PICKING UP THE THREADS AFTER TRAUMA

BACK IN THE KITCHEN

As people wrote to me and talked to me about Tashi after he died, of course they touched on losses they lived with. It was a reminder that life is about loss and suffering as well as about growth and hope and positive change.

brilliant colour on a grey day just before the latest snow; the bush is Cotoneaster horizontalis

And as I type this, I am listening to a short clip from the terrific film made by Sepideh Farsi called Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk. The film is a series of phone-video conversations between the filmmaker, who is in Paris, and her Palestinian photographer subject, Fatima Hassouna. In the clip, Fatima tells her that (even though she is living in a fraught situation in Gaza) she lives each day with joy and optimism. In the background we hear the sound of bombs. But Fatima’s smile and confidence push the fear away and assert the vitality of the life she is living in the moment.

That’s what many humans in crisis seem to do: try to live each day as best they can. I had a glimpse of this long ago, in Cambodia in July 1997. There’d been a coup d’etat, as Hun Sen ousted Ranariddh from their joint presidency. There’d been violence and deaths. Many foreigners had left Phnom Penh. But already a couple of days later the local markets were open. It was as if people were pushing back, insisting on daily rhythms and normalcy, resisting the anarchy of violence and disruption.

Death is a violence, a big rip in the fabric of life. Even when we expect it, death knocks us sideways, takes our breath away. There’s an impulse to just sit still and live in a separate space, timeless and disconnected. Some people find themselves adrift in that space for a long time, unable to retrieve a sense of life or purpose or connection. Others go the other way and rush into activity. Perhaps the urge to keep moving is a denial, a kind of running away from the harsh truth. Or maybe it’s a built-in human survival strategy: after a shock you keep moving so your body continues to function.

These last weeks I have kept moving, but kind of ineptly. I seem capable of only one thought at a time, and I easily lose track of my intentions. The day zigzags, with long pauses for reading, or phone calls. I haven’t sat down to draw, not even a bare sketch.

And some tasks have been abandoned. Garlic, for instance. In October I bought garlic to plant in my small back garden, as I do each year, just a few bulbs, that I break into cloves, soak overnight, and shove into lightly tilled ground in several rows. But events overtook that project this fall, so that when I next was home and paying attention, there were only two mild days left. Each day I looked out at the garden and thought, “Today. I’ll dig and plant garlic today”. And then I just didn’t. I couldn’t commit to anything, not a coffee date, not what I would make for supper, and not planting garlic.

Now here we are into the first week of December, with snow on the ground, a hard frost, and the full moon tonight. My garlic-planting window has gone. Or perhaps not, my friend Lillian told me today. According to her, if there’s a mild spell in the next few weeks I could still get it into the ground.

I’ll let you know!

IN THE KITCHEN

I may still lose track of time as I get lost in thought, and I certainly still have trouble making commitments, but basic habits and gestures keep my blood flowing and my brain ticking over, however slowly. I’m discovering that kitchen tasks, from making my fried eggs over leftovers in the morning, to cooking supper with friends, revive me.

eggs over leftover bean stew from our at home party for Tashi

A group meal last weekend helped get me moving in the kitchen in a light easy way. We had a large lamb chop and several pieces of smoked lamb (a delight!), all from Andreas of Buschbeck Farms. My partner Paul grilled them over charcoal after brushing them with fish sauce and a little pomegranate molasses. Meantime Dawnthebaker chopped and oven-roasted a handful of carrots of many colours. They went into a large bowl with two kinds of radicchio, to make a salad that we dressed with a blend of tahini, olive oil, creme fraiche, and brown rice vinegar.

two kinds of radicchio on the left; and the not-yet-dressed salad on the right

I had bought three large-ish candy-striped beets from Footsteps Farm, at Wychwood Market. Dawn peeled and grated them, while I made a hot dressing of minced ginger and sliced garlic cooked in hot olive oil spiced with mustard seed and fennel seeds, and spiked with vinegar. There were a few sorrel leaves and stems of parsley still green in the garden to add to the gorgeous pink of the beets. Once we’d sliced the lamb and dressed a green salad we all dived in.

grated beet salad; plated meal of two kinds of grilled lamb, plus salads

After that meal, and a few other small excursions in the kitchen, I’m even starting to imagine doing some baking. I’ll keep it simple by making standbys from my HomeBaking book, for example sweet paximadia (biscotti made with olive oil and flavoured with cloves and cinnamon), which I make with whole grain flour.

This morning I realised I was thinking about buying organic citrus to make candied peel. And that led me to imagine mincemeat. Perhaps it’s a bridge too far? The hazelnut frangipane in the pear tart Lesley Chesterman made ten days ago in Montreal (see my last post) was so excellent; perhaps a fruit tart lies in my future. And from there it’s a hop skip and jump to a gateau des rois. Hmmm.

a shot of me in the kitchen, by Ed Rek, as I cooked the hot dressing for the beet salad

Life and curiosity beckon me forward.

faded, dried out, and perhaps even more beautiful: a bouquet of peonies brought to the house by Robin Kay after Tashi died