1. Appetizers

We begin life with an appetite. We begin as hungry, little, mole people blindly searching for our mother’s milk.  If our needs are met and we are nourished by an abundant breast, we learn to trust in the world.  If we encounter a timid breast that fails to nurture us and we’re unable to suckle, we learn to be anxious. These first lessons shape both mother and child.  My first child, a son named Michael, was born too early and lived only five days.  We both suffered from a blow to my belly by a jealous boyfriend and the resulting hemorrhage and malnutrition.  I saw Michael only through glass and never held him in my arms. After his death, I left that boyfriend in an alley and moved away.  Later I met a Hungarian Carpenter at a hippie commune near Berkeley California.  He was a gentle-man who played Joni Mitchell songs on his guitar and so I married him. My second pregnancy was a leap of faith.  Our daughter, Lillie Beth was also born early but she was healthy.  Seconds after her birth she was cradled in her Papa’s arms and cooing at him. But my milk was slow to arrive and she slept through the feedings.  I felt her tiny body slipping away in my arms and I was filled with guilt.  Then a friend smuggled a can of beer into my hospital room and insisted that I drink it as she stood guard.  The Carpenter Husband instructed the nurses to stop feeding his daughter formula before they brought her to me. At the next feeding my milk began flowing and my hungry girl was fed. My youngest, another boy, Maxx the Wunderkind, was also an early arrival but this time with no anxiety and no timid breast.  He always knew there would be plenty of milk and has never doubted my love. Lille Beth never felt nourished by me and has always searched for more love than I can provide. We teach what we learn.

     The meal begins with the appetizers.  This is the food you eat before you eat the meal. This whole concept defies logic. If the appetizers are good the dinner guests might fill up on them and not stay for dinner. On the other hand, if the appetizers are bad the guests may believe that the meal won’t be any good either and they’ll make excuses to leave. The appetizer concept is not rational yet it seems to work. I suppose it’s because a tiny bit of food wets the appetite and creates a sense of anticipation. Just a hint of the culinary delights to come and the dinner guest wonders, “Is this all there is? Will there be other dishes? Will there be enough for me?” The suspense keeps them glued to the chair while the aromas from the kitchen bring out Pavlovian drools. 

     We train our children the same way. We teach with cruelty. We teach with fear. Bad parents keep their children hungry and devoted by occasionally serving up appetizers. It’s not enough to feed a growing child but it is enough to keep them coming back to the table. When a child is never sure where the next meal is coming from they learn to be patient.  They wait like the dogs under the royal table for scraps of affection tossed their way. This is the worst kind of cruelty. If the child was never loved, never given a morsel of affection, they would simply leave and find the nourishment elsewhere. But the family cook gives an occasional crumb and teaches the growing child to live with the hunger. Worst of all, they are taught they don’t deserve more, they haven’t earned their keep. The promise of acceptance and a full belly is dangled as elusive bait. The good parent only dangles desert. Nourishment is taken for granted. A child has a right to expect dinner.

     I raised Lillie Beth and Maxx on fresh air and square meals.  I fed them recipes I found in an old leather-bound Watkins cookbook and the Vegetarian Epicure that was a gift from a good cook. The Carpenter Husband was a disciple of the natural foods diet and was strict about avoiding artificial food and white sugar.  He taught me how bad it was for the children and insisted I make everything from scratch. He was so strict that I was not permitted to buy vanilla yogurt, I had to buy plain yogurt and add honey and vanilla extract. Lillie Beth and Maxx were never given sugar cereal or sugar snacks.  Instead they had fresh fruits and homemade bread. After few years the Carpenter Husband changed his tune when he tired of Joni Mitchell.  After he left I found a garbage can full of candy wrappers under the seat of his truck. It was then I started using recipes I found on the backs of soup cans because I believed Campbell’s when they said, “Soup is good food”. I started buying vanilla yogurt and paper towels but I never bought sugar cereals. 

