Remembering a heartwarming holiday edition of “Mary’s Farm,” where Edie Clark reflects on the powers of cooking and friendship.
By Edie Clark
Oct 12 2007
Orphan Holidays | Mary’s Farm
Photo Credit : ThinkstockEditor’s note: Yankee published “Orphan Holidays” in November/December 2007 as a special edition of Edie Clark’s long-running column “The View from Mary’s Farm.” Excerpted from the memoir she published that year, Saturday Beans & Sunday Suppers, this essay represents everything readers loved about Edie’s storytelling: It is graceful, heartwarming, and true.
I’ve been alone a long time now, nearly 20 years. It’s something I never imagined, and yet at this point in my life, I can’t imagine its being otherwise. I guess you could say I’ve grown accustomed to this life alone. I’ve figured it out.
My life alone intensified five years after my husband, Paul, died; both my parents passed away, and sometime later, my Aunt Peg and Uncle Jamie left this world as well. It’s sobering to be this alone in the world. Being without a spouse, without parents, and without children leaves one in a kind of dangling solitude from which there truly is no rescue. It’s simply a state of being. And I figured either I could continue feeling I was at the end of that perilous rope or I could find a family of my own — a family without the traditional ties but one that nevertheless provides everything the traditional family does and, in many cases, probably much more. So one thing I figured out was the benefit of being able to choose this family.
A lot of the rest of what I figured out had to do with food. I realized that by inviting someone to join me for dinner — and on occasion that “someone” may be as many as 21 people — I’ve accomplished a lot. I love to cook, so I’ve brought to my home people for whom I can cook. And I may presume that I’ve been able to provide these people with some good food and company as well. Though I can’t be absolutely certain I’ve done that for them, I can be certain about the pleasure it brings me.
It’s a mystery to me why I haven’t remarried. I suppose there are many reasons, but I do recall that in those first confusing months after Paul’s death, I felt certain I would marry again. I’d been happy in my marriage to Paul, and so I reasoned that I would find that again. I wished we’d had children, but life is so complex, and to those who truly believe that everything in one’s life is a result of a deliberate decision, I can only say that I wish that were really true.
Most of what any of us encounters is such a complex stew of circumstance and happenstance that we’re truly fortunate if we can choose what we’ll have for dinner that night, much less our own destiny. Anything more that seems deliberate is simply illusion. Paul was 39 when he died. I have many friends who have lost their spouses at a young age, and I know people whose children have died, and friends who have had accidents in which they’ve lost their legs or their minds. No, it seems to me that in many cases we’re asked to react to circumstances, not choose them.
And so, for whatever reason, I’m still alone. But I’m not alone in any real way. For one thing, the renovation of this house has consumed me, as much as any marriage with at least three children would have. Constantly, there were decisions to make, budgets to balance, supplies to pick up or deliver — and all for the ultimate well-being of the structure as well as my soul. I needed this house in a way I’d never needed anything.
After I bought the house, the pace of the project quickened, and once the first few boards were torn from the side of the building, it didn’t slow for nine long years. And so, within that storm of activity, I found a compelling heart to every one of my days, a rhythm that kept beating and never slowed, until just recently. With the work still unfinished but so close, I can rest a bit now and reflect. For a long time, reflection wasn’t possible. Or even desirable. The work was a kind of frenzy; if it had been set to fast motion, as is popular now on house-building shows, you would have seen siding and roofs flying off, additions and dormers magically appearing, walls disappearing, doors moving from one opening to another, and windows vanishing as new ones zoomed into place. If Mary were to come back from the dead for a visit, she’d be lost in her own house.
But within all of that, there was always time for a meal. The first really new parts of this house were the kitchen and the dining room. And so these two spaces became almost sacred as other spaces were pounded into place. And there were meals, gatherings, parties — something for which I wasn’t particularly well prepared. My Aunt Peg had given dinner parties on occasion, and as a child, I sat there uncomfortably as the erudite conversation wafted high above my head. But the food was good. That was always something to look forward to.
