Just yesterday I had a hankering (Don’t you just love that word, hankering?) for the kind of lunch my mother sometimes made for my siblings and me when we were children. So, instead of the usual apple and cheese slices or tuna on lettuce fare that I normally prepare for myself, I decided to cater to my desire and boiled some white rice. Once it was ready, I melted a pat (or two) of butter into it and added some milk. I then slathered some peanut butter over a slice of warm bread for dipping. Voila! Lunch was ready. No, it certainly wasn’t anything fancy, but just as when I was a kid, it did fill my belly, which was something I figure was important for a woman like my mother who had to live through the depression.

 

I’m sure, though, that my desire for the flashback lunch was from missing Mom. She died over a year ago and I think of her often, the distance of time allowing me to survey our relationship, which was not always close. We never had a falling out of any sort, but there were times we should have aired our thoughts, but we didn’t. Mom rarely expressed herself, even though I began to realize as an adult that she was depressed much of the time. As I stated, she lived through the depression, and one time, only once, did she hint at how tough it had been for her and her family. It was during a game of Scrabble that she and I used to enjoy playing together when she’d mentioned in passing that at one point all her family had left to eat was a single pickle that was in a jar on the shelf. We’re talking about eight siblings and their parents splitting one pickle.

 

This I believe explains my mom’s impatience with me when I was a teenager. I cannot help but laugh now at how she must have thought she was living with an alien at times. Rarely was I satisfied, but dare I say not in the selfish, dissatisfied way as those shallow housewives or preppie kids who whine through their so-called reality shows. Rather, I was dissatisfied with corruption, injustice, ignorance and so on, and I was rather vocal about it while dramatically yearning to make a change. Mom didn’t understand such feelings and would scold me for having them. It wasn’t until I was older and given a few more snippets of her very difficult childhood that I realized it was because she’d been robbed as a young girl and taught herself just to put up with things, no matter how awful. I also suddenly appreciated that while I looked at the white rice and peanut butter sandwich as little more than something to fill the belly, my mother considered it a feast, one that she could provide her children. For that, I thank her.