     Lillie Beth and Maxx grew beyond my menus.  They started eating strange exotic things I couldn’t find on soup cans.  They took over my kitchen and eventually found kitchens of their own.  They left the mountains and found homes near the sea.  Hating the silence they left behind and not knowing how to make soup for one, I followed them. Maxx turned gaming into a livelihood and Lillie Beth got tangled up with the wrong man.  She was not quite twenty when she gave birth to his son. 

     The night that my beloved grandson was born, I was looking at apartments.  I got a call that my daughter was in distress and I took two buses to the hospital.  The doctors decided to do a C-section because Lilly Beth’s preeclampsia.  Knowing that I would sit white knuckled on the waiting room chair like I do on airplane flights, she sent a message.  “Hold the plane up for me, Mom” she said.  And I did.   Tater Tot was born healthy and Lillie Beth recovered quickly.  I resumed my apartment search until a few days later when I got another call.  This time she wasn’t able to breast feed.  I arrived an hour later with a six pack of beer and a stack of fashion magazines.  The milk began to flow.  I didn’t leave again for five years. I was there for Tater Tot’s first smile, tooth, steps, words and his first day of school.  I survived the colic, eczema, diaper rash and projectile vomiting with pleasure because this child was the light of my life.  Then one day my daughter moved to Atlanta cutting off all communication.  A few years later she reappeared again broke and needing a place to live. They moved in with me.  My precious Tater Tot who was a joyous, precious toddler when he left, returned a timid and withdrawn.  It broke my heart.

His mother quickly made herself at home in my kitchen and fixed herself a plate of apple slices and peanut butter. My grandson looked at her and his eyes got big. He walked up next to her and said, “Oh me too!’ and reached for one of the apple slices. My daughter back-handed him and he fell backwards. From his reaction this was not the first time she had done this. I was speechless for a second. I didn’t want to believe what I saw. Calmly I told her that I thought what she did was wrong and took my grandson into the kitchen.  I made a apples and peanut butter snack for him and then I gave him a tour of the kitchen.  Together we picked out a shelf in the refrigerator and one in the cupboard and designated them as “Tater Tot’s Food”.  I let him help decide what to keep on his shelves and picked things I know he could prepare and eat independently.  We filled his shelves with fresh fruits, juice boxes, fishy crackers and other treats.  From then on I kept those shelves stocked with his favorites and whenever he came to my house, he’d check his cupboard. I wanted him to know, what his mother knew growing up, that at my house they were always welcome to food.

I made it my mission to teach him how to feed himself. He started spending the weekends with me while his mother partied with her friends. She became a world traveler while I taught him to make easy foods that would fill a hungry belly; peanut butter and jelly, cereal, cheese and fruit and toast. Over the phone I taught him how to wash out a glass and get some milk when his mother was passed out drunk. I taught him to survive my daughter, or at least that’s what I told myself.  Maybe I should have been more forceful in my condemnation. Maybe I should have turned her in to Child Protective Services.  I was afraid she’d disappear again and I would be cut out of his life again. I was afraid of the shape he’d be in next time I saw him and so I kept the cupboards full and said nothing.

Of course my daughter disappeared again; it became her weapon of choice. Whenever I would try to contact my grandson, I would be treated like a stalking pervert. Then when she has run out of money and alienated all her friends, she returns. I ask no questions, I just try to keep her busy while I try to find the little boy inside my grandson. But those walls grow higher with each year.

One year his principal called me to tell me that my grandson was threatening suicide and had pleaded with them to call me.  When they put Tater Tot on the phone he begged me to make things right with his mom so that he could spend weekends with me again. I promised that I would do whatever it took.  Not wanting to risk rejection, I called and left a simple message explaining the call from the school when they couldn’t reach her.  I made no accusations, simply asked if I could see Tater Tot. When I didn’t hear back, I called again only this time I begged and I groveled. Two days later when I still had no answer I called the school. They said that if they allowed my grandson any contact with me Lillie Beth was threatening legal action. But they had recommended a therapist for Tater Tot.

