Taming of the Dude: One man's Journey with Jesus

Chapter 8- Mom's Secret Recipe

Chapter 8 Mom's secret recipe

Believe in yourself, and the rest will fall into place. Have faith in your own abilities, work hard, and there is nothing you cannot accomplish. Brad Henry

I knew that things were not the best in my house, but the truth of how bad it would become apparent in Middle School. I had friends, but most of my friends were fringe dwellers. They were not the jocks or the in-crowd. They were minorities: people who were different due to cultural background, ethnicity or in the case of one friend, brilliant with poor social skills. I had social skills, but I was not brilliant. I had smarts, but they were not booked, but street smarts. I knew how to navigate tricky situations, like breaking the law without getting caught. I am not sure, but for some reason, we were friends. We would be friends all the way up to the time he went on to a private school for the incredibly gifted, and I went on to the local public school, for all those who went to school because it was mandatory.

When we were together and hanging out, we would spend time at each other's houses. I remember one time we were hanging out and time got away from us. I was still there by the time dinner was to start. They invited me to stay, but I never do well with adults and strangers, so I declined. They insisted, and would not stop asking until I said yes. In the end, I did say yes and stayed for dinner. It was like I was eating with aliens. I had never been to a dinner table where the people would sit and talk. It was weird. They were talking about politics and abstract thoughts on every topic. Their words were all more than one syllable. And every thought was an intelligent, well thought out argument. I was adrift, drowning and hoping for a lifeline. My friend did not think it was odd at all, in fact, he said that was the way most dinners went at his house. Besides the conversation, the food was foreign too. They had this thing about eating healthy. They served homemade bread that had over a billion seeds and nuts in it. It weighed a ton and took an hour to eat, and another week to digest. The plate had vegetables and other healthy options. We did not eat vegetables at my house, and the only bread we had was "Wonder Bread", which was soft and gooey and dissolved in your mouth. You don't even have to chew it. We spent a good hour of conversing, for me listening and daydreaming about the meal being over, and eating stuff that I have no idea what it was. I think one thing they offered was hummus, which to me looked like vomit, but I did try it, and it was good. I think it was the first time I have ever eaten garlic. I eat garlic all the time now. Eventually, we finished and I asked my friend if we were celebrating a special occasion. He told me that is just a normal meal. I told him if that is normal, then please do not invite me again. I cannot handle the good food or all of the conversation that you all do. He just laughed and thought I was joking. He would learn, not so far off in the future, that I was not joking.

It just so happens that a month later, my friend found himself at my house for dinner. I think it was a Saturday night around 7, my mom was not home and we were getting ready to watch a dirty movie. I knew how to make some basic meals. One such meal was spaghetti. It was relatively easy. It only required cooking hamburger, boiling noodles and placing it all together in one pot with spaghetti sauce. There would be no salad, or vegetables with this meal. The bread would have butter, but it would be white and not weigh 2 pounds, due to whole wheat and nuts. Everything was going without any problems, but in the process, my mom came home. She was drunk and insistent on taking over. Her speech was slurred, so politics and abstract conversations were out. She did manage, "hi" with a hiccup. She staggered in the kitchen and mumbled away about some stuff. She would reassure us that everything is going well and dinner would be ready shortly. I continued to watch the TV with my friend. He seemed kind of oblivious to my mom and her drunken state , which was okay with me. I heard a loud noise in the kitchen. I got up and went to check it out. I was really annoyed with what I saw. My mom dropped the sauce. The last step to making spaghetti, and she messed it up. The sauce was everywhere. It was on the floor, the walls, the furniture, and the ceiling. I asked her what were we going to do. My friend was expecting to eat, and it was really late now, too late to start something else. My mom's solution was to scrape the sauce off the floor and add it to the awaiting meat and noodles. I protested, but being that my mom was in no state to rationally understand what she was doing, I left. It was useless to argue or to change my mom's dinner plans. I returned to the living room and told my friend that dinner would be ready shortly. On reflecting back on the situation, I probably should have given my friend the option of eating or not eating the spaghetti... but I didn't. We all sat around the table with my drunken mom, the spaghetti that was scraped off the floor and my friend. He ate spaghetti. We did not talk, and dinner did not last an hour. It probably was over in about 5 minutes. My friend choked down his dinner. I ate butter bread,then we went back to our movie. He would ask me later why did I not eat. I told him that my mom scraped the sauce off the floor, so I did not want to eat it. He looked at me shocked and said, "Why did you not tell me." I looked at him and said that I thought you were hungry.

We both agreed on that day that we would not eat at each other's houses. He had his reasons, and I had mine. I think his reasons were more justified than my reasons. I am happy to say that the dinner did not end our friendship but he definitely did not take any food from me.