Can You Hear Me Now?

I stopped cooking when my sister left town. She's always leaving. Houses, cities, states, husbands, lifetimes. Our relationship rekindled exponentially with the advent of the cell phone. Now I can reach her anywhere, with two exceptions: The Cabin and The Afterlife.

The Cabin refers to a slice of woods and shoreline a stone's throw from the Wilderness at the back door of Canada. My husband and I stumbled on it several decades ago; we had no clue it would morph into the mythic boreal version of "We'll Always Have Paris" that it has. But it has. "If there's a war (pestilence/comet/invasion/another Bush in the White House), head for the cabin" has become a mantra within our group. At the very least, its location allows us the illusion that we are indeed really Canadians, having nothing whatsoever in common with your Average American Asshole (hereafter referred to as AAA). Actually, we think of ourselves as Borderliners. With all that implies.

The Afterlife speaks for itself. At least my sister thinks so. In a way, she believes this is The Afterlife, in that it has come after The Former Life, which came after The Life Before That, you get the idea. I don't know about this. But I do know that Verizon can't cover the Borderline, and it goes without saying it can't cover the Ultimate Border, so unless one of us is dead or at The Cabin, my sister and I are a cell phone's throw from one another at any given time. I like to say of my sister, "She moved to California, and it took." Which explains alot. About both of us.

Periodically, my sister makes a pitstop back in her home state for a couple of years. To catch her breath and remind herself why she got the hell outta Dodge in the first place. Minor things like forty below zero and Jesse Ventura come to mind. Not to mention AAAs with gun racks for headboards. The last time my sister revisited Dodge, she parked her gypsy wagon Up North, about a mile from chez moi. This happened just after our father died. She came for the funeral and stayed for a year. One night, in the midst of funeral week, she had a vision; the next day she called a rental agent, found a place to live, flew back to California and pulled up stakes. She tucked the stakes into a secret compartment in the trunk of her car and headed 2,000 miles east, then turned left.

That was the Year of Living Gastronomically. Having never known my way around a kitchen (I tend to get lost in the refrigerator, somewhere in the vicinity of Ecco Domani), that year I became inspired. Like I'd had a vision. My sister would come to dinner every Saturday evening, and because the default season Up North is winter, I'd spend the afternoon shoveling snow and cooking, usually something red. After eating, we'd convene to the living room to feed the fire and drink wine and commune. Mostly we communed about The Cabin and The Afterlife. This went on for months. Then, when the snow melted in July, my sister checked the secret compartment in her trunk and drove back to California. Soon afterward I started getting lost in the refrigerator again.

I don't understand why I suddenly donned a chef's hat that year. Or why I later misplaced it. My immediate family should be culinary inspiration enough, it seems to me. Maybe I'm a bad person. Although for one year, a few years back, I was a good cook. Now, occasionally, I'll feel that urge again, and I'll whip up a vat of chili or a tub of marinara or a plank of lasagna. It's usually below freezing when this happens. Afterward, with the candles snuffed and the dishes bussed and the leftovers tucked away in a secret compartment, I'll convene to the living room and call California. A sort of prodigal gourmet. And whether she's between houses or husbands, and thanks to one of the miracles of Modern Life, my sister usually answers.