Cherries in Winter: My Family's Recipe for Hope in Hard Times by Suzan Colón Read Free Book Online Page B

again.
    Between shifts I managed to squeeze in a small nervous breakdown, but at least I never had to ask my parents for a dime. I had enough of those in my tip jar.
    • • •
    There’s a lot of negativity about being laid off, but I’ve discovered one of the major benefits: time. More time with Nathan, since I used to get home from work at around eight-thirty on a good night, and now I’ve got dinner going when he walks in at five-thirty. And more time to make the three-train trip up to see Mom whenever she’s got a day off from working at the furniture showroom she runs with Dad. In this economy, when my parents may go half a week without seeing a single customer, Mom and I are spending a lot more time together. Sitting with her at Nana’s antique dining table, learning about our history over many cups of tea, is something my old impressive salary couldn’t buy.
    Mom’s got her own stories about heading down south with more hope than money, but they’re much happier ones. “It was right around this time of year,” she says one night at dinner, “just a few weeks before Thanksgiving, that your Nana reached her breaking point with the farm …”
    • • •
    NOVEMBER 1949
    SARATOGA SPRINGS, NEW YORK
    In a way, Matilda thought as she peeled potatoes by the sink, waiting for Charlie to come home, her husband’s impulsive decision to buy the farm had been something of a blessing. If they had stayed in the Bronx, they would have suffered through unemployment and food rationing during World War II. But between the income from Charlie’s job at the factory and living on what was essentially a very large victory garden, they’d done better than most.
    Which wasn’t to say life had been easy—that first winter especially. But Matilda had learned her way around the farmhouse’s ancient kitchen thanks to The Grange ladies (who were thrilled with their new hairstyles and makeup), and there was some more income from selling milk, butter, and eggs. Which was also extra work: Charlie had to milk the cows when he got home from a full shift at the plant, and Matilda made the butter herself with a churn operated by a foot pedal. It was exhausting work, but it kept her legs good. She’d swing the milk pailaround and around over her head without losing a drop, just as she had with Grandpa’s beer pail when she was a kid, to make Carolyn laugh. When the chickens had gotten old enough to lay eggs, they’d started selling those to the distributor too, candling them in the basement and trying to keep them safe from the large, egg-thieving rat that lived down there.
    The chickens also provided plenty of meat, if not a lot of variety; Matilda routinely scoured the newspapers and magazines for new variations on the chicken dinner theme. Then they’d had to leave off of it for a while after Carolyn’s pet chicken Ferdie, who was born with a peg leg, was accidentally served for a family supper one Sunday.
    “Holy Mary Mother of God,” Matilda had hissed at Charlie as she held up a drumstick noticeably shorter than the others in the pan.
    “Jesus H. Christ!” Charlie had cried as Carolyn howled. “He was with a whole gang of other chickens—how was I to know?”
    “For crying out
loud
, didn’t you see him trying to limp away from you?”
    Matilda now looked over at Carolyn, who was sitting at the kitchen table and keeping her company as she peeled. Her daughter had gotten over the loss of Ferdie after a few weeks of ignoring even the mashed-potato houses her father built for her, the rooftops studded with peas.
    Matilda had never been one to shy away from hard work; that wasn’t her problem with life on the farm. Adjusting to the isolation had been much more difficult—especially the night she’d woken up to the sound of tires on the gravel driveway.
    “Is Daddy home?” Carolyn asked sleepily. She was allowed to sleep with her mother in her parents’ bed since Charlie was away nights.
    Matilda rubbed her eyes and