Theirs was a wonderful marriage… one that you don’t see very
often. Some called it “perfect.” It had all the essential ingredients;
friendship, humor, passion, and respect.
The achievements of their lives and their long term goals had come about
in the most natural of ways. From their
early days as a couple, they just seemed to click. They made decisions together but there was
rarely much discussion. They just seemed
to think alike. They raised two
wonderful daughters, now grown and making their own way. A comfortable retirement was staring them in
the face on that fateful day. Mac had
sold his manufacturing company and collected $60 million literally minutes
before a massive cargo trailer decoupled from its cab, careened across the
highway and ended the life of his beloved Claire.
Claire was a busy pediatrician but she still found time for
her interest in cooking. She claimed it
was a great way to escape the demands of the practice. She also knew that Mac loved a good meal on
the table. One of Mac’s favorites was
Claire’s meat loaf. Now, good meat loaf
is hard to find. Some is stuffed with
too much filler. Some is too bland. Some just don’t have the right texture…
“mouth feel,” as Mac called it. But
Claire’s was just right. Claire’s
meatloaf soon became the most requested meal for family birthday dinners at
which the birthday person gets to pick the meal.
So it was one day in June when Sarah, Mac’s oldest daughter
dropped by his house in the afternoon.
Sarah and her sister Nicki made a point of seeing their father as often
as possible. Truth be told, they
secretly devised a schedule between them to insure that at least one of them
was in touch with him every day. They
missed their mother terribly and could only imagine how badly Mac did. Nicki called such visits “life support,” and
Sarah agreed. But both girls were crazy
about their father and welcomed such “duty” cheerfully.
“You know what I’ve been missing?” Mac asked Sarah.
“What, Daddy?”
“Your mother’s meat loaf,” he answered. “Man, what I would give for one of her meat loaves.”
They were sitting at the kitchen table where so many great
meals and good times had taken place.
Sarah glanced over at the bookcase that occupied the corner near the
window overlooking the back yard. “Me,
too,” she murmured quietly as got up.
She moved toward the bookcase.
“If you’re thinking there is a recipe for it over there,
we’re going to be disappointed,” Mac said.
“She never looked at anything when she was making that meat loaf. She had it in her head.”
Sarah took a loose leaf binder from one of the shelves. “Well, she didn’t always have it in her head, Daddy.”
Sarah thumbed through pages and pages; some typed, some written in
Claire’s neat hand. She turned over
newspaper clippings containing various dishes.
Mac watched with a smile on his face as Sarah dealt with
Claire’s filing system. “I tell you she
just knew it, Sarah.”
“Hmmm. Here’s
one.” Sarah studied an old three by five
index card. It was soiled with what
appeared to be spilled ingredients from plenty of use. “I can’t read the first words but the last two
are definitely ‘meat loaf.’ I’ll bet
this is it.”
Mac’s eyes brightened and he stood. “Let’s go to the grocery store. Bring that card,” he said.
An hour later, Mac and Sarah were back and unpacking the
recipe’s ingredients on the kitchen counter.
“Let’s make this together, Sarah. I need to learn how,” Mac said.
“Okay,” she agreed. “I’ll
read off what to do and you do it. Let’s
double it and I’ll call Jim and Nicki.
You know they’ll want some.” Sarah’s
husband had once said he would walk across cut glass to get to Claire’s meat
loaf. And her sister, also a doctor,
simply said that she would kill for it.
Sarah watched closely as Mac followed the directions that
she read from the card.
The impromptu family dinner happened that night. Seated around the table with empty plates
before them, Mac leaned back in his chair and smiled. “Claire left us many things,” he said. “But her meat loaf is sure one of the best.”
“It sure is,” said Jim.
It was Nicki who declared, “There’s a reason they call it
‘comfort food,’ Daddy.”
Learn more about Mac and his family in “FollowingClaire.”
Click here for Claire’s Meat Loaf recipe.
Got everything but the saltines. Going to the store, gonna make it tonight!
ReplyDeleteGolf