Breaking Bread

My mom grew up with her three siblings in the house where their mother was born on Castialia Street in Bellevue, Ohio, the same town where her grandfather and great grandfather ran a successful furniture business on Main Street for more than half a century. Briehl roots run deep in Bellevue and a majority of the family tree has blossomed there.

Mom had been in the habit of visiting her sisters at least once a year. Circumstances beyond her control constrained her recent travel, Covid, of course, but also her husband’s medical conditions. After the second death in our family, however, she felt compelled to return. She was going to see her sisters, and nothing was going to get in her way.

The grand plan was for me to travel with her to Ohio while my siblings took care of details in Texas. None of us kids really wanted Mom traveling alone. Admittedly, she is in excellent health at the young age of 82 and I would not call her frail. But at 4’9” and 105lb sopping wet, she might get swallowed up in the masses of people moving through the DFW airport scurrying to their connecting flights.

Reality quickly set in when I saw the cost of air fare, that it was double the price since the last time I flew to Ohio, and add on top of that a side trip to Texas to pick her up? Yeah, it wasn’t going to happen.

We settled on visiting at the same time. I found reasonably priced tickets on a red eye to Detroit, which as it turned out, was closer to Tiffin, where my cousin, Jennifer, lives. She graciously picked me up at 0 dark 30 am. Bleary eyed and bushed, we joined Mom who had arrived safely the previous day and was already refreshed and relishing time with her sisters. There she sat on the couch giggling like a school girl. I should have known she would be fine.

We had a lovely time. Like a line from HMS Pinafore, I saw my three aunts, my remaining uncle, most of my cousins and most of my cousins’ kids. As it happens with people you love, we picked right up where we left off. We toured their new homes sharing in their future plans. We visited their old homes stepping into and cherishing the past. I closed my eyes and was ten years old again, snitching a second piece of Aunt Mary Ann’s Texas sheet cake which she brought to every Thanksgiving dinner. There was lots of laughter. And a few tears.

We visited the graveside with Aunt Flossie where the memorial stone for my Uncle Walt was newly set allowing the finality of death to sink in. I reflected upon life’s twists and turns that take us away from our family and place of origin and the twists and turns that bring us back.

We drove by Jennifer’s childhood home on Gunther Street where I had spent at least one week practically every summer in my grade school days with Jennifer and her brothers, Chris and Kevin. I remembered playing games in their basement, calling Time and Temp to see if it would be warm enough to ride our banana seat bikes to the local pool for a swim, running around with sparklers in her back yard, walking uptown to the Cherry Festival, and walking back home with lips stained and bellies aching from eating oodles of cherries, not to mention cotton candy and vinegar drenched French fries.

Those were the good old days. And these were the people I had broken bread with back then.

A few days prior to my Ohio departure, I chatted with my cousin about trip details. She inquired about any food allergies or sensitivities I had. Apparently, Mom told Aunt Joannie I was gluten free or did not eat bread. I chuckled. I guess I have become more high maintenance with my personal food rules. I own that. I called Aunt Joannie to put her mind at ease. “I will eat whatever you put in front of me.”

The food was delicious. (Shout out to PeeDee who hands down, grills the best deer steak you have ever tasted.) But being with family, that was the real treat. There is just something about sitting across the table sharing a meal with people you love and who know and love you, the extended family you grew up with and with whom you made memories.

I was asked to offer grace before one of our many meals together and found myself overcome with emotion. It is a wonder to hold the present and the past together in the same moment, giving space for joy and sorrow and gratitude and longing, feeling the loss of those who have gone before us and at the same time being so thankful for those who remain. All while sharing a meal.

I pondered the tempo of our meals. Nothing forced or rushed. All in due time. I found myself effortlessly putting my fork down and breathing. Why would I rush this? We had all the time in the world to spend this time together.

Breaking bread with the people you love. Life does not get better than that.