Because I have to get around to ordering a monument for my husband’s gravesite, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the connection between names and being remembered.

Tony was buried on December 15, 2019, and the next month I started looking into what I always called a “tombstone,” which apparently they now refer to as a monument (kinda like how garbage trucks are now “sanitation trucks” and “used cars” are “previously owned”?).

But “monument” is good because a tombstone is a memorial that is also a monument to the person who died. Something to honor them as well as to have them remembered, identified for the future.

 In Jewish tradition, having a tombstone is important, which I suppose is why anti-Semites destroy or desecrate tombstones in Jewish cemeteries—it’s as close as they can come to killing the person, blotting out their memory, as if they never existed. You are supposed to have a tombstone on the grave before the end of a year and there is an “unveiling” at the cemetery when it’s ready.

Tony’s birthday was July 31st. I still hadn’t made the arrangements, so I decided, time to get on with it before time  runs out. Tempus fugit!

I’d been hesitating. Other things had taken over my life due to Coronavirus. I was grateful to be working, but it was demanding, especially when I had to teach online. I was also compulsively ordering food and supplies and wine, obsessing with staying safe, not wanting to get sick and die. I took care of all that bureaucratic work that comes with death, including having to fight a mistake where Social Security thought I too had died when my husband passed! But thank God Tony died before this horrible virus. He went out in peace; he was buried with dignity.

Now, it is time to do that last rite of honor. To get him that monument, engrave his name in stone and erect the granite tombstone where I can leave a small stone on top whenever I visit his grave. Another mark that he has not been forgotten.

Monuments are so much in the news these days in America. Many people want to pull down public monuments to people who were slave-owners, confederate “heroes,” or racists. The removal of Confederate flags is not enough. The statue of General Robert E. Lee is coming down in Richmond, Virginia. A statue of Christopher Columbus in Boston was beheaded; one in Virginia was spray-painted, set on fire, and thrown into a lake. Christopher Columbus was also toppled in St. Paul, Minnesota. Jefferson Davis was taken down in both Kentucky and Richmond, Virginia. Buildings and schools at elite universities are being renamed (as in the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University) to erase the names of people from the past who were famous, but now infamous. One impulse to preserve; another impulse to blot out. I think of the prayer on Yom Kippur where we pray that we might be “inscribed in the book of life.” I think of Milton’s Paradise Lost where we are told that “Satan’s real “name” in heaven before the Fall has been permanently blotted out.

Many of the seventeenth-century poets I teach and love were anxious about having their names and words survive. Shakespeare tells the unnamed “young man” in his Sonnets he will forever “grow” in the poet’s “eternal lines” (Sonnet 18). The poet confers a kind of immortality, although the irony is that we do not know the name of that young man. It is Shakespeare, the poet, we remember. Robert Herrick ended his volume of more than a thousand short lyrics with a poem declaring that, despite the appearance of their fragility (like flowers), they “never shall / Decline or waste at all,” even though, “kingdoms fall.” Some people hope to find an extended life in having children. But we all want to feel that something of us will last, something material, yet more than material, a book, a poem, an engraved image of our name, as if our name expresses our self.

But I also think of those seventeenth-century writers who mused on the futility of our efforts to be remembered. George Herbert’s beautiful poem, “Church Monuments,” meditates on tombstones and monuments in the church and graveyard, some of them elaborate artifacts, and reminds us of their futility. He imagines the time in the future when even those monuments will become dust. Nothing lasts. 

Then there are those sonorous sentences in the final chapter of Sir Thomas Browne’s Hydriotaphia, an essay about his attempt to identify ancient burial urns that recently had been discovered in Norwich, England. “There is no antidote against the opium of time, . . . our Fathers find their graves in our short memories, and sadly tell us how we may be buried in our survivors.” He continues, “The iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy.” And lastly, “Darkness and light divide the course of time, and oblivion shares with memory, a great part even of our living beings.”  The beauty of his words, lifting the spirit, almost outweighs the sadness of the thoughts.

But we are alive now, in the present, treasuring and loving life as best we can, even in difficult times, and making monuments. Even knowing that nothing is permanent, we need to mark the significance of a life, make sure to have it remembered by those who still are living or will come after. I am not depressed and I am not morbid. For Tony’s birthday last week, I made a fragrant spaghetti sauce with garlic, onion, ground turkey, olive oil, chopped tomatoes, fresh basil, oregano; an apple crisp; and an arugula salad. Things Tony loved (well, not the arugula). I ate them in pleasure. Though I sat alone at the rosewood table, I had the company of good memories, thinking of our shared meals as I looked out at the dark sky streaked with scarlet, orange and yellow over the Hudson River. I felt grateful for the day, for being here and alive right now and relished a little more wine than usual.

I guess I’m ready to proceed with getting a monument. I love the Jewish prayer, “May his (or her) soul be bound in the bond of life,” though its meaning has always eluded me. Maybe it is up to each of us to figure out what it might mean, the ways a person’s soul could be “bound up in the bond of life,” or how we who survive might help it happen. Yes, gravestones, tombstones, monuments of granite, are one way, but only when engraved with a name, with words.

Cooking is probably my only hobby. And I take the same amount of pleasure doing it as when I’m working, which is saying alot. So, I thought I’d write about some of the things I cook for comfort and health, but also share some weird recipe “cures” I came across in a book I was reading by Michal Oron, called Rabbi, Mystic, or Impostor?, which I’m reviewing for a scholarly journal. This fascinating book included a translation of a diary written in the eighteenth century that ended with a list of bizarre folk remedies. While reading a few, I burst out laughing. My first thought was, how could anyone believe or do these things for cures? But then I thought of Trump’s suggestion that ingesting bleach might cure Coronavirus, and then many of his supporters did! In fact, the Center for Poison Control suddenly had a huge uptick in calls about bleach poisoning. And, of course, we live in an age of “fake news,” an age where many people (even presidents) distrust science. Perhaps not much has actually changed, or maybe we’re reverting back to an age of superstition, which seems preferable to some rather than the Enlightenment’s age of “reason.”

First, here are a few of my improvised, so-called “recipes.”  I consider these to serve as inspiration, not something to be followed to the letter, which is why I’m not a baker. Tasty, colorful things lift my spirits, but are also therapeutic to me—kind of a body/soul connection. But as laughter too is good for you, as many studies have shown, I will end with some of the hilarious folk remedies I mentioned. Yes, yes, I know I have an awful, lowbrow sense of humor and confess I’m no witty intellectual. But I hope you’ll let your elevated guard down in reading them. They are most funny when you visualize the instructions. And we all need a little humor these days, don’t we?.

1. )    Pasta -- can’t give it up, but I only use good imported Italian pasta. With various sauces:

a.    Saute fresh tomatoes, red pepper, and a lot of garlic in olive oil, and let it caramelize a bit. Add anchovies if you want and cook until they melt. (Add salt if you really like salty.) Stir in your pasta (which you cooked while the sauce simmered). Serve with plenty of fresh-grated parmesan regianno. (If you want to look fancy, adorn with three basil leaves.)

b.     A variation to the sauce as you’re cooking would be to add a jar of good imported tuna in olive oil, drained (tuna in water is dry). Cook it all together. Maybe add some capers? You may or may not want parmesan with the tuna. up to you. Or you can add the tuna and capers the next day to whatever pasta sauce is left. That way you get two different meals with no additional work.

c.     My simple pesto dish consists of basil, walnuts, garlic, excellent olive oil, and parmesan regianno. Wash and dry a bunch of fresh basil. Peel and chop a bunch of garlics. Put the garlic and a handful of walnuts in your Cuisinart.  (Walnuts are healthier than pinenuts; using more walnuts than most recipes call for tones down the sharpness of the basil, but also means you need less olive oil). Pulse the garlic and walnuts. Then add the basil leaves and pulse. Then olive oil. Then, finally work in the grated parmesan (or pecorino romano if you want it saltier). So many recipes tell you to measure. But why? I say, just make it so it looks and tastes good!

Note: always a green salad or vegetable. For color as well as nutrition. If you are really lazy, just put a handful of baby arugula in a bowl.

2. )     I love to make my pomegranate chicken. All you need are boneless thighs, garlic cloves (of course), a little salt, pomegranate molasses (sometimes called syrup), and a nice pan (10- 12 inches), perhaps nonstick, that has a lid. Heat a little olive oil, stick in the chicken and the garlic cloves (more the merrier), and saute over medium flame. Grind some salt and pepper on it. Drizzle pomegranate syrup over all of the chicken, turn to coat and drizzle more if you want. Then cover the skillet and turn the heat down to simmer until done. Turn the chicken a couple of times. If it’s too liquidy, take the lid off and let it cook down until it caramelizes. (If you have to cut out or down on salt, take it from me, the pomegranate syrup makes you not miss it!).

If you want, you could add to this dish shallots, or carrots or mushrooms. Or throw in a chopped tomato or two.  Anything fruit or acidic tenderizes chicken, so if you can’t get pomegranate molasses, use good red balsamic vinegar (same principle!) and sun-dried tomatoes. 

Serve with basmati rice (you could fry chopped onions until they’re dark while the chicken is cooking and stir into the rice), and a green salad. Sometime I also enjoy sliced cucumbers or a handful of arugula.       

3. )    *Asarita is my take on the so-called “skinny” margarita. And the best part? No sugar, no headache and no hangover. A “clean” drink that’s so simple. Plus it’s something even a diabetic can enjoy! Ingredients: high quality 100% agave silver tequila (the cheap ones have sugar and other additives), ice, and a nice big juicy lime. This may be too sour for some, in which case add a drop or two of Cointreau or Grand Marnier. Fill a glass with lots of ice cubes. Poor in some tequila. Squeeze ½ a lime into it, then the rest. That’s the way I like it; the more lime the better. It makes it much smoother, especially if you let it sit a few minutes as the ice melts. Very sippable and refreshing! Added value: you can use the squeezed lime rinds as a deodorant! (“Drink and don’t Stink”) Also, it’s a full day’s worth vitamin C! 

Note: before starting to cook, make the libation of your choice -- water, apple cider vinegar in water, wine, craft beer, or my “asarita”*.

Okay, now for a couple of hilarious eighteenth-century folk remedies/recipes. I didn’t pick the most offensive, having to do with excrement, though I know that medical scientists now are using poop pills to cure intestinal problems! Just remember that laughter is the BEST medicine.

1. )     For insomnia: “take horseradish and cook in a little water, then chop up in a grinder and spread on the person until he sleeps. Tested and proven.”

2. )    “To make a person sleep: take a dead man’s tooth and place it beneath his head, without his knowledge.”

3. )     “For gout: take a bone from a corpse and wood from gallows, make a charm, and hang it from the neck.”

4. )    “For headache: cook oats in strong vinegar and lay the mixture on the person’s forehead from ear to ear until he sweats.”

5. )      “For a man who cannot urinate: take nine herrings and burn to ashes, or take butter and put together with the burnt herring, boil in water, and give him to drink. Tested and proven.”

6. )     “To cause a person not to wake from his sleep: take the gall of a hare, and place a little in the sleeper’s mouth; he will not awaken until someone urinates straight into his mouth.”

Well, there you have ‘em - My foolproof, delicious recipes and some from ages ago I hope tickled your funny bone, if just for a little bit ;-)