To gather around a deathbed is a privilege. Candle-lit and flower-adorned, It's a sacred stage to bear witness to humanity's rawest, most precious traits.
It's the loving and loyal hands of a husband on his wife's face. Daughters singing to their mother's favourite songs. Grandchildren decorating every square inch of the bedroom wall with art for their Nanny.
I had my turn recently as I watched my partner and her family bid farewell to the matriarch of their family - Christine. We knew that time was of the essence when her prognosis came in, and she was given weeks, a month at best to live.
A theme of these long goodbyes is this sense of urgency to mine for information to hold onto. It's like uncovering the artefacts of a lifetime, something tangible to ground oneself with: family secrets, childhood memories, words of comfort and love. However, what struck me most was the importance of her preserving her recipes.
A theme of these long goodbyes is this sense of urgency to mine for information to hold onto.
Christine never fell short of dinner ideas. In the kitchen, she would create meals for her family that would leave colourful, lasting memories.
My partner grew fond of sharing those moments on the long drive home from visiting her:
"On the walk home from the bus stop after school, we always knew mum was home early from work. You could smell her pikelets wafting 500 metres up the street, and as soon as we did we'd start running home.”
Gestures of love quickly become family traditions, and when Christine's grandchildren were born, they grew to love the pikelets as much as her own children did. Helping to crack the eggs, mix the batter and flip the sweet-smelling hot disc in the pan.
My partner is a chef - a career choice that was undoubtedly a nod to her mum. So when she couldn't replicate Christine’s recipes straight away, it didn't sit right. One day, I watched on as my partner darted back and forth from her mothers bedside to the kitchen, visibly stressed. "Mum, are you sure you haven't forgotten something? These aren't turning out,” she would complain. Later, Christine confessed to leaving out an ingredient - a moment of rare oversight thanks to fogginess from her pain medication.
My partner is a chef - a career choice that was undoubtedly a nod to her mum. So when she couldn't replicate Christine’s recipes straight away, it didn't sit right.
Christine had an unmatched resilience that I feel grateful to have seen in action. Even in her final days, you could expect to see her in the kitchen when she felt well enough. The last time Christine made it out of bed, she whipped up a batch of her famous spiced nuts that would go home with her friends as Christmas gifts. And - in her typical no-nonsense style - scolded me for eating too many before she could jar them up.
By Christmas Eve she was in and out of consciousness and too unwell to join us for dinner. But she got one last taste of her beloved caramel tart - made by her daughter from a recipe that had been passed down to Christine by her own mother. Something she regularly asked for in her final weeks.
Only a day shy of 2021, Christine took her last breaths, and with her went a lifetime of hard-to-replicate recipes. I understood then that even our family recipes endure their own cycle of life: we live and learn and pass on our lessons, and if we are lucky, they come back to love us. I have no doubt my partner’s family will spend the rest of their days trying to bring them back to life.
Bre Smith is a mental health worker and freelance writer, you can follow her on Instagram
