The Truth About Luck: What I Learned on My Road Trip with Grandma (21 page)

“When Mom called to see how things were going one night, I told her about what was happening. How I was going crazy. She offered her own suggestion of salt. She said I should sprinkle it around my bed. She didn't think they'd like getting the sharp salt pieces in their legs. And then she started getting really excited. She suggested some herbs: dried, not fresh; maybe some basil, oregano, or, better yet, cayenne or smoked paprika. I wasn't sold, but I had some herbes de Provence, so I sprinkled it liberally.”

“Oh, Iain.”

“Funnily enough, it was a light that finally let me doze. It was the one I'd had with me since I was a kid. It's a chicken-shaped night light that plugs directly into a wall socket.”

“I saw that, too,” says Grandma, smiling.

“Yeah, I found it in one of my desk drawers,” I say. “So this is basically how I sleep every night now, pushed away from the wall, ear-plugged, surrounded by strong synthetic scents, dried herbs, and a small chicken torch spraying its light across half the room. And if it's not centipedes, I'm often thinking of something. I might start thinking of all the moments in a day when it's possible to choke on food or catch a foot and fall down some stairs. Other nights I think about something completely arbitrary, like a bag of brown sugar with an image on the front of a steaming cup of coffee. I'll think about how that was someone's job, to design the brown sugar bag. Why did they decide to put the steaming mug of coffee on it? None of this makes sense or is even reasonable, I know.”

“It's just the way your mind works. I wish I could be more of a help,” adds Grandma, patting me on the arm. “But you know me, I never have any problem with sleep.”

“That's amazing. It doesn't even rattle you when you're away from home or in another bed?”

“It doesn't even need to be a bed,” she says. “I can always sleep.”

The lack of rain, and maybe all the chatting, has made for a more pleasant trip back to the mainland. My mouth is dry from talking so much.

“That really is amazing,” I say. “Sometimes when I can't sleep, I'm not sure if it's because of something I was already thinking about too much or because I start worrying about not sleeping.

“I have a self-imposed rule,” I say. “If I've been lying there for more than an hour, I have to stop checking the clock. It only makes it worse if I keep looking and confirming how late it's getting. So I just try and ignore it. Sometimes I end up reading until it starts to get light out.”

“I haven't been awake at that time of night for ages.”

I turn down the Guthrie tape. “When you go to bed, how do you just turn your mind off?”

“Well,” she says, “I guess I don't have to.”

I look out my window for a bit and then ask Grandma if she wants to go up to the observation deck. But she says she's happy to stay in the car; she might even take a little snooze.

8:14 p.m.

I TOLD GRANDMA
I would make dinner.

“Oh, are we staying in to eat tonight?” she asked.

“Yeah. It's our last night. I thought that would be nice.”

“It'll be great.”

I poured her a glass of sherry and marshalled her to her pink chair, where she could read until dinner.

I returned to the kitchen and exhaled audibly. I put on my apron and made a scratch meatloaf with the lamb from the farm. I mixed the lamb with breadcrumbs, garlic, onion, an egg, and some spices, including cumin and cinnamon, and topped it with a sweet-and-sour sauce I made by reducing ketchup, vinegar, mustard, and brown sugar. I boiled some frozen peas and made a quick salad with iceberg lettuce, with mashed potatoes to go along. I understand it may not sound appealing to most, but this type of meat-and-potatoes dinner is right up Grandma's alley. It's the type of dinner she would have made for her family. She's always saying how she doesn't need anything fancy.

The loaf took some time to cook. It was after 7:30 p.m. by the time we sat. Now it's after 8 p.m., and we're just finishing. Grandma claimed to enjoy it. I think I was a bit heavy-handed with the cumin. She says she wants the recipe.

“And tell me again what you did with the salad. What was the dressing?” She takes a scrap piece of paper and a small blue pencil from her purse. “I want to write this down.”

“It's very easy. Just some balsamic, oil, and mustard. And just mix it all together. It's called Iain's Special Dressing.”

“It was lovely.”

