Regret

And Pie

When I die, it will be with at least one regret. I didn’t call my aunt, and then she passed away.

One October a few years ago, I began to think about holidays and holiday food. My mother’s layered pumpkin chiffon pie popped into my head. Trouble was, I had lost the recipe and my mother passed away in 2012.

But I knew my Aunt Susan would have it. Trouble was, I also wasn’t certain I wanted to make the pie that year. It’s a pain to put together - it takes all my mixing bowls and measuring cups and spoons at least twice over during the process and that year I must have been feeling lazier than usual. If I called her to get the recipe and then didn’t make the pie, I’d be wasting her time and I’d feel bad about that. So I didn’t call her. Next year, I promised myself.

Thanksgiving Eve, we were at home, my husband and I, preparing to drive into the city the next day for Thanksgiving dinner with our kids and grandkids, like always. The phone rang. My favorite uncle was on the line. Brother to my mom and to Aunt Susan, too.

“Susan just had a stroke,” he told me, “They flew her down in a helicopter. Maggie and I are on the way to the hospital right now.”

The hospital was 1200 miles from them and 150 from where I was sitting at that moment. My uncle is a truck driver; his wife is as hardy as any flyover country farm girl. I knew they’d make it, no problem, and fast. So would we, my husband and I. But already that pie recipe and the missed opportunity to talk to my aunt was chewing at the back of my neck.

My aunt lingered for ten days, an agonizing eternity for the family, and probably her, too. Thanksgiving came and went, although I can’t remember anything about it.

At some point my uncle or the doctors, or the good Lord, decided my aunt would not recover and she was transported to a hospice care facility near her home. God bless her, she hung on until everyone in the family came by to see her. She died the night we came to visit, after everyone had left and only one of her grandchildren was in the room with her.

The following year, I called my cousin, her daughter, and asked her for the pie recipe. I knew she would have it. She took a picture of her copy (titled “Aunt Grace,” my mother, at the top of the page) and texted it to me right away. I printed it out and typed an extra copy. This year, I made the pie.

But the recipe is even more special now. When I made the pie, for Christmas that year, one of my boys became very excited while eating his slice. “Mom,” he said, “I remember eating this at grandma’s house a long time ago. I never liked pumpkin pie, but I loved this pie. I’m so glad you made it.”

I’ll always regret not having called Aunt Susan to get my mom’s pumpkin chiffon pie recipe. It would have been my last conversation with her, and a good one. Our talks were always peppered with bits of family lore which I loved hearing. And what experience is better than two women sharing family recipes? It would’ve been a loving, funny and fun conversation with her, the closest sibling to my mother and someone who was nearly as dear to me.

I made the pie this year with my heart full of Mom and Aunt Susan, now together back in Nebraska, buried with my grandmother in the family cemetery. I also remembered why I don’t make the pie every year. It takes forever; it makes a huge mess; there isn’t any way to do it over several days in steps, as with many other dishes, and isn’t Thanksgiving busy enough already?

But I have to admit to experiencing the same nirvana with my first bite of the pie, this year as with all other years, now accompanied by a twinge of regret. There is nothing better tasting; it embodies the holiday spirit more than any other dessert. And eating it is way better than making it. So I’m having a slice with my morning coffee today. Thanks, Mom. Thanks, Aunt Susan.