It’s difficult to imagine my parents’ driveway as the kind of place that invites terror, but there’s no other way to describe the kind of action it’s seen over the last 30 years. Here, surrounded by sun-cracked gum leaves, my father in his 50s, 60s and then his 70s, has crouched in wait, desperate for an opportunity – any opportunity – to feed people, whether they want to eat or not.
“Eat it while it’s hot,” he once screamed as he worked a couple of (Turkish meatballs) through the tiny gap in my car window before I even had the chance to put the vehicle in park.
“You look hungry,” he exclaimed not long after trying to open my husband’s car door - bread roll also in hand - as the car slowly pulled to a stop outside his home.
I can’t even remember just how many boyfriends and friends I’ve had leave the engine running – because the fear of getting any closer to the house was so great, they couldn't actually stop the car.
No bread roll is safe in the hands of an over-generous parent. (Alan Benson) Source: Alan Benson
“But I’m not hungry,” they would tell me. “How do I convince your dad I’m not hungry?”
Upon seeing my father’s magnificent smile, tongs in hand, I would suddenly share my then-boyfriend’s panic. “He doesn’t understand the meaning of the word full, reverse the car and STEP ON IT!”
Here, surrounded by sun-cracked gum leaves, my father in his 50s, 60s and then his 70s, has crouched in wait, desperate for an opportunity – any opportunity – to feed people, whether they want to eat or not.
Some people love to eat, but my father loves to feed and his reign of terror was not limited to the driveway. The phone calls would begin in the days leading up to my visits demanding to know what I felt like (so he could make two weeks’ worth of whatever it was) and he would look at me with such disappointment when I popped in unannounced because it meant he didn’t have time to whip up a 25-course meal for his only daughter.
When I’m lying on my deathbed, I have no doubt that one of the images flashing before my eyes will be one of my favourites: my father standing joyously by the front door and giving the dining table – which was buckling under the weight of the food behind him – a wave like a (very manly) model on .
“I hope you’re hungry.”
It isn’t a question. My father has always known, just as I have, that there can only ever be one answer.
“Staaaaarving!”
The first upset, when it came, was delivered when my father hit his 80s. Walking into the house, I was confused by a number of things. Firstly, he hadn’t sprung out from behind a bush to attack me with some variation of a stuffed vegetable, and secondly, he wasn’t standing by the door to greet me with a glass of tea. The table was still laid out, but something was … wrong. “Darling, could you be a dear and pour tea for everyone?” my father asked as he breathed heavily, his eyes closing as he sat in his armchair. “I’m just going to have a rest.”
Being greeted – or ambushed – with stuffed vegetables was the norm in this household. (China Squirrel) Source: China Squirrel
My eyes welling, I stared at him like a dog being shown a card trick, too shocked to make the move to the kitchen to start pouring. It might sound like an insignificant moment, but for me it was like an earthquake had brought everything down around me because this is the moment where I knew. Knew for certain that my dad was getting old and knew that the food torture we all complained about but secretly loved would be coming to an end soon enough.
Firstly, he hadn’t sprung out from behind a bush to attack me with some variation of a stuffed vegetable, and secondly, he wasn’t standing by the door to greet me with a glass of tea. The table was still laid out, but something was … wrong.
As someone who has spent the last decade refusing to believe my father could ever leave me, I realised then and there that this was a very clear sign that he was slowly on his way to doing just that and then I went to the kitchen and silently cried as I poured the tea.
Today, my father rarely serves tea and he most definitely does not terrorise people in our driveway but, oh, how we miss it. On days where he has energy, he comes out grinning, delicate glasses looking ridiculously small in his giant hands, and I stop to think about how much joy he radiates whenever he’s tending to the appetites of his loved ones. On other days, he sleeps on and off and I’ll slice the feta and chop the cucumber and serve up what can only ever be a poor man’s version of my father’s infamous spreads.
I know my father gets frustrated with his deteriorating health (the heart still wants what the heart wants and his heart wants to feed), yet regardless of how he’s feeling or which part of his body is aching, he always comes to greet me in that driveway with that crazed look in his eye.
It's always a promising sign when he shows his enthusiasm for Turkish tea. Source: Getty Images
“Are you hungry?” he asks.
It’s a kind of language between us and it’s love, pure and simple.
Dad, for you, I will always be staaaarving. Promise.
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