S.O.S.

He loomed large, his white t-shirt bulging, his apron hanging off an impressive gut. “Keep stirring,” he said, slapping me on my back as he wandered off. Over his shoulder, “Just keep stirring.” The pot loomed large, with an equally large wooden spoon. I stood on a chair and stirred. The white gooey matter didn’t look like food, but it smelled creamy, with a hint of something else. The spoon moved easily in the pot, and I felt it slide across the bottom, and saw the liquid well up. I began to sweat, first from the heat and then from the work of stirring. Was it my imagination, or did the spoon move more slowly now. I gripped it with both hands, and remembered his order: Just keep stirring. I imagined this pot, this goop, sloshing inside a floating metal box, thickening as hundreds of hungry young men in blue and white waited patiently to clog their guts or, clutching a pitching rail, empty them. I weakened, I think, as I struggled to move the spoon. It felt like hands were gripping it, preventing me from stirring. I pushed with all my strength, knowing that the white paste would brown, then burn, if it stayed on the bottom too long. My adolescent body began to fail, and I called out: “Help! I can’t stir the pot!” In a flash he was back, dumping gallons of milk into the pot, the paste immediately loosening its grip on the spoon. “Thanks for your help,” he said. “I’ve got it from here.”