Nostalgia is a Three-Bean Salad

“That’s crazy!” I said, wrestling our dull can opener into a can of green beans. I stood next to my mother at the long laminate countertop that peeled up at the edges, a green plastic bowl between us. She stared down as she carefully diced an onion, not meeting my gaze. I had just finished telling her we would never fight, a reassurance following her argument with my little brother, but she had responded that we would. Maybe not until I was older, she said, but she could promise we would. At nine years old, I was aghast.

“But you’re my best friend!” I said. “Why would we ever fight?”

“Oh Janie,” she said, “it’s big and complicated and confusing. But we aren’t going to fight this morning, so let’s focus on the party, okay?”

“Okay,” I said reluctantly, draining the can of beans and dumping them in the bowl. “What else do we have to make?”

“Just the potato salad,” she said. “Tasha’s bringing the baked beans and coleslaw, and we made the banana pudding and the cake last night.”

“Can I help cut the watermelon?” I asked. We had bought a huge watermelon, one of the biggest ones I had ever seen. My mom had barely been able to carry it up the stairs to our new apartment.

“Only if you bust those last five cans of beans open,” she laughed. “It might take you until the party starts.”

“It won’t,” I said, teeth clenched. We all hated the stupid can opener, but it was worst for my mom, who was left-handed as well.

“Three-bean salad is gross,” my little brother said, wandering out of his room. “Why do you even make it?”

“Your sister likes it,” my mother said, “and it’s a summer classic. A quintessential summer food, you might say.”

“A disgusting summer food,” Nate shot back, pretending to gag. “Hot dogs, hamburgers, potato chips – those are summer foods. Can I go play at Theo’s house?”

“Clean your room, Nate. You can hang out with Theo all afternoon.”

“But the party’s outside,” Nate whined. “Why does it matter?”

“Because we only moved two weeks ago and it’s already a pigsty. And besides, people may come in to use the bathroom.”

“That’s dumb,” he said, showing his seven years. “We all live on the same block. And besides, Jane should clean her room instead of making that stupid salad.”

“It’s not stupid!” I shouted. “It reminds me of Sour Patch Kids!” I liked how the green beans and the wax beans burst in my mouth, soft and a little slimy, and how the tangy taste of the vinegar yielded to the sweetness of the sugar. I could never believe just a single teaspoon of sugar went so far, but like a culinary magic trick, it was always enough to kill the bite. And as far as my room went, it was sparse but pristine and Nate knew it, which I proceeded to tell him.

My mother was not in the mood for bickering. The word “kids” came off her lips as a warning, so I turned my attention to the beans in earnest. Another can of green beans, two cans of wax beans, two cans of kidney beans and an aching wrist later, the salad was almost done. My mother added the finely diced onion and called out, from memory, the amounts of oil, vinegar, and sugar I should add.

“No extra sugar, Jane,” she reminded me. I saw a roach crawling across the cupboard shelf and wondered if I should tell her. They had exterminated before we moved in two weeks ago, and we had been careful not to bring any when we packed at the old apartment, throwing away gummy photo albums and washing our clothes twice. It was a big day though, and I didn’t want to upset her.

“No extra sugar,” I responded, slamming the cupboard door shut. I mixed the salad and put it in the refrigerator while my mother started dicing onions again, this time for the potato salad. I pulled out the chilled potatoes – we had boiled them the night before – and began chunking them into soft squares. As usual, I was enjoying getting ready for one of mom’s parties more than I would enjoy actually going to it; we worked so hard making food and cleaning that I was worn out by the time they started. I hoped this one would be different, but I also knew it wouldn’t. We were celebrating the Fourth of July in our new apartment complex by inviting our neighbors to a huge cookout. We knew most of them already because my mom’s best friend, Tasha, had lived there for years, and it was where my mom spent the weekends partying. Partying, of course, meant drinking, and I entertained no illusions about how this party would end. So I chunked potatoes and measured mayonnaise, putting my reservations aside.

Five hours later, the party was in full swing. Our old wooden picnic table was covered in a cheap vinyl tablecloth, Fourth of July themed, and loaded with cookout standards: hamburgers and hot dogs and spicy Italian sausage; potato salad and coleslaw and my beloved three-bean salad. Plastic bags of buns, beaded inside with moisture, softened in the sun’s heat. A disposable foil pizza pan was loaded with cheese, lettuce, pickles, and tomato and onion slices. Bottles of ketchup, mustard, and mayonnaise sat alongside 2-liter bottles of generic soda - cola, orange, lemon-lime, and grape. The kids mixed all four flavors together; we made sloppy burgers dripping with condiments and spit watermelon seeds on the pavement. The adults tried to down their 40-bolts of Olde English and Colt 45 before they got warm and skunky in the heat, the entire patriotic affair set to the music of Prince, Zapp & Roger, and Tina Turner, courtesy of an 80’s boom box and an extension cord.

We were poor in the projects that summer, and I was just reaching the age that I knew it. I had started a new school that year, an honors school, and was the proverbial fish out of water. At my old school, the kids were all from our neighborhood; we knew how to make coffee filters out of paper towels and negotiate credit at the corner store. But now I had been to birthday parties with kids from my new school, and I knew that the houses I saw on “Who’s the Boss” and “Family Ties” actually existed. I wanted a dresser instead of cinder block and plywood shelves; a washing machine in our house instead of the dirty laundromat; a yard with green grass and a flower bed instead of a dirt field with weeds and broken fencing. I was tired of the gunshots and the sirens; sick of the mice and the bugs. I didn’t think I was better because I went to a new school, but I knew there was something better – and now I wanted it too. I sat in our dusty field, contemplating the chaos and chastising my yearning. It was, as my mother had said, "big and complicated and confusing."

I was the most guilt-ridden child in the world.

A bright burst of laughter broke through my thoughts, and I looked up to see Nate and Theo soaking wet, victims of a water balloon attack, running towards me. My contemplations forgotten, I shrieked and ran as sheer summer joy wrapped itself around me. Joining the dozen kids racing through our field of a yard, I grabbed three water balloons from the bucket and hid behind a porch with my friend Suzanne. Our huddled bodies were sticky with smoke and humidity. The breeze, thick with moisture, lifted the layer of charcoal fire from our skin, leaving behind a complex but distinct scent of summer - chlorine and sunscreen; salt and sweat. Our mouths were dry from too much sugar and salt, from cured and charred meats, soda pop and Now N’ Laters, frozen Dixie Cups filled with extra sweet Kool Aid. I aimed my last water balloon at my brother, hitting him square between the shoulder blades, and ran to hide under the picnic table. As soon as the balloons were gone, I crawled out and got a second bowl of three-bean salad. I sat backwards on one of the picnic table benches, eating the kidney beans first and thinking new complicated thoughts. Soon we would watch darkness fall, throw poppers on the sidewalk, wait for the fireworks as our clothes dried in the dusk. It was only minutes ago that life had seemed so bleak and overwhelming; now I looked out at my chaotic corner of the world feeling peaceful and content. I let the wave wash over me, this feeling of belonging, as my mother stumbled across the field to sit next to me.

“It was your great grandmother’s favorite, too” she said. “Three-bean salad. She actually used to put bacon in it.”

“Really? We should try that,” I said.

“Maybe,” she said. A faraway look crossed her face, one I didn’t recognize. She didn’t seem drunk yet, but in that soft, fuzzy place she went first.

“Mommy? Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she said, putting her damp arm around my shoulders, the closest we could get to a hug in the heat. “I was just thinking about how summer fixes things sometimes.”

“Fixes things?” I asked.

“It’s kind of a grown-up feeling. But sometimes, I just get this feeling like everything’s going to be okay. You know? I mean, I know things aren’t easy for us. But – "

“But they’re going to be okay.”

“You understand?” She looked at me in wonder.

“I do, Mom.”

We sat together quietly then, sharing my bowl of three-bean salad and staring out at the field: the cheap charcoal grill, the men chugging beer, the girls drawing a hopscotch grid. Tomorrow we would sleep in before dragging our salt-bloated bellies back to the neighborhood pool. We would eat leftover cookout food for dinner, skimming the congealed fat from the burgers and salads, and I would wrestle the knots out of my braids, damp in the center but dry as straw at the ends. The sun moved lower in the sky, softening both its light and its burn. I put my head on my mother’s shoulder and closed my eyes, remembering the moment even as it unfolded, letting the summer soften my turmoil.

Forty years later and six without my mom, I look across our yard from the porch. Poverty is far in my rear-view window, a combination of hard work and abundant grace. My husband laughs with our neighbors as he grills on the patio. The dog crosses the green yard lazily, and as the meat comes off the grill, I carry the side dishes out from the kitchen. We eat hamburgers, hot dogs, and salmon with potato salad and coleslaw, finishing the meal with watermelon, berries, and brownies. We relax with mojitos muddled with fresh mint, watching our glasses condense. But as darkness falls and we wait for the fireworks, I find myself conjuring the scent of cheap beer and a dusty field, teasing out the chords of the only Fourth of July I vividly remember, wondering if I truly appreciated it.

And nostalgia is indeed the three-bean salad; a wistful longing for an astringent time, sweetened.