Bathing the Spaghetti
It was the seventies, we hadn’t been married long and lived on a small acreage off Boles Road southwest of Mills, WY. At a craft fair, I found a cute apron made of Christmas napkins, sewn together at the top with a pretty, red, satin ribbon to tie it on with. When the top napkin became soiled, you just ripped it off and you had a clean apron again! I wore it when I invited all the neighbors over for a Christmas spaghetti supper.
The spaghetti sauce was a recipe from an Italian co-worker at the University Hospital in Seattle. So good. Still use it. It takes four pounds of hamburger and a pound of sausage plus oodles of other items simmered for at least an hour.
The problem began when I had to cook a large amount of spaghetti for quite a few neighbors. Instead of doing it in small amounts, I figured I could dump a large amount in a canner full of boiling water. It clumped. And when cooked, how to drain it? And rinse it? No humongous colander! Well, all the people were there by then—a dozen or so neighbors.
A ”bright” idea: Rinse and drain it in the bathtub using the lid to stop the spaghetti and just let the water drain out! Hoping no one saw me!
So I lean over the stove to lift the big 7-quart-jar-size canner full of spaghetti and water off the stove, and I see a flash of light near my feet!
“You’re on fire!” Someone yells. My pretty Christmas apron is on fire! So, now every eye is upon me as I hastily set the canner back on the stove, take my apron off and throw it in the sink to run water on it! There’s a delay until everyone is visiting and ignoring me again, then off to the bathroom I slink with the canner of spaghetti.
Did you know spaghetti likes to escape? Where one strand goes, the rest follow. Soon I had spaghetti lying in the bathtub, (which I had cleaned and rinsed well before my party, thank goodness). Well…easier to rinse now I think! Run the shower! Not so easy to throw back into the canner, but I made it! Returned to the kitchen with spaghetti ready for the authentic Italian sauce!
The party was a success. The neighbors were all still healthy and alive a week later!
Then the Lord spoke to me again and asked, “What do you see now?” And I replied, “I see a pot of boiling water, spilling from the north.” NLT (I wonder if that pot had spaghetti in it!)
