Every year, I make the Kringle, and I think of the woman who made it before me.
A woman I never met, but wish I had. Her name was Paula Haar, and she was my husband’s grandmother. A mother of five, a piano teacher, a talented organist, a lover of people, these things I know she was. I know these things through the stories her family still tells. Though she’s been gone for many years, she remains woven into the tapestry of people she brought into creation.
Every year, I think of her as I work the soft dough with butter-greasy hands, and I think: am I doing this right? Did her dough crack, too, just there, if she rolled it too thin? Did she, too, wonder if that was enough pecans in the filling, or too much?
Every year, I consider her legacy. Without Paula Haar, there’d have been no Margaret, my beloved mother-in-law. There’d have been no Jeb, and no story between he and I. There’d have been no Evie, no Jonah. Paula was responsible for the making not just of Kringle at Christmastime, but for an entire collection of some of my favorite people in this world.
How do you express gratitude to someone, simply for having lived?
I guess this is my way. I bake the Kringle, thinking of her rolling the dough, filling the pastries, years before I was even conceived.
Thank you and Merry Christmas, Grandma Haar
