Thoughts upon turning twenty five

I wrote this many years ago, when my son turned ten years old. It was his twenty fifth birthday this week:

Thoughts Upon Turning Ten

I was not a happy pregnant woman.

Even when my limp hair grew thick and curly, my skinny, angular frame became round and voluptuous, I wasn't happy. Like everything I have ever done in my life, I leapt into pregnancy and wrestled with the consequences when they became inevitable.  I was depressed, I worried, and I felt intensely alone, even though my husband awaited the birth of our newborn intently.

Would I love my child? Would I bond with him? How would I figure out what to do with this mysterious creature? My life would be forever altered and would I ever be able to adjust?

When my baby was born, I shared a room with three of the saddest women that maternity has chosen: birth defects, spousal abuse, abandonment, there I had it. I thanked the heavens for my stable marriage, my loving family, my comfortable home in a middle class neighbourhood.

My baby was beautiful, with a rebellious head of black hair that stood defiantly straight up.  Nobody in my family was dark, and I had produced an original.  He tormented me and challenged me like no statistics or physics course ever had, but he was gorgeous.

I waited for the bonding to happen, like the books said it ought to. We argued constantly, like we do to this day.  Finally, one night, as I fed him, he looked up and with a stare from his beady little dark eyes, stopped the motion of the rocking chair.

I wept.  Here was this completely helpless infant demanding, with his gaze, what he needed from me, hooking me completely into his primitive little soul.  How could anyone ever deny someone so tiny, yet so strong?

While I was unlocking the mysteries of breastfeeding and bowel movements, there was a story on the news that was gripping many Montrealers. It was the story of baby Aldo, who had been neglected, abused and starved to death by his own damaged parents.

I looked at my baby that night and cried and cried. I was angry, I was confused and I knew that this baby had to be the most important thing that I have ever accomplished in my life. There was no way that I would ever intentionally let him down.

There were thirteen little boys in my yard this afternoon, celebrating my baby's tenth birthday.  I watched them playing soccer, pushing, yelling, laughing.  There was the boy with the angelic ringlets, desperately playing for attention, the dark boy with the chip on his shoulder that everyone picked on, the shy kid with no athletic skills playing goalie, the natural athlete who scored on a breakaway and turned perfect cartwheels to celebrate.  Some of these kids are neglected by career obsessed parents, by parents who have burnt out and lost interest, by parents who are now single, trapped and bitter. Little Aldo is missing, but little Aldo never had the chance to get this far.

I watered the trampled lawn, staked the mangled plants after they left and I found myself weeping again for little Aldo, for all the kids in my yard who have made it this far, but have a huge battle ahead of them to grow up to be worthwhile human beings who don't have their own Aldos.

I may not be a perfect parent, but this is my biggest challenge. I am going to hug my son tonight and tell him how important he is to me.  I am going to hope that Aldo's parents have salvaged their own lives and I am going to say a prayer in my heart for little Aldo, who would have been ten years old this year.

Syringa vulgaris

The third week of May is when my depressed, alcoholic nation turns into a bunch of sentimental romantics. The lilacs are blooming. Their lush fragrance overwhelms and manages to transform our bleak, Northern souls.

May 1958 in Montreal: You’re struggling to adapt to a strange new city in a strange new land. You don’t have a lot of hope, but you have a Joe job, and a boyfriend who could be Elvis. He snaps off a lilac branch for you as you stroll through Westmount. And you know he’s The One.

May 1982 in Riga: Life is grey. There are drunks sleeping it off on every second park bench. Brezhnev will rule forever. But the air smells like heaven. So you snap off a couple of lilac branches in the park and present them to your favourite old auntie. She’s smitten and twenty one again.

May 2002 in Valois: It’s an old house with a garden full of heritage plants gone wild. As usual, you have bitten off more than you can chew, and have taken on the massive job of pruning the neglected lilac hedge that surrounds the property. You’re hot and sweaty and exhausted from hauling tree-size branches to the curb. But you’re compelled to offer a fragrant bouquet to every lady walking home from the church on the corner.

You’re a hero! Sentimental romantic, that you are.

Risotto ruminating

When the boss from hell has made your day memorable, come home, make risotto.
All you need, for four generous servings is:
a bottle of red wine
olive oil for frying
a smallish onion, or two shallots, chopped fine
1 cup Arborio rice
1 liter of chicken broth
a small bunch of asparagus, woody ends snapped off, cut in 3cm segments
350g shrimp, raw and peeled
Pour yourself a glass of red wine and get on with things, refill as needed.
In a heavy saucepan, brown the onions in the olive oil. Pour in the Arborio rice and stir a bit. Add a third of the chicken broth and stir while the rice and onions bubble away. A hypnotic figure eight motion works for me. When the rice has started to absorb the broth, add another third of the broth.
Stir, stir, stirrrrrr...
Or not.
Stir once in a while, while you peel the shrimp and cut up the asparagus. Stir once in a while, while you set the table. Stir once in a while, while you tell the telemarketer to get lost.
But the therapeutic benefits of stirring are the big reason for making risotto.
So stir, stir, stirrrrr....
Add the last third of the broth.
Just before you would think of adding more broth, add the asparagus. When you would add more broth, if you had it, add the shrimp. When the concoction is soupy, take it off the heat and let it sit for five minutes. The whole stirring process should take about twenty minutes.
Serve it on plates and eat it with a fork, or go the comfort route and serve in a bowl, eat with a spoon.
There, don’t you feel better?

Bacon Heaven

Everyone has an opinion when it comes to the best piragi – Latvian bacon rolls that are a must-serve at any meaningful gathering. This is mine.

Filling:
1 pound bacon, cut in tiny cubes – not maple, that would be weird
1 pound ham, cut in tiny cubes – important to keeping the piragi plump and meaty
1 onion, cut in tiny cubes
Salt and pepper to taste – be generous, or the result will be VERY bland!
Fry up until the bacon is slightly wilted. Pour into a colander and let the fat drain off until the dough is ready.

Dough:
3 tbsp, or 3 packages dry yeast
½ cup warm water
1 tsp sugar
2 ½ cups milk
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt - be generous!
½ cup butter
2 eggs – purists just use the yolks, but if you forget to separate them, don’t stress, it’ll be ok
6 cups flour, or more
another egg for the egg wash glaze

-Sprinkle yeast over warm water and sugar and let rise 10 minutes. A great way to do this is to put a deep pan of hot water on the lower rack in the oven, and put the stuff to rise on an upper rack. Keep the oven door closed with the heat off, and create a warm, moist and inspirational environment for the yeast.
-Scald the milk in a saucepan, add sugar, salt, and butter. Cool to lukewarm, add 3 ½ cups flour, eggs and yeast. Beat with a wooden spoon until smooth and shiny. Replace pan of hot water with a fresh pan, cover bowl of dough and let rise in the oven for 15 minutes.
-Turn out on a floured table, add remaining flour and knead until the dough is elastic and comes off your hands. You may need to add more flour than the recipe calls for. Knead it a bit and see.
-Take a good handful of dough and squeeze it out into an inch-thick snake. Chop off 1 ½ inch long segments and pat a segment into a 2-3 inch wide circular patty. Take a teaspoon of the filling and put it on one half of the patty. Flip the other half over, pinch the seam closed and place the pirags on a greased cookie sheet with the seam tucked underneath the pirags. Repeat with the next chopped off segment. They can be placed quite close together on the pan.
-Egg wash the piragi, stab three little vent holes in each, and bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes until golden.
- Makes 80-100 rolls, depending on how elegantly tiny you are able to roll them. The whole process will take you about 3 hours.

The revolutionary thing about this recipe is the minimal rising time. It makes for a ‘’thin-crust’’ pirags, and minimizes the possibility of them gaping open as they rise and cook in the oven. Being vigilant about keeping grease out of the seam is also important for keeping the little buggers closed.

Aromas

On spring nights Valois smells of daffodils and tulips, followed by apple trees, lilacs and roses. In summer the barbecues take over with the sound of laughter, racoons scrapping, and tomcats yowling. During the week there's the crack of baseball bats in the park and cheering crowds at the pool. On weekends, the dirty blues from the backroom of the Mayf' can be heard from three blocks away. In August, the spiders are in high gear on the veranda. Your glasses get caught in their webs and a fat full moon rises over Jennifer's house.

The Joy of Solitary Dining

or

Omelette au Fromage*

Stumble home from work with your feet aching and your faith in humanity smashed.

Ensure that there are no other human beings in your abode who might further tread on your bedraggled aura. Dogs and cats are fine. Rabbits not so much.

Whisk together two eggs in a bowl.

Grate a thumb size piece of sharp cheddar.

Cut a smallish red pepper into strips and sauté in butter in your omelet pan. When softened, remove and set aside.

Pour eggs into pan and swirl around until almost set. Top one half with cheese and as many pepper strips as you want. Put the remainder in your salad tomorrow.

Sprinkle on some fresh rosemary from the plant that you got as a quasi-Christmas tree last year and put out in the sunshine in May, where it has made a miraculous recovery.

Fold the omelet over, reduce heat and cover while you open a bottle of red, pour yourself a generous glass and set the table. Full tablecloth treatment is nice.

Slide the omelette au fromage* onto a nice plate, salt and pepper to taste and take yourself out to the clothed table on your terrasse.

A deep, dark, green salad (spinach and enoki mushrooms would be divine) would go nicely, but don't stress. You're getting your vitamins from the peppers. And this is supposed to be a solitary dinner, anyway.

Watch the fading light transform your garden, or flutter through the city maple tree that brushes against your balcony, or turn the stop sign on the corner to neon.

Stay out there soaking in the view until the bugs get too nasty, or you get cold, or worst case scenario, the red runs out.

Peace, tranquility and omelette au fromage*.

* Say it with a Parisian accent and you couldn't be cooler with a beret and a Gauloise.