Everyone began preparing in the morning. Truth be told, K started weeks ago: making pierogi and uszki (two different types of dumplings) and freezing them. Still, with two soups, dumplings, kraut with wild mushrooms, and a main course (accompanying salads and such not counted) on the menu, we had to get a quick start.
There was a salad to make, beginning with boiling veggies and eggs — lots of this. And sauteing onions on a cosmic scale.
There was chopping galore: before and after the boiling; during this; before that. “Click, click, click,” was the soundtrack of the morning.
And there was ironing and setting of places.
In the end, it was the common lament: all the time spent cooking, and the food disappeared so relatively quickly. There’s the eternal entertaining conflict: one wants them to savor everything, yet while everything is warm and the fish is still moist, one wants everyone just to hurry up and get to the next course.
It was a special wigilia for us because it was a special Christmas Eve for L: the first one she knew what was going on, possibly the first one in her memory for some time. She ate the barszcz; she devoured the mushroom soup; and she sat calmly as the rest of us ate. Afterward, Nana and Papa successfully spoiled her with their generosity (not to mention us: as I write, I’m listening to Madeline Peyroux’s excellent new album, Bare Bones, on a new iPod — the woman is incapable of making a bad album). With guests, gifts, and attention, the Girl danced, sang, smiled, laughed, and was the center of the evening. It’s likely to be that way for, well, the foreseeable future.