Stanley Tucci, Italian cooking, cancer, and the meaning of life

Stanley Tucci ends his memoir in a way he admits might seem odd for a book about food. He describes, in somewhat unpleasant detail, his years-long battle with oral cancer and its aftermath.

Ghost

Before it was over, he was forced to live for months receiving nourishment only from a feeding tube. The radiation therapy damaged his sense of smell and taste to the point that even a whiff of something in the refrigerator made him want to vomit.

Tucci at the 2010 Annual Hamptons Film Festival. Photo via Wikimedia Commons.

He lost weight. He languished in bed, “a ghost in my own house,” while his family of growing children, including a newborn infant as well as teenagers bound for college, went on with their lives downstairs.

Even after his feeding tube was removed and he was free to eat again, food was a challenge to him. He could not drink carbonated beverages or eat anything spicy. His mouth was not producing enough saliva to allow him to chew a piece of steak or any other meat, sometimes not even a piece of thick bread.

Eventually, he was able to pursue his favorite pastimes, cooking at home or eating in restaurants with family and friends. But he anticipated each meal with fear that he would not be able to handle whatever food was on the table.

Taste

Now that he’s cured, he explains his reason for ending his book about food by telling readers about his long ordeal without it.

“I have chosen to write about this painfully ironic experience,” he wrote, “because my illness and the brutal side effects of the treatment caused me to realize that food was not just a huge part of my life; it basically was my life.”

Thus, the title for his memoir: Taste: My Life Through Food. After entertaining us with stories of his childhood growing up with sumptuous dishes served as only Italians prepare them, after giving us a peek into his celebrity life by describing unequaled meals served by world-class chefs all around the world, after sharing family recipes for delicacies he has cooked and served for many decades, and after describing the torment of cancer treatments that left him for so long unable even to consider putting a bite into his mouth, he explained what the trial taught him. He almost lost what meant the most to him, he wrote. Food was his life.

Die

He quotes Rainer Maria Rilke in Letters to a Young Poet who answered a soldier aspiring to be a poet. Rilke’s advice: The man should be a poet only if he felt like he would die were he unable to write.

Frankly, I was getting a little bored with the book before I got to this final chapter. But I closed it realizing that Tucci had touched something far deeper than what we can fix for dinner.

What loss would make me want to die?
What would I say IS my life?

I came quickly to two conclusions. Some will find the first one very religious, while others will say the second borders on heresy.

Live

You might expect my experience as a Christian writer and teacher to bring me to a Bible verse most Christians know. “For to me to live is Christ,” the apostle Paul wrote. And if the purpose of these Wednesday posts was to rehash familiar inspiration for an audience that likes that sort of thing, it would be easy to go there.

But many Christian readers might well respond, I’ve heard that before. And a nonbeliever might well ask, “So what does that really mean?”

The answer is more difficult than we Christians want to admit.

Is Christianity for us simply an add-on to make our lives more respectable or comfortable? Do we accept Christ much the same way we choose a financial advisor or pick a new car or agree on what to grill for the cookout?

Do we see Christianity as merely a way to give our lives order? You know: See the doctor for annual checkups, brush your teeth every day, buy insurance  (term, not whole life), happily join company colleagues for their annual service at the soup kitchen, and show up pretty regularly at church.

Many would respond, “And what’s wrong with all that?” Nothing of course, except that even at its very best, all that is only a scant beginning for experiencing “for me to live is Christ.”

I’m still working on this. I’ve written that I’ve come to see giving care to my wife as my mission these days. My duty to God is expressed through my attention to her. For me to live is Evelyn, and I’m remembering Christ as I do so.

Blessing

But (Christian friends, don’t stone me), that’s not everything.

I would feel like I wanted to die if I were not able to laugh and think out loud and, yes, eat, with friends.

I would feel like I wanted to die if I had no way to express the thoughts and feelings that churn inside me or if decided no one cared what I had to say.

Thankfully, I have not come to either of these ends. I’ve already described the ongoing blessing of friends who make time for me alone or for us together. And more than one reader of this blog has said, “Keep writing.”

Grasp

And so, even though some part of every day is a slog I never would have chosen (and sometimes wonder if I’ll ever escape), I’m not in despair.

My urgent grasp for faith in God helps me find meaning in life’s pleasures as well as solace in this chapter’s pain.

But I think about so many other caregivers who have put their own lives on hold while they give themselves to the indignant duties of caregiving. And I wonder how they would react to the soldier poet’s dilemma and the Italian actor’s conclusion.

What is their life? And are they truly able to live it?