My Mom's Laterday Peasoup

ADDENDA:
Forgot to pack lunch. So much for starting with my best foot forward. Me and B struggled (and failed) to get our old couch out of the house this morning, she's staying home to accept delivery of a new one. Maybe we can just place the new one directly on top of the old?

Slept for 10 hours last night. Again had very odd dreams. I was on the sidewalk in Tribeca, and Robert Deniro was driving a large pastel-colored car with Florida plates on the sidewalk coming towards me. I run up onto a wrought-iron fire escape, and watch Deniro cross the street and go into a tight alley. The building he entered the side of all of a sudden transforms from an ugly brick tenement to a modern glass-fronted luxury apartment. I notice on the fire escapes around me are Mafioso holding guns, pointing at each other, and I realise I need to get out of there quickly. Huh.

BREAKFAST: 7:30am, yogurt with raw cashews, dirt pill, 500mg Vitamin C, hunger 3/5
Throat feels a little scratchy. People at work have been getting nose and throat infections that they need anti-biotics for. So I popped a vitamin C in hopes of heading off something more serious.

AM SNACK: 9:30am, 24 oz still water

LUNCH: 2pm, half a pastrami sandwich, peasoup, water, 2 pickles, non-mayo slaw, hunger 4/5
I needed to sit and be quiet, work is good but a bit intense right now. Salt be damned, sat down at Juniors, on the last pages of Animal Vegetable Miracle (I'm a slow reader). Rather than the usual matzoh-ball, I ordered the hopefully less-salty peasoup.....

.....and remembered. After my dad died, in the process of my mom getting over her grief, cooked a little. She made herself peasoup from canned peas. She mentioned it a few times in passing, that she made pea soup again because it was good. The few times I was over her place, she offered me soup, but I wasn't hungry and turned her down.

I think I tried not to acknowledge or even think about her peasoup because it was such a new concept - my mom cooking. It scared me. Things had really changed for her. She was not a woman who cooked, not for any lack of skill or desire (though she had neither), but because she was a life-long career woman who had other things to do. Her job and her kids took up her time, and she took more pleasure from laundry and cleaning than from any sort of food prep. My mom cooking for herself - she now had time - her husband AND her career were both over. She filled in this gaping void with peasoup. I felt so bad for her, so bad for myself, I didn't know how to acknowledge it.

I wonder how her peasoup was. I regret not trying it.

PM SNACK: 5:30pm, 2 potato samosa, hunger 4/5
About to go to Wholefoods before home to cook, didn't want to be too hungry while at the market. From Green Symphony.

DINNER: 8pm, tofu stirfry with basmanti brown rice, small green salad, 1 glass white wine, fresh apple crumble and dulche de leche gelato, hunger 4/5
Haven't made a stirfry in a while, this one had broccoli, portabellas, and kick ass farmers market German garlic and baby onions. Threw in good olive oil, a dash of sesame oil, a dash of soy sauce, some white pepper, quickly wokked it at high heat for 2 minutes until the broccoli was glowing bright green and WOW! it actually tasted kick-ass, not greasy and the flavors of each veg popping. Even the bland tofu got seared with the oils and soy and garlic to really compliment the dish.

Betsy was home today and finished the apple crumble (!), so I made another, this time adjusting the recipe to my taste, and it also came out kick ass. Some meals I feel like an ignoramus, but this meal I wish a whole bunch of friends were here to enjoy it too. Good thing I have Betsy to eat it with.

EVENING SNACK: 10:45, pretzel with fresh peanut butter, hunger 4/5
Craving sweet, but this'll do. Ground the peanut butter from a machine in Whole foods, so I know it ain't nuttin' but peaz n' nuts. These pretzels kick ass, everyone I've given them to agree. I should buy a few bags and spread the love....