Eating Authors: Bre Lockhart

If you’ve been following along, you know that last Monday I had a trifusion catheter installed in my chest. The next day was the first of three scheduled opportunities to harvest the desired eight million stem cells, with the plan being to arrive by 7:30am for bloodwork, then hooked up to the harvesting machine for fix or more hours, and then waiting around until 5:00pm for the an injection to facilitate the next day’s harvesting. Except, I blew it. My cells were working overtime, and the hospital harvested 15.2 million on the first day. So, not only did I get to go home early (no lingering for that injection), but I was done for the rest of the week and could stop various other meds that were all a part of the harvest regimen. Yay.

Today, I’m being admitted to the hospital and given the massive chemo (aka Poison). Tomorrow, last Tuesday’s cells will be reintroduced to my body, to jumpstart replacing all the bits killed off by the today’s treatment. This is not my idea of fun.

However, it’s a bit of a segue to this week’s EATING AUTHORS guest, because Bre Lockhart is the personification of fun. I met her last November amidst the chaos of the 20BooksVegas conference and from the moment she announced on social media something to the effect of “Find me, I’m wearing these red glasses!” I knew she was someone who would have an interesting meal to share.

Bre lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which doesn’t explain her aggressive dislike of cereal, but I’m not brave enough to inquire further. She’s making her fiction debut with her University of the Fae series. It’s your classic tale of sorority hijinks with the requisite bitchy mean girls, except that magic is real and the protagonist just found out she’s fey! The first book, Rush Week, came out last Thursday.

LMS: Welcome, Bre. So, what stands out as your most memorable meal?

BL: When you asked me this question, a specific memory immediately popped into my mind.

And then I read some of the previous answers to your question written by authors with backlists and accolades. I paused. My story was far removed from grand quests and world travels. My story was small town with zero Michelin stars.

My story was about coneys.

Heathens might call them chili dogs. Yep. Chili, cheese, hot dogs, and a bun. To be clear, not just any cheese; it has to be the kind that squeezes from a bottle. Judge me if you must.

We’ll pretend I don’t care about that while I tell this story.

When I was four or five, my grandfather would pick me up from daycare. He was a tobacco distributor for convenience stores — very glamorous — so he always had tons of boxes in his very uncool maroon van. Fortunately, at five, I didn’t yet care about cool. What I did care about was squeeze cheese. And he knew this.

Every few weeks, he would pick up an order from this fantastic place that had pealing particle board on the walls next to posters of Greek landmarks. He would hide the styrofoam container amongst the boxes in the back seat. My five-year-old nose would sniff out the treasure like a bloodhound. The game was to see how long it would take me to notice. Whether it was thirty seconds, or we made it all the way home, my grandfather was always equal parts excited. His eyes would light up the moment I asked, “Papa, did you get coneys?” in my tiny, innocent but thrilled voice.

Then we would laugh and eat hot dogs on something similar to bread topped with cheese that has no nutritional value and very few easily identifiable ingredients. It was heaven.

After I started driving and well into my twenties, I would pick up our usual and sneak it into the house, waiting for my grandfather to scent the greasy goodness. The dynamic had changed, but his eyes held that same mirth after all those years.

My grandfather might be gone, but that tiny location still serves a mean coney and a solid dose of nostalgia.

To summarize, my most memorable meal was a one-dollar hot dog eaten in the front seat of a cigarette box-filled 1985 minivan.

#SFWApro