The thing about stuffing, and also the mailman, and wait what was I saying

You know what I was thinking about today? Well, not today exactly. Maybe yesterday. Or Tuesday. What day is it? Doesn’t matter. The point is the stuffing.

My grandmother made stuffing. Not the stuffing you get now. This was real stuffing. The kind that made you feel things. Important things. Like when you’re sitting at a table and everyone is there, except they’re not there anymore, but they were there then. You know?

The mailman came by this morning. Or maybe it was the UPS man. Hard to tell these days, they all wear brown. Not like my grandmother, she wore an apron. Blue, I think. Or was it green? She made this stuffing every Thanksgiving and it wasn’t just stuffing, it was love. That’s what people don’t understand. They think stuffing is just bread and butter and I don’t know what else, but it’s not. It’s a feeling.

Speaking of feelings, my knee hurts. Been hurting since 1987. Or was it ‘97? The doctor says it’s arthritis but I think it’s the weather. Or the stuffing. Not that the stuffing made my knee hurt, but when I think about my grandmother’s stuffing, I remember sitting at that table and my knee didn’t hurt then. So maybe it’s connected. Everything’s connected if you think about it long enough.

The mailman - or was it the UPS man - he reminded me of my cousin Henry. Not that they looked alike. Henry was bald and the mailman has hair. At least I think he does. I wasn’t wearing my glasses. Henry loved the stuffing. He’d eat three servings and my grandmother would just smile because that’s what the stuffing did. It made people happy and it made my grandmother happy to watch people be happy. It’s a whole thing.

You know what’s wrong with stuffing today? Everything. I was at the store last week - or maybe last month - and I saw the stuffing aisle and it made me want to cry. Not actual crying. I didn’t cry. But inside, you know? All these boxes. Stove Top this and Pepperidge Farm that. In my day, stuffing came from your grandmother’s kitchen and it came with feelings. You can’t put feelings in a box. Well, you can, but they’re not the same feelings.

My grandson tried to make stuffing once. Sweet boy. He called me and said “Grandma—” wait, I’m not the grandma, my grandmother was the grandma. I’m the granddaughter. Or am I a grandmother now? I think I am. Time is funny like that. Anyway, someone made stuffing and it wasn’t right. Too dry. My grandmother’s stuffing was never dry. It was moist. People don’t like that word anymore, “moist,” but I don’t care. That’s what it was. Moist and full of love and sage. There was definitely sage. I think.

The thing about 1957 - or maybe it was ‘67 - is that’s when I learned that stuffing isn’t just food. It’s a memory you can eat. Does that make sense? Probably not. Nothing makes sense anymore. The TV remote has too many buttons. The phone is also the camera is also the computer. But stuffing? Stuffing made sense. You put it in your mouth and suddenly you’re seven years old and your grandmother is alive and everyone is at the table and nobody’s mad at anybody yet.

There was this one Thanksgiving. Must have been before the war. Or after the war. One of the wars. My grandmother made the stuffing like always and my uncle Frank - you remember Frank? Course you don’t, you never met Frank - but Uncle Frank said it was the best stuffing he ever had and my grandmother just nodded like she knew that already, which she did. She knew her stuffing was good. It was the kind of good that gets into your soul and stays there. Even now, and she’s been gone… how many years? Doesn’t matter. The stuffing is still there in my soul.

My doctor says I need to watch my sodium. I said “what does that have to do with stuffing?” and she gave me a look. Doctors always give you looks these days. In my grandmother’s day, doctors made house calls and probably ate stuffing. Everything was better when people ate my grandmother’s stuffing. That’s not just me being old and nostalgic. It’s a fact. A stuffing fact.

The mailman - I definitely think it was the mailman now - he was wearing shorts even though it’s November. Or is it December? Anyway, it made me think about how my grandmother would never wear shorts. She was a dignified woman. She wore dresses and aprons and made stuffing that would make you weep. Not that I wept. I didn’t weep. But I felt like weeping sometimes, thinking about how good it was and how it’s gone now and all we have is boxes.

Boxes of stuffing. Stove Top and all those others. You just add water. Or is it milk? You add something and stir and heat and it’s supposed to be stuffing but it’s not. It’s brown mush that tastes like cardboard had a baby with disappointment. My grandmother would be so sad if she could see what we’ve done to stuffing. Although maybe she can see it. From heaven. Or wherever grandmothers go. Probably a place made entirely of kitchens where they make stuffing all day and everyone is happy.

