Corned Beef 2021

Published in Pen to Pandemic: A Community Anthology from the Time of COVID-19 (ISBN 978-1-61468-654-5)

My grandma is a stubborn old Irishwoman, and you can tell her I said so. She’d wear it like a badge of honor.

We’re in her kitchen, in the Brunswick house where my ma grew up. I’m watching her score the corned beef. She’s already parboiled six flat cuts and is about to coat them with the brown sugar and mustard she’d mixed together yesterday. While the glazed brisket portions roast, she’ll boil enough cabbage and potatoes to feed the entire population of Rensselaer County. Every ten minutes she’ll open the oven and pour half a bottle of stout over the beef. Irish basting, she calls it. I know her routine by heart because I’ve watched her do it all my 35 years. Well, except last year of course.

As if she’s reading my mind, Grandma declares, “I’ve always said when St. Paddy’s falls in the middle of the week we should have our dinner the Sunday before. But no, last year this one was working and that one had a basketball game and the other one wanted to go skiing. So we waited for the Sunday after and the next thing we know, we’re all in lockdown. And we never got to see Louise and Frank again. We couldn’t visit them in the hospital and we couldn’t even have a proper wake. It sure would have been nice to have one last St. Paddy’s with them, God rest their souls.”

“But they were already sick, Grandma, even though no one knew it. We might have all caught it from them. I know it’s not the same, but you made the corned beef anyway and they got to have some.” Grandma had gotten in her car and made contact-free deliveries to relatives all over the Capital District, from Queensbury to Voorheesville and out to Hoosick Falls. Uncle Frank and Aunt Louise’s symptoms didn’t start until a couple days later.

“Well, what else was I supposed to do with it?”

In each bag she’d left a note: “Next year – God as my witness – we are doing it the Sunday before!”

Of course, the other thing none of us knew then was how long this would all last. So, instead of the usual 40 or so, only 10 of us are eating with Grandma at her house today. I don’t know if the governor or the president or Dr. Fauci would approve, but she makes her own rules. We’ll each leave with packaged dinners to deliver to those who aren’t here.

“Grandma, did my brother call yet?”

According to Grandma’s rules, any adult on the guest list who wasn’t vaccinated yet had to get tested before coming for dinner. Timmie, as usual, had waited until the last minute and as of two hours ago was still waiting for his results.

“No, but he’ll be here. I prayed to St. Jude. Go see what your grand-uncles are doing.”

“OK,” I say, pushing away from the table even though I could tell her right now what her cousins are doing. Solving the problems of the world, we call it. They have plenty to cover this visit, not having seen each other in over a year. I notice a problem as soon as I enter the den.

“Uncle Jack! You need a coaster under that drink!”

“Oh, your old shanty-Irish uncle forgot this is a lace-curtain house,” he answers, using his favorite turn of phrase for distinguishing those who have two quarters to rub together and a pot to piss in from those who don’t.

“Go on with ya, old goat,” I say as I lift his whisky glass and toss a coaster onto the table. My nickname for him came from having seen “ye old goat” painted on an Easter egg at his house when I was a kid. It’s what his daughters called him, long before GOAT came to mean “greatest of all time.”

My cousin Ellie follows me back into the kitchen, carrying her empty pint glass. “I haven’t said hello to Grandma yet. Holy cow, what is all that?” She’s looking at the wall behind the old Formica table, where two big whiteboards have replaced fifty years’ worth of family photos.

Grandma turns away from the counter and points with a mustard-coated butter knife at the whiteboard on the right. “That, young lady, is how I make sure you’re all doing what you’re supposed to do so that sneaky demon doesn’t get any more of us.”

“Look, Ellie,” I say, “there’s your name halfway down, 38 years old, secretary.” I show her the checkmarks by each name, indicating Grandma had called everyone this week, and the status columns across the top. “Now, tell me if this is right. You’re not eligible for the vaccine yet. You traveled out of state on Monday, but you worked from home the rest of the week. You had one potential second-hand exposure and you had your Covid test on Thursday.”

“Well, I haven’t been a secretary for years, but the rest is right. Wow, Grandma, you call everyone every week?”

“What, did you think I only called you?” She’s washing her hands and setting the oven to preheat while she teases Ellie. “What fancy title do you have now?”

“Program analyst.”

“Same thing.”

“It is not, Grandma. I have a lot more respon—"

I interrupt because I’ve heard the two of them have this conversation a thousand times. “Now check out the other board, Ellie.”

Ellie walks around the table to get closer to the left whiteboard. Down the side is a list of occupations, age groups and health conditions. Across the top are pharmacies, locations of state-run vaccination centers, and names of all the local counties with their health department’s phone numbers. X’s show which category of people can get a vaccine at each place. Below the grid is a list of names and phone numbers, some checked off and some not. “Who are these people, Grandma?”

Instead of answering right away, Grandma says, “Jesus, Mary and Joseph. If you’ve got nothing better to do than bother me with all these questions you could at least peel some potatoes.” She moves a big bowl of scrubbed spuds to the table and gives us each a small knife. While we start peeling, she puts water on to boil and starts coring the cabbage.

I answer Ellie’s question. “They’re people who need assistance getting vaccine appointments. Grandma, do you have a bag for the peelings?”

“How do you know these people?” Ellie continues her questioning while Grandma digs a plastic bag out of the stash she hoarded before they were banned.

“Do you girls remember my friend, Catherine? She sends out lists of people who call because they’re having trouble,” Grandma says. “You know not everyone has computers or can make phone calls during the workday. The whole thing is very confusing to figure out. Once I got the family all set, I wanted to use what I learned to help others. There’s a whole group of us doing it.”

I’m proud of my grandma. This is right up her alley. I saw her in action the other day when I stopped by, with her phone on redial, continuously refreshing both her laptop and her tablet. Heaven help the poor slob on the other end of the phone who tries to end a call before she has an appointment for everyone on her list for that particular site. I imagine a big reunion of all the phone reps where they compare notes on the “Jesus-Mary-and-Joseph lady” from Brunswick.

The back door crashes open and in burst Mark and Colin, Ellie’s husband and nine-year-old son. Mark takes off his gloves and rubs his hands together in the steam from the pot on the stove before nicking a slice of warm soda bread from the covered basket. Colin crosses the room to stand between Ellie’s outstretched arms and says, “Mommy, the wind was blowing me everywhere!”

“I told you it wasn’t a good day for skateboarding.” Colin had wanted to try his new board on Christmas day, but Ellie talked him into waiting. Of course, he woke up this morning to remind her she’d said maybe St. Patrick’s Day would be good.

“What’s all this?” Grandma asks, tapping Colin on the head and knees with one hand while she uses her other to help him with his jacket.

“It’s my helmet and knee pads, GG!”

“That’s right, Colin,” says Ellie. “We don’t want to go to the emergency room if you fall.”

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph. We didn’t have any of that when I was a kid, not even when we used to roller skate—”

“—down Lincoln Avenue from St. Joseph’s cemetery!” We all chime in to help Grandma finish the sentence.

“You tell us that story every time we go see Pops,” says Colin as Ellie, Mark and I all smile.

I hear shouting from my two kids in the living room and turn to see Timmie standing on the threshold. He’s looking every bit the Irishman in his heather-green Aran Islands sweater and herringbone tweed cap. “Hi, everyone!” he says. “I’m negative!”

“God is good,” says Grandma. “Get yourself a drink; we’ll be eating soon.”