Grandma's Hands

My mother did not cook or bake, or when she tried, it was a disaster. I can be critical of that because I am a disaster myself. My grandma cooked and baked for all of us and she was the life of our family.

She grew up poor. There were too many kids in her family. By her accounts, she did not even grow up with her family but lived with some distant relatives or strangers. I cannot remember this clearly. But she said she used to work for that family at an early age. Her hands started working very early, which means she had to learn how to survive fast. She also learned that life was not fair -- yet her kindness only increased with all the pain and humiliation she was accumulating.

Grandma spoke about war. How they closed the window blinds to create the impression no one was living there -- so why destroy that household? She said during the war they had to ration their food and she was happy when she had to eat a piece of bread.

Her fascination for bread was going to last her whole life. She did not ever discard bread, not even when it was old and started to show green pixelations -- it was developing mold. She would give it to the woman who cleaned the big yard that was part of our enclosed space in those ugly communist flats. Grandma loved bread so much, she would brew tea and break tiny pieces of bread to let them soak and expand their texture. She would make French toast which she called "Gigi papa." I never asked her why and I thought that was the real name (and to me it is, that's how powerful grandma remains for me).

She had a life few would be able to live. Like I said she was poor; she did not live fully with her family; she started to work at an early age. She married young to a man twice or almost twice her age with whom she had a daughter. She was a young widow. Because of her circumstances, she did not pursue her education (and I mean basic). So when she became a widow she had to be inventive and resourceful to put water and bread on the table for her daughter. She did that and suffered silently.

Growing up, I did not help her in the kitchen when she was cooking, but I loved to be her sous-chef when she made preserves. I remember plucking rose petals, leaving them on a white, clean tablecloth, and then transferring them on the stove to make preserve. We made green walnut preserves, too, and, since we did not have kitchen gloves, our fingers had the discoloration of the iodine for days. I remember we baked "cornulete cu rahat" and "branzoaice."

On my birthday, she baked for me "mucenici," the ∞ cookies that are traditionally baked on March 9. The whole house was divinely perfumed. I tried to bake those here, and even though the recipe is simple, it is not the same. I gave up.

My grandma loved to read. After a long day in the kitchen, she would retire into her room and read. She wanted to share what she read. I was not kind to her when she chew food loudly because the dentures were not that good. I am sorry.

When my mother died, she was the one to announce that. Helped by a neighbor, she washed her daughter's body and got it ready for the funeral. Grandma embodied la pietà motif with such dignity, I had a hard time processing what I was witnessing. In the following years, I think she lived without living -- after all, she lost her only daughter, before that she had lost her husband. But she did not complain. She would light the oil candle, go to read, start the day with tea and bread, end the day with tea and bread.

When she almost died, she could not eat anything. We took her from the hospital and brought grandma home. My older sister and I were afraid of losing her in the same apartment where we had lost our mother. My sister came up with this clever plan to feed grandma by making balls out of bread and inside those balls she put some crushed vitamins. Upon contact, tongue touching the bread, grandma started to eat. She eventually managed to eat by herself.

I will never forget... I had to leave my hometown, Tulcea, to go to the capital to pack my things and go to the States. Another summer was ending abruptly. Still weak, a Giacometti in miniature, she came all the way from her room, walking very slowly. I asked, "What are you doing?" and started to walk towards her. She said she wanted to say good-bye. It was not an ordinary good-bye -- it would be her last. I held her hands in my hands... when I am sick, every now and then, I remember how she used to touch me with those hard working yet the softest and warmest of all hands.

PS: In a world full of misogyny, remember you are nothing without women. Women's Day, every day.