The Particular Sadness of Tetrazzini

It happened for the first time late one afternoon in April. It was a warm spring day, a breeze moving east from the clay colored banks of the Chattahoochee, stirring the the pink eyed blossoms of the cherry trees. Spring was nearly in full bloom. It was that slow quiet time when the sun softens and the day begins to wane into the early evening. I was home by myself. My mother had gone out. I don’t know where. But she deserved a break from me.

In the weeks prior rain had washed all the joy out of the house. Sunshine was rare and never to be expected. I needed a lot of rain. It like having the perfect anecdote for how I was feeling. But that day the light was good company.

A stick of butter left out from breakfast was blurring at the edges, golden, waxy, softening with the heat of the day. I remember when the room would fill with the smell of warming butter, with sugar sweetening the air, with the zest of lemons tickling my nose. My Nana always had a bowl of cherries in a blue and white china bowl by the edge of the stove while she baked. I can taste that first delicious bite of lemon meringue pie.

My mom’s friend Anne was coming over that afternoon. I was thinking about the show I would have to put on, when all of a sudden the pie over took me. I was starring into the lightness of the memory, of that first bite, consumed by its delight when I felt a sudden shift inside of me. I didn’t deserve this goodness, the goodness of the fine ingredients. Then in an unfurling I could taste nothing but smallness, of shrinking, of upset, of the distance illness had created between me and my family.

Anne brought flowers wrapped in plastic, turkey tetrazzini, and a bottle of laxatives. She says narcotics paralyze the gut. We were sitting on the sofa when my mom walked in the door, smiling ear to ear. I could tell she was considering hugging me. She walked over to the two of us, threw her hands up in delight to see her friend, and bent like a crane placing her arms softly around the patient. It made me feel cold. It made me feel hungry. It felt inadequate for how much I needed.

I smiled and thanked Anne graciously for coming. I told her how truly blessed I am to have such a wonderful mother to take care of me. She is a fabulous nurse I say. That evening we sit down to eat the turkey tetrazzini. We say grace. Each bite is awful, filled with absence, with hunger, with sprawling hallows, with having so much to be thankful having survived the surgery and some how, that not being enough.

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