These two are my favorite family stories and I laugh every time I tell them; I hope you do as well. In Chile, as my mother worked, and my father was incapacitated due to muscular dystrophy, we had two maids to help the household. While this sounds… uppity, in Chile, at least at the time I lived there, most households employed at least one maid. Our maids had room and board as well.
The two maids used to share the workload, one primarily doing the family shopping and cooking, and the other one doing the cleaning of the home and laundry. When I was around 6 or 7 years old, the maid that cleaned our home got sick. Apparently, she had something wrong with her kidneys. I remember that she was out of the house for a couple of weeks.
The maid who cooked used to confer with my mother early in the morning over the day’s menu and get money from Mom to buy groceries. She would then go to the market and shop accordingly. One day, while the maid who cleaned was still out sick, my Mom, with an exquisite sense of timing, ordered kidneys and something or other for dinner. Kidneys… Can you see the mind of a 6 or 7-year old working yet? If not, here it goes, purely deductive reasoning from a 6 or 7-year old mind: Our cleaning lady is out because she had kidney problems; she’s had an operation to her kidneys; she’s not been here for a while after her operation; Mom orders kidneys for dinner. Therefore, it’s clear: the kidneys belong to the cleaning lady and there’s no way in hell that I’m going to eat them. And to this day, I don’t eat kidneys…
Christmas dinners at our home were always special: lots of goodies and my father used to come down from the main bedroom, regardless of how bad he may have felt, and eat dinner with us. We usually had roasts (whether beef or some game bird), plus lots of sweets, cakes, etc. In other words, they were always great, but…
One Christmas when I was 7-years old, us kids asked Mom what she was going to make for Christmas dinner. She said it was a surprise but that we would really like it. We were thrilled!!! A surprise!!! Probably some great meat roast, chocolate cake and ice cream—in the Southern Hemisphere, it’s summer during Christmas, so yeah, ice cream. For about a week, we kept pestering her about what the surprise meal was. She always answered, “It’s a surprise but you are really going to like it.” In a moment of weakness, she said it was beef… GREAT! I could see a giant roast and, like Pavlov’s dog’ would salivate at the thought… Dog Boy!
Finally, Christmas day!!! After all the presents had been opened, Mom began preparing dinner. Normally, the maid cooked but on special occasions Mom herself did the cooking with the maid assisting her. This was such an occasion. Naturally I was very curious about Mom’s surprise. I tried to sneak into the kitchen—NO GO! This was really going to be a surprise. I went upstairs and tried to get my father to tell me, but he wouldn’t—he said he didn’t know. I hung out near the kitchen door—lots of smells but… nothing like beef roast…
Finally, it was time for dinner. Dad came down from upstairs, we all sat down, said prayers, etc. Time for the food… I get this plate with something grayish-white on it; it looked YUCK!
“What is it?” I asked.
Mom: “It’s cow brains. Try it.”
NO WAY! It smelled… and not like roast beef for sure. I think I may have tasted it once but didn’t eat any of it. Cow brains for Christmas! Love you, Mom, but really??? No thank you.
Though I’m a meat and potatoes guy, I’ve never overcome my aversion to any kind of internal organ meats, whether kidneys, brains, liver, etc. And even though our family comes from the Basque country in Spain where internal organ cuisine are a specialty, no internal organ meats for me. Don’t know if the maid’s kidneys or brains for Christmas caused it, but I’m sure they didn’t help my appetite and I won’t touch any!
By: Homeless With a Laptop, That is My Name
Бездомные с ноутбуком, это мое имя
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