CityView Magazine

10 | January/February 2018 N M C F A D Y E N ' S M U S I N G S Kitchen Duty BY BILL MCFADYEN N ews of the impending death of one of the moms of my childhood, Allene Williams, came to me while at a church officer's meeting. I had seen her in church a few weeks before and she was the same smiling and happy lady I had always known, walking on the arm of the same man for all my 56 years. She had two children older than Jeff and me, so assume over 60 years of marriage to the same man. For those at the meeting not born into my church and unfamiliar with whom she was, I described her as one of the women in whose kitchen I grew up. is ending of the earthly life of this good woman set me to thinking of the many such kitchens that comprised the village of my childhood – those kitchens captained by someone other than my own mom. Bill Wiggs would call my house on ursday evenings at or around the time of the evening meal. All he would say was, "Do you wanna spend it?" at was boy-code for packing a bag, taking it to school and riding the bus home with him on Friday for a sleepover. Sue Wiggs was commander-in-chief of that kitchen. Even as boys, we all knew Mama Sue was the prettiest sort of woman. Her kitchen held for me a great allure of goods not found in my mom's kitchen. For instance, her peanut butter had peanuts in it. Chunky peanut butter, we called it. In Mrs. Wiggs' cupboard could be found the little round can wrapped in white paper containing Underwood deviled ham. It had as its emblem the little dancing red devil with his pitchfork held alo. It got me wondering whether the Devil was really all that bad if Sue Wiggs had him in the cupboard. (I seem to recall that Bill and I actually tested that theory quite oen through the years.) She mixed the ground meat with mayonnaise and smeared it on white Wonder Bread. She served it with chocolate milk from the fridge, whereas my mom only stocked "vanilla." e absolute pinnacle of someone else's kitchen growing greener grass than my own was when a Dracula movie came on television and Mama Sue would hook us up with Jiffy Pop popcorn – the kind in the little aluminum pan with the problematic metal handle that you used to shake the pan back and forth across the hot burner. When the kernels started popping, the big aluminum foil top was designed to pop up into a silver sphere of hot smoking popcorn. e kids on the television commercial always seemed to get their sphere into a perfect geometric shape. Ours was something less perfectly shaped with a certain amount of burnt corn and unpopped kernels on the bottom. Still, the steaming fluff on top was one of the great moments of childhood. Pat Paschal hosted many an army from the Skye Drive Dirt Clod Wars held in the woods between her kitchen and the Kmart canyon. She was a regular on the route of the Charlie Chips delivery truck. I can still see that gold and black can and the metal lid being removed with a baritone pop to expose the best potato chip ever fried.

• Cover