I don’t know about you, but if someone calls me a smart cookie, that makes me happy.
A cookie is a good part of our lives, and it only stands to reason that it’s more flattering to be called a smart cookie than a smart anything else.
My earliest--and best--memories of my grandmother involve cookies. I was blessed with a storybook, grandma who lived nearby, just on the other side of the “hollow.” She walked with a cane, had short white hair, and always wore a faded dress worn to softness. That dress often sported a few safety pins, and I’m not clear as to whether they were holding her dress together or just there handy as she knew her day might need a safety pin. Maybe both. What I remember is that no matter what day or what time, I could walk to her house, come in without knocking, and she’d look up and smile at me.
And I remember her baking cookies.
The best.
My favorite were her raisin-filled sugar cookies. Huge soft pillows filled with boiled raisins in the middle. As an adult, I tried more than once to recreate them, but I couldn’t. I’ve concluded one has to be in her 80’s, wear soft blue plaid dresses, and have beautiful hands seasoned by hard work and arthritis to make cookies like those. I’m not there, but…well, on my way for sure.
One time my sister Cindy and I trotted down the hollow and up to visit Grandma, and to our joy she handed us a big bag of those raisin-filled sugar cookies to take home to the family. Before we had topped the hill, we had made our plan. Mom never saw that bag. It went into our bottom drawer in our bedroom—the drawer that held our treasures. Cindy and I had those cookies, and there was no sharing.
Shame on us! But had you had one of those, you’d not have shared either!
Cookies are in the middle of so many great memories!!
- Becky Coursen