. There was no logical explanation. The only possibility was that my friend had made it happen from the other side. It was the first of several connections she made from the other side in those first months.
As luck would have it (ha) I noticed that an anthology called Here in the Middle: Stories of Love, Loss & Connection from the Ones Sandwiched in Between was still seeking essays. I sent We Cook in and it was accepted almost immediately. Two years ago, it was published. Here it is:
We Cook
for Marilyn
by Carol A. Cassara
We cook.
When we don’t know what else to do, we cook.
Seasoned tri-tip roast nestled in a bed of organic broccoli slow-cooked to palate-tempting perfection. Beef for stronger blood, broccoli to repair the immune system. Dishing out hope against hope, heaping spoonfuls of guarded promise carefully plated and set on the table.
Pulling a big knife from the block I chop watermelon into sweet red cubes, dice redolent minty green leaves and section an orange. Sprinkling feta cheese over the mix I serve it up on a white plate, a life-restoring offering.
If only.
I stand over a stainless steel pot of black beans infused with onion, garlic and spices, my wooden spoon moving in slow circles to meld the flavors, my nose twitching at the aromas. She loves my black beans and will ask for them several times this week. How little it is, but it is all I can do. We are all helpless when we see death in the waiting room, biding its time.
Broad layers of pasta noodles in the casserole topped with meat, yellow and green vegetables and scarlet marinara remind me of the cooking course the two of us took outside of Rome that autumn week. We cooked two huge meals a day—and ate them—laughing the whole time, learning from Italians who had no English. We were fluent in the language of the kitchen and we speak it still, even as we watch the stopwatch tick steadily the minutes of her life, our lives.
We will speak it until the end.
How did we get here so fast? I wonder, as carrots, zucchini, onion and green beans simmer in the soup pot, my face hot in the steam, holding my tears in the corner of my eyes, blotting them before they fall. I am afraid if I let them go they won’t stop: tears for the women we once were, the women we are now, but mostly for what she’s going through, her disease picking up speed now. They can’t infuse bags of blood and platelets fast enough to keep up with it. I can’t infuse food fast enough, either.
I didn’t draw a lucky family card and longed for the kind of sister mine would never be. I was 33 when I got someone better, this sister-friend who is now dying.
Who can explain the alchemy of sisterhood, when masks drop away and souls connect? How is it that we can have it with one and not another? What will I do when she is gone?
We’ve sat together at many tables, for meals, for cocktails, pouring wine and pouring out our souls. Now, she insists on rolling her walker to the dinner table and sitting for as long as her disease will let her, even if it’s just minutes.
Through onion tears I can barely see the knife move on the cutting board. If I’m not careful I could slice my finger and I almost want to, to feel something other than gut-wrenching sorrow.
Endings have never been my strength; I’ve always kept people in my life long after the relationship had wilted around the edges. But this one stayed fresh through each stage of our lives, though we had little in common, nothing obvious, anyway.
I grab seasonings from my rack. She’s always loved her food spicy, but now it takes more than simple spices to tempt her palate. I double my usual measured spoonfuls and add oregano and seasoned pepper to the waiting stock pot, and then, hot pepper.
When we met she was a stay-at-home wife of a prosperous executive and mother of two. Divorced twice and childless, I was trying desperately to find a job in a new city, new state and new industry. Her long, graceful fingers sparkled with diamonds and gold, while my one solitaire sat in a drawer, a symbol of my failure. Her friends were all ladies who lunched and I was a woman with a briefcase and a 1980s business suit.
But we “got” each other instantly. Maybe it was because we shared Italian heritage, maybe because we were both transplanted Californians from the northeast. I can’t explain it, and really, it’s not important. What’s important is that we connected. It stuck, too. Our bond would carry us more than 30 years, through love affairs, divorces and remarriage; through new jobs and graduations; through earthquakes, dinners in Italy and wine drunk in in Napa. And through secrets, shared and unshared.
Later, it carried us through ambulance rides to the emergency room, three different wheelchairs, two walkers, stints in the intensive care unit; through chemotherapy, opportunistic infections and then, through celebrations of miraculous rallies. Now, though, in a final test, it’s carrying us through her death.
That 30-year span of friendship was unfathomable when we met, but now, as the end is foreshadowed, I’m startled at how quickly the days have passed and are still speeding by, way too fast. I want to stop time, freeze it in place, keep her with me. I can not fathom the world otherwise.
I hold on to the cutting board as if I were holding on to her life, chopping furiously, furious at the loss that is to come, each chop a No!, half pleading and half demand.
Broth is simmering on the stove, waiting for me to add the last cup of her favorite vegetables. She’ll have the soup for dinner tonight, served hot, not lukewarm. She hates her food lukewarm.
I scoop bright green florets of broccolini into the water, add seasoning and cook.
Carol A. Cassara is a writer whose essays have appeared in Skirt!, the Christian Science Monitor, Blood and Thunder literary magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, on KQED public radio, several Chicken Soup for the Soul books and other publications and anthologies.
