Mum
I promised last week that this missive would be about how you can never go home again. While I still think that statement holds some truth, it’s not what I want to talk about. For once, I think this is going to go in a very positive direction.
From Wednesday to Saturday this week I left my new life to return to my old one. I neither attended Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival as a regular patron nor did I hop back on board the vending train. Instead I found myself in a truly unique position: Domestic Goddess.
To clarify, in the past, a vendor friend of mine (http://www.dazzlestudios.com/ , check her out, she has BEAUTIFUL things) has brought someone in for her big shows every year to cook, clean, and bartend. She has affectionately dubbed this position “Domestic Goddess,” and this weekend that was me. Further clarification: I was not a great bartender nor I was I particularly on the ball with cleaning…the cooking we’re going to get to.
So, there I was, back in vendor land, no longer one of them but amongst them. I was nervous. I shouldn’t have been. The love I felt from these old, dear friends was instant, powerful, and uplifting. To paraphrase one of the many amazing people I got to spend my time with I’m tenured, I’m part of the community, they’d do anything for me. I don’t really have the words to describe the joy hearing that made me feel, and if I try I’m bound to get sappy. So, back to the cooking.
The part of the Domestic Goddess gig that really interested me was the cooking. I love to cook. Apart from a brief time in my teenage years when I pretended I was too cool to know how to cook I have always enjoyed preparing food. Cooking for myself, while a little depressing, is one of the ways I’ve worked to get my relationship with food back on track, and it’s a great skill to have. However, I definitely enjoy cooking en masse more than cooking for one.
That’s what made this gig so great. I was up in the morning making breakfast sandwiches, ready with a nutritious lunch in the afternoon, and preparing a hearty healthy dinner as the evening wore on, all for a minimum of six or seven people. I could focus on food that was good for me (and everyone I was feeding) instead of thinking about all the delicious, nutritionally bankrupt food I could be eating instead. Also, I was able to bring some comfort and support to my friends who were battling the heat while trying to do their jobs. It was a wonderful experience, and one I hope to repeat as soon as I accrue some more time off.
I also had the rare benefit of a domestic goddess with her own demi-god. I had an assistant, a young man who had never really cooked before, and I was able to teach him some cooking basics. Instructing him and having his help (mostly with the dishes…thank god!) gave me a kind of warm fuzzies that I wasn’t expecting. I’ve always shied away from teaching as that was my mother’s profession (and she was and is an AMAZING one). I knew I could never live up to her skills and abilities to connect, so instead of trying to find my own way, I avoided the comparison. That said, I think I *taught* this kid how to cook (not everything, but a lot of things). And it felt…good.
I can’t imagine growing up and not knowing cooking basics. My mum still tells stories of how she would put me in a baby backpack while she cooked dinner so I would know what she was doing. My dah, too, would engage me in his cooking experiments. They didn’t always come out quite the way he wanted, but he would try again, adding a pinch of this and swapping out that for another until it tasted the way he wanted. I think I get some of my crazier flavor combinations from him. Knowing how to create meals from basic ingredients was intrinsic to my upbringing, and, having spent some time with someone who didn’t have that experience has showed me how grateful I am for the parents I have and the skills they gave me.
My mum was a family and consumer science teacher (Home Ec if you’re old-school) amongst many
other things. She taught 6-12 graders how to cook, sew, and generally care for themselves for almost 20 years before retiring. I was one of those kids, but I also got the double dose of cooking with her at home. I know that my classmates and I are better off for having had her in our lives, teaching us nutrition and food chemistry and basic kitchen skills. The kids from my valley all have the ability to prepare food for themselves in large part because of her. Seeing this young man who had no idea what seasonings to put into hamburger meat, let alone how to know when they were finished cooking, showed me how lucky I was to have my mum and how lucky Rochester, VT was to have her as well.
Everyone should know how to cook the basics. Everyone should be able to sew a button on their shirt, do the dishes, and press a nice dress or a pair of slacks. Everyone should know how to budget when they go grocery shopping, balance a checkbook (or bank account as checks are virtually a thing of the past), and plan for the future. But we don’t. These skills have been marginalized in favor of…well, I’m not entirely sure what, but I don’t see a lot of people my age who had the opportunity to learn these things in school. We’re not getting them at home and we’re not being educated in them. Slowly but surely, we’re becoming more dependent upon prepared foods and cheap, disposable clothing. We’re going broke because no one ever showed us the correct calculations for financial stability. I’m not saying we should feel like failures because we don’t know, I’m just saying perhaps we need to look at the things we prioritize. If we can’t take care of ourselves we can’t even begin to change the world.
I’m grateful for the experience I had this weekend. I’m grateful for the amazing festival family that I chose (and that chose me). And I’m profoundly grateful for my mum and the skills she instilled in me so that I could have this experience.
