"Food is not rational. Food is culture, habit, craving, & identity."
Born and raised in Brazil, my mother grew up on rice and beans. That was her staple dish; that was what defined her. My dad was born into a Slovakian family, where goulash (a pasta dish with meat sauce) was central to his heritage. Both dishes meant something more than what they looked or tasted like; they represented my parents. As a daughter brought up in America, I didn’t really have a dish to my name. I inherited both meals in a way, but felt I couldn’t call them mine. They belonged to my parents.
Watching my mom cook her rice and beans, I used to think to myself, what’s my dish? What do I bring to the table?
Well, I knew one ingredient essential to both dishes: salt.
Of course salt is in them, salt is in everything. No shocking revelation there. So why am I putting the morsel of spices in the spotlight? See, instead of a dish, what I was given at birth was the gift of weighing the exact same mass as a can of Morton Salt: 1 pound 11 ounces.
Although, doctors fixed complications with my lung and intestines, my leg could not be revived. I was endowed with a lasting limp on my left leg, due to a condition known as spastic dysplasia cerebral palsy. As a little kid, my leg was what defined me. Mom was defined by her incredible rice and beans, dad by his extraordinary goulash, and I had… a distasteful limb. Searching for a dish that represented me, I concluded I was the salad of sorts- the dish that everyone looks at, but sees no impressive quality. Lettuce, tomato, cucumber. No authentic representation, unique history, and definitely not worthy of praise.
Stares would be endured when my abnormality was pointed at, the same reaction displayed if escargot was added to the McDonald’s dollar menu. In a sense, I hated standing out. Don’t get me wrong, if I’m special in a good way, I want people to recognize it, but I was the center of attention for a being a type of foreign that attracted eyes of pity, rather than admiration.
During this time, I had to wear an orthotic leg brace to try and correct the in-toe on my foot. It was plastic and bulky, clunking every time I lifted my foot, and thumping every time I brought it down. Attempting to make my brace more enjoyable, doctors would offer cool designs on the straps and swatches of colors to choose from for the plastic exterior.
“Do you want glow in the dark? What about neon pink? Oooh, we can even put glitter or hearts on it!” my doctor would say.
No.
“Plain white please,” a response with which my doctor’s face exhibited heavy shock to the little desire I had for glam or pizazz.
What was I to them? An elaborate cheese platter? Here’s Gouda, Brie, and Asiago, just to name a few. Impelling me to choose from unnecessarily eccentric tastes, when all I wanted was mere Swiss.
When 2nd grade rolled around, my defining part finally became uncovered. It was story time one morning, and my teacher brought in a can of Morton Salt. She announced to the class the reason for its significance. She said that I weighed the same amount as it, and because of that, I was a miracle. The miracle bit I was already told a million times over, but never really grasped what people meant by it. Miracle meant amazing, but if all I felt was bad about it, how could the word be good? I was a miracle, but alone in that league. It never made me feel any more a part of something. The salt part however, that hit me. No one had ever compared me to a can of salt, and when the students sat there amazed, I too was enchanted in the realization of how small I was. I see mom use salt all the time when she cooks rice and beans, and dad too, when he stirs up his goulash. It was with that example that I now felt connected to their dishes. I found my ingredient.
Salt was mine to own. In school, I was now known as salt, but unlike salad, escargot, or fancy cheese, salt brought with it a positive connotation. I was special, in a good way. Yes, I still had people stare at my leg and point at the manner in which I walked, but I didn’t mind the staring or assumptions as much; I learned to take them with "a grain of salt". As I grew up, I came to embrace the salt as a proper representation of who I was. I was simple; I didn’t stand out. But I was necessary. I mixed into both of my parents’ dishes and cultures. I was not more one or the other, I was integral to both.
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