Birthday

My mother’s birthday is in May. When her mother was still alive, for the occasion she would take the train all the way from Limburg, a southern province in the Netherlands, to visit us. My sister and I would pick her up from track 8 at the Haarlem train station.

In a big bag, wrapped in a wet towel, was my mother’s present: a giant heap of white asparagus, fresh from the farm, and already peeled. (That’s what made it so presentlike.) “The asparagus should squeak like guinea pigs when they move alongside each other in the towel,” said my grandmother. That’s how you know they’re fresh.