Cornbread

Today I was making cornbread to go with our soup and it made me think about my great grandmother, Little Mama. I grew up in a multi-generational house so there was always people around and almost always someone in the kitchen cooking. I remember this one time when I was about 5, Little Mama was in the kitchen with my grandmother, Nanny. Little Mama was mixing something in a bowl with her electric mixer and I was certain it was one of the cakes she always made. My great grandfather,Papa had a huge sweet tooth. Whenever she made cake, I liked to lick the beaters. This time when I asked for the beaters, Little Mama told me no. I got really upset and decided I would go pester her from outside the kitchen window. The window was open and she was looking out the window, so I felt this was the best way to pester her in to giving me the beaters. As I was approaching my spot outside, I got distracted by a bee in the dogs water. I decided to be nice to the dog and take the bee out. Of course, I didn't stop there, I had to squish the bee with my bare feet. The bee promptly stung the crap out of me sending me back inside the house crying. When I got back inside, Nanny fixed up my bee sting and I immediately went back to pestering Little Mama about the beaters. Finally she was tired of telling me no, so she gave me a beater. As she handed it to me I will never forget her words. She said, "you aren't going to like this, but just remember that you asked for it". I proceeded to take a big lick off of the beater and realized she was right; that was the nastiest tasting cake ever. It was not sweet and was very gritty. That's when she told me she was making cornbread.

I wish I could say that I learned my lesson that day, but I didn't. I had many more such lessons to come. I was always the child who was very head strong and had to learn the hard way.