I contacted Grandparents groups, Child Protective Services anyone who could help me contact Tater Tot.  I hit a brick wall.  I called the school again and pleaded for help. The principle told me that the state mandated the counseling because of the suicide threat.  They told me he seemed less anxious.  I kept trying; I made a nuisance of myself.  But whenever I gave up I remembered his voice on the phone.

This time she arrived after an eight year absence. My worst fears were confirmed. My little grandson was now a handsome young man. He is tall with unruly hair and the kindest eyes I’ve ever seen.  But there is a solitary shadow   just below his well natured mask.  He had learned to survive his mother’s moods but he has also learned that life is a cruel place and you should never expect it to be any different.

When he arrived he would sit for days without eating until his mother offered him food and would never ask himself. When we would have a meal, he would never ask for seconds, he would wait and ask for the scraps from the plates. This horrified me.  I bought food especially for him but it sat uneaten until his mother gave the OK. At night, instead of sleeping, he quietly searches the kitchen for food. I gave him his cupboard, though I doubt he remembered. Finally I told him, “This is your Grandmother’s house. All the food is YOUR food.” It seemed to work, after a few weeks he was making sandwiches as though he had a right to.

This time it is worse. She’s taken him out of school to “home school” him. That means no school lunch, no friends and no teachers or counselors to check up on Tater Tot. He hides in a world of Japanese comic book heroes and softens her anger with his wit. He is kind courageous and he is my hero. For a moment, the curtain dropped and he allowed me to see him. It made her furious. Then whoosh…gone again, dragging my grandson behind her like a toy on a string. Hateful words on her way out the door.

My daughter is a “hunger tourist.” She complains her own appetites but doesn’t see that she is raising a starving child. He has been hungry all his life even when there was food in abundance. It makes me wonder what lesson I taught when I pushed my plate across the table and let her eat my dinner even though I was still hungry. I wanted to save her from the starvation that has plagued my life. Instead I taught her to be selfish.

I know what it’s like to be in my grandson’s shoes. Every crumb that ever entered my mouth was because of my mother’s broken back and aching feet. Feeding me was killing her and she never let me forget it.  The nausea set in early as the food felt like homicide in my mouth. It sat on top of my stomach like human flesh. The step-fathers, the boyfriends and the foster fathers, offered me praise, acceptance and bits of something I thought was nutritious. But it was actually deadly poison. It made me sick and I would spit it out and push the plate away. I’d settle for coffee with lots of milk and sugar and vomit even that.

Most of the stories in this book are about being hungry. About life filled with too many appetizers and no real nourishment. It’s also about the family secrets. Even now, past sixty, I open my mouth to speak and the family doors slam shut and the phone calls go to a full voice mail. My emails bounce back across the universe and I am the orphan again. In unsent letters I cry to them, “When will I be allowed to speak? How much longer do I keep the secrets? When will I ever be good enough to sit at the table with you? When will you stop punishing me for being hurt?” Cowards, they are cowards. Afraid of the truth they sentence me to a lifetime of anguish and hunger while they feed me appetizers and tell me it’s all I deserve. It’s not all I deserve. It never was.

So here it is. I offer myself up on this paper platter. My life, my story for all of you to munch at will. I become bite sized mushrooms stuffed full of the anger that I cannot speak. I am zucchini sticks, or potato skins. I am the wings of a chicken, a bird that cannot fly, covered in spice and ready to be devoured. I offer myself up, not for them or him or even me. I offer myself to all those who have also been silenced. Those who find they are forever tarnished by shame they did not deserve, paying for sins they never committed. For those who hunger to speak the truth, I’ll dish it out. Not merely appetizers, but full hearty meals and even seconds, served with love and understanding hot off the griddle. For the little boy, now young man who left weighted down by his mother’s erratic mental health – I’m here. I’ll always be here. You’ll always have that cupboard and more.