People Make Pie!

Did you know that? Real people make pie with their hands. I don't mean you and me - we know we make pie- I mean other people. There are places you can go and slices of homemade pie are available for sale. Seriously.

We had vehicles with exhaust problems but no one locally wanted to repair the broken part - just the broken part. The whole kit and caboodle was the deal. We don't even need to speak of expense - it was astronomical. As luck would have it, there is a guy, a really nice guy in a town west (quite a bit) of us willing to cut out the bad part and replace only that part. Genius, less wasteful and happily far less expensive.

Rocky drove us to the local restaurant and we settled in with books, notepads and conversation for the 2 hour wait ahead. We each ordered a club sandwich from the attentive waitress with a Minnesotan accent. There is really nothing to say about the squishy, pink tomato club - nothing at all. But toward the end of our visit things started looking up when the pie lady walked through the door. Tall with white hair, wearing polyester pants in a springy pastel, some of the pies were still warm. They were in real pie tins. Dutch Apple, Strawberry-Rhubarb, Lemon Meringue, Coconut Meringue and Cherry.


I brought home a slice of Coconut Meringue because coconut is off limits by all other Downings. The meringue melted in my mouth with a touch of burnt sugar essence. The vanilla custard, with inconsistencies befalling homemade was layered with lots of coconut. The crust which was paper thin crumbled like old paper. I think it was made with lard. It was a lovely pie.

The best part of my midday gluttony was the simple joy of a homemade, small batch pie made by a seasoned pie maker. There still are old ladies wearing polyester pants baking pies.

Some days everything - mufflers and pie included - is right in the world.