Traditions Have Their
Ups and Downs
How many cookie monsters do you know? Thirty-seven years ago (or maybe thirty-six,
I can’t be sure) I became one. I know
who set it in motion—it was Jane. She
shared a gift and with it a recipe. Since
that Christmas, we have prepared countless batches of them. They have marched with us from Indiana to
Atlanta to Savannah and beyond. They
became a Christmas tradition of which we grew quite fond.
It became mine alone (for a time, at least) more than thirty years ago. Our schedules at work set most of this in
motion. I worked days (some of them
long) during the week, she worked retail—and that meant nights and
weekends. We couldn’t do it together,
but it had to be done, so it became mine to do—with the help of our two little
elves. By the time we made our next
corporate move (to Savannah), the elves had both outgrown what we never
could--one was away at college, the other in high school. Neither thought much (or as much as we did)
of our tradition. Some of this is explained
by age—before I say it was their ages, perhaps it was ours.
The explanation might just turn on how much older we were. The young do not instinctively respect
traditions, while olders cling to them.
We continued to make the traditional treats for the next seven years,
then moved on to the Lowcountry of South Carolina. Not two years into our stay there, we started
a tradition ourselves. For thirteen
years, we adults have gathered to make them ourselves, even giving them to the
youngers who have chosen not to keep it up that we know of.
Last year, we added two of our contemporaries to this older
sort of event. There were a couple of
bumps in the road this year. First, we
noticed as we broke things up and divided our production (I would never call
them the “spoils.”), that the production was much darker in color. We shrugged, and headed home. The next morning, we noticed these
darker-hued products were harder, too.
In fact, they were more rocky than crisp. That morning, I had two more batches to cook,
so I set to work, turning on the oven and setting the preheat
temperature.
It was then I noticed it, the previous day, when I arrived,
I had asked our baker to raise the temperature.
I was sure the recipe called for a higher cooking temp. As it turns out, I was wrong. Looking at the recipe (written on an old card
more than thirty years old), I realized I had caused the overcooking of the
prior day’s output. I sent out a note
to the prior day’s participants, explaining my mistake, and promising to
replace it all, which I did.
In taking the additional steps that required, I had to prepare two new batches of dough the next day to replace the batches I
cooked to keep my commitment to replace the bad batches. Are you with me so far? I
couldn’t even follow it all.
Consequently, I made a mixing mistake on one of those
batches, which I realized that afternoon, and was able to correct by doubling
the size of one of these new batches.
When they rolled out of the oven, it all worked out (as far as I know so
far). So what’s next? Will the mistakes become traditional? Stay tuned