Grandma's been doing this with most things I've made. She's asked for the recipe and then written it down. I don't imagine she'll ever get around to making any of these dishes. She thinks she will. I'm not sure she'll remember she's written them down or even be able to find them, since some are just on scraps of paper. But it shows how much she still enjoys food and the idea of cooking. It's knee-
bucklingly
charming.

“I've always liked food,” she says.

“Yeah, I've noticed that. It's great you still enjoy eating.”

“I've had some wonderful meals in my life. I've forgotten most of them by now.”

“But there are obviously some you remember.”

It takes her a moment to calibrate her thoughts. She places her notepaper on the table. “There was something I ate in Rome,” she says.

She tells me that in Rome, as in London, she seldom went anywhere or did anything alone. “Not by choice,” she says. “There was always a soldier, another nurse, a group around to join whatever was happening. One day I'd decided to go for a walk down into the city. I'm not sure how or why, but I was alone. It was a rare stroll, to have some privacy.

“We never really had much meat, and our rations were rarely satisfying. I'd been eating a lot of dry biscuits. The Americans had better rations. The Canadian nurses were given British supplies. When lucky, I would sometimes share a luxury only the Americans were given.”

“What was that?” I ask.

“Spam. The canned Spam was ambrosial. And at this point I hadn't had any Spam in months. I remember I was very hungry,” she says.

I stand and clear our plates. I leave the wineglasses. There's still about a third of the bottle left.

“I'm still listening,” I confirm, carrying the plates to the sink.

“Even for us nurses, clean water was very limited. The strict rationing included assigned canteens. We had to find the water truck in the morning to fill up. We had to use it for drinking, but also cleaning our teeth, washing, everything.”

Grandma tells me she had a German water bottle and had started using it. She doesn't reveal how she got it. “But the German design was superior. It had a larger volume and a cup attached to the top.”

She tells me again how she'd always loved food and eating. She'd grown up in a family who all appreciated and delighted in their nightly meal. She reminds me of this, but having seen her clean her plate entirely, even at ninety-two, at every meal this week, I'm keenly aware of her love of food and eating. She is wonderfully unfinicky.

“Back before the war, it was common while I was still studying in Winnipeg to stop on my way home to pick up some supplies for supper. I knew where to go: the basement of the Hudson's Bay store. They had a deli and fish counter down there. It was one of my favourite places in the city.

“I knew the men who worked there. I recognized the smells. Occasionally, as a treat, my mother would request a piece of cheese. My father's preference was always Gorgonzola.

“When I was younger still, my standard school lunch consisted of bread, butter, and a can of sardines. My classmates were always grossed out. I loved those lunches. And every so often, my mom would pack a piece of cheese.”

Grandma explains how it was cheese of all sorts that was the creamy, savoury foundation, the family's comfort food, at any meal. “We all just absolutely craved cheese,” she says before pausing. Her expression changes. “What was I telling you about?”

“You were talking about going for a walk one day, in Rome. And you were alone.”

“Yes, yes, I'm sorry, that's right,” she says. “When I was away from my duties, away from the routine, that's when I was hungriest.”

Grandma had gone for a solo swim in the sea. Then, she says, she went for a stroll. She found a signless café and entered.

“From the size and layout I assumed it served coffee, tea, maybe some sweets. But once I got inside, where I could smell all the smells, I realized it was a real restaurant. The waiter was a middle-aged man. He was tall and thin, like a fencepost.

“He moved around casually, gently, on the balls of his feet. I guessed he was in his late forties, but he looked older. I think he nodded at me when I first came in, smiled maybe, and left me some more time to settle in. He'd recognized my nursing uniform so was happy to serve me.”

“Even though he was Italian?” I ask.

“Yes, definitely. It seemed like everyone I met in Rome was happy to see me. It was amazing. I was welcomed everywhere in the city. Since being in Sicily and Italy, I'd sort of generalized everyone as lovers, not fighters. I know it sounds silly, but that's just how I felt. Like us, they wanted the war to end.

“Before I got to the café, I passed a young teenager on the street who was humming. So I kind of lingered within earshot. And I recognized the tune. Unlike the boys of that age in Canada, he was humming an operatic song. You see, it was just different there.”

“I'm sure.”

