More than words, food tells our story.
I am notorious for my monstrous appetite. At first glance, one can only see my scrawny arms and chicken legs. But sit down for a meal with me, my friend, and you will see what I eat, and learn who I am.
There is a noticeable change in my demeanor when I am talking with someone over a bowl of goulash or a plate of short ribs. I open up like a cracked egg. I reveal everything. This characteristic is not unique to me, as I’ve learned from experience. Eating a meal with someone is much akin to lying flat on a therapist’s couch, your chest and neck exposed. I understand that breaking bread with another is no new concept, and I make no attempt at claiming otherwise. Food, however, much like reading, has played a large part in my (and I’m guessing your) life, serving as the centerpiece for many of my most potent memories.
Recently, doctors found two polyps in my dad’s colon: One polyp was benign while the other was determined cancerous. Being a man of extraordinary gentleness, my father broke the news to me over the phone only after my mother threatened to tell me herself. After her own battle with stage 3b breast cancer—one hell of a contender, let me tell you—she now believes in nothing other than complete honesty.
Dad underwent surgery this past week in order to remove the section of his colon where the polyps were found. Though the doctors suspected that the cancer had not made its way down to the tissue, they preferred to remove the segment so that they could examine it and confirm their suspicions. Thankfully, the surgery went smoothly, but all the while I could not help but think of how much I would miss my father’s food if something were to happen. This is not a new idea. I thought the exact same thing during my mother’s own tribulations.
My parents have always been fabulous cooks—culinary wizards. They cook dishes that grace tables all across the globe—Indian, Italian, Eritrean. Never once have they consulted a cookbook, instead they consult one another—each the other’s Rolodex of recipes. Acerbic cheeses, roasted tomatoes, creamy oils—these are the tastes and smells on which my home was built, a home in which something is always brewing but never burning.
In my family, we end each of our conversations over the phone with “I love you,” but beyond that we avoid gushing. Sentimentality is cheap. So we put our love in other things, like food. My parents make it, and my brother and I eat it. This is the exchange, simple and routine. On the surface it appears as nothing more than a familial and biological tradition/necessity, but in it one can find traces of something bigger.
One’s love of food is intrinsically tied to one’s own personality. In my home we taste everything once, our palates almost completely non-discriminating. I don’t trust picky eaters because what they fear in food, I fear in them. What does it say of a person when he or she completely eliminates the possibility of experiencing something new?
When we think of food, we think of one another and the moments in our lives that are ours together. Our first dates, where the food goes untouched, either out of sheer nervousness or a bright conversation that leaves no room for anything else. Our funerals, where food is slaved over for hours because that is all one can offer. Our first nights on our own, where we eat the delivered pizza while thinking of our mother’s casserole.
So this is why when I think of my parents not being there, I think about food—because the wealth of their love is tasted, more than heard. And why, when I sit over a plate of baked rigatoni, I am willing to divulge anything—because I am with family once again.
Thomas Gebremedhin is a Trinity senior. His column runs every other Thursday.
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