I never would have guessed that photo manipulation skills were genetic, but I hopped on over to my Cousin Zee’s site and found her PaintShopPro play with a couple of photos, so now I’m thinking maybe not all of my artsy-fartsy comes from my mother’s side as I’d originally thought. Cousin Zee’s related to me through my father’s side, so there must be some artsy-fartsy on that side as well.

Come to think of it, both my parents had ridiculously beautiful handwriting. My mother’s is all round and smooth, open and flowing. My father’s neat and precise, all straight lines and smooth curves. To this day, I have never seen handwriting more beautiful. Theirs are the ideal to which I compare every John Hancock. Puts me to shame as my own handwriting has degenerated to a doctor’s scrawl. And H.E.’s is worse. It’s a complete mess.

Despite all that, I never really considered my father an artist. My mother was the one who drew colorful pictures of clowns, hot air balloons, and statues, her art taped to walls and in her scrapbooks.

But as I think about it more and more, I guess my father was an artist in his own way. He did the cooking in the family, and he did it well and with style. I remember him preparing food for a party. There were small sticks of cream cheese wrapped in thinly sliced ham, toothpicks holding the hors d’oeuvres closed. There was a big watermelon rind bowl shaped like a ship, with string strung on toothpicks for the railing and with honeydew, cantaloupe, and watermelon balls within. There was a beautifully roasted fish lying in a bed of green garnish, and on the sides, orange rinds shaped like roses. And cole slaw. He made the best cole slaw I’ve ever had, with just the right amount of mayonnaise and pepper, with the cabbage cut long and fine. No cole slaw I’ve ever had even comes close.

I wish I had inherited a little bit of that love for cooking. I avoid the chore like the plague and am therefore not very good at it. The most sophisticated cooking I ever did was Cornish game hens, lemon pepper chicken, honey mustard chicken, and green bell peppers stuffed with falafel—and that was all back when I had a jet stream oven and cooking was easy. Outside of that, my repertoire is rather limited to ramen, spaghetti, omelettes, and tuna casserole. I’ve made crepes from scratch once in French class, and I’ve baked quite a few times from instant mixes, but that’s pretty much it. Theoretically I can make lumpia, which are egg rolls—I know how to do it, but I’ve never actually done it before. I’ve helped my mother put the ingredients together to be readied for frying and nothing else beyond that.

My father, on the other hand, could make anything. Anything. And whatever he made, it would taste great. He’d improvise and get creative. He’d dress the dish up so that it pleased the eyes as well as the mouth. That’s what I didn’t inherit.

I did, however, inherit my mother’s way of allowing the man to cook. When H.E. is here, he does the cooking, and like my father, he can make anything. Anything. He can make his own salad dressing from scratch, and he can guess at the ingredients in a dish he never had before. And while my father makes a mean cole slaw, H.E. makes a mean Maryland mashed potatoes. It’s the best mashed potatoes I’ve ever had, with creamed corn and onions, so rich and smooth, so creamy and sweet, I salivate just writing about it.

I’d write more on the topic, but I’m hungry now, and I have to make myself some dinner somehow.

Thank God I didn’t inherit a finicky-eating gene.

Share this post: