• • •
January came, and on my first “official” day of work in the shop, I found myself turning off the buzzer on my alarm, sliding out of bed, and pulling on my new uniform—sweatpants, a T-shirt, and sneakers. I headed down the hallway, stepped out the side door of the house, and walked across the driveway toward the garage. As I made the twenty-foot commute from our house to Mom’s shop, I couldn’t help but think, It wasn’t supposed to go like this. I’d had an idea of what I’d do after college, and this was not it. Where was my black suit? I couldn’t even remember if it was hanging in my closet, or if Mom had packed it away somewhere.
I was grateful to have something to do that would take my mind off what I’d been going through, even if it was only for a few hours a day. But when Mom asked me about officially working with her in her bakery, she was so enthusiastic that I immediately said yes, without even thinking about it. Now I was having second thoughts.
As I reached for the knob on the glass door to the bakery, I tried to reassure myself that everything was going to be okay. I was weak, worn out, and still recovering from my cancer treatments, and I knew that, for now, working with Mom was my only option. There was no way any employer would take a chance on hiring me while I was in this condition. Just look at what had happened to Dad the year before.
So there I was inside my new office—a four-hundred-square-foot bakeshop that had formerly been our family’s garage. I used to store my Rollerblades where a three-foot mixer now sat. My brothers, sister, and I used to have an oversize tub of basketballs that had been replaced by a sink mounted on the wall. Dad used to park his lawn mower where a commercial-grade monster of an oven was now situated. Looking at it now, you would never know this cute little space had ever been a grungy garage. The floor was freshly painted, and the window frames and wood trim were a bright, cheerful red. We had even stenciled fun black polka dots on the white walls, to match the cute packaging Mom wrapped her creations in. I didn’t know who was going to find Mom’s shop on our quiet neighborhood street, at the top of our long driveway, but it looked adorable.
I stood apprehensively beside the stainless steel worktable in the middle of the shop as Mom finished frosting a three-layer cake. What am I supposed to be doing? As she whipped frosting with a spatula in her left hand and spun the cake pedestal with her right, I began to feel totally inadequate and unprepared. I was not a baker or a pastry chef or any sort of culinary expert. I wasn’t even a business major. I figured I could probably build a few gift boxes, tally the orders, and sprinkle some sugar on the gingersnap cookies that were becoming Mom’s bestseller. At least I knew one thing for certain: having Mom as a boss was going to be convenient. There were still days when I felt completely exhausted. Where else would I be able to come to work late, leave early, and essentially wear pajamas all the time?
Although I wasn’t unhappy working with Mom, it didn’t feel like a “real” job. At the most random times, while I’d be on the phone with a customer or watching Mom take a new batch of cookies out of the oven, I would find myself wondering, What does it all mean? Who am I now? Where do I go from here? I wished I could just move on or flip a switch that would let me forget everything I had been through over the past several months, but I couldn’t. I was a different girl from the one who had crossed the stage at graduation, and I wasn’t sure how to move forward.
That first day, as Mom popped the layer cake in the refrigerator, she called out a baking tip to me. “The cold air helps the frosting set.”
Oh, should I be taking notes? I thought. Who am I kidding? I have zero intention of ever touching a cake.
Before the refrigerator door swung shut, Mom hauled out a huge ball of hard brown dough that looked like a blob of petrified elephant poop and walked toward me with it. Nodding her head, she motioned to the opposite side of the worktable. “Honey, why don’t you stand right there? You can watch me for a minute and then jump in whenever you want. It’s easy.” She grabbed an oversize cookie sheet and began molding the gingersnap dough. Somewhere between the first and second tray, I reached over to grab some dough, Mom and I continued talking, and I started getting the hang of it. The motion was productive, yet pleasantly mind-numbing.
I soon found that there’s something simple and satisfying about baking, and I started to understand why Mom liked being out in her kitchen. Scoop, stamp, sugar. Scoop, stamp, sugar. There’s an ease and an exactness that comes with the repetition. Put the dough in the oven, bake for ten minutes, and take out perfectly round, delicious gingersnaps every time.
