Not quite book related - but almost.
We are having a string of grey and rainy days, so I decided yesterday that I would make a pot of soup today. What kind of soup you may wonder? Leftover soup.
Leftover soup started for me almost twenty years ago, when my dear friend Shari was moving from Louisiana to Texas. She had a bunch of frozen vegetables in her freezer that she didn't want to throw away, so she asked me if I wanted to take them. I said yes, and in the midst of our long goodbye, the vegetables were mostly not frozen anymore when I got home.
I really didn't want to waste them, so I made a big pot of vegetable soup with them. I have no idea what all went in that soup. But it was delicious. And it started something.
Whenever I have a little bit of something leftover, I put it in the freezer. Often, those bits and pieces of leftovers become leftover soup.
Today's version has some chicken meatballs, and some white beans, and some rice and some roasted vegetables and some leftover rotisserie chicken. Every leftover soup is different, but so far, everyone has been good.
Now here's the tie back to my latest book. In this book, Harriet Marshall and the Social Concerns Committee at Holy Redeemer are working to address food insecurity in the parish. My leftover soup is a pot full of meals made from leftovers that could have been thrown away, so I was thinking of Harriet Marshall while I was making my soup.
And I was thinking that in some ways leftover soup is a metaphor for life. Every day we have the opportunity to overlook or throw away some small thing. A smile, a kind word, a look of understanding. If we store those small things up, like I do my leftovers, they can be accumulated into something wonderful and nourishing.
The best moments in life, like the best pots of soup, are not always those where a plan was made or a recipe followed. Sometimes, the best soups and the best moments are accidental, and comprised of small things that aren't all that valuable on their own.
Today, I wish for you leftover soup. I wish for you small moments that you can put together to create wonderful memories.
