Mendolonium

Everybody knows the phenomenon of walking into the kitchen, opening the refrigerator, looking through your pantry, opening the refrigerator – again, and wondering, “What the hell am I going to make for dinner?”  Those are the kind of nights that drive us to ordering pizza or making a run to In-N-Out.  Now there’s nothing wrong with ordering pizza from time-to-time and sometimes a girl just needs a grilled cheese, fries, and a milkshake.  But, personally, I want to really crave something like pizza or fast food in order to eat it, not just succumb to random pantry syndrome.

Last week I read this article interviewing chef Tamar Adler in which she discussed the essentials of her pantry and how she uses up what’s in her fridge.   When asked what her top five pantry essentials are Chef Adler replied:  olive oil, salt, red wine vinegar, eggs and a loaf of good bread.  And she added in garlic as a sixth key ingredient.  I had to agree with the olive oil, salt, eggs, and garlic.  I would probably substitute a lemon for the red wine vinegar (that way you get the acid of the juice and the flavor of the lemon and the zest).  But I have to rather stridently disagree with the choice of bread.  Bread?  I just don’t think of bread as an ingredient.  Instead of bread I would have chosen flour.  I think that her choice of bread was telling.  American food culture glamorizes well-known chefs and the intricate food that they create at the same time that record numbers of Americans rely on food stamps.   I realize that simple, delicious breads are not exciting to most chefs nor to most home cooks – there’s a reason that isn’t a “Baguette Wars” on television.  Yet bread is a staple of the American diet.  If we want all Americans to be able to cook and eat simple, delicious, and affordable meals; we all need to know how to make a loaf of bread (and bread’s fast and easy cousin, quick breads).

I did enjoy Chef Adler’s descriptions of how she uses up what’s in her fridge in ubiquitous frittatas.  At our house we have some sort of frittata/quiche/strata about once a week.  I just wish Chef Adler had chosen some flour for her pantry.  Because while a simple loaf of bread is great, the ingredients and skills to make baguettes, boules, focaccia, muffins  are so much better.

What are your pantry essentials?

A couple of weeks ago as Jeff and I sat snacking and discussing our “favorite” topic of conversation – schools – we heard the Pasadena police helicopter begin to buzz overhead.  I know that the helicopter serves a purpose, but I have to admit that I loathe it – I find it impossible to relax or feel safe when it drones overhead like an overgrown mosquito – the sound of the blades signaling that there is yet another criminal to pursue.  There has been a dramatic increase in crime in and around our neighborhood over the past year and it is now common to hear the helicopter circling over our house three or four times a day – annoying enough during the “short” stints of a few minutes of searching and deeply troubling when it flies above for hours – seeking but never finding its prey.  That evening a couple of weeks ago was such a night and after two hours of listening to the helicopter, checking to make sure the house was tightly locked and the alarm system armed, Jeff and I were both noticