Read Online A Virtuous Woman (Oprah's Book Club) by Kaye Gibbons - Free Book Online
Authors: Kaye Gibbons
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way back into his home. I was a daughter who’d mainly watched men work a farm from a kitchen window.
When mama and daddy died and everything passed to Paul and Jimmy and me, I let them divide my part between them. It wasn’t so much that they’d worked the place and I hadn’t, they’d known the value of it. They’d always known what we had there. Before I did it though, I talked it over with Jack and told him if he really wanted me to I could keep my land and we could move there together and work it. Then he’d have something. He’s always wanted something. But he told me he couldn’t take it, he appreciated the offer but he couldn’t take a strange place. I should’ve known better than to offer it. He wanted, still wants land, but not any land will do. He’d hoped for this place but I’m afraid that hope died with Lonnie.
And I can’t even say I did my part inside, the woman’s work, and let the men manage the outside. But I wasn’t helpless, just useless. See, I had it in the back of my mind that one day I’d have somebody like Sudie Bee to help me, and I’d be able to pass for a grown woman, or the lady of the house. Somebody like Sudie Bee covers for people. Having her in my kitchen would’ve been no different from those commercials you see where the husband says, “Mmm, Mmm, this sure is good cake. Tastes like you made it from scratch,” and the wife just winks at the camera andwiggles the mix box behind her back. It’s not any different from that at all.
Mama’d baste a turkey that Sudie Bee had chased, caught, killed, scalded, everything. She’d tap more salt into the pan dressing Sudie Bee had made, and I’d come in when everything was basted, salted, and garnish the turkey, put the napkins in rings. I put finishing touches on mama’s finishing touches. I was twice-removed from the real work, far away from mama stooped over a roasting pan brushing butter on the turkey, and even farther away from Sudie Bee running around the chicken yard with an ax in her hand. But I had it in the back of my mind that mama was capable of doing all Sudie Bee’s jobs, and she just didn’t do them because she needed to be free to do other things, like sitting down at the kitchen table every morning with her cup of tea and a notepad, making a list for the day, then going upstairs to bathe, read, rest, embroider, then coming back downstairs to check on how things were moving along, do some of her finishing touches and split a RC Cola with Sudie Bee.
Try as I might, I’ll never forget the first night I spent with John Woodrow in one of those little migrant places, and I opened up two kinds of canned something and stirred everything together in one pot. I stood at that grimey old hot plate and wished Sudie Bee would come through the back door, take her hat off, come over to me, take thespoon out of my hand and say, “Lord have mercy! You got to stir it quicker than that to keep it from ruining all on the bottom. Let me do it. You go set the table and put the ice in the glasses.” But she didn’t show up to keep me from ruining the food, and I doubt we had any ice for the glasses.
I spent many a frustrating hour learning how to cook, trying to remember how Sudie Bee had done things, but mostly making things up as I went along. Poor Jack had to choke down a few dry mouthfuls before I could even make a recipe come out. Cooking’s not like cleaning. You don’t just know what good is and then cook it. You need a touch that comes with time and patience, especially if you grew up playing the piano while meals were being prepared and then coming into the kitchen just in time to put parsley on the plates. But you ought to see the way I’ve kept this house and cooked for Jack. I’m sorry to say that I might not have much in my life to be proud of, but I’m surely pleased with myself every time I see bread rise, and it rises every time.
I don’t hear any more shots. He’s finished. I have to be, too, for now.
When mama and daddy died and everything passed to Paul and Jimmy and me, I let them divide my part between them. It wasn’t so much that they’d worked the place and I hadn’t, they’d known the value of it. They’d always known what we had there. Before I did it though, I talked it over with Jack and told him if he really wanted me to I could keep my land and we could move there together and work it. Then he’d have something. He’s always wanted something. But he told me he couldn’t take it, he appreciated the offer but he couldn’t take a strange place. I should’ve known better than to offer it. He wanted, still wants land, but not any land will do. He’d hoped for this place but I’m afraid that hope died with Lonnie.
And I can’t even say I did my part inside, the woman’s work, and let the men manage the outside. But I wasn’t helpless, just useless. See, I had it in the back of my mind that one day I’d have somebody like Sudie Bee to help me, and I’d be able to pass for a grown woman, or the lady of the house. Somebody like Sudie Bee covers for people. Having her in my kitchen would’ve been no different from those commercials you see where the husband says, “Mmm, Mmm, this sure is good cake. Tastes like you made it from scratch,” and the wife just winks at the camera andwiggles the mix box behind her back. It’s not any different from that at all.
Mama’d baste a turkey that Sudie Bee had chased, caught, killed, scalded, everything. She’d tap more salt into the pan dressing Sudie Bee had made, and I’d come in when everything was basted, salted, and garnish the turkey, put the napkins in rings. I put finishing touches on mama’s finishing touches. I was twice-removed from the real work, far away from mama stooped over a roasting pan brushing butter on the turkey, and even farther away from Sudie Bee running around the chicken yard with an ax in her hand. But I had it in the back of my mind that mama was capable of doing all Sudie Bee’s jobs, and she just didn’t do them because she needed to be free to do other things, like sitting down at the kitchen table every morning with her cup of tea and a notepad, making a list for the day, then going upstairs to bathe, read, rest, embroider, then coming back downstairs to check on how things were moving along, do some of her finishing touches and split a RC Cola with Sudie Bee.
Try as I might, I’ll never forget the first night I spent with John Woodrow in one of those little migrant places, and I opened up two kinds of canned something and stirred everything together in one pot. I stood at that grimey old hot plate and wished Sudie Bee would come through the back door, take her hat off, come over to me, take thespoon out of my hand and say, “Lord have mercy! You got to stir it quicker than that to keep it from ruining all on the bottom. Let me do it. You go set the table and put the ice in the glasses.” But she didn’t show up to keep me from ruining the food, and I doubt we had any ice for the glasses.
I spent many a frustrating hour learning how to cook, trying to remember how Sudie Bee had done things, but mostly making things up as I went along. Poor Jack had to choke down a few dry mouthfuls before I could even make a recipe come out. Cooking’s not like cleaning. You don’t just know what good is and then cook it. You need a touch that comes with time and patience, especially if you grew up playing the piano while meals were being prepared and then coming into the kitchen just in time to put parsley on the plates. But you ought to see the way I’ve kept this house and cooked for Jack. I’m sorry to say that I might not have much in my life to be proud of, but I’m surely pleased with myself every time I see bread rise, and it rises every time.
I don’t hear any more shots. He’s finished. I have to be, too, for now.
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