Despite their three year age difference, my kids are generally invited together to birthday parties. This makes me happy for a number of reasons, for not only are Brainiac and I keen to avoid the playmate age stratification thing that is so common these days, but I'm also not generally a drop-off mom, preferring instead to stick around while the party is underway and it's easier to stay when both kids are among the partygoers. This isn't due to any helicopter inclinations I might have (but to which I am loathe to admit) but rather because staying at birthday parties, which tend to be fairly short affairs, suits my desire to make my life as uncomplicated as possible. If I leave, then I have to go somewhere and do something to fill the time but if I stay, I can hang around with other staying moms for some chit-chat and a diet soda. This is what I like - going somewhere as busy work is complicating and annoying (and by the time I get back home, I have maybe 20 minutes before having to leave to go back, which is dumb), but chit-chat with other parents can be fortifying even if it's just that, chit-chat, and not a BFF-type situation.
So usually ('round these parts, anyway) at parties where parents are welcome to stay there is a special seating section with parent-specific snacks and drinks. Lovely. And it was in just such parental seating where, at a recent party, I stopped the conversation cold by throwing in the following during a discussion about young celebrities showing off their pantylessness while getting into and out of cars: "I remember from charm school that one is supposed to kind of pivot...."
I got no further. Dropped jaws and looks of utter disbelief will do that to a person, and when the conversation started up again we had completely moved away from celebrity pantylessness and landed directly in charm school. "Did you really go to charm school?" asked one woman, "I didn't think they existed anymore."
I pointed out that this was maybe 25 year ago so it's possible that they don't, in fact, exist. But they did and at mine I learned all about how to get into and out of a car so that one's personal attributes remain so, and also about wedding stationery (white border) and funeral stationery (black border), French vs. British vs. Russian table service, doing one's own manicure should that be necessary for some reason (remember: this is at least a decade before every strip mall boasted a nail joint) and so on. Oh, and that cold water is a natural astringent.
Although I've never asked her, I suspect my mother chose to send me because I was a sort a galumphing kind of kid, awkward and mouthy, not at all the delicate and sweet child she might have anticipated. Charm school didn't really make me galumph less, but I did become aware of when a more, say, nuanced approach to life might be appropriate. I remember a great deal of what I guess you'd call the curriculum so the effort doesn't seem to have been wasted and as I've never advertised the presence or non- of my underpants while getting into or out of a vehicle I'd say we can safely say it was also at least partially successful.
We missed the opening day of my favorite farm market last week, something to which I haven't totally come to terms. I'm planning to make up for it tomorrow, though, and the family has been put on alert that as soon as the last morsel of breakfast passes their lips we are heading out. Because I am being vehement in a way that I usually reserve for, say, contract negotiations or vacation planning, no one is quite sure what to make of my enthusiasm.
The truth of the matter is that I've become enamored with the idea of a 100 Mile Diet. I love the farm market for its retro charm - something that fits in quite well with my general inclination toward old furniture, big band music and dusty used book stores. But I like shopping farm markets because I find that my values are increasingly aligned with its presence in my community, what with my growing interest in relocalization (not just because of oil-related stuff - although that's certainly SUPER IMPORTANT enough to warrant capital letters - but also because I think that close communities are healthier than what we've currently got going). And if one is to not eat anything that one's great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food then a farm market really comes in handy. And "mine" is great - produce, dairy, meat, honey, breads...it's all fab and I am deeply in love enough to go even when the forecast calls for rain, as it does for tomorrow.
I'm careful to temper my enthusiasm, though. I think there's a real danger that beleaguered moms could (fairly) regard farm markets as just another stop they're being asked to make "for the children" in addition to all the other places we (as a society) believe they should be going, and one more stop for which the time needed to accomplish it will further eat (ha!) into the available time for actually preparing the fresh, organic stuff purchased.
Moreover, I'm concerned about the trend toward markets-as-entertainment. My market has musicians serenading, a children's activity tent, pony rides and more. Now, don't get me wrong, this is all fun stuff. The danger is that using these methods to attract families back to farm markets (and I do hope it's families who are being attracted and not just moms) could serve to reinforce the idea that many people have acquired that food should be entertainment delivered upon them and not something in which they should take an active interest for their own health and that of their communities. (For similar reasons, I cringe at in-store child play centers being installed in my local supermarkets. Sure, I love a few quite moments as much as the next woman and, if they come in the canned soup section, so what? But I fear that taking such quiet moments will only remove my kids further from the source of their food, not to mention eliminating them from a very important economic and financial function. We've all heard our older relatives talking about the price of bread back in 1948, for example. If our kids are sequestered in play areas - sponsored by processed food manufacturers, natch - will they have such an economic memory? Or will they more likely grow up lacking the ability to compare the then vs. now of the economy they'll inherit?)
So I'm taking my kids (and husband) tomorrow, in the rain. And we'll together choose bread, eggs, chicken, bison, cream (raw?! yum) and lots of radishes and greens to get us through the coming week. The children will enjoy a slice of cinnamon bread and Brainiac will buy a cup of coffee. We'll all carry a (brought from home) bag and work together to put our purchases away. It'll be a pleasant way to spend an hour or so as a family but, more important, it's an investment in the way I hope our lives will unfold and I cannot wait.
The truth of the matter is that I've become enamored with the idea of a 100 Mile Diet. I love the farm market for its retro charm - something that fits in quite well with my general inclination toward old furniture, big band music and dusty used book stores. But I like shopping farm markets because I find that my values are increasingly aligned with its presence in my community, what with my growing interest in relocalization (not just because of oil-related stuff - although that's certainly SUPER IMPORTANT enough to warrant capital letters - but also because I think that close communities are healthier than what we've currently got going). And if one is to not eat anything that one's great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food then a farm market really comes in handy. And "mine" is great - produce, dairy, meat, honey, breads...it's all fab and I am deeply in love enough to go even when the forecast calls for rain, as it does for tomorrow.
