Fishing for bread balls (in tomato soup)

The title, Fishing for bread balls in tomato soup was inspired by our younger daughter, the lively one in the family. Cayly as a little girl didn’t walk into a room, she leapt or ran; she slid down balustrades, skipped along pavements, skidded down passages, she didn’t sit in chairs, she draped herself over the chair backs or sprawled sideways over the arm rests or bounced up and down on the cushions. She was a girl on the move. She commanded attention. She was born for the spotlights. And I was her eager exhausted mother.

One day, as we sat together outside under the gazebo eating tomato soup, I cajoled the young Cayly into eating by suggesting she roll bread pieces into balls, toss them into the bowl, and then ‘pretend fish’ the lumpy bread balls swimming in the tomato soup sea. She instantly warmed to the idea. What followed was a rare respite of stillness amidst the daily turbulence. We sat in silence side by side for a long while, doing our ‘fishing’. And then she looked up at me and said simply, “I love fishing for bread balls in tomato soup with you.”

Those innocent sweet words melted my heart. They also gave me pause.  Could it be that my daughter was in constant motion because I was in constant motion, too? Perhaps she needed daily down time outdoors as much as I did. And what if my real job as her mother wasn’t to hurry her through the day, the week, the month, the term, rushing about pushing and pulling, trying to get to all the places we needed to go and to do all the things that needed doing, but rather to figure out a way to be present, be at peace, and to do less?

As I finished my soup, I asked Cayly to show me her bowl.  She’d been sitting there quietly fishing for nearly an hour, her charming red moustache smile the proof of a stellar catch! Sweetly she held her empty soup bowel up for me to see and announced, “Can you make tomato soup every day?”

Over the last thirty years since then, I’ve eaten many memorable meals with family around our simple wooden dining room table, at picnics, in hanoks in Korea, sidewalk cafes in Normandy, pubs in London, but fishing for bread balls swimming in tomato soup will probably remain one of my forever favourite food memory moments. 

Tomato soup is a reminder of my own small epiphany on that ordinary, long-ago lunchtime ‘fishing expedition’. It will forever remind me of the moment I fished into my own heart and realised that, despite all my efforts to be a good mother, I had my priorities wrong. We could continue to fill our days with fast foods and fast activities and then huff and puff to get through them. Or we could do less and enjoy our lives more. We could begin to focus on what really mattered. Each other. The small moments. The little things. The freedom of an empty afternoon, the joy of make belief, the pleasure of dress-ups, the sweet intimacy of slowly sipping tea from pretty floral teacups, munching melting marshmallows between Marie biscuits, crafting animal shapes from play-dough, making potato prints patterns, building high block towers, playing I-spy-with-my-little-eye.

I knew so little then about who our girls would turn out to be or what might lie ahead for any of us. But I’m so grateful I did eventually awaken to this: their childhood would be over before I knew it. Never to be lived again. If I didn’t slow down, and pay attention, my daughters would grow into young women and head off into their own life stories, and I’d be left looking back, wondering what had happened and where the time had vanished. And so it was that our family life began to change. Change. Change. Many material sacrifices were made in pursuit of protecting quality family time, but I have no regrets. No, not one.

As I type these words Claude and Cayly are in the kitchen together making raita for biryani. An unseasonably heavy spring rain is falling. The pigeons congregate on the roof of my neighbour’s cottage, undaunted. There is a new romcom movie to watch later on Netflix once I’ve stacked the dishwasher, brewed herbal tea, and Claude has stoked the indoor fire. And in this moment, I’m challenged to somehow hold both the anguish of so many others and, too, to be fully present here, at the end of another quiet, uneventful, but sacred to me day. I’m trying to pay attention to what’s right in front of me. 

I remind myself that to have empathy for another’s suffering is needful. But, that is not to deny the small moments of grace that are also mine to experience and fully embrace. My heart matters too. Grief and gratitude are intertwined. There is much to grieve in our wounded world, and yet it seems that each and every startling reminder is also an invitation to notice how much we often take for granted, and to become ever more aware of life’s preciousness, it’s impermanence, and its beauty. To live. Live. Live.

Lately, as the pace of our lives is rapidly picking up (we’re refiring when most others our age are retiring) I’ve found myself drawn back to the simple sacred rhythms Claude and I so purposefully established when our girls were young. Back then, as we pruned back our schedules, commitments, and our children’s activities, and introduced a daily quiet time, we discovered a simplicity and a contentment that had eluded us in the maddening maelstrom of the world’s mantra of ‘go-grab-get’. Less became more.

And so, it seems worth remembering that, all our work, our play, our child rearing, and our meal making matters, as long as it’s offered with love. And whether you’re making yet another snack for a school lunchbox, or slicing biltong for your pooch, or Claude is baking moussaka for our grandson, or fillet and garlic bread for our granddaughter, or I’m baking a tomato tart for a friend, or you’re inviting friends over for pizzas, or I’m savouring the special to me memory of a little loved one fishing for bread balls in tomato soup, let’s remember: feeding one another with simple food and sincere fellowship is a way of honouring the sacredness of all life.

Dear God,

“Thank you for the lovely food, the hands that prepared it, and the company with which to share it.”

As my family and I sit around our wooden dining room table, we acknowledge Your extravagant unfailing goodness toward us. Thank you Jesus that your are the bread of life. As we come to you we will never grow hungry and as we believe in you we will never be thirsty.

May we always be willing to offer a seat, set a place, and break bread with whomever hungers for life and love.

Amen

What memories come to mind of a singularly special meal or time with one of your children?

Looking back, what would you have done more of (and less)?

How can you arrange your own life now to where less is more, where in simplicity you can experience contentment