I tried to remember the recipe once. Sat down with a piece of paper. A real piece of paper, not on the computer. I don’t trust the computer for recipes. Anyway, I wrote down what I could remember: bread crumbs. Check. Butter. Check. Sage probably. Celery? Maybe celery. Onions? Could be onions. Love? Definitely love. But you can’t write down love as an ingredient because people will think you’re crazy. But I’m not crazy. The stuffing was love. Anyone who ate it knew that.

My neighbor makes stuffing from a box. I’ve eaten it. I didn’t want to, but she invited me over and you can’t say no when someone invites you over, that’s rude. So I ate her box stuffing and I smiled and said “this is nice” but inside I was remembering my grandmother’s stuffing and how it tasted like it meant something. Like every bite was saying “you are loved and you belong here and everything is going to be okay.”

Box stuffing doesn’t say that. Box stuffing says “I am food that you are eating. I will eventually become waste.” That’s it. No love. No belonging. Just digestion.

The thing about stuffing - and I know I keep coming back to this but that’s because it’s important - is that it’s not really about the stuffing. It’s about sitting at a table with people who are mostly dead now and feeling like you matter. That’s what my grandmother’s stuffing did. It made you feel like you mattered. Even Uncle Frank, who was kind of an asshole if we’re being honest, even he mattered when we were eating that stuffing.

Where was I? Oh right, the mailman. Or maybe I was talking about my knee. Doesn’t matter. What matters is the stuffing and how you can’t get it anymore because the recipe is gone and my grandmother is gone and even if I had the exact recipe, I couldn’t make it taste the same because I don’t have her hands. She had these hands, you know, these grandmother hands that just knew things. Knew how much butter without measuring. Knew when the bread was dry enough. Knew everything.

I saw a commercial the other day for Stove Top stuffing. There was a family sitting around a table looking happy and I thought “liars.” Those people aren’t happy because of box stuffing. They’re actors pretending to be happy. Real happiness came from my grandmother’s kitchen, from that big blue bowl - or was it white? - where she mixed everything together and it smelled like Thanksgiving and love and everything good in the world.

My grandson asked me for the recipe last year. Or maybe it was last week. Time is weird. He said “I want to make Great-Grandma’s stuffing” and I started crying. Actual crying this time, not just inside crying. Because the recipe is gone. It died with her. Or maybe it didn’t die, maybe it just went somewhere I can’t reach anymore. Like her voice. I can’t remember her voice. Isn’t that terrible? I can remember the feeling of her stuffing but I can’t remember her voice.

But the stuffing. God, the stuffing. It wasn’t fancy. It didn’t have cranberries or sausage or any of that bougie nonsense they put in stuffing now. It was just bread and butter and sage and whatever else and it was perfect. Perfect like things used to be before everything got complicated and difficult and full of boxes.

Boxes everywhere. Box stuffing. Boxed meals. People living in boxes. My grandmother never lived in a box. She lived in a house with a kitchen that smelled like stuffing in November. Or whenever she made stuffing. I think it was just Thanksgiving but maybe she made it other times too. I hope she did. The world needs more stuffing days.

What was I talking about? Oh, doesn’t matter. The point is this: if you want to feel something real, if you want to taste love and memory and everything that’s gone and never coming back, you make stuffing from a box. Not because it’s good. It’s not good. But because it’s all we have now.

We used to have my grandmother. Now we have boxes.

That’s it. That’s the whole point of everything.

Grandma’s Stuffing Recipe (The Only One That Matters)

You’ll need:

1 box Stove Top Stuffing Mix (any flavor, doesn’t matter, it’s all the same without love)
1½ cups water
¼ cup (½ stick) butter or margarine

Instructions:

Boil the water in a saucepan. Add the butter. Let it melt. Think about your grandmother while you wait.
Stir in the stuffing mix. It will look like brown crumbs because that’s what it is.
Cover. Remove from heat. Let stand 5 minutes. During these 5 minutes, remember sitting at a table with people who are gone now.
Fluff with a fork. Try not to cry.
Serve it to people you love. They will say “this is good” but they’re lying. It’s not good. It’s just stuffing. Real stuffing died with your grandmother.
Eat it anyway. We’re all just eating it anyway now.

Serves 4 people who will never know what real stuffing tasted like.

Written by someone who can’t remember what day it is but remembers exactly how my grandmother’s stuffing made me feel