A Tribute to my Grandmother Helen Wahl My grandmother was a Mennonite grandma, there can be no doubt about that. And I wish that everyone had a Mennonite grandma, because one thing you can say for sure, a Mennonite grandma can cook. In fact, she could do a lot more than cook, she knew what to do with a freshly butchered pig. Everything my hungry young tummy needed to know about good food came from grandmother’s kitchen. Oh my mother made good foods too, don’t get me wrong, but that was normal every-day food. My grandmother’s food was special food, for all those special occasions like Christmas. Grandma’s buns would melt in your mouth. If one came within an inch of your lips they would dissolve into thin air. In fact, there was no such thing as one bun. Pull it open and put a dab of plumb jam right there in the middle if you want. Then there was the borsht, summer borcht with potatoes and kalbst borsht with cabbage, served with chicken legs sticking up in the pot. Hazel showed me how to put Ketchup into it to boost the flavor. And there was plummamouse, she even managed to pass that recipe on to my wife Cheryl. Rollkuchen and water melon were for those summer day visits. Then there was the farmer sausage, I think she called them knackworst, and the schmaultfaat for the potatoes. If that wasn’t enough enough, I’ve left out the supreme dish of all. Wait for it…. The Wareneki. Wareneki with smaultfaat was equal to heaven on a plate. And not just one plate, we ate so many Wareneki we were stuffed to the gills. In a hall like this, you could see it as just some food. But I’ll propose to you that food is culture and culture is life. As Grandma freely gave the work of her hands, and as I happily gorged myself on its delights, it was like a model of the God’s grace. My grandmother and my wife Cheryl were very compatible.. They did lots of things together while we visited with our young children. There was a spark of mischievous zest in Grandma that only occasionally showed. They were worried about the feather pillows we were using not being clean

enough. So they had to wash the pillow. While the pillow was in the dryer it burst open and all the feathers escaped. Grandma smiled and gathered them up and stuffed them back in the pillow. My wife Cheryl, thinking back to the days when we first got married, “she made nice pies, and awesome plumamouse, and I learned from her. She pulled a Corel mug out of the cupboard and says, you fill one of these. So we went home and saw we had the same mugs, so we checked it out, a Corel mug is exactly one cup. The pie crust recipe is still pinned to our bulletin board. We also came for a visit when our children were 2 and 4 years old. Grandma had just had surgery to remove a mole. And the kids were scared of her because she had a big bruise on her face. She smiled at them and she gave them Smarties and won their hearts, because she had Smarties, that’s what great grandmas do. She gave me food, she mentored my wife and loved my children. In so doing she grounded me in culture, a community, a lifestyle. Even thought I don’t live as she did, her way was and always will be there as a reference, a companion, a point of departure. Owing in no small part to her, I still regard myself as a Mennonite, and so do my children. I am connected here, securely grounded in the history and tradition of this place and these people. One of the last things she and I did before she went into the nursing home, was take a drive around the villages where she showed us how she lived and grew up. This is who I am, thank you for a life well lived. I only pray that I might accomplish as much. Thanks to Grandma, we also know now that you can wash feather pillows. Doing so has its perils, but go for it anyway.

All my best Rob Wahl