Marilyn inspired this business, A Healing Spirit. You can read her story on the home page and you can buy the wonderful grief and healing toolkits to help support loved ones who might need a lift.
You can buy the book and read everyone else’s essays at this affiliate link.
The kitchen is where everyone hangs out at parties for a reason. There’s something about the process, smells, and companionship that make it the place everyone wants to be. So sorry for the loss of a blessed friend.
I was lucky in the sister department and was so lucky to have her for over 50 years. But as I read this, I was reminded of how I read a book to her in those last three weeks. I read because that is what connected us a shared love of mysteries. What you did with food we did with books.
I am new to cooking and I am loving the feeling of sharing what I have done to others and the feeling of how the people appreciates your effort too. What you have been through is really heartbreaking and I have been there and only time heals. Good thing is that I was able to divert it on other activities.
Hugs to you! Losing a loved one is never easy and I know we must find ways to do the activities we used to enjoy doing together with our departed loved ones. This essay is a reminder for us to never let a day pass without reassuring our loved ones that they are loved.
That was a wonderful, heartfelt essay. I can feel your pain through your words. When my dad fell ill with cancer, I was the one with him most of the day, attending to his needs, cooking for him, and keeping him company. It has been 26 years since he passed and I still have not gotten over his passing.
I do not cook. But this essay gives me all the feels. This would help anyone who is experiencing loss.
I do not cook. But this essay gives me all the feels. This would help anyone who is experiencing loss.
I’m always so self conscious about my cooking. I always wanted to give new moms or new widows a meal, but I was always afraid that they wouldn’t like what I cook.
I think it’s nice when we can share meals together and also, discover different cuisines together. This post really is full of emotion and just so beautiful.
I love bean soup but have never made it with just black beans. I like different kinds and make into a hearty soup.
Such a heartfelt story.
Now I need to call my best friend and tell her I love her. This brought tears to my eyes.
This is beautiful! I am so happy to hear she has recovered. I can understand the feeling of helplessness, cooking and providing comfort any way we can for a loved one it a great thing!
I cook when I’m angry, sad, confused and bored. I love to share the foods I create. Your post is very touching and I enjoyed reading this.
Food is such a common way to express love. When you don’t have the words to say, you can still cook.
This is such an emotional post. Thanks for sharing your heart in these words. Cooking can definitely be a great way to help us deal with difficult times.
Food brings us together. When there’s nothing else to do, we can busy our hands in the act of cooking. It nourishes the body to be busy in the midst of hardship.
Nothing motivates anything quite like the thought of food. I love my job and cooking all the time.
My best friend since we were 15 has been diagnosed with Stage IV breast cancer that’s spread to her lungs and her brain. Today is her third chemo, and I pray it’s not as rough as the first two rounds. I could have written this post. I’m devastated for her and everyone who loves her.
I also cook for others when I don’t know what to do. I cooked several time last year for a neighbor with cancer. It makes me feel like I am doing something to help them.
I think this is the most beautiful essay I’ve ever read. I’m in tears but so inspired.
XO
What a beautiful story and tribute. It’s amazing how therapeutic cooking can be.
I know, right?
This is such a beautiful post. Carols essay is amazing. It’s amazing how her essay was submitted in the perfect timing.
Thank you, Tasheena
When your aching hands long to do something. Anything . . . to help. This is absolutely beautiful, Carol!
Aww, thanks, Diane.
That was beautiful! Your words are magic…
Thank you, Donna. xo
What a wonderful post. It is true, we do cook to help, to feed, to comfort. Sometimes it feels like a chore, but there is always a purpose to it.
This is wonderful! I love to cook for those important ones in my life, and really anyone!
How beautiful. What a beautiful friend God graced you with. And what a great friend you have been to her as well. I love your writing style
Crying now, but feeling all the love in this post. My sister died in May, and I was fortunate that she was my sister-friend by blood and by soul. I miss her so. Separated by three states, and because her death was sudden, I couldn’t cook for her at the end. But I would have. Whatever she wanted. Thanks for a great post.
Oh, Lisa, my heart goes out to you. Sharing your sadness and feeling your love.
Wow, this is so beautiful! I agree with when I don’t know what to do or how to deal with something I will cook. Cooking to me for others is a Blessing and no matter what, food always feeds the soul. I’m so sorry for the loss of your friend, glad to see your book is out.
It’s my way of showing love and concern and hopefully bringing a warm and full belly to the ones that need it. Love the post.
Mine, too. Thank you, Terri.
That was beautiful. I’m like this, too. I cook when I have no idea what to do. This gave me all the feels.
Thank you, Stacie.
Yum, I do love food! I wish I could cook better though. I tend to burn stuff. I come from a line of impatient women in the kitchen.
Making and giving food has always been a way to show we love, worry and care about someone. Hospitality use to be important and a drink and something to eat was always offered.