TheBanyanTree: Sort Of About A Mixer

[Pam Lawley]

So, my KitchenAid mixer is dying...  yes, I suppose that there are more
pressing issues in the world today, but right here, in my house, to me, this
is pretty major.

The father I grew up with was a jerk.  Of course, he probably thought that
his father was a jerk as well, and unfortunately, he was only taught one way
to raise children.  Be in charge and beat obedience out of them!  I would
never have dreamed of talking to my father the way my children sometimes
talk to me.  And if I had ever reacted to my children talking that way, the
way my father would have reacted, well, I'd be in jail right now probably.
 But times, they are a changin'...

I remember bloodied lips and bloodied noses, and bruises.  A lot of bruises.
 And beatings.  My stomach just dropped, right now, just remembering back to
those beatings.  And they were the same beatings that my gather got at the
hand of his father as well.  NOT a cheery way to raise children.  We weren't
a 'touchy-feely' lot, and nobody ever told anybody that they were loved or
appreciated. But somehow, my two siblings and I managed to grow up.  Oh, we
all have our issues, trust me!  I don't think you can grow up with that much
'dysfunction' and not!

The kicker is, that I grew up loving that man, and craving his approval!  I
was also the middle child, and from what I've read, a pretty textbook
'pleaser'.  My mission in life has been to "keep the peace" and do whatever
I could, in whatever situation I found myself in, to make everybody happy.
 Silly, a person can't "MAKE" anybody do or be anything!

(A conversation with my children's father way back when:  Him:  "Are you
trying to make me mad?!?!?".  And me:   "No, if I could MAKE you something
I'd MAKE you turn the TV off and change your son's diaper!")

Anyway, I've gone through life feeling a lot of moments of panic, and my
first thought was, "I'll bake cookies!".  I'm not sure WHY I thought baking
cookies would make everything alright, but it's always been my first "go to"
happy thought for keeping the peace.  There you have it!

But my father... He drank a lot, and he smoked.  There was always a bottle
of Jim Beam in the house, and I can remember many mornings watching him take
a shot.  He said it was for "medicinal purposes only".  Whatever.  I always
thought that I never saw him drunk, but the truth is that maybe I never saw
him sober.  He was a big eater - strictly a 'meat and potoatoes' kind of
guy.  The foods that I remember liking in my childhood were foods I ate in
the lunchroom at school.  (We had quite healthy and varied lunches back
then!)  Oh, we were fed just fine at home, but it was never anything
original.  Just the basics that my father liked.  Except for canned
mushrooms.  I remember weekends when my mom made spaghetti sauce.  Cans and
cans of tomatoes and sauces all dumped into a big pot and set to simmer all
day.  And she always threw in canned mushrooms.  My father HATED them so I'm
not exactly sure how she dared displease him and use them, but I remember
every time we had spaghetti he would pick through the sauce, claim he got
EVERY mushroom from the can, and he'd put them on her plate.

Anyway, suffice it to say that my father was a bastard - but a really
charming and likable guy! - and we all lived in fear of pissing him off.  He
spent 24 years in the Army (which probably didn't help his disposition any)
and then retired and started his own wallpaper hanging business.  He worked
hard and he played hard, and enjoyed golf on the weekends.

And then, in 1982, karma dealt him a little payback (okay, so maybe it had
nothing to do with karma) and he had a stroke.  And it was a pretty
debilitating stroke at that, in the brain stem.  While it was touch-and-go
for a few hours, he lived, but he lived a very different life and all the
rules changed.  He suffered no paralysis, but one side of his body remained
'numb' for the rest of his life.  And something in his palate was screwed up
for months and he couldn't swallow.  He would chew and spit - he carried
that damn cup around forever and somehow we all adapted to the grossness of
it.  They sent him to a hypnotist after awhile thinking that so much time
had passed that he was afraid to swallow.  I went with him for that and
watched the whole process.  It didn't work well and he continued to spit,
and hack and cough when things 'tickled' the back of his throat.  But
eventually, though it was never THE 'red letter day' we'd anticipated, he
needed the cup less and less until he just didn't need it anymore.

He also never walked again without a cane.  His balance was screwy and he
always looked drunk, sort of going from Point A to Point B, via Point C.  He
found it was a little challenging to be the Jerk In Charge would people
could outrun you!  And were stronger than you.  And had more balance than
you too!!  My very favorite story from mother was the day they argued and it
all just came bubbling up and she stood up to him - she, his main
care-giver! - and shouted in his face, "F**K YOU!  F**K YOU!  F**K YOU!"  Of
course, then she ran, but he ended up laughing at the absurdity of it all,
and in time, came to appreciate her.

