I love pie

I love pie. Pecan, peach, strawberry, blackberry. Pizza pies of all kinds, especially white pizza with artichokes, chicken pot pie, Shepard's pie, and any variation of quiche.

We all know quiche is just a stuck-up name for pie. They look like a pie, smell like a pie, cut like a pie and eat like a pie, therefore, they are pie. My grandmother just never could move into the twentieth century, and always called them "quickies." It wasn't that we didn't have the heart to tell her that the correct pronunciation was "kee'sh", we just thought it was funny and liked to hear her say it. She also called lasagna "lah-zag-nuh" but she was in her eighties, and at the age, you can call it anything you like.



I love "The Waitress," the ultimate cult movie for pie-a-holics. We're kind of like the "Rocky Horror Picture Show" crowd, except we wear aprons and carry around rolling pins. I love to sing the pie song, "Baby don't you cry, gonna bake a pie, gonna bake a pie with a heart in the middle." It just kind of sticks in your head once you start and then you sing it all day. With a smile on your face. Pie-a-holics have all verses of "The Pie Song" memorized and have replicated every pie recipe the very pregnant Jenna created. When writer/director Adrienne Shelly was brutally murdered in her New York flat, we had a national day of mourning. Fortunately, there were support groups to help us get through it. Many are still in therapy.



Friday evening Sissey and I hosted an "ALL GIRLS NO BOYS ALLOWED" party to celebrate the end of a grueling week of school. The attire was pajama casual, movies were the entertainment, pie was the menu. My three year old niece was attending her first all-girl event. We taught her the universal secret signal used to open every "ALL GIRLS NO BOYS ALLOWED" gathering (arms crossed over-head in the shape of an "X"), chanted our universal mantra (Veni, Vedi, Visa- I Came, I Saw, I Shopped), gave the battle cry "Charge It", and headed for the dining room table. Tomato pie, ham and sweet red pepper pie, cheese and egg pie - laid out in symmetrical circles, evenly sliced into eighths. It was a picture of perfection, completeness, wholeness. It was pie heaven. We didn't care that real men don't eat quiche. They weren't invited, and it left more for us.



I love pie. I love the way the word spills out of your mouth like a kiss. Say it slowly. Pie.... I love the long vowel that lingers in the air like a sweet aroma, a soothing, comforting sound. I love the family stories that are baked into each recipe, the memories that are captured in something so simple as a pie. A pie, a simple little pie, holding such rich, delicious, complex histories, filled with sweet memories, carefully made with loving hands, oh yes, yes, I love pie.