Salsa is the last stage of grief

To many of my oldest friends, my father was best known for one thing: his salsa.

It was objectively out of this world, and the craftsmanship he used was nothing short of incredible. I remember watching him, at the green granite island in my childhood home, taking tomatoes and looking at them like a championship athlete surveys a playing field.

Then he’d take these tomatoes and mince them into minuscule cubes, better than a machine could, even if he had a dull knife. Then he’d do the same with an onion and cilantro before adding spices, hand-squeezed lime juice, and one or two green chilies. His salsa was the stuff of childhood legend, and the way he made it, with such precision and pride, was legendary to me.

It is without exaggeration to say that one specific thing I grieved when he went ahead was that I was never able to have an afternoon with him - where he would pass on the recipe, yes, but also his wisdom, his blessing, and the torch. Even when I was young, long before I knew he would be taken from us so suddenly, I put it in my mind that the salsa was not just a recipe but an important rite of passage.

I haven’t been able to bring myself to try making it since he died. The thought of making it was sad, but also scary. The knife would’ve invoked the feelings of a haunted house, I thought, and how could I do it justice without him teaching me the secrets of his work? Anything less than perfection would’ve felt like an insult to his memory.

—

My family has more than its fair share of gardeners.

I’ve been hearing about Udai Mama’s green thumb - he’s one of my four maternal uncles - from my mom for decades. My Masi, who’s know by her nickname “Gudda” in our family, is the same way. She’s created an Eden in her backyard in Long Island, with everything from tomatoes, to Indian vegetables, to figs.

She sent us home with a bounty from her garden last weekend, when we were visiting our New York family. So here I was, with a deluge of perfectly ripe tomatoes I didn’t know what to do with, which would surely rot within a week without intervention. And how could I waste a basket of tomatoes from my aunt’s garden? I may not be perfect, but I’m not a savage.

As it happened, five days after our return from New York, our youngest son Emmett was to be baptized. Our plan was to have everyone over - our family, godparents, friends, kids, everyone - for an early dinner before Mass. Robyn created the menu and had us stocked up to make our crowd-favorite white bean chili, cornbread, and a frosted chocolate cake. I picked up a Sister Pie because I happened to be in the West Village for lunch with an old friend.

And there were those tomatoes in the orange, plastic colander - the one Robyn had in her apartment when we first started dating - that were just sitting there, catching sunshine, getting riper and riper by the day.

—

It was one of the proudest moments, Papa, I’ve ever had over something I’ve made - when person after person was raving about the salsa I made. Your salsa. I got to tell all our friends and family present for Emmett’s baptism - most of whom I met after I moved to college - the story of your salsa and say with so much joy, “I’m glad you liked it, it was my Dad’s recipe. I always thought he should market it, too.”

As I was making it, I was remembering you. I was remembering your life, how you left India and landed in Tehran to join the ship on which you were to be an engineer. I was remembering how intensely you insisted on doing the right thing, in the right way, down to how you impressed upon me, “You MUST cut the tomatoes by hand, a machine leaves the pieces too large and soft. The tomatoes must be firm, Neil, FIRM.”

When you died, in addition to tremendous sadness and grief, I was also under duress for practical reasons. I didn’t know how to do any grown up stuff.

How do I negotiate a salary? How do I buy a house or plant a garden? How do I feed a baby a bottle? How would you like your last rites to be conducted? How do I find a new dentist? How do I file my taxes? How do find my way in life? How do I make your salsa? These were the things I needed to ask you, that I never could.

And beyond those practical concerns, that was supposed to be our time. I was finally grown. We could finally be the friends we were always meant to be. Asking you for advice was how we were going to bond as grown men.

I was so sad that we never got that time. I still am, because I’m balling as I’m writing this part of the essay. But I suppose you probably see that.

But a funny thing happened as I was making that first bowl of salsa yesterday. In addition to remembering you. I was remembering all the stuff that’s been going on over the past few weeks. All the grown up stuff Robyn and I have had to do lately.

I took the lead for us and traded in Robyn’s car for a minivan that can fit our growing family. I cleared the garden we plotted in our backyard for the winter, and put away the drip irrigation system I installed. I found a masonry contractor and got our garage fixed. I found a high-interest cash account to take advantage of rising interest rates. I navigated a career decision. I, and Robyn too, figured out how to get help from a therapist-coach so we could be better parents to Bo - and we graduated, so to speak, after four months, earlier this week. I figured out that the secret ingredient I was missing in the salsa was ginger.

I realized when I was chopping those tomatoes and onions that you probably never had a salsa recipe. Of course you didn’t have a recipe. Indians didn’t invent salsa. You made it your own. You figured it out. Just like you figured out everything else in your whole adult life, when you were oceans away from your family, making it as a first-generation man in this country.

As I was squeezing the lime I remembered all the things I saw you figure out. How to make a shelf. How to deal with customer service agents who disrespected anyone with an accent. How to use credit card points toward the purchase of a car. How to build a house. How to deal with unemployment. How to raise a son. How to be an honest man. How to live a life.

You were the example of figuring it out, for my whole life, and that’s what I realized yesterday. Even though you went ahead, I should’ve never been worried about the things I didn’t know how to do. It was never about that. I finally realized that you never needed to teach me the salsa recipe or anything else fathers tend to teach their sons as adults. Because you taught me to figure it out. You left me prepared, long before you died, to figure it out - whether it was the salsa or anything else.

It was an unexpectedly big moment, Papa. I’m not scared anymore. I can figure it out. I know this now.

I can figure out how to build a thriving marriage. I can figure out how to be a father to each of our very different sons. I can figure out how to be a man of good character, worthy of our family’s name. I can figure out how to make a contribution to this world, in my job and outside of it. I can figure out how to make your salsa, because you taught me to figure it out.

It’s a cliche to say, but is true - not a day goes by where I don’t think of you. I’m still so sad that you can’t be here with us for the big and little family moments we have. I still have so much gratitude and joy when I think of the happy stories we can tell about you. I know you would’ve wanted us to keep living life, and I swear to God I have. But the weight of grief has been heavy.

But yesterday was a big moment. Something feels different, lighter perhaps. When I think of you I will always have sadness, gratitude, joy, and laughter all mixed together. But now, after learning this lesson from the salsa, the grief part might now, finally, be over.

Photo Credit: Unsplash @yehoshuaas