The Compliment

He was just a little blonde kid, last time I saw him. But that was thirty five years ago. His name is Charlie, and he is the first-born child of my first cousin Stella. Stella is one of my favorites- she’s bright, funny, and brash.

Two weeks ago, Charlie (who lives in California) called to say he would be Seattle for one night, so I invited him to come for dinner. I decided to make the family favorite, pasties. I’ve told you before that "pasty" rhymes with "nasty," but it’s not. Pasties are a staple of a miner’s lunch in Wales. They made their way to the Iron Range of Michigan in the hearts and memories of the daughters who came to America. Many miners came west to the copper camps in Montana, bringing with them the recipe for this miner’s meal. It’s a simple thing: raw onions, carrots, potatoes, and meat, wrapped in pie crust and baked for an hour. Of course, it takes a little practice to make something that resembles a turnover, but many good Butte girls have got the hang of it with time. In our modern era, many men have also taken on the pasty making duties. My dad could "wrap up" a pretty good pasty after my mother died, and he took it upon himself to teach the next generation.

What does this have to do with Charlie? Well, he arrived when I was filling the pasties, so he sat at the counter watching me while I worked. We were laughing and talking about our family. He told me about his brothers and sister, and he helped flesh-out these cousins I had never met. It’s one thing when Stella tells me about her kids, but hearing from the big brother gives them another dimension.

I can be a pretty messy cook, so I was wearing a chef’s coat to protect my clothes. Nothing worse than buying a cute blouse and ruining it with a splash of oil. My best friend had given me the chef’s coat. On the left shoulder, under a blaze of embroidered flames it reads, "I know it’s burning!" This came from an incident when I had overflowed a pie in the oven, and then forgot to clean it up before the next time I used the oven. On that occasion, family and friends drifted through the kitchen asking me, "Is something burning?" After each inquiry I said, "I know it’s burning. Finally, I said, "I KNOW IT’S BURNING!" Then I opened the oven to find flames due to a faulty thermostat. I’ve never lived it down.

At some point in my conversation with Charlie, he said, quite seriously, "You’re smokin’!" I’m sure I blushed- it was a nice, unexpected compliment from a younger man. But gesturing to the oven, he said, a little louder this time, "You’re SMOKING!" I turned around to see smoke pouring from my preheating oven. Now it was Charlie’s turn to blush when I told him I thought he was giving me a compliment. After I cleaned out the remains of a pizza that had dripped in the oven, I baked pasties that would make our ancestors proud. Lenny and I, along with my brother Walt and sister Jeanette, enjoyed the taste of home, and cemented the bond of family with a fine man named Charlie.

The rest of the night we spent telling Charlie about his great-grandparents, and the grandmother he never knew, my mom’s little sister Frannie. And I will never forget the unintended compliment. I know I’m not hot, but apparently, I’m often smokin’!