Everything Goes Away
Ever since I was a child I have loved baking; melting chocolate, adding eggs and crispy brown sugar, stirring and turning it into smooth consistency. Sifting a bit of flour and mixing, mixing, mixing until it gets perfectly brown and homogeneous. Placing it into the oven for twenty minutes, letting the aroma of anticipated chocolate pleasure spread around the house and out of it, through the small open window, beckoning even strangers passing by. Later, when I open the oven, the hot chocolate aroma kicks me right in my nose — the cake is ready.
My grandmother was the one who instilled in me the love of cooking and especially baking. As most children are close to their grandparents in childhood, I used to be very close to her. Almost every dark autumn evening of weekdays, after the homework was done and school could be forgotten, I spent in my grandma’s kitchen, trying new receipts from her old-old notebooks. She was born in 1927 and by the time I turned 6 in 2005, she had a great collection of all possible bakery recipes and hints. Old, but good, tested by time and generations.
What used to attract me most was the process of creating food, while my father was the one who enjoyed homemade pastries. Only sweet and warm memories of childhood and my grandma’s kitchen are left from those times. The atmosphere of coziness would be doubled by the presence of my little dog –Liza, similar in character to me. This small and nimble ball of short black fur would constantly begged for something from the table, eventually getting the bowl to lick after the pastry has been put into a baking container.
Those warm and carefree times. When I got older and entered my teenage period I turned into a little bastard who would get irritated in one second, willing to argue with all around. Consequently, I started spending more time at my computer, gradually leaving cozy evenings behind in the past. By the time I entered my university, the communication with my grandma reduced to nothing. However, I have never forgotten that she loves sundaes and every time I went to the shop I got one for her. She couldn’t walk due to the old trauma of her broken thigh. In her eighties she barely had teeth or vision. Not the best retirement at all.
University education limited my home visits to four times a year in my freshman year and to two times in my sophomore year. The last time I have been home was sevenmonths ago for the duration of 4 days. And in those days I wouldn’t spend time with my grandmother. Moreover, making myself clearer, I would barely visit her house, which actually wasn’t that difficult as it is 20 meters from my family’s, in the same yard. I am one of those children for whom the knowledge of their close ones being well and alive is enough not to worry about them.
I left my home again seven months ago and I did not say goodbye to her. I forgot.
My dog passed away in May after my freshman year. My grandma left this earth in July 2018 after my sophomore year, less than a month before her birthday.
In the end of this summer in the US I thought of cooking pancakes, the real ones — Slavic. The ones my grandma used to make. Thin dough, perfectly cooked with crunchy spots. Nobody could cook the same ones, even me — her “student.” I wanted to contact her in order to get the recipe. But, there is no one to be contacted any more and will never be. Everything gets eventually taken away. Everyone goes away. The only question is: “When?”
What cannot are my warm memories of dark autumn evenings with my grandma and the dog in her kitchen full of baking aromas.
