Cast off like the sweater I wore, the one with the cracked buttons he left on the chair at the foot of our bed to mend, the one I knit for him the year I discovered Joni Mitchell, my husband called me from his car Thursday night when I expected him to walk through the door any minute for dinner. In the kitchen at the stove I stood sautéing the risotto like it called for: I stirred the onions in butter until they were translucent. Then I added the risotto and stirred them around long enough for the kernels to get toasted. That’s when the phone rang.
“Hey,” he said. “I’ve got a meeting tonight. I won’t be home, until late.”
It was the last thing he said to me without his attorney.
“Do you want me to save you a plate of food?” is what he didn’t hear me ask when his line went dead. I waited a few minutes and stirred the risotto, measuring the broth in half cup increments, watching the kernels absorb it, thinking he would call me back, but he didn’t.
The courier delivered the divorce papers the next morning. That was a month ago. His number has been changed since then. I know, because when I hit “husband – cell” on my phone, someone new answers. I guess in a town of two million people, preserving old numbers is a thing of the past, like mending old sweaters. I thought, perhaps, they would save the number for him in case he came to his senses and needed it back, but the operator told me that isn’t how they do things now a days.
When I’d added all of the broth to the risotto, I stirred in the water from the reconstituted mushrooms I’d saved. I think it adds a nice rich touch to the dish. Then I added the mushrooms. Risotto isn’t a difficult dish to make, it just requires constant attention. This occurred to me recently, how very much like a marriage making risotto is. For a while, I was too busy stirring my family – being mother to our three children, keeping the house in order – and my husband, it turned out, needed his kernels toasted. Ha, that’s a funny pun. Too bad it’s my life I’m poking puns at.
If I could go back twenty years, I’d insist on finishing my degree first, before we got married. But twenty years ago, I was marrying for love, and that was going to be enough to carry us through. Finding myself in this mess of a life never occurred to me, then. I knew who I was, then. I was the beloved wife, then, but I soon became the beloved mother of three and my beloved husband became my partner and father, but not my love. Did it bother me? Sure, but I thought we’d have time – time at the end of our lives to reconnect, to get to know each other, again, as lovers and friends, once the children had grown.
On the morning after I served the mushroom risotto for dinner, carefully shaving the parmesan over our plates and then sprinkling them with the bit of chopped parsley I’d cut from the herb garden on the patio, that morning after I sat in the dining room by myself with my book for company since the children had all made plans for their Friday night, that morning when the courier rang the bell, rousing my youngest son from the stupor he was in lying on the sofa in front of the Xbox in the family room, when he answered the door and called “Mom, there’s some woman at the door who says she needs to see you.”, that morning, my time ran out.
None of my children had seemed concerned when they came home and the space where their father usually parked his car was empty. It happened often enough – an out of town business trip, or a late night meeting with a client that lasted so late, and happened so often, it just was easier for my husband to stay at the office – sleeping on the leather sofa we’d purchased for the corner window room he’d acquired when he finally made partner. It happened so often, as a matter of fact, none of the children were concerned to see his side of our bed empty when they came in to kiss me goodnight, nor were they surprised to see the dish of leftover risotto covered with saran wrap in the fridge.
When they were younger, and he’d come home for dinner so we could all eat as a family, he’d carefully wrap his own leftovers, and place them in the fridge with an “I spit on this! Dad” note taped to the top to protect his dish from growing boys who had hunger fits long before he’d return from his nightly meetings. The “I spit on this! Dad” note I put on top of his dish of risotto is still in there, right where I left it. I guess none of the kids had the nerve to throw it away, not after the way I reacted when I learned they’d all three known Dad wouldn’t be coming home that Friday night. They even knew about the apartment he’d rented months earlier, which – from the website – looks as if it would be a perfect place to keep his sofa.
I wonder if he has anyone to make him risotto, or if he needs anyone to darn his sweaters, or if he’s outgrown that need now.
“Hey,” he said. “I’ve got a meeting tonight. I won’t be home, until late.”
It was the last thing he said to me without his attorney.
“Do you want me to save you a plate of food?” is what he didn’t hear me ask when his line went dead. I waited a few minutes and stirred the risotto, measuring the broth in half cup increments, watching the kernels absorb it, thinking he would call me back, but he didn’t.
The courier delivered the divorce papers the next morning. That was a month ago. His number has been changed since then. I know, because when I hit “husband – cell” on my phone, someone new answers. I guess in a town of two million people, preserving old numbers is a thing of the past, like mending old sweaters. I thought, perhaps, they would save the number for him in case he came to his senses and needed it back, but the operator told me that isn’t how they do things now a days.
When I’d added all of the broth to the risotto, I stirred in the water from the reconstituted mushrooms I’d saved. I think it adds a nice rich touch to the dish. Then I added the mushrooms. Risotto isn’t a difficult dish to make, it just requires constant attention. This occurred to me recently, how very much like a marriage making risotto is. For a while, I was too busy stirring my family – being mother to our three children, keeping the house in order – and my husband, it turned out, needed his kernels toasted. Ha, that’s a funny pun. Too bad it’s my life I’m poking puns at.
If I could go back twenty years, I’d insist on finishing my degree first, before we got married. But twenty years ago, I was marrying for love, and that was going to be enough to carry us through. Finding myself in this mess of a life never occurred to me, then. I knew who I was, then. I was the beloved wife, then, but I soon became the beloved mother of three and my beloved husband became my partner and father, but not my love. Did it bother me? Sure, but I thought we’d have time – time at the end of our lives to reconnect, to get to know each other, again, as lovers and friends, once the children had grown.
On the morning after I served the mushroom risotto for dinner, carefully shaving the parmesan over our plates and then sprinkling them with the bit of chopped parsley I’d cut from the herb garden on the patio, that morning after I sat in the dining room by myself with my book for company since the children had all made plans for their Friday night, that morning when the courier rang the bell, rousing my youngest son from the stupor he was in lying on the sofa in front of the Xbox in the family room, when he answered the door and called “Mom, there’s some woman at the door who says she needs to see you.”, that morning, my time ran out.
None of my children had seemed concerned when they came home and the space where their father usually parked his car was empty. It happened often enough – an out of town business trip, or a late night meeting with a client that lasted so late, and happened so often, it just was easier for my husband to stay at the office – sleeping on the leather sofa we’d purchased for the corner window room he’d acquired when he finally made partner. It happened so often, as a matter of fact, none of the children were concerned to see his side of our bed empty when they came in to kiss me goodnight, nor were they surprised to see the dish of leftover risotto covered with saran wrap in the fridge.
When they were younger, and he’d come home for dinner so we could all eat as a family, he’d carefully wrap his own leftovers, and place them in the fridge with an “I spit on this! Dad” note taped to the top to protect his dish from growing boys who had hunger fits long before he’d return from his nightly meetings. The “I spit on this! Dad” note I put on top of his dish of risotto is still in there, right where I left it. I guess none of the kids had the nerve to throw it away, not after the way I reacted when I learned they’d all three known Dad wouldn’t be coming home that Friday night. They even knew about the apartment he’d rented months earlier, which – from the website – looks as if it would be a perfect place to keep his sofa.
I wonder if he has anyone to make him risotto, or if he needs anyone to darn his sweaters, or if he’s outgrown that need now.
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