Red Velvet Wisdom

Last year my sweet little mother-n-law shocked me when she uttered these words. “I’m writing a book.”

We call her Ninny, and I was already dying to know more.  At 86 I had never known her to write more than a birthday greeting. It didn’t matter because she ia great cook and we love her. But what kind of book was she writing? Romance? Murder Mystery?

It turns out she was writing the memories of her life in a spiral bound notebook. She wanted her kids and grandchildren to have them so they would remember he after she passed on. She wanted me to copy them on a copy machine and staple them together. I already look for shortcuts to take and I knew I could make this book be something that was better than photocopied pages. In the end, we self published her story and added pictures and recipes. It is one of the sweetest things I’ve ever seen and is titled, Ninny.

Her book is one of the reasons we founded this site. The reaction to her book has been so amazing. People want to do the same for their family members who are older and have similar stories to tell. Her pastor was so moved by her book that he had a workshop for the senior citizens of the church to learn how to do the same. He reminded the congregation that once these stories are lost, we can’t get them back. How true.

Writing these stories has made me laugh and cry,  sometimes doing both simultaneously. I organized her story starting with her childhood. She was born and raised the era of the great depression. All they knew was the life they had. People were poor in a pitiful way we can’t imagine today. Her mother was in bad health. She had to take on the role of her mother at an early age. She said that she began getting up to make biscuits from scratch on a wood stove around the age of 12 and continued to do so until her husband passed away in 1965. Her style of cooking was born from having to use what she had to feed the family.

I asked what a typical day was like for her as a young wife. She said she woke early and made biscuits from scratch each day in the wood stove. She served honey, syrup, or gravy to go along with that. If a hog had been killed recently they would have sausage or bacon. Around 10:00 in the morning she would start a pot of beans on the stove and then cook some potatoes. That would be lunch and dinner as well. Rarely would there be any meat as they did not have a refrigerator. On Sundays there might be fried chicken. This would mean that someone (her) had to catch the chicken from the yard, wring its neck, dip it in scalding water, and then cut it up and cook it. Just hearing that makes me want to throw up all the chicken I’ve ever eaten.

Pork was an important staple in their lives. Kill a chicken: eat for a day. Kill a hog: You live the high life for months. They used the lard for cooking, baking and making soap. The fat was also used to season beans and peas. Sausage was canned and bacon cured to eat later. Very little went to waste in the hog killing process.

Very little went to waste at all in that time. Her underwear was made from flour sacks, only owning a new pair after she was married. Her prom dress was cut from curtain material. Peelings from fruit was dried to later make friend pies.

At times she shakes her head at the technology of today. Her new great granddaughter has more baby items than all of her kids together. I asked if she had anything like a bouncy seat. “No, I did have a little tiny rocking chair. They loved it. I would tie them in it and they would rock themselves to sleep.  Yes, I laughed out loud at the the thought of my husband tied to a chair.

“What did you tie them with?”

“A diaper. I just tied it around their waist and then the back of the chair.”

I asked how they washed diapers. She said they boiled them and hung them out to dry. I can picture myself letting slacking off on laundry for a day of 5 and  not have a diaper. She said no, she never did that. Maybe once one of the boys was sick to his stomach and she has to use a cup towel, but otherwise you just did your laundry each day. Boiling and hanging out. Why do I have a hard time getting them to the room where the washer is? Heaven help my family if I had to boil a pot of water and hang anything out.

We enjoy this dish more than anything else she makes. She makes them at least a few times a month and we never have any crumbs left. (shocker)

Sweet Potato Pie

• 1 C. Cooked Sweet Potato
• 1 1/2 C. sugar
• 3 Tbls Flour
• 2 eggs
• 1 stick margarine
• 1/2 C Corn syrup
• small can evaporated milk