My Grandma's Tortillas

I love Mexican food.  I love it all.  I love chips, salsa (don't you dare leave out the cilantro), guacamole, black beans, rice, enchiladas, fajitas, pollo loco, queso, all manner of soups, tortillas...all of it.  GET IN MY MOUTH.  I could eat this genre of food more than any other.  I realize I am eating a totally altered version of it's true heritage, but it's just what I know.  I come from a long line of Mexican food lovers.  I grew up eating it often, even on some holidays.  This deep love for Mexican food has now been passed down through 4 generations.  The real reason?  Back in the 1960s when my mom's family was living out in Arizona my grandma learned to make homemade tortillas from a friend.  I'm not kidding you, they are so unbelievably good.  If you ever have the pleasure of tasting one that is hot off the skillet you will be ruined for all other tortillas forever.  Over the last 50 years she has made thousands.  She texted me earlier and said that she made 40 this morning.  She keeps her kids, grandkids, and friends supplied with this manna from heaven.  So, the bottom line is, she has to live forever.  She has to.  We won't know what to do with ourselves for many more important reasons, but who will make us tortillas???  I can't dwell on it.

Last Christmas Jeff and I decided we would at least try to learn the skill of making tortillas to make her proud, and to at least possess the knowledge should it become necessary to make our own someday.  If we are going to learn, we want to learn from the best.  She graciously and patiently instructed us.

First try at rolling them out and frying them for Jeff and I.  I'm not saying which one of us made the nice round one and which one of us made the wonky shaped one.  I'm just simply posting a picture. :)

Truth be told, Jeff and I tried to make these once by reading the recipe but it quickly became obvious that we needed a hands on lesson.  There is no substitute for being taught by the expert.  It was fun and I at least feel like I COULD get the hang of it…someday.  For now, we will still be happily receiving shipments from Iowa.

While I am on the topic of my grandma I wanted to elaborate on the picture that some of you probably saw on Facebook the other day.  I took the kids up to my parents’ house to spend the afternoon with both of my grandmas.  I cannot tell you how lucky I feel to still have them both in my life.  My grandma Helen (pictured on the left) is now 91 and my grandma Marianne (pictured on the right) will be 85 in a few weeks.  I know some of you don’t have your grandparents around anymore.  I feel that gap and loss with my grandpas.  One of them died when I was only a year old and I lost my other grandpa just a couple of weeks before Micah was born.  It’s hard to not know your grandparents and it’s hard to lose them.  So, please believe me, I know what a gift I have every time I get to spend time with them. 

 After dinner (I’ll give you exactly one guess as to what we ate) I sat at the table with my grandmas and talked.  We talked about everything from giving birth to nursing homes.  They can both remember how long they labored and how much their children weighed.  My grandma Helen's initial response to how long she labored was, "LONG ENOUGH."  Ha!  I can’t come up with my kids’ exact birth weight anymore.  How in the world can they remember that?  I was amazed at the details they could recount7.  I don’t know exactly how we got there, but somehow we arrived at the topic of growing old.  

 The floodgates of wisdom were opened to me.  

The first thing that I remember my grandma Marianne saying was that her mom (who lived to be 102) used to tell her, “It takes so little to make an old person happy.  It just takes a post card, a phone call, or a visit to make your day.”  She said she knows that to be true now.  So many elderly people are lonely.  Friends and family pass away before them and others move away, leaving them alone during some of the most vulnerable years in life.  My great grandma Mary lived with her and my grandpa Bill for nine years before she went into a nursing home.  She said it was so hard to walk away on the day they moved her in.  Both of their moms (my great grandmas) lived in the same town, and eventually the same nursing home before they passed away.  My grandma and grandpa were faithful to spend time with them there after they were no longer able to care for them at home.  

 I already observed this in my childhood, but my grandma described in more detail about the decidedly different outlook each of them had on life and the situation of finding themselves in a nursing home.  My grandma Mary never once complained about the food, her roommate, or the care she received.  She was content.  My grandma Agnes struggled with contentment throughout her life and it continued during her time in the nursing home.  It’s a cautionary tale to me.  Discontentment in our hearts never just magically goes away.  Even if you set your life up to serve your own happiness, and others do the same, no one will win.  The heart is never quite satisfied, or never for long.  The craving to make our world always happy and comfortable is such a chasing after the wind.  Those who pursue it the hardest are usually the most sad and discontent in the end.  She told me that my grandma Mary confessed to her one day that she would often lay her head down and pretend to be asleep when my grandma Agnes would stop by her room to chat.  She just couldn't take the complaining!  Not long after that my grandma Agnes said, “Why, I can NEVER find your mother awake when I stop by!”  It was so hard for her to not laugh because she knew what was happening.  I DIED.  These stories are priceless! 

When I asked my grandmas how they felt about the possibility of moving into a nursing home at some point, my grandma Marianne said, “Well, I’ve decided that the best thing you can do is just to accept it.”  I assume she learned this by watching the different ways her own mother and mother in-law handled that transition.  Accepting unwanted changes always takes time but I hope I always move in the direction of acceptance in things that I cannot change.  We struggle with growing old in our culture.  We fight it with every skin cream and surgery known to man.  “Never ask a lady her age,” they say.  We can be so insecure about growing old.  We do not honor the aged and revere their wisdom.  We foolishly disdain the blessing of being able to grow old and rich in wisdom.  Nothing can be gained by trying to turn back the hands of time.  IT CANNOT BE DONE.  We should take care of our health, but we cannot make time stand still.  If wisdom and eternity is our aim, why would we want it to anyway?

As we were in the middle of our conversation, her phone started ringing.  She pulled it out and said, “Oh, that’s just my reminder to stop and pray.  It goes off every day at 7:14.”  She immediately quoted 2 Chronicles 7:14, which is the verse that prompts her and some others from her church to pray every day at that time.  I’m sorry if your grandma is not this amazing.  I asked her what she prays for every day.  She said, “Oh, it just depends.  I pray for our military and their families.  I pray for our country’s leaders, my family, friends, and others I know who need prayer.  There are so many people that need prayer.  And I pray for people that are lonely.  I think one of the worst things in life is to end up being lonely.” I swallowed hard and should have removed myself from the table right then to go repent of my own prayerlessness, but I didn't want to be awkward.  She was teaching me so much without even meaning to…because she is just wise.  She can’t help it.  It’s just who she has become after 84 years of living life with a teachable heart. 

I drove home with a full heart that night.  I had been loved deeply, listened to, and taught in those few short hours.  I am so blessed.  If you have a grandparent that is still living and loves you, please go sit with them when you can.  Or, maybe we could go sit with someone in a nursing home near us.  Ask them to tell us stories.  Ask about the people they love that are living or have passed away.  Ask about the changes they have seen during the course of their life.  Ask them what is most important in life. Listen and learn.  We may observe a cautionary tale, and we may strike gold in wisdom.

It will probably make their day, and it will probably end up making ours too.