Thursday, May 11, 2006

Iris the cook

Iris had never been an adventurous cook as she had spent most of her life looking after her semi-invalid mother. She would come home from work and have to start preparing a meal for the two of them. She did that for year after year and consequently, her social life was virtually non-existent. It was only after her mother’s death two years before I met her that she began to venture out in the evenings occasionally with friends from work.
On the evenings we were going out, we would have dinner/supper towards the end of the night at some restaurant or other as quite often, I would be working a club and had to be there for around 7pm. If I didn’t have a booking, she would get great pleasure from preparing a meal for me when we did not have to rush out early.
My mother was, among other things, a wonderful Cordon Bleu trained cook and she taught my wife many of her skills. I once asked mother how to prepare and cook lobster thermidor only to be told that my wife knew how, as she had told her. I had to explain that I wanted to pass on the information to someone else. That, on top of the postcard from Felixstowe, set a few wheels turning in my mother’s mind! I remember her giving me an ‘old-fashioned’ look as if to say, “What’s going on?”
Eventually, I couldn’t keep Iris a secret and later, the two of them became good friends.

To Iris, knowing that you love me. June ‘73

My darling Iris, proud possessor of my heart. I know
So well that you do love me. Yes, my love, You told me so.
Discovering untold delights in every touch and soft caress,
As you whisper of your love for me with gentle tenderness.
Happy am I that I can fill with love, some part
Of that aching void that lay within your lonely heart.
I see the love you have for me in oh, so many different ways;
In every touch, in every smile and in your sparkling eyes always.
And holding you, my dearest heart, is all I need to make me see
So clearly now, that I adore you, and you, my sweetest love, love me!

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