Grandma Almerinda's Kitchen

The smell of cake fresh out of the oven fills the air as Aunt Irineia pours generous amounts of lime glaze on top of the golden brown, slightly burned crust. And that’s the way it was supposed to be! I was home from school; my two youngest siblings just finished their homework and are now playing on the street with the other kids. Neyma, who lives just next door, brings Paulo Renato in his stroller and Juliana in her belly. Dayse comes over with Christiano, just a few days older than Paulo, and Jacqueline in her belly. Funny how those babies always come in pairs. Cousins Monica and Elaine are arguing, as always. Aunt Gloria and her three boys show up from across the street. Silvina and her daughter Silvia are there too. My mom comes straight from work bringing eight loaves of warm French bread that she picked up in the bakery by the bus stop. Grandma Almerinda makes a big pot of coffee. There are not enough chairs in the kitchen, so we take turns. Noise, laughter and stories are passed along with cups and plates. That’s the image that comes to my mind at the mention of the word family.

That scene was played and replayed every day with small variations. It was our ritual, our identity. Those afternoons defined us and our relationship with the world outside. We learned to talk and listen. We learned to trust and keep to ourselves. We learned to pass the bread, but take our slice too. We learned to appreciate imperfection and not care about the burned crust as long as it tastes good. We learned that some people never learn, as Monica and Elaine, now 52 and 47, still argue. We learned to offer our seat when we’re done with our coffee. We learned from the stories, but made the same mistakes anyway. We never used the word love (funny how different cultures save some words like they might wear out), but it was there.

In some way, that kitchen was our womb. A warm, comfortable, familiar place where we belong. Our origin. The place we come back to whenever life becomes too much to deal with. There we found nourishment and shelter, and we couldn’t possibly need anything else. But life takes you places, and that sense of belonging also helped us let go of the blue walls and venture into the big, real, unknown world. And so we did put down our cups, we pushed the chairs under the table, and off we went, to conquer the world!

Time goes by. We move, marry, divorce, our children grow up, we become aunts and grandparents ourselves. Grandma Almerinda is gone... but we are still in her kitchen, whenever we need to just be. That is our true home, our comfort, our haven, our happiness, our heaven, the place we will all come back to someday.