And there was something else, something much harder to grasp. The dining room in that old Colonial house had a big fireplace; in the winter, the fire was always lit, as were the candles, which gave the room a glow and a cozy feeling, as if we’d all come in out of the cold to gather there. Of course, we had, in a sense, but to my way of thinking there was something more primeval about it — a kind of bonding together against the rigors of the wilderness of an ever-more-confusing world. Maybe, in some vague way, that’s what I’m reaching for when I invite friends to dinner.
My first bit of fortune came with the table that my parents left me. It had belonged to my great-grandparents. My great-grandparents, I should explain, had a lot of money — money that never made it past the year 1929. The money was gone, but the furniture stayed with us, passed down and down into ever-smaller homes. In our modest house in New Jersey, the table was a circle with four grand chairs around it. Two of the chairs had arms, and with their high, ornate backs, they seemed somehow out of scale against the table, which had a beautiful mahogany finish. As a child, I loved to hide under the table and was always slightly awed by the fierce nature of what held it up: a grand base carved into fearsome eagle’s claws, grasping big wooden balls.
In the basement, my father had stored four more chairs to match the set and four leaves that could be set into the expandable table frame. I’d never seen it with more than one leaf in it, because my parents’ dining room had been too small. But, once the table made its way to this new house, I was able to expand it completely and set all the chairs around it. I’d already envisioned it many times as the workmen were demolishing two old bedrooms and putting the new wainscoting into place: This is where the table will go. This is where the fun will happen.
The appearance of my new dining room and the banquet-size table must have seemed absurd to anyone watching this process, as this was a home for one person. Who was going to sit around this table? I’m sure it’s a question poised on the lips of anyone who enters this house, especially all the men who come to do various jobs, wiring and plumbing and flooring. I can see them glance into the big room and then glance again.
My dinners began some years back when, weary of trying to figure out what to do for Thanksgiving and Christmas, I hit on the idea of what I called “orphan holidays.” Gradually, I noticed that I wasn’t the only one around who was alone at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Not only were there those who were truly alone, but there were others who weren’t technically alone but were in transition — friends whose spouses had died, friends in the midst of divorce, friends in some other kind of despair. I realized we could all come together on those days, and hosting the holidays fulfilled my need to cook a big meal for many hungry friends.
At the most, I’ve crowded 25 people around that table (with an extension), and at the least, I’ve hosted seven — all grateful for a good place to go to share what can otherwise be deadly days of remorse or sadness while (you’re certain) the entire rest of the world is happily celebrating with their big families. An exaggeration, of course, as I know there are people with large families who grit their teeth through the whole ordeal — but, truly, holidays can be so difficult for anyone alone.
I love the holidays as a way to try out new recipes and to re-experience the joy of bringing out old favorites. I also love this time as a way of loving my house. You could look at it as something very similar to dressing up — that wonderful outfit just hanging in the closet, waiting for the right occasion. Well, I love dressing up my house. It’s a chance to decorate. (I’d never unpacked even a single Christmas ornament before I started hosting the orphan holidays. It seemed so pointless. Decorate for what? For whom?) And it’s an opportunity to get out the good china and silverware, use the gravy boat, change the tablecloth, put new tapers into the candlesticks…whatever.
It’s no different from what everyone else loves about having family over for Thanksgiving and Christmas; it’s a chance to change gears, see the house through different eyes. I love every part of a party: planning the menu, cleaning the house, setting the table, cooking the meal — which I insist must be almost completely ready before the first guest arrives. All I want to have to do once the party starts is put the food on the table. After all, I want to attend this party, too. That’s why I’m giving it!
And so, out of the somber puzzle of how to cook for one came the joyous process of cooking for 20 and more. I recommend it highly. My favorite moment of all comes at the height of the party: to sit for a moment and listen…listen to the talk, the laughter, the joy within these walls.
