Feeling Souper

Today, I made soup. That is a simple sentence, but I swear it’s a really big deal. I love soup, which is strange because I had no idea I did until I got to Rome and found a gaping hole in the grocery store in the area usually overflowing with “Campbells Soup.” Oh wait, there wasn’t a gaping hole. There wasn’t anything. No soup. No possibilities.

As per usual, I’ve come down with a plethora of colds and sniffles and other gross things I’m going to avoid blogging about. Though Mass General Hospital will undoubtedly disagree with me, my white blood cells are out to get me. After spending all of Freshman year under the weather and the beginning of Sophomore year in the same boat, I crossed my fingers that the same wouldn’t happen in Rome. Apparently that’s not one of the many hand gestures accepted in Italian culture, because I got sick. After my weekend in Florence, I dragged myself to Zen Garden and ordered a steaming bowl of Wang Dang soup(?) It was a little something like Won Ton soup, but mostly nothing like it at all. Next time I’ll ask for a little MSG on the side.

I was just getting over the last sniffles and had rid my jacket pockets of crumpled tissues when there it was…that awful, terrible, very bad feeling in the back of my throat…a little “fuck you” from my immune system. I trekked through Venice, refusing to admit that I was sick. I woke up every day with sharp pains in my throat restocked my jacket with our hostel’s toilet paper. I didn’t take medicine because there was no way I wasn’t drinking wine at Carnevale. I finally made it back to my apartment and no sooner did I set my backpack down than I announced, “I’m sick.”

So here I am, sniffly and such, lacking Campbells Chicken Noodle Soup, a Trader Joes Challah Roll, and the wonderful company of my best friend Alex. Those were the glory days that got me through my first year and a half of college.

Well, that wasn’t gonna stop me. I decided to make lemonade out of lemons, or rather, soup out of a hodgepodge of things in my cupboard and freezer. I’ve never made soup before. I’ve always been intimidated by it. Like, what even is soup? Today, I found out. I threw a bunch of things that looked like they belonged in chicken noodle soup into a boiling pot of vegetable broth, added the few spices provided in my “equipped” kitchen, and waited. The result was incredible. Guys, this is big. I made soup! And it tasted like soup too! It was delicious and I ate it all up, burning my tongue in true overzealous Sienna fashion. With the back left-hand side of my tongue singed and my nose still running like a faucet (ew), I may not be feeling 100%, but at least I can make soup!