I'm careful to temper my enthusiasm, though. I think there's a real danger that beleaguered moms could (fairly) regard farm markets as just another stop they're being asked to make "for the children" in addition to all the other places we (as a society) believe they should be going, and one more stop for which the time needed to accomplish it will further eat (ha!) into the available time for actually preparing the fresh, organic stuff purchased.
Moreover, I'm concerned about the trend toward markets-as-entertainment. My market has musicians serenading, a children's activity tent, pony rides and more. Now, don't get me wrong, this is all fun stuff. The danger is that using these methods to attract families back to farm markets (and I do hope it's families who are being attracted and not just moms) could serve to reinforce the idea that many people have acquired that food should be entertainment delivered upon them and not something in which they should take an active interest for their own health and that of their communities. (For similar reasons, I cringe at in-store child play centers being installed in my local supermarkets. Sure, I love a few quite moments as much as the next woman and, if they come in the canned soup section, so what? But I fear that taking such quiet moments will only remove my kids further from the source of their food, not to mention eliminating them from a very important economic and financial function. We've all heard our older relatives talking about the price of bread back in 1948, for example. If our kids are sequestered in play areas - sponsored by processed food manufacturers, natch - will they have such an economic memory? Or will they more likely grow up lacking the ability to compare the then vs. now of the economy they'll inherit?)
So I'm taking my kids (and husband) tomorrow, in the rain. And we'll together choose bread, eggs, chicken, bison, cream (raw?! yum) and lots of radishes and greens to get us through the coming week. The children will enjoy a slice of cinnamon bread and Brainiac will buy a cup of coffee. We'll all carry a (brought from home) bag and work together to put our purchases away. It'll be a pleasant way to spend an hour or so as a family but, more important, it's an investment in the way I hope our lives will unfold and I cannot wait.
Earth Day seems to have influenced the Boy Wonder: "Mom, when I'm a grown-up, I'm going to make a law that says that people need to make sure they recycle and stop buying so much stuff. Oh, and quit buying big big cars to drive when they don't really need to. And so they stop littering. And share more, 'cause the earth is the only place we have to live and we shouldn't ruin it for everyone."
The downside of his enthusiasm is that I'm having a hard time getting on board with his youthful optimism that me remembering to bring my cotton bags to the farmer's market (met with an arm pumping "YES! Go mom!!") is going to do all that much to further his goals. The upside is that I now have a much easier time convincing him that running out to the compost pile twice a day is something both important and useful and he's actively whittling down his "wish list" of hoped-for possessions ("Mom, I don't really need magnet toys since I already build with my Legos and they seem more useful for having fun.") He's more eager than ever to help in the garden mulching and weeding and generally helping our little sprouts along. Our conversations on the matter of environmental issues have been a useful lesson to me in taking joy from small events in the face of larger and vastly more grave concerns.
One of my abiding interests, conservation-wise, also fits nicely in with my general obsessions regarding food and food preparation. To wit, we're building a solar cooker. I've long found the idea tempting, for we don't air condition much (by U.S. standards, anyway) and I am always motivated to reduce generation of additional heat during the long and humid Philadelphia summer. Now seems like a good time to act on the interest.
On the one hand, I think that using a solar cooker could be a useful tool for busy family cooks much in the same way that slow cookers are in the sense that even less time could be spent fussing and monitoring food as it cooks. On the other hand, there is a greater need to let go of control, to eat the food when it is ready and not demand a certain time for dinner, that could prove problematic for families that rely on split second timing to accommodate everyone's work, sports schedules and general busyness. Because Brainiac and I have promised each other that we'd actively avoid this approach to life - so far quite successfully, I think - I have high hopes that adding solar cooking to my food preparation repertoire will be highly successful experiment.
Not to mention all the new recipes to try (did you see? Beer bread!). There's not to much making a virtue of a necessity when I think I'll enjoy the process so much, eh?
The downside of his enthusiasm is that I'm having a hard time getting on board with his youthful optimism that me remembering to bring my cotton bags to the farmer's market (met with an arm pumping "YES! Go mom!!") is going to do all that much to further his goals. The upside is that I now have a much easier time convincing him that running out to the compost pile twice a day is something both important and useful and he's actively whittling down his "wish list" of hoped-for possessions ("Mom, I don't really need magnet toys since I already build with my Legos and they seem more useful for having fun.") He's more eager than ever to help in the garden mulching and weeding and generally helping our little sprouts along. Our conversations on the matter of environmental issues have been a useful lesson to me in taking joy from small events in the face of larger and vastly more grave concerns.
One of my abiding interests, conservation-wise, also fits nicely in with my general obsessions regarding food and food preparation. To wit, we're building a solar cooker. I've long found the idea tempting, for we don't air condition much (by U.S. standards, anyway) and I am always motivated to reduce generation of additional heat during the long and humid Philadelphia summer. Now seems like a good time to act on the interest.
On the one hand, I think that using a solar cooker could be a useful tool for busy family cooks much in the same way that slow cookers are in the sense that even less time could be spent fussing and monitoring food as it cooks. On the other hand, there is a greater need to let go of control, to eat the food when it is ready and not demand a certain time for dinner, that could prove problematic for families that rely on split second timing to accommodate everyone's work, sports schedules and general busyness. Because Brainiac and I have promised each other that we'd actively avoid this approach to life - so far quite successfully, I think - I have high hopes that adding solar cooking to my food preparation repertoire will be highly successful experiment.
Not to mention all the new recipes to try (did you see? Beer bread!). There's not to much making a virtue of a necessity when I think I'll enjoy the process so much, eh?
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