By The phone rang at 3:47 PM on Tuesday.
I was at the construction site. The phone was in my truck. I heard it ring through the open window — three rings, then voicemail, then immediately ringing again. Two calls back to back. Nobody calls twice in a row unless it's urgent. I set down the level and walked to the truck and picked up the phone and the number was a 270 area code — Kentucky, but not Lexington — and I answered.
"Mr. Hensley, this is Captain Morrison from the United States Army."
The world stopped. The construction site stopped. The air stopped. My lungs stopped. The only thing that didn't stop was my heart, which accelerated to a speed I haven't felt since the mine collapsed twenty-eight years ago. "Mr. Hensley, your son is alive. I want to start with that. Your son is alive."
Your son is alive. Four words that split time in half: before this phone call and after this phone call. Everything before was one life. Everything after is another.
Clay's convoy was hit by an IED on Monday, July 7th. Two soldiers in his squad were killed. Two. Dead. Gone. Soldiers with names and families and mothers who got a different phone call. Clay was ten feet from the blast. He was not physically injured. He was not wounded. He was alive and whole and every part of his body was intact and accounted for.
But.
The Captain said "but" in the way that military officers say "but" when the physical report is clear and the rest of the report is not. Clay is alive. But he was ten feet from an explosion that killed two of his friends. But he saw things that no nineteen-year-old should see. But the Army is monitoring him. But he will call when he can.
I hung up. I sat in my truck. I called Connie. She answered on the first ring because Connie always answers on the first ring and because she heard it in my voice before I said a word. I said "Clay is alive. His convoy was hit. Two soldiers died. He's not hurt." She was silent. Then she said "Come home." I said "I'm coming." I left the site. I drove home. I walked into the kitchen and I didn't cook. I sat at the table and I stared at Clay's empty chair and I breathed.
I didn't cook this week. For the first time in three years, I didn't cook. The kitchen was dark and the stove was cold and the cast iron sat on the burner and I couldn't touch it because my hands were shaking and my son was alive but two other boys were dead and the world was wrong in a way that food couldn't fix. Not this week. Not yet.
I’m not ready to cook yet. I don’t know when I will be. But Connie kept asking me to eat something — not because food fixes anything, because it doesn’t, but because she loves me and because my hands were still shaking Thursday morning and she said you have to put something in your body, Craig. So I stood at the counter and I threw strawberries and pineapple into the blender and I pressed the button and I drank it standing up, staring out the window at the street. It wasn’t cooking. It was surviving. And sometimes that’s the only recipe you need.
Strawberry Pineapple Smoothie
Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cook Time: None | Total Time: 5 minutes | Servings: 2
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups frozen strawberries
- 1 cup pineapple chunks, fresh or frozen
- 1/2 cup orange juice
- 1/2 cup plain yogurt (or milk of your choice)
- 1 tablespoon honey, optional
- 1/2 cup ice cubes (omit if using all frozen fruit)
Instructions
- Combine. Add the strawberries, pineapple, orange juice, yogurt, and honey (if using) to a blender. Add ice if your fruit is fresh rather than frozen.
- Blend. Blend on high for 45—60 seconds until completely smooth. If the smoothie is too thick, add orange juice a tablespoon at a time. If too thin, add a few more frozen strawberries.
- Pour and drink. Divide between two glasses and drink immediately. You don’t have to sit down. You don’t have to set the table. Just drink it.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 148 | Protein: 4g | Fat: 1g | Carbs: 33g | Fiber: 3g | Sodium: 38mg