JUST A CLOVE – a Short Story from Precious Memories by Lynn Stannard

As a young bride, I decided to try cooking beef stew for my dear husband. I carefully followed the directions in the cookbook. The stew cooked all afternoon. He would be so pleased. I knew he liked it.

After the stew had been cooking for a couple hours, I checked the cookbook instructions again. The next step was to remove the garlic. So I did.

Garlic Clove (The Little One)

Then I wondered what to do with it. The directions didn’t cover that. So, I called my mother on the phone.

“What do I do with the garlic after I take it out?” I asked her.

“Why are you asking me that?” she probed curiously. “Well, you know. It’s kind of big. Do I keep it or throw it out?”

“Oh, dear! Just how big is it?” she patiently asked me.

“You know, Mom. Oh, about the size of a small onion.” I answered.

Mom quickly told me, “You’d better open all your windows! Go do it right now!”

In about an hour, my husband returned home from work. Our apartment was on the second floor of a two family house. When he opened the door, he almost fell down backwards. He called up the stairs for me to come down. We would be going out for dinner that night. There was no way on earth to salvage that dinner.

After I finished crying and feeling sorry for myself, we enjoyed our dinner out. The next problem was how to get back into our home. The open windows helped, but the garlic smell was in everything for weeks. It seemed like forever.

Well, I’m way past being a young bride now. And that was the last time I ever bought, used, or ate garlic.

Precious Memories by Lynn Stannard

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