For the Love of Honey Mustard

Corrie found me.

She shocked me in a moment when I was simply tired from the week, and didn’t feel much like talking to anyone.

If you’ve read my family’s story, you know about the sudden loss of our daughter, Cora, but called “Corrie” all of her life on May 27, 2020 due to an undetected tumor …

Almost one year ago.

I’d taken a break from all social media and writing for three to four weeks to see how I was doing as I approached the one year mark without my baby, one of the three loves of my life.

Because the fact is:

I’m strong.

I can deal with the sight of a mother with four little girls, fewer or more, even as my heart envies her. I can handle the sight of an older brother with his little sister. I can handle the news of another woman expecting a child while I still … wait.

None of it stopped Corrie’s memory and her spirit from burning in my heart in an unexpected moment.

As I sat with my mother and son, Hayes, in a local restaurant, the waitress delivered my “lean” turkey sandwich with my sweet potato fries.

She put a single container of honey mustard next to my serving, and I fell through a time loop. I vanished into a different world away from my mother and son and their conversation.

Another time and place appeared before me. It had a a large stage in a space that resembled a large beer hall in Germany at a theme park where my husband, John, and I took our children every summer before COVID-19. I saw a little girl sulking about …

“Ah, I don’t have one,” she said. “I don’t have any honey mustard.”

Why?

One container of honey mustard was not enough for a child who enjoyed fries with her honey mustard.

I heard her voice, and how she fussed at the “unfair” distribution of the right kind of mustard.

As a parent of young children serving lunch in a crowd, we had one parent to get the food. The other sat with the children.

When one parent returned with the food, the other went to get the sauces. You had to get the right amount of ketchups, regular mustard, and …

the much desired honey mustard.

When I was tired, I’d sometimes skimp on the honey mustard because I thought:

I won’t need one for my meal.

I did this because I was tired, or because I thought my children did not need so much ketchup, mustard, or honey mustard.

But, then I heard:

“Awe, that’s the wrong mustard.”

She’d say it in a sweet, but disappointed voice the first time.

With the honey mustard containers John and I brought to the table, you’d think we’d have four children instead of only two.

As good as Corrie was about sharing at school and in public spaces, her brother was a different matter. In fact, Hayes said this week when we talked about trust.

I loved my sister. I liked my sister, but I never trusted my sister.

my son, hayes

This had to do with the typical brother-sister relationship from stealing his dinosaurs, hiding them under her bed or in the special boxes her paternal aunt gave her, or telling me a full report about his time in after school. This “trust issue” extended to the honey mustard.

If a container sat between the two of them, each child swirled the fry all the way around leaving maybe half of it filled with honey mustard.

Then I heard:

“Awe, Hayes took all of the honey mustard.”

There was another container, or nineteen, left.

“No, I didn’t,” Hayes said. “There’s some left.”

I’d also hear the argument the other way around.

A moment of magic and the relief of all occurred when I pushed two containers of honey mustard in front of each of them, even if each child only had four French fires left.

I smiled remembering those moments of honey mustard disagreements. I smiled remembering how it showed my daughter was far from perfect, and had her moments of “I want” and “He has this …”

For the love of honey mustard, I can still smile as I remember those memories I need, like air, of Corrie.

By Rebecca T. Dickinson