Thank you to Edie and to all who ‘choose’ family, host and embrace the “orphan” and those in transition. Our home is one that is open, not only to family, but also chosen family–who may once have been strangers. May God’s love assure us of His grace as we welcome all–perhaps even angels.
What a thrill it is to see her back in the pages of Yankee. I have several of her books and I spend happy hours reading about her life and I realize what a wonderful person she is. Thank you! You have made my Christmas a much happier one. I am a widow and have been to many “orphan dinners”.
So happy to read Edie again! Thank You
I always looked forward to Edie’s column. It left an imprint on my heart. She is sorely missed
This will be my second Christmas “alone” since my wife died suddenly a year and a half ago. But, actually, this will be the first as I was able to share some of each holiday since her death with some piece of my family. COVID-19 has taken even that small solace from me this year and so I ate my Thanksgiving alone and Christmas will be the same. Oh, I was invited to dine with family but, in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to chance becoming infected and risk being one of the statistics. Being in that “vulnerable” group of folks made me want to take no chances that I would not be here next year to get back to not being alone during the holidays. I only put out a minimal number of Christmas decorations this year as well – celebrating for the neighbors but not much inside – a couple of ceramic Christmas trees instead of my actual tree. My consolation is that there has been delivered to us a light at the end of the COVID tunnel and I intend to reach it. Merry Christmas to all of Edie Clark’s many fans!
Edie Clark’s article is one of the most powerful, emotion-filled articles I have read in a very long time. The fact that her articles appear monthly in Yankee Magazine has made me decide to finally subscribe. I will also be purchasing two of her books, Saturday Beans and Sunday Suppers and The Place He Made. I look forward to future issues and emails.
What is the titles of Edie’s 2 books.
My favorite feature of Yankee.
Hope Edie’s continuing to improve.
Merry Christmas, Edie!
Edie: I am trying to recall where I read a comment that has stayed with me for years. I want to say it was in one of your columns back in the 1990’s. It was something to the effect that “three of the best things in life are: to be dirty and to get clean, to be hungry and to eat and to be tired and to rest. Is this from one of your columns?
Thanks.
Thankyou Edie for this wonderful article……as with all of the others which I have read, there is always something so heartwarming and special which stays with me in my mind’s eye.
I have only just today read about your beginnings as a writer and just wanted to say how much I loved reading your description of using that typewriter…..the sounds it made, aligning the paper, the words appearing on the page.etc. etc……oh, how I identified with this and remembered my first tentative ‘goes’ on the typrewriter in my fourth year of high school in the early 1960’s…..I went on to be a Secretary/receptionist and, even though I don’t write for my living, I still enjoy typing and seeing the words appearing, not on the paper page these days, but onto my monitor which sits here in my studio in Cottesloe, Western Australia…….I so look forward to reading more and more of your articles as time permits. Regards and Smiles. Sue.
I have looked forward to Edie’s article every month. I have read both of her books and hope she writes more. Today a friend gave me some rhubarb, so I got out Edie’s book “SaturdayNight Beans and Summer Dinners and made the rhubarb soup. What a treat!
I have subscribed to Yankee Mag for years and it is my favorite magazine. I feel a kinship to the people of New England although I really do not have any connection to your part of the country. I have visited twice to Vermont and Cape Cod. Thanks for your giving me an armchair vacation every time I get your magazine. Lou Shellenberger
Just love her articles and have just ordered both her books…
Thank you for keeping Mary’s Farm in your new Yankee magazine, tho I miss it on the back page since it is the first article I read! Because Edie Clark is such an exceptional writer, gifted, in my opinion, I immediately sent for her two most recent books your magazine mentioned and was not disappointed. – Both books, The Place He Made and Saturday Beans and Sunday Suppers are captivating. Her love for New England is evident in all her articles, essays and books and the candid observations are most welcome.
Thank you for featuring her work. She certainly knows how to connect with a reader.