“I actually thought the waiter looked like an older version of the humming boy. Maybe it was his father. Probably not. But maybe. The waiter had been humming, too. Maybe that's why I thought they looked alike.”

Grandma laughs, I think at the implausibility of the two being related. It takes a moment for her to regain her place in the story.

“The place was empty. The street had been busy, and I could see people walking by the window. I suppose the majority of locals probably wouldn't have had any money to spend in a restaurant.

“It was cool inside; I think the window had been opened slightly. I could feel very little breeze, if any. I felt so comfortable. And as soon as I sat down I knew what I wanted. I'd been craving it for weeks, Iain, months. Well, for years.”

“What?”

“If the waiter had told me they served the freshest, best-tasting pasta on earth, smothered in the most exquisite sauce, I would have believed him. It just felt like the kind of place where a claim like that could be true. I could smell coffee and imagined it was likely better than any coffee I'd ever had. But I didn't want pasta or coffee.

“You see,” she continues, “being treated wasn't uncommon in those days. It just rarely involved food. It was often drink. One time — you can stop me if I've told you this already — I was taken to a pub — have I told you this?”

“No, I don't think so.”

“I was with a pilot. He was tall, a basketball player. I used to tell him that after the war I was going to have five children and all five would be boys. I wanted a family. He didn't know why I wanted five boys. I just thought five boys would be fun.

“But at the pub we met up with a large group. He left me at the table and returned with two glasses. Each one had a couple of inches of dark amber liquid. He put one down in front of me.” Grandma mimics the action of putting a glass down in front of her, her empty hand landing with a thud on the table. “And he kept one for himself. Just as he sat down, I picked up the glass, brought it up to my mouth, and tipped it down in one go.
Whoosh
, just like that.” She brings her hand up to her mouth, throws her head back, and then lets her hand fall back down to the table.

“It burned all the way down. He was shocked. You should have seen his face. He wasn't expecting me to drain it in one go. He asked me if I knew how much it had cost. He went on to tell me it was fine cognac. He said I was meant to swirl it, to sniff it, to sip it. I just shrugged and told him I was sorry. But it was pretty funny. He went back and got me another. But why was I telling you this?”

“You were telling me about the restaurant where you went alone.”

“Yes, that's right. In the restaurant that day I didn't want wine or cognac. And I was going to treat myself. I was alone, it was up to me. This will probably sound ridiculous to you, Iain, but you know what I wanted? Just cheese. And I wanted it plain, with a piece of fresh white bread.”

I'm watching Grandma as she speaks. Her cheeks have reddened again as the evening has advanced. Likely from the wine, though perhaps she's tired from the day, and the talking, maybe her cold. She looks happy, though. She looks lively, awake.

“It doesn't sound ridiculous at all, Grandma,” I answer. “I can't relate, obviously, but I can imagine.”

“But it was trying to order that became a game of misunderstanding. The waiter's English was poor. And as you know, language has never been my strength. Eventually, in my fuzzy, broken Italian, I conveyed my simple request. I just wanted some cheese, any cheese. He was genuinely pleased when he finally understood. Five minutes later he was back carrying two plates.”

“And you were still alone in the place?”

“Yup, just the waiter and me. One plate had crusty bread, the other had the cheese. He didn't tell me what kind. He just smiled and left it on the table.

“I knew I'd come to the right place, because the bread was warm. The piece was thick and crusty; I ripped it in two with my hands. The cheese was light in colour, a cloudy beige that grew lighter around the edges. I smelled it. It had an earthy, salty scent. It was firm. I wasn't really concerned about this, though. I wanted to taste it. I broke off a hunk and put it on top of the bread and took a bite. I've never had another bite of food like it. Never.

“After the war, thousands of miles from the restaurant in Rome, that meal came up for the first time. I told my Italian neighbour about the only piece of cheese I ate throughout the war. It had stayed in my mind. It came up the way these things do, spontaneously. It was summer. We were both outside working in our gardens, talking over the fence. My hands and knees were covered in dirt. I had mud under my fingernails, my cheeks must have been beet red, I was hot and sweaty. And I described the cheese in detail to him. I'm still not sure how it came up.