Dali

The only person I know who can make a great sweet potato pie is my grandma Pearl. Unfortunately, my grandmother is far too old to be traveling to the local grocery store to get the potatoes needed. Thankfully (for her, at least) her ‘strapping, handsome’ young grandson can. I kept telling myself this was for her as I scanned the isles of Food N’ Stuff, looking for the ingredients. I wondered if she wanted canned or not. I never really watched her make the pie, I just ate the stuff. I grabbed a can of sliced, skinned sweet potatoes. I could hear her already.
“What a pies needs is tender love and care,” She said to me. I was maybe twelve at the time. “A pie can’t be cooked by an amateur. It takes an expert,” she said. I watched as she poured beans into the pie crust.
“What’s that for grandma?” I asked. She gave me a smile.
“It’s to make the crust tough in the oven. You pour beans into the crust, and bake it. When it’s done, the crust will be nice and hard, and it’ll be able to hold anything we put in it,” she said. I looked from her to the pie, and back to her.
“So, that’s your secret?” I asked her. The look on my face made her laugh. She nodded.
“Yes Jakob, that’s the secret. If the outside of the pie is hard, the inside of it will be safe,” she said with a smile. I smiled too.
I don’t have any regrets, but I’m glad that she told me the secret to her pie making. Whether or not this applied to real life is a different story. Being hard on the outside does have its downsides, but in some situations, it allows you to remain calm. Be it the loss of a family member, having your car break down in the middle of nowhere, or being chased by a seven-foot, three-hundred pound man in a Russian torture facility with a broken leg and a blinding chemical agent in one eye, hardness can keep you strong, help you safely find a way home, and cleverly outdo a murderous foreigner any day. I have no research that supports being gooey and good-tasting on the inside is helpful, unless it has to do with pie. Which makes me wonder, does my grandmother use premade pie pans? I don’t think so. I looked up at those little signs above the isles. Which isle has the baked goods? I left isle seven and turned into isle eight. Candy. I scanned the isle before walking all the way in. I saw some licorice, some hard candies, and some Juicyfruit. I stopped and pondered. I like Juicyfruit. I should get some. I quickly snatched a three pack, and continued into isle nine. There it was, a premade crust. I stared at it. Took long enough. As I reached for it, my phone rang.
“Hello?” I said, answering it. I tossed the crust into my cart. My sister spoke.
“Hey, Jakob,” she said. I looked around the isle.
“Hey Beth,” I said. Beth laughed at something on her end.
“Ha, hey, Jakob, never mind about the shopping list,” she said. I nodded.
“Great,” I said. She hung up. I nodded my head. “Just great.”