Horseradish Sauce

This weekend, I traveled to Buffalo to witness my Godson's wedding.  I ate well.  It was an odd experience, being sans children.  You would think having time without household chores or people to serve, I'd have written something but alas, I discovered, my time management skills are worse than I thought, for I am a sufficient reason to not get to the keyboard.

While at the hotel, the Taste of Buffalo filled the street outside the lobby.  I enjoyed wine ice cream and fried risotto and even took a turn at Karaoke.  Mercifully, the video my mom took is too long to upload so my teens won't have to suffer having their mom's warbling preserved forever in internet amber.    It's good to know it's there though, sort of like a plausible threat of mutually assured destruction.  They don't want it out. I don't want it out. They behave, I retain a hint of dignity online, if not in reality.  

During the course of the weekend, I spent a lot of time thinking about having ten kids, raising them, and the ups and downs of it all.   Someone at the reception asked if I'd wanted ten kids and if I'd considered how much work it would be before beginning this journey.   I admit, sometimes the bills, fights, messes, assignments, schedules and demands for regular meals can overwhelm.  

I finished the trip with a dinner at the Anchor Bar annex at the airport.  I ate wings and Beef on Weck, which if you don't know, is a Buffalo specialty.  It is thinly sliced roast beef au jus on a crusty roll studded with kosher salt and caraway seeds. A thin layer of horseradish sauce is considered a must.   One would never think, you know what I want?  Horseradish sauce. If one considers horseradish sauce alone, one would never consume it. It's bitter, it leaves a bite on your tongue.  Why would you agree to have horseradish sauce?  However the whole sandwich rocks and I'm only sorry it isn't something that's caught on anywhere else but Buffalo.

Considering only all the labor and trials and scourges of having ten kids is rather like eating horseradish sauce alone.   Who wants to go to the DMV 20 times in one's life?  Who wants to fold 100 socks a week?  Who wants to do dishes for 33 every day if you count all the meals?  Who wants to drive a 12 passenger van?  Who wants to read aloud the Harry Potter series 7 times thus far, and try to must all the energy you had at the first go around?  Who wants to hear 10 "Hey Mom, guess what I dreamed last night?" summaries at breakfast?  Or change diapers for 23 years?  Or solve fights seemingly to the death between a five year old and her older sister over an invisible cat?  Alone, it's untenable, there's just no way, it's too much work, too hard, too expensive, too protracted, too much too much too much.

Absent love, it's overwhelming and at times, it even has a bite.

However...when it is spread over the whole of life, these trials augment everything else.  The sufferings of parenting, they fade like labor pains, even the big ones like teens rebelling or toddlers potty training. The bite doesn't remain, only the flavor, and the whole family, is one I'd order again in a heartbeat, horseradish sauce and all.   They are a feast set for me.  

I ate Charlie the Butcher's Beef on Weck too. Very tasty!

Bon Appetite.