Madness string 122551

Random mermaid
The pumpkin was starting to collapse, so I assumed it was mouldy and hucked it off the balcony. When it turned out it wasn't, I had to then go actually retrieve the thing, clean off the dirt, chop it up, and boil it and freeze it, so it could continue to persist perpetually in the Pantry Of Things I Don't Know What To Do With But Are Technically Still Food.
It's one of those family recipes where something is changed or added with every generation. Like, my great-great-grandmother just made a simple, plain pumpkin soup. My great-grandmother added herbs and spices, nutmeg and rosemary, sage, thyme from her garden. My grandmother added garlic and onion. My mother roasts the pumpkin instead of boiling it and added a couple of small kumara (or sweet potato), and I use extra garlic that I also roast and I use a little parmesan cheese. I use some of the extra garlic to make a butter to spread on toast for the side. It's not like it's particularly fancy, it's just pumpkin soup, but whenever I make it, I make it with a lot of love, because it's all the memories of learning to make it with my mum. It was the first thing I learned to make. It's the warmth that it fills me with while it thunders and rains and hails outside, because it's my go-to for that kind of weather. It's the crunch of the toast. It's sharing something that I love with someone that I care about. And that's what cooking is supposed to be like. Happiness and love on a plate (or in a bowl).