family

When it came to throwing a party, my Grandma Rose Mary was a pro. While I was lost in a mass of aunts, uncles, and cousins, she was making the party happen. Her presence was strong yet subtle. Her gatherings taught me to value my extended family.

As a child and then a young adult, I got to know Grandma in more intimate settings. We shared dozens of lunches over the course of many years. During these meals, I learned about her. She and I had attended the same elementary school, and so I loved her stories about the nuns, about early morning music lessons, and about the time she won a radio at field day. As I got older, she told me about her travels to India, Afghanistan, and other places I will probably never see.

Sometimes we dined at the Younkers Tea Room, and sometimes we shared soup in her kitchen. I still see myself in that farm kitchen, seated on a bench against the wall… asking lots of questions, drawing her out, and seeing the stories flow into one another. Once, when I was learning to cook, she passed on a few of her favorite soup recipes. I love her soups and I love that her handwriting is mixed in my messy recipe files.

Grandma Rose Mary’s Ground Beef Soup with Rosie Stars is a winter standard in my home. Over the years, I have adapted it to my tastes. Although it comes together quickly, it has smooth, rich flavors. Tomato juice and Italian parsley lend it brightness. Shredded cabbage makes it mellow. Ground beef and pasta give it heft. I make this soup on Sunday and eat it throughout the week, thinning it with water as needed.

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Then each one of us, […] will move back out on the pitch-black porch and let the body heat of the day leech from the house and our own bodies out onto the night, its billion singers—tree frogs, cicadas, the deathless crickets, the high whine of bats–” Renyolds Price, Outdoor on the Porch

This bean has recently fallen under the spell of cicada music. As the day’s last light falls, she wanders from Grandma’s porch into the front yard to explore the emerging sights and sounds of twilight… she seems most intrigued by cicadas, which the Bean Girl sometimes refers to as bicadies.

She hears their song—verging on deafening—but she doesn’t see them. Perplexed, she returns to the porch, peppering Uncle Jack and Aunt Allison with questions. What are cicadas/bicadies? Where are they? Why do they make that noise?

We dig deep to share what we remember about the insect. In the winter, they live underground. After many years, they are ready to come up and spend time in the trees. Cicadas have wings. When Uncle Jack gets technical, Bean Girl makes her way back to the yard, swatting at oak and hickory trees with sticks. She hopes to lay her eyes on a cicada.

Her precocious exploration sparks my own inquiry. What do cicadas teach us? I recall that they are a beloved symbol of Provence. They spend years underground before seeking the sunlight. 19^th century poet Frédéric Mistral even granted cicadas their own motto: the sunlight makes me sing.

That light is slipping through our fingers. The evening air is heavy, but we feel autumn coolness pushing up against these last days of summer. As Bean Girl searches the yard, we settle deeper into our spots on the porch and sip the last of the rosé, engulfed in cicada song.

Inspirations

Out on The Porch

The Song of the Cicada

Sharing Soup, Sharing Stories

Cicada Song