Turning Heartbreak into Hope, One Bowl of Pasta at a Time

Written in April 2022

Dr. Linda Barrasse had never spent much time in the kitchen during her youth. Simply watching her mother carefully construct meatballs to accompany pasta with a Sunday sauce each week was enough for her. But, of course, she always loved how the smells of oregano and garlic powder carefully danced around the kitchen and into her nose; to her, it felt like a hug, it felt like home, it felt like the most tangible existence of a mother's unconditional love for her children. 

Linda soon began living on her own as she completed her residency for med school. Once again, the oregano and garlic danced gracefully like Tchaikovsky’s sugar plum fairies, but this time, the ballet was choreographed by Linda herself. Being in the kitchen allowed her a sense of freedom, and she viewed it as an escape from her everyday persona of being a female med student. She learned some of life’s most valuable lessons through burnt garlic and soups that wouldn’t thicken, and she wouldn’t have done it any other way.  

Years later, two little soldier dolls joined the stage in her production of The Nutcracker, and that unconditional mother’s love became a hand-me-down. Smiling proudly, Linda recalls cooking for her two “greatest life accomplishments.”

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"It was like working for a catering company. I was booked for a 500-person wedding seven days a week for twenty years, give or take."

She watched her soldier dolls, Cody and Joseph, go off to high school, fall in love, play on the varsity football team, and drink their first legal beers–all of which were fueled, in some way or another, by her beautifully crafted meals into which she poured an extra helping of love just for good measure. Soon enough, the boys marched their way to college at Penn State University. Even from miles and miles away, the boys always had their mother’s love in their college refrigerators and freezers, and a hug was only a 30-second microwave interval away. 

On April 7, 2013, one of her soldier dolls, Cody, took his final bow on stage. Just months shy of his Penn State graduation, Cody was visiting friends in Pittsburgh and sustained an irreversible head injury after being struck by a car as a pedestrian. At 4:46 am, Cody quietly left this earth.

"That’s the phone call that every single mother fears."

April 7, 2013, brought the most unbearable heartbreak; it brought heartbreak that even a bowl of Cody’s infamous breakfast–a bowl of leftover cold pasta–could mend. Until, somehow, it became the only thing that could. 

"On his 22nd birthday, several weeks before he died, we had a brief, yet very intense conversation about some of his strong feelings. He made it very clear that if anything ever happened to him that prevented him from living life as he currently was, he wanted to be fully let go, and instructed me to give everything he had away. The conversation was not morbid. It was very matter-of-fact. I had no idea where this conversation came from, and I tried to explain to Cody that he would be making those decisions for me, not me for him. He made me promise."

"And I did."

After Cody was called home with open arms, his built-in partner-in-crime, Joseph, refused to let Cody’s “magnanimous” spirit follow him to his eternal resting place. Surrounded by his friends, along with all of Cody’s, Joseph spent hours each and every day creating a memorial foundation surrounding organ donation awareness in Northeastern Pennsylvania. Just four months later, Linda and Joseph orchestrated a 3-on-3 basketball tournament held at the boys’ alma mater, Scranton Preparatory School, as well as an intimate, beautifully planned night event called Continue Cody’s Commitment, a Night to Promote Organ Donor Awareness. Speaking on Linda’s strength and poise throughout this ongoing project, Linda’s brother Joseph D’Andrea said he “just doesn’t know how she does it. She was always the perfect sibling, y’know? She has this passion for turning obstacles into opportunities. She always has.”

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"That night, I went home weary after a very long, yet magnificent day. It was somewhere after midnight, I remember, and I had myself a bowl of cold pasta in memory of my precious Cody."

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Linda’s quaint Moosic, Pennsylvania home has been the Cody Barrasse Foundation’s headquarters for every seventh day of the month since April 2013. Back then, Cody and Joseph’s friends came with a certain quietness to them. Gathering around her kitchen’s island with piles of Linda’s perfectly seasoned masterpieces staring back at them, friends and family listen to Linda say grace before they all tasted her love through spoonfuls of cavatelli bolognese and laughed together over memories of Cody.

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"Bless us, oh Lord, and these Thy gifts, which we are about to receive from Thy bounty, through Christ our Lord. Amen,

And bless all of our children, wherever they may be."

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In just two weeks, it will mark the ninth anniversary of Cody’s death. It will mark nine years since Cody performed his final act of magnanimity of organ donation, and it will mark nine more years of life for eight individuals who would have otherwise not had the chance to live on. 

Although there can never be a solution to the heartbreak of losing a child, Linda knew that 100 dinners honoring her precious son was quite a feat. Cody’s friends aged eight years, too; friends turned into misters and missus and some even assumed the titles of Mama and Dada. 

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"I betcha Cody’s up there crackin’ up seeing Quinny as a dad."

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Linda continues to spend hours curating new meals for the dinner each sixth and seventh of the month, but she wanted to celebrate the unwavering love that the Foundation had created over the course of 100 dinners. 

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"Truthfully, I always wanted to write a book. I was kind of a weirdo as a kid, and I always had magical thoughts, like, I swore the pansies in the woods could talk to me.  So, I was going to write about The Land of the Talking Pansies. Then, I really thought I could fly. So, my next thought was to write To Fly.  Unfortunately, someone stole that thought from me. So, instead, I thought, ‘why not turn the story of Cody into something magical, too?’"

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Linda worked tirelessly to construct a “non-cookbook,” as she calls it. She admits that, yes, 7 on the 7th appears to simply be a cookbook from the outset, but that it is a cookbook filled with each and every recipe that sat on that kitchen island over the past one hundred months. One hundred months of hugs, one hundred months of laughs, and one hundred months of a celebration of the gift of life.

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"What it really is is a love story. It’s the story of Cody’s life and how it continues to live on through stories that started, and usually end, with food."

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So much so that in this case, food was the essential catalyst for the development of a magnificent love story that resulted in the Cody Barrasse Memorial Foundation. Her non-cookbook is an even more tangible depiction of a mother’s love, separated into seven chapters of memories, anecdotes, and life lessons that were fueled by the recipes they accompany.

This group has decided to make something beautiful out of something tragic. Hopefully, their lives are filled with more meaning.  Hopefully, the sting of their loss hurts a bit less. Hopefully, their bellies and souls have been filled with comforting food and love.

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When asked about this year’s tournament, Linda smiled.

"I’ll be home this weekend. Come over and we’ll chat. I think I have some leftover pasta, too."