French Onion Soup

"Your due date is December 24th."

"No, no, no, no. Are you sure? That can't be right."

The doctor looked at me over the top of his reading glasses. It was 1991, and questioning medical authority was still unpracticed--especially when the questions came from pregnant women.

"It's just that I have three small children at home. I can't...I mean, seriously...I really CAN'T be in the hospital on Christmas Eve. Are you really, really sure?"

Was that pity or annoyance crossing his face?

Yes, yes, he was sure.

I'd come to the doctor in the first place--folded my clothes on the chair--wrapped the thin paper robe around me--sat on the edge of the stainless steel table, arms gripping elbows--because of my husband. Well, yes, of course, THAT, but really because of this conversation:

Me: I can't believe I've had the flu for so long. I just keep feeling like total crap. I mean, how long can this last?
Him: Jill.
Me: What?
Him: Look at me.
Me: What?
Him: You don't have the flu. You're pregnant. You should take a test.
Me: What?

Now, keep in mind that I pretty much knew I was pregnant immediately with my first three children. This time, my husband, a human being with no uterus, knew before I did. This is why I think I didn't know:
1. my oldest was sixish.
2. my second was four.
3. my youngest was, well, one.
4. my husband traveled...a lot.

After the baby was born, we spent a lot of time in surival mode: everyone safe and fed, nothing more and nothing less. (Well, there were the times that two-year-old Laura moved baby Rachel from the couch onto the floor when I went to the bathroom, that Laura drank Dimetap while wearing her bathing suit in February and the nurses at St. Clair Hospital narrowed their eyes at me while I held the baby in one arm and my poor toddler's head in the other while she vomited the contents of her stomach, that I sliced open the palm of my hand on a sheet of heavy-duty aluminum foil while helping Matty build a diorama of the Mall in Washington, DC while Andy wrote his spelling words and the girls pounded on their high chair trays and blood dripped on the Lincoln Memorial). [Editor's Note--these events are just a representative selection of the chaotic events that occurred in the Sunday household].

On the night of the bloody-monument incident, I looked at my babies--Matty's sweet face open with expectation with the promise of this project; Andy's red head bent over the paper, freckled hands carefully looping letters; Laura's little voice piping "Why, Mommy?" as she watched me tear the foil, squirming impatiently in her high chair; and the baby, Rachel's hands smacking the tray top, her movements sending cheerios into flight--and the deep ache of parenthood washed over and through me...this would not be the only time I would lovingly and unintentionally fail them.


In California, where golden warmth is a daily presence, where oranges mimic the sweetness of the sun, they call her Sunny. She is that, my own share of the sun, and decidely much more wonderful than a prolonged bout with the flu.







So, I'm here to tell you now that my golden moment was at the end of a day, when my babies were fed, bathed (so sweet-smelling in their soft necks), and piled around me for story time, all of us leaning into one another, through a weird blend of mother will and metaphysics morphing into one. I'd close the last bedroom door, tiptoeing away, a peaceful lullaby beating in my heart. Yeah, even if I had to bleed on the Lincoln Memorial again (even repeatedly, just like the seemingly never-ending Groundhog Day) I'd buy the ticket for that time-travel experience without hesitation.

About a week after my first boy left for college, the sweet-faced Matty of the Mall project, a bottle of Red Hot in the Giant Eagle condiment aisle did me in, his absence in my daily life made so clear to me by the fact that I didn't need to add that thick, spicy liquid to my purchases. His siblings followed suit, of course, as it should be, and my cart was less full of their wants and needs.

"What would I  like for dinner?"

Hmmm....now that's a question that took some time to answer.

My children call me for my recipes, often while pushing their own carts through grocery stores as far away as Maryland and California. (Soon, there will be calls from Helena, Arkansas, as "Why, Mommy?" Laura begins work there.) When Laura dropped her college meal plan, after she'd moved into an apartment as a sophomore, we'd spend an hour or so on the phone while she strolled the aisles of Safeway.

Sunny Rachel girl would roll her eyes, "Are you really on the phone while she SHOPS?" It wouldn't be long until I shopped long distance with her, too. Now we trade Snapchats of our separately-prepared feasts.

In my comfy chair, with my feet up and my eyes closed, I walk next to my girls, sharing recipes. Later, a little bit of me shows up at far-removed dinner tables, sometimes at four different spots in one night!

Look! There I am.

On a weekend like this, when Mother's Day temperatures threaten to take us back into the chilly zone, and I long for that long lost golden hour, it's best to comfort ourselves with some French Onion Soup. The most glorious French Onion Soup I've ever "ohhhheeeddd" over spoonful by spoonful, I ate at a little bistro in Paris situated across the river from Notre Dame (but within perfect view of its spires), and just down the street from Sylvia Beach's legendary bookstore--Shakespeare and Company. The best version I've made myself is fashioned after Pioneer Woman Ree Drummond's creation; she concludes her beautiful step-by-step photographic instructions by saying "It’s everything, is what it is."

When my children were little, I often made French Onion Soup in the crockpot. I like this new version better, and when they call me for the recipe, here's what I'll tell them:

There will probably be tears. [Editor's Note: Feel free to substitute a mental image of the Lincoln-Memorial incident here.]



Things will probably get a little messy. [Editor's Note: Feel free to insert "Try, try, and try again" or "I think I can...I think I can..." here.]

 

 

 

Quality counts. Buy the good cheese. [Editor's Note: Feel free to subsitute "To thine ownself be true" here.]

 

 

Don't cook with wine that you wouldn't drink. [Editor's Note: Feel free to substitute "I hope you dance" here.]

 

 

 

 

Hot cheese fixes everything. [Editor's Note: Feel free to substitute "I will always love you" here.]

 

 

  Here's Pioneer Woman's recipe for everything.  Enjoy.