MIRACLE PIE

Tomorrow is our Gracie’s birthday, all grown up from the tiny toddler girl she was when she and her Mommy came to live with us for a year and a half.  We had so many wonderful moments and playtimes and adventures during those close-at-home years, from waking to her request for “coffee” to bedtime prayers naming each and every relative, pet, doll and stuffed animal who loved her.   

I’ve been reminiscing over the sweet days when we had such a close bond, and how it’s had to stretch mightily as they moved so far away.   They’re now within an hour and a half, and perhaps we’ll get to celebrate together soon.   One of my sweetest memories is a Thanksgiving when she was about five, and very fond of helping out in the kitchen.   She always had her own little aprons and tiny set of kitchen tools.

She and Caro and I had spent the afternoon of Tuesday-before-Thanksgiving making pies---sweet potato and pecan and lemon, and she had punched out little leaves and flowers and all sorts of beautiful decorations from the crust scraps. We arrayed them grandly around the margins, crimped them into the edges, and scattered them atop, crusted with sugar.

When we finished the three, there was one of the roll-up crusts left in the box. She said "Let's make a CHERRY pie!!!" I said I don't think we have any cherries; she smiled me the patient smile we’d reserve for a gently-addled aunt and said, "See, there they are---Cherries!" And they were, right where she pointed---on the crust box. So, as not to undo any child's fancy of the magical power of being in Ganjin's kitchen, I went unhopefully to the pantry, knowing I hadn’t bought a can of pie filling in a coon’s age.

And there, atop everything else, front and center, over the tuna and the Del Monte beans, the crushed pineapple and the Campbell's, with the beam of that 100-watt hitting it like the Gleam of Glory, sat a can of Lucky Leaf, shining in the shelf-light. Not a mote of dust, not a sign of its having lived a moment in that pantry---I'm convinced it sprang to life as I hit the light switch---soft strains of angel-song in the background, and a swell of harps.

And it was a LOVELY pie; we ate every bite for Supper dessert, and I so wish she could be here tomorrow to celebrate her birthday.  I know I haven't bought any pie filling in a long time, but miracles do happen.