I make this dish for Jill to take to work because she has a real job and I don’t and because it’s food I can make. I place whatever fresh peppers are on sale – green, red, yellow, even orange – on the burners of our stove and leave the kitchen. If you wait until the sides of the peppers are on fire and blackened, you can take the tongs and turn the peppers and do the other sides until all sides of the pepper are cooked like the flesh of almost the last victim in a horror movie.
Shut off the flame because you don’t want to burn down the home of your son who has autism (and the home of your son and wife who do not have autism) and move the horror-movie-flesh-blackened peppers to a bowl. While the Seared Roasted Peppers cool, heat a good olive oil in a small frying pan (preferably one that my mum had) and dice four gloves of garlic. Slice the peppers to remove almost all seeds. When the oil smokes in the pan, dump in the garlic and sauté until blackened. Dump in the sliced pepper and the sauté until your glass of beer is empty. About the best I can do these days. Yr peppers were grt! Jill sometimes texts from her office.
Over this weekend, for some reason, Alex carried chopsticks around. Maybe it was because we went to Chinatown. He couldn’t have known we were going to Chinatown but still he brought them. He waved them around but wouldn’t let us put any food on them. Oh no, no food no! That’s most weekends with Alex.
On this late afternoon of the last Monday of the school year, Alex has come off his school bus (a challenge in itself these days) and is home. I sit at my computer dreading the next few weeks of KIDS HOME when I see Alex coming from the kitchen with chopsticks in his hand.
In the chopsticks is a piece of Roasted Seared Pepper. He makes a beeline to the bathroom mirror. Alex likes his reflection when trying new food.
These moments are gold. Gold. Gold. Gold. “Alex,” I tell him from where I sit on the toilet, “chew chew!” Chew chew I say, thinking about the drama teacher in Fame who says to his students chew chew chew and how I realize he didn’t have a clue what real acting meant.
“Swallow!” I tell Alex. He spits out the first piece. “Alex,” I say, working his chopsticks. “Here’s another! Chew! Chew!” I work my old jaw and its splintering molars. “Chew, chew!” And by God, by all that is holy and all that has meant my life, he chews and swallows. I see it go down.