And his kids too.  Perhaps it helped that I - who was the only one of us
three who had ever attempted it! (because I was a suck-up trying to please
him!) - talked to him.  And I told him a lot of things that *I* had kept
bottled up inside.  One conversation particularly was pretty cathartic.  I
explained to him that I did NOT want to raise my children like he raised us.
 I wanted them to be able to BE children - and that meant NOT sitting
quietly at three (he used to LOVE to brag about how people thought that we
were SO well-behaved as children!), spilling the occasional glass of milk,
and being energetic and running around and testing boundaries SAFELY without
fear of blood!  And I told him how I made sure to tell my children EVERY DAY
that they were special and loved.  I'll always remember his question, "But
Pam, didn't you *know* I loved you?"  And me, "Dad, was I supposed to be
able to read your mind?"

It was sort of like finding that the nice guy we just KNEW had to be
suppressed underneath the bastard, finally came out. It wasn't easy at first
- it felt so damn STRANGE! - but I always made it a point to TELL him that I
loved him, and always told me the same.  I had always been his
self-professed 'favorite' -no surprise there!  *I* was the only one of the
three whose life mission was to PLEASE him, my older sister and younger
brother reacted to his personality just the opposite, and did everything
they could to get trouble and anger him!  Anyway, in those last 14 years of
his life, we became even closer and found we had a lot of things in common.
 (Funny, I also ended up the one with the worst memory!  My sister relates
stories of hateful, ugly things he did in my childhood and I simply have NO
memory whatsoever of them!!  [Wouldn't a shrink have a fine time with all
that?!?!])

After his stroke he had lots of doctor's appointments, and some of them were
at Duke, a major medical center here in North Carolina, a few hours from
their house.  One day, after an appointment, they stopped at a small cafe
for lunch, and my dad ordered quiche.  It was something that he would
*never* have eaten pre-stroke, and for whatever reason, he found it easier
to chew and digest!  So my mom came home hunting up quiche recipes to make
for him since she was always on the lookout for things that caused the least
amount of coughing and gagging.

But my mother still worked full-time, so it came to father to find things to
swallow.  Their kitchen was relatively small and he could stand up and have
a counter within easy reaching distance whichever direction he might have
started to stumble.  And then, a gourmet cook was born!  First he started
with fruit juices, combining bottles and bottles of different flavors trying
for something new and original.  (Another note here - he tried to pour a
little vodka into that juice but quickly found out that his already-unsteady
legs didn't need any help!!  He big drinking days were past.)  And then,
when he was able to swallow on his own more and more, his cooking got more
creative as well.  Oh, he was still a basic 'meat and potatoes' guy, but he
was at least willing to experiment and try new things.  Including mushrooms.
 If he cooked red meat, then first he was sauteing a pan full of sliced
mushrooms and onions in butter!!   Yes, the man who cringed at a tiny bite
of canned mushroom suddenly couldn't cook without a pound of fresh!

And then he branched out into baking.  He actually took a cake decorating
class from Wilton, and even managed to show PATIENCE with the hand that
constantly shook!  (Ever tried to hold a bag of frosting steady with shaking
hands?!)  The kitchen became HIS, and he collected every gadget and
appliance he could find!   Including his very own KitchenAid lift-stand
mixer!  A heavy-duty 4.5 quart Pro Series!  She was a beauty - powerful and
sturdy!  I remember the first time I saw it, and I told him, "When you die,
I want THIS!"   Neither my mother or either of my siblings was big into
baking so it was never a big fight to begin with.

And when he died, I carried that mixer home.  I've been trying to figure out
how old it might be.  His stroke was in '82, and he died in '96.  Split the
difference and say '90??  I dunno.  But it has lived a long and useful life!
 I also inherited all his Wilton decorating tools, and decorated frosting is
mixed for 7 minutes.  Multiply that by dozens and dozens of recipes.  And
the cakes and cookies and even mashed potatoes I've whipped up.  Hours and
hours and hours of mixing.

But now it's starting to die.  I made a Mexican Hot Chocolate Pound Cake
last week and was quite saddened to hear the motor whining.  (Another note:
 A friend's son made up a recipe for Hot Chocolate cookies - and he threw
some cayenne in there for a wonderful 'tickle' effect in swallowing.  When I
saw the cake recipe in my recent copy of _Southern Living_ magazine, I
copied his idea and tossed a teaspoon of cayenne in with the cinnamon!!
 WONDERFUL!)  I've started pricing them - they range into the hundreds!
 Some of their models have beautiful color choices - including purple! - but
not in the model that I want.

And NOT getting a KitchenAid is simply not an option.  Having lasted all
these years, it's proven that it's worth the money.  And if dad was still
around I'm sure he'd be disappointed if I didn't.  Not that I'm still living
to please him - it's just one of the lessons he managed to embed on my
brain:  'It only costs a nickel more to go first class.'  Actually, I've
found that's really only true at the post office, but the spirit of the
point lives on.

Pam