I’ve noticed something about kitchens over the years. The nicest ones always seem to have something hanging on a hook. Sometimes it’s a well-used dish towel. Sometimes it’s an old cast iron skillet waiting for supper. And every now and then, it’s an apron that looks like it has seen just about everything – and every ingredient in the pantry and refrigerator – life could throw at it.
I have a few of those.
Actually, if we’re being honest, I probably have more aprons than one person reasonably needs. At least that’s what someone who has never gathered eggs, picked tomatoes, baked bread, weeded a garden, or tried carrying three things at once across the yard might think.
Around here, aprons earn their keep. One usually gets tied on before I head outside in the morning. It keeps scratch grain off my clothes, catches whatever dust the chickens decide to kick into the air, and somehow manages to collect cow nose prints across the front before I’ve even finished feeding everyone. I still haven’t figured out why cows think a freshly tied apron is the perfect place to scratch their noses, but they seem quite convinced of it.
Then there’s the baking apron. That’s a completely different story. The flour eventually washes out. Most of the time, anyway. Cookie dough has a way of finding places you didn’t know existed, and pie filling seems determined to test your reflexes every chance it gets. Still, those little smudges and stains don’t bother me nearly as much as they used to.
In fact, I think they make an apron more interesting. An apron that’s never been splashed with soup, dusted with flour, or wiped across a child’s sticky face is a little like a cookbook that has never been opened. It may be perfectly clean, but it hasn’t had much of a chance to live.
My favorite apron belonged to my Aunt Dot. It isn’t fancy. There aren’t any embroidered flowers or ruffles around the edges. What it does have is a towel sewn right into the waistband, because Aunt Dot believed if you were going to wear an apron, it ought to be useful. I don’t know how many meals she cooked while wearing it, but I know every time I tie it on, I find myself thinking about her.
Funny how ordinary things can do that. An old recipe card can remind you of someone’s kitchen. A wooden spoon can make you remember cookie dough shared straight from the bowl. An apron can bring back an entire afternoon. Even the smell of cinnamon can send you back fifty years in the space of one breath.
One Thanksgiving, my daughter Sarah and her friend Kelly were busy in the kitchen baking together. At some point I looked up and realized they were wearing the old aprons that had belonged to my grandmother and Aunt Dot.
For just a second, time seemed to fold in on itself. The faces in the kitchen had changed. The laughter hadn’t.
Those aprons weren’t family heirlooms because they were expensive. In fact, I doubt anyone else would have looked at them twice. They had simply stayed around long enough to become part of our family’s story.
I suppose that’s true of a lot of things. We don’t always recognize the ordinary moments while we’re living them. We don’t know which recipe will become the one everyone asks for every Christmas, or which joke will be repeated for the next twenty years, or which apron will quietly move from one generation to the next.
Life has a way of deciding those things for us.
These days, when I tie on an apron before cooking a meal or kneading bread, I don’t worry too much about getting splashed. That’s what it’s there for.
Besides, somewhere down the road, I like to think someone else might pull it off the hook, smile at a stain that never quite washed out, and remember not the apron itself, but the kitchen where it was worn…and the people who made that kitchen feel like home.
If you’re curious and want to know where at least one of those stains came from, I can tell you – from making an Apple Pie with Cheese Crust. If that sounds stain-worthy to you, just follow me into the kitchen.
Come Back Anytime…
…I’ll leave the porch light on for you.
Until next time…travel safely.
Stroll Down Another Path
Another Porch Conversation
There’s always room for one more conversation.
Hands at Work
Sometimes the best conversations continue with busy hands
Another Garden Path
When one conversation naturally leads to another.
The Bookshelf
Stories, books, and favorite reads that have found a place on my shelf.
Front Porch
Head back to the porch and see what’s new.
Leave a Note on the Porch