Southern Ways
“Neighbors bring food with death and flowers with sickness and little things in between.”
I have always loved that quote from To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee (my favorite book ever by the way) because it evidences the fact that Ms. Lee is truly a Southern woman. I do not doubt that many all over the world try to comfort the families who have had a recent death with food, but in the South it is a tradition, no it is a rule. The idea that one must prepare food seems almost biblical in its authority.
I know this because I am so Southern—born in Atlanta, a huge Southern town, the town that Sherman burned on his march to the sea; the town that Margaret Mitchell made immortal by her book Gone With the Wind. I have lived near Atlanta for all of my life (with one exception, a year or so in Birmingham, Alabama, another Southern town of note), so I know the South.
When I was younger I always wondered as my mother cooked food for such families with a death—why food? It can’t truly comfort, I thought, for it is no more powerful than flowers, or cards or letters, or kind words.
But through the years I have accepted the custom, participated in it wholly and come to understand the importance of such food. First, it will provide sustenance for family members who do not feel like preparing food in their mourning; we send food because it takes time and more effort than sending a plant, or writing a card (all of which we do in addition to sending food.) It is personal in that it is prepared by the hands of the woman of the house, handled with loving care as if she is undertaking a holy task. No doubt her mind is on the deceased and the family as she mixes and stirs and bakes. The task itself creates a pensive thoughtfulness about the deceased and their meaning in our lives.
I thought on this a great deal this past weekend when a church member had passed away. He and his wife were the dearest couple with good values, kind ways, who were devoted to each other during their 68 years together. He served in WWII, Korea, worked hard all his life and was a true Christian, an example I always held in my heart when I thought of true men of God.
And so, I went to the funeral home and visited the family. I tried to comfort and commiserate, as I knew the feeling of their loss after having lost my father and my husband. I stood next to his casket, covered with an American flag, and I thought that no one deserved that flag more. I mourned my friend.
And then I went home and cooked. As I prepared a dish for a family supper at our church I followed in the footsteps of all the women of my family for years. I was paying the last homage that a woman can offer in the South, a dish made with love.
I also thought that I knew why we prepare such food. It is all we can think to do, after the hand-holding, and visiting, it is the last symbol of Southern values for those we love and shall miss with all our hearts.