Tabasco and Eggs

 Don't be surprised if my first book isn't about breakfast.  Piecing together the words for this letter, I uncovered ideas for at least a dozen more.

When I was young, getting a private audience with my dad was something of a challenge.  There were seven of us at home, plus the maid and the dog.  At its peak, there were almost five hundred Missco employees, plus Millsaps, plus Trustmark, plus Unifirst, plus St. Dominics, plus Galloway, plus whatever else Daddy got himself roped into, so if I was going to see him, I had to be clever.  When he turned fifty, the Dominican Sisters gave him a two-by-four so he would have another board to sit on.  When they get together, nuns can be some of the funniest people you'll know.

Being a voyeur of other people's habits, I discovered that Daddy liked to eat and he liked to get up early.  That was my inside track.  Breakfast would be our time together.  If I could manage to meet him around six-thirty in the morning at either LeFleurs or Primos number two, I'd have my dad to myself for half an hour or more.  My sister had him for half an hour before that when they'd run together.  She's pretty clever about watching people's habits too.

My dad was never the kind to teach me things by saying, "do this, this way."  He was too subtle for that, and I was too stubborn.  To teach me, he performed the behavior he wanted me to learn when he knew I was watching (which was always) and waited for me to say, "why do you do that, Daddy?"

Fatty, sugary, creamy, breakfast foods are usually comfort foods.  That's not necessarily what you want to start a work day, though.  Daddy had a routine that turned fluffy scrambled eggs into a spirited wake-me-up to rival the blackest coffee.  

"Daddy, what are you puttin' on your eggs?"

"That's Tabasco Sauce.  They make it in Louisiana."

There are probably five thousand different kinds of hot sauce between Texas and Louisiana.  There are posters showing all the colorful bottles of Lousiana hot sauce, but I stick with Tabasco.   Tabasco chili peppers are filled with capsicum, one of the greatest gifts of the people we stole this land from.  As a young man, I took the Avery Island tour where they make Tabasco and saw an alligator, so that's maybe why Tabasco imprinted on me; plus, there were days when I shared a bottle with Daddy, Deaton, Wingate, Bass, and Taylor before we went to see if there were any fish in the water.  When it comes to tradition, the Jews in Fiddler on the Roof have nothing on us Southerners.  

There are a lot of health benefits to Tabasco sauce.  It adds virtually zero calories, is very low in sodium, and the capsaicin in it somehow raises your metabolism by almost ten percent for a little over an hour.  It quickens your mind and body at the time of day when you need it most.  It doesn't hurt if you miss the eggs and hit the bacon a little, either.

By this time next year, Daddy will be out of my life a few months longer than he was in it.  He taught me so many things.  Things that made me what I am.  Some lessons were very serious, some not so much, but my favorite (and his) was how and what to eat.  Sitting in a house Daddy helped build with Sister Josephine, trying to regain the strength I lost, there's a plate with the remains of scrambled eggs and Tabasco behind me.  If that doesn't make me better, nothing will.