As you know by now, I not only loved my mother, I admired her. But even so, I was all set to snicker in writing about some of her recipe choices. I have sometimes referred to her as “The Jell-O Queen of Southern Indiana.” To confirm my diagnosis, I took a good hard look (and count) in her recipe file box. Here’s the verdict: 31 Jell-O recipes—all in the Salad section.
They had names like Divine Surprise, Princess Salad and Cherry Delight. Most contained fruit, such as crushed pineapple, mandarin oranges, bananas or cranberries (cut in half!) Others contained chopped celery or grated carrots. And several had toppings, like icing on a cake. Those toppings weren’t exactly calorie-free, since they contained either Dream Whip, sour cream, cream cheese, mayonnaise or some combination of them. No wonder I liked them as a kid. Desserts masquerading as health food—right up my alley! This vintage ad, from an unidentified magazine, made me laugh out loud in recognition when I saw it in an antique store.
As I continued cruising Mother’s recipes, I noticed something more important. They had titles like “Pearl’s Ribbon Salad” “Moneda’s Orange Salad,” (with GOOD written beside the title,) “Renna’s Frosted Cranberry Salad” and “Nelle’s Lime Salad.” These were my mother’s lifelong friends. She grew up with most of them, and taught their Sunday School class at church for years. I’m proud that in a town of 20,000, where she lived her entire life, she found plenty to keep her useful and a loyal circle of friends.
How many of us can say we have maintained those friendships we made as kids or in college, or even as young adults? Part of that in her case was staying in the same small town where she grew up. But that’s not the entire story. It also required patience, kindness and counting to ten, sometimes more than once, for ALL of them, I’m sure.
Besides the women mentioned above, I can still recite Mother’s other friends’ names: Opal, Elsie, Mabel, Irene, Mildred, and Helen among them. Since my dad often collected rents at night, Mom usually took me with her, as a very young child, to the monthly meetings of her women’s group, the Delta Alpha class of the North Methodist Church. She sternly warned me to keep my mouth shut, speak politely only when spoken to, and NEVER use an adult’s first name.
After the business meeting was over, various women made conversation with me, asking about my activities or commenting on my dress. I learned that the husband of one shared my birthday, so until his death, he and I sent each other silly birthday cards. A childless member, ill with cancer, gave me her silver as a wedding gift, engraved with an M, since we shared that initial.
OK, so maybe their Jello recipes weren’t the most nutritious “salads” out there, but those ladies certainly knew how to gel, in more ways than one.
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