We were nearly finished scooping out the last of the cookie dough when Mom abruptly turned, grabbed a broom, and started sweeping the floor. Our conversation came to a halt, and an awkward silence filled the room. I could tell she was gearing up to say something.
“What is it?” I asked, worried. Was I doing a bad job?
With her back to me, Mom took a deep breath. “So, Suz… I was thinking.” She stopped sweeping and turned to look directly at me. “Please think about this before you answer.” I could see in her face that whatever she was about to ask me meant a lot to her. “What would you think about naming these cookies Susansnaps?”
All the hard stuff I had been through was finally over—the meds, the treatments, the daily doctor’s visits. Now I’d get a cookie named after me? I’d spent the last year wanting desperately to blend in. I didn’t want to be singled out in any way, let alone this one.
But from the tone of Mom’s voice, I knew this was not a casual question. It was calculated, direct, asked with purpose. Mom is a determined person, and there’s always a method to her madness. I continued to scoop, stamp, and sugar, lining up the cookies six across and nine deep. I kept my head down, thinking that if I focused on the cookies, I could will away the tears brimming in my eyes. Blinking hard to hold them back, I tried to calm myself. All right, Susan. It’s fine. It’s just a cookie.
Finally, after a few minutes, I answered. “Mom, really? What are you going to say when people ask what a Susansnap is? Or why you picked that name? Who is going to buy these? People who feel sorry for us?” As the questions poured out of me, Mom’s face fell. But I kept going. “So we’re just going to figure it out as we go? Do you think Aunt Sue would like this?” I should have known better, but I was caught up in my own frustration and confusion.
“Susan, it’s just a little cookie that people seem to like. I’m not going to organize a big fund-raiser or run a marathon in your honor. I just want to name this cookie for you and Aunt Sue.”
No twenty-three-year-old dreams of a future spent baking gingersnap cookies with her mom. And I certainly never dreamed of having a cookie named after me and Aunt Sue because we both had the same disease. I wanted to say no. I wanted to forget about my cancer. Watching my mom bake Susansnaps every day was not going to make that easy.
But for so long, I had been the sick girl who needed my mom at my side. Maybe this time, she was the one who needed me. So many times, during my worst days of chemo, I had needed her to remind me, “You can do this. You are doing a good job.” I had always been able to count on her. Couldn’t I finally do something for her in return?
After my initial defensiveness had subsided, I realized that hearing Mom say “Susansnaps” was the sweetest and saddest thing. I started rethinking my reaction. Susansnaps? I don’t know… Susansnaps. Hmm… Maybe it is kind of catchy.
I was hesitant to put my name on the cookie, but I decided that if that was what Mom really wanted, it would be all right. I have to admit that part of me figured not many people would ever buy the cookies, so it wouldn’t really matter. I’m not sure why I questioned Mom about whether Aunt Sue would like the idea. I already knew the answer. Based on everything I knew about her, I’m sure that Aunt Sue would have been somewhere between laughing at Mom’s absurd garage business and being her biggest supporter.
Dear Sue,
The
first time I worked the dinner shift at Carver’s, I worked with you. Remember how nervous I was? It wasn’t the twenty-stool counter the two of us would be waitressing or taking customers’ orders off the burger menu that scared me; it was the thought of potentially messing up in front of the huge Friday-night crowd—and in front of you. “Laura, you’ll be fine. It’s no big deal,” you said, cool and unruffled. “Besides, it’s just hamburgers and pie. It’s not life-threatening.” Those words stuck with me all night, and I ended up having a great time. We whirled around the restaurant, serving burgers and refilling drinks. We sliced and served our share of Mother and Dad’s famous banana-nut cake that night too.
I never would have imagined that thirty-five years later, I’d be baking that same cake for dozens of customers in a stand-alone building next to my house in Atlanta. You won’t believe what happened. I was baking out of the house when I got a big order for twenty-six custom cakes from the kids’ orthodontist. He ordered them as thank-you gifts for all the dentists who had referred patients to him. I burned up the mixer baking all those cakes. After I ran out of space, I covered our kitchen table in the house with cooling racks and pans. With that, Ken said, “You can do this, and it’s time to get you out of the house.”
What I should have done, months before, was get a normal job. After Ken’s treatment, we were worried about our family’s finances. I could have gone to an elementary school and applied for a teaching position—that would have been the logical thing to do. But that’s not what happened. In the midst of Ken getting treatment, losing his job, and losing his health insurance, and despite the fact that we had kids to put through college, multiple cars in the driveway to maintain, and a household to keep up, Ken was totally supportive of me when I wanted to build out a full-fledged commercial kitchen in our garage and start my own bakery. I laugh now, thinking about how ridiculous it sounds. I’m so lucky that Ken has always loved me and believed in me. He didn’t even flinch when I first told him my garage-to-kitchen idea. In fact, he was so enthusiastic that I never stopped long enough to figure out how I’d pull it off before I dove right in.
Looking back, I realize I really didn’t know what I was doing. Of course, I knew how to bake a good pie. Mother passed that skill on to us. I was using a few of her and Dad’s recipes from the restaurant too. But in terms of the logistics of running a business? I didn’t have a clue. And then I talked Susan into working for me. How was I going to manage having an employee when I was barely making a profit? The truth is, I was desperate to have Susan there, so I could keep an eye on her. She was more fragile than she realized. If I could keep her in my shop, even if it meant scrounging up little jobs for her to complete, I’d do it.
There were so many times in those early days that I felt so scared, and then I would think of you. I’d hear your voice saying, “Laura, you’ll be fine.” I sure hoped we would.
11
Double-Sided Tape
January is such a letdown of a month. There are no parties, no festivities, no merriment, no special foods or treats, and people are low on money after holiday shopping. It’s a month of resolutions—get back to the gym, get healthy, get a promotion, get a new job, save up for school or vacation or a house. I usually look forward to the new year, but that year I found it hard to. Coming out of treatment played tricks on me. I had a lot to sort through, to figure out what I wanted to do next, but I wasn’t sure where I fit in anymore. I didn’t want to talk about my cancer, chemo, or radiation. I was ready to leave all that behind. But, somehow, it kept popping up, in conversation and in my own thoughts. And although I was ready to focus on Mom’s business, I didn’t know what I had to offer.
The first of the year brought a dead halt to Mom’s growing business. With those pesky New Year’s resolutions under way, suddenly there were no calls, no orders, no cars pulling up the driveway to pick up cakes, pies, cheesecakes, and cookies. Every time I saw a commercial on TV for weight loss, I cringed. Who eats sweets in January?
The loss of income was problematic, of course, but the lack of business was also hard for me, because I was once again facing long days and not much to fill them with. A job with no work? That might sound like a nice deal to some people, but to me, it was frustrating. I started to feel useless again, and I think Mom did too. Together, we started asking, “What comes next? What do we do now?” Mom didn’t seem to mind that she had brought me on as an employee and now had nothing for me to do—I think she was just happy she didn’t have to give me shots, dole out pills, or sleep on the floor in my room anymore. But I was getting restless.
Around that time, I started to have vivid dreams of Aunt Sue. I had only heard her voice on Mom and Dad’s wedding video, and of course I’d seen photos of her, yet she appeared in my dreams, talking to me. But, eerily, rather than being Mom’s age, she was in her twenties and looked about my age. I didn’t know what to think about that. And then I started having real nightmares that I was stuck in chemo. Dr. Weens would be there, telling me that my treatment hadn’t worked, that the cancer hadn’t gone away. I wasn’t sure I could go through it all again—the chemo, the terrible side effects. I’d be screaming in my nightmares, trapped in this otherworldly treatment. It was terrifying. I’d go out to the shop and try to find something, anything, to do, but I couldn’t forget those vivid thoughts. The nightmares got worse whenever I had a follow-up doctor’s appointment; I’d find myself worrying about what would happen if the cancer wasn’t gone. Even an ounce of doubt was hard to shake.
And then there was Randy. He had found a job in Birmingham and was saving up to move to Atlanta and go back to school. There is no guidebook for what he had been through, twenty-one years old with a girlfriend who was recovering from cancer. He didn’t know what he could do to help me, and for that matter, neither did I. Randy had been devastated by my diagnosis and tended to imagine the worst. When I would try to make light of something related to my cancer or treatment, he wouldn’t find it funny. I worried that it was all too much to ask him to deal with and that I was dragging him down. I knew he meant it when he assured me he didn’t feel that way at all and he would do anything for me. For some reason, his reassurances made it easier for me to tell him not to come around too much. Maybe I was pushing him away. I was protective of Randy, but I also didn’t want to become some sad, sick, pity case.
One thing I found helpful was when Mom and I got cable in the shop, which sounds like a small thing but was actually life-changing. We plugged in my old eleven-inch TV and were able to enjoy our daily lineup of shows right from the bakery. Between having ongoing conversations about our shows, and then, once business started to pick up again, helping with batches of cookies, putting together shipping boxes, and doodling business card ideas, I had plenty of opportunities to distract myself from my fears.
One morning, we were putzing around in the shop, cleaning and organizing, when I asked Mom, “Did you see the final tally of orders from December?” I held up a clipboard.
It turned out that the tins of gingersnaps, which Mom did end up naming Susansnaps, were our number-one seller. I couldn’t believe it. Out of all the delicious desserts my mom baked—cakes, pies, fancy cookies—people liked the simple gingersnaps best. Of course, they were delicious and a quintessential Christmas cookie, but I couldn’t help but wonder what exactly made them appealing enough to outsell all our other products.
I thought about the act of gift-giving and how I had received presents while I was sick. People gave me the most random things—a bonsai tree, a bird-watching pamphlet, a coffee-table book called How to Dress for Success—probably because they didn’t know what to send. Honestly, what do you give a twenty-two-year-old with cancer? And what do you say? That’s why, when I gave out Mom’s cookies to other patients at my treatments, I kept it simple. “Hang in there.” “We’re thinking of you.” “Hope today goes okay.” Finding the right thing to say was especially hard when I was talking to someone who was very sic
k, since telling them, “Get well soon” was not an option. But thanks to Mom’s bags of delicious cookies, I didn’t have to say much at all because the sweets did the talking for me. Maybe that’s why the gingersnaps were our bestselling item. They were simple, not over the top—just enough to let someone know you were thinking of them. That was what meant the most to me when I was sick.
One thing that bothered me though, was when people would say things like, “You’re going to be fine. It’s treatable, right? Oh good, you’re fine.”
It might have been true that I’d be fine, but at the time, it didn’t necessarily feel that way. Nothing about the treatment I was going through was “fine.” I was grateful for the drugs and grateful I had excellent medical care, but the treatment process was brutal, and it didn’t help to hear people minimize what I was dealing with.
One night, when I was feeling particularly down about not having a job and worried about a relapse, I’d had my fill of hearing things like that from various people. We’d had a nice Sunday dinner with the family, everyone else had left the kitchen, and Mom was doing the dishes. I took a seat at the counter and said, “Mom, if one more person tells me I am going to be fine, I think I’m going to hit them!”
Mom sat down next to me. “Oh, Susan, the things I’ve heard. Someone stopped me at the grocery store once and said, ‘I heard your husband has non-Hodgkin’s. Did you know that Jacqueline Kennedy died from that five months after being diagnosed?’ Suz, what was I supposed to say back? ‘Excuse me, you’re blocking the broccoli’?”
Mom and I sat there commiserating about ridiculous things people had said to us until we started laughing so hard we were both in tears. Mom had never shared anything like that with me before. I felt like she was letting me in on a little secret. During that cathartic laugh fest, I realized what really bothered me about people telling me I would be fine was feeling like I had to console them by agreeing with them. “Yes, I’m going to be okay. You’re right. It’s not that bad. It’s not that bad at all. Don’t worry. I’m fine!”
The Cookie Cure Page 9