The Frying Pan: 30 years, 30 Days, 30 Stories. Day 14 out of 30

         When I was young I never had a reason to cook for myself. My mother, being proud of her Italian heritage, loved to cook and she did it very well. When she couldn’t cook my dad had a repertoire of a few things that he did very well, among them was Chicken Parmesan. We NEVER ever starved in my house and, as any friend of mine who has ever visited my family’s house can attest, there was rarely an occasion where there weren’t ample left-overs. It is not hard to imagine then, that when I got to the novitiate and they told me that I had to cook about once a week for the community I was a little frightened at the prospect.  The afternoon before I had to cook the first time I went to the grocery store, and there I made my choice, Chicken Parm it was… I walked down the aisles in the Jackson Square Stop and Shop… Chicken, check. Bread Crumbs, check, Tomato Sauce, check, Mozarella and Parmesean shredded cheese, check, pasta, check. Bread, check. Ingredients for a Salad, Check.

The Desired Result

            The next morning we went out to the work that we did two days a week during novitiate. I went to the Jesuit infirmary at Campion Center in Weston, MA. One of the older Jesuit Fathers named Leo asked me: “So Michael, I hear that you are going to cook tonight, and what are we attempting to prepare?” “Chicken Parmesan, Father.” I replied, sitting there in the room that was used both as the recreation room and for activities.  He asked, “And why did you choose that?” “Well Father I have seen my Dad prepare it a thousand times, so I figured I could do it too.” One of the other Fathers, who rarely spoke, sat in his wheelchair. This priest had been in Jamaica for years working as a missionary in one of our high schools there, he nodded and grunted in approval of my choice.

            That night we started out after work towards the novitiate. I figured that if I had an hour and half before dinner I should be able to get things done. We got into the car and exited off of route 128 (Interstate 95 for those of you not in the know) and on to route 9 to return to the novitiate. What one needs to understand about route 9 is that it is a 4-lane road. In parts it is 50 miles per hour, in other parts there are stoplights and major intersections. It was the most direct route home. It was, however, Boston, at rush hour, and we got stuck. I finally pulled into the driveway of the Novitiate at 4:30pm, a half an hour before Mass, not sure that I had enough time to cook.

            As I walked into the house I apologized profusely to the novice master, “If I had known I would have left work earlier,” and  “I am so sorry, it won't happen again,” came forth from my mouth. Paul, my novicemaster, being a wise, relatively patient, and gentle person said, genuinely: “Michael, don’t worry, we’ll just order pizza.”

            This should be the end of the story because now, 8 years later, I would take it as a relief and get on the phone to the pizza place down the street, but not then. “No,” I said “I can still get it done.” “Are you sure?” he asked. “Yep.” Immediately I sprung into action. Chicken out, bread crumbs out, bread the chicken. Frying pan on the burner, Olive oil in, heat up. Fry Chicken (I burnt it because the heat was too high) Put Chicken in Baking Dish, Pour Sauce, scatter cheese. Throw in oven… whew, done with 10 minutes to spare.

            As I turned back to the counter away from the oven I began to prepare the salad when my classmate Matt, who was setting the table, walked through the door. “Umm Michael,” he said, in a remarkably calm voice, “I think there is a fire behind you.” I turned around, flames were gushing out of the frying pan and into the industrial hood that was over the stove. I was about to turn the novitiate into an inferno, and all that I could say in that moment was: “We should do something about that.” Thankfully, both Matt and I, who were not only novices to religious life but also to cooking, knew enough not to throw water on it. We searched frantically for what felt like an hour, but was no more than a couple of minutes, for the fire extinguisher. When we found it we unleashed hell on the grease fire, and in the process covered what seemed like half the kitchen in extinguisher foam.

            When I went upstairs to the chapel for mass, which was about to start just as the fire was going out, the first words out of my mouth to the novice master were “Now just so you know, the fire is out.” Immediately my novicemaster, who had survived the worst fire in the history of our province when he was a novice, tensed up. “We may have lost the brand new frying pan for good, but no more fire.”

The unfortunate victim. 

            That night we all sat after mass and ate what remains to this day to be the worst meal that I have ever prepared. Everyone were gracious about it, however, and we all had a good laugh when the novicemaster said, during the cleanup of the kitchen after dinner, “Oh no, not the frying pan given to the novitiate by his Holiness the Pope.”

            A couple of days later I went back to the Health center, and I was sitting there with the same Fathers as before. Fr. Leo asked how it went, and I told him the story of chicken burnt and frying pan lost. As I concluded the other father, who was named Ted, looked up from his wheelchair and rare words issued from his mouth. “That’s ok, when I was in novitiate I killed a horse!” The entire room erupted in laughter.

The Old Shadowbrook Novitiate, sight of the unfortunate
equicide. 

Apparently as novices at the old novitiate they had to work the farm that was there. He was told not to take a specific older horse out into the pasture one day, but he did it anyway. The horse had a heart attack, keeled over, and died on the spot. Obviously this is not an example of animal cruelty. As his words later in life attest, his intention was never to kill the horse. There he was, though, consoling a young novice by reminding him that the loss of a frying pan and a little burnt chicken really wasn’t that big of a deal.

            It strikes me that stories like this are what Lent, which begins in a half an hour here in Rome, is all about. The truth is that in Lent we need to first admit something that is universally uncomfortable to admit. We need to admit that we are not perfect, and be humble enough to accept it, laugh at ourselves and move on with God’s grace. That night in the kitchen I didn’t cook because I had to, I cooked because I didn’t want to admit that I couldn’t. I cooked because I didn’t want to admit that I wasn’t perfect and a frying pan went up in flames in the process. (Thankfully that was all that went up in flames.) The classic call of Lent, which is already posted on some churches here in Rome, is to repent and believe in the Gospel. Before we can do that though, we have to be humble enough to know that there are things to repent of, and free enough to be honest with those faults. It’s wrong to assume that we need to be perfect too. Sometimes, when we can be honest with who we are our imperfection can be just the thing that helps others become more comfortable with who they are. Even if it means admitting that you once, unintentionally, killed a horse. 


Note: An apology to anyone who read this post earlier. Unfortunately,  I copied a draft version onto the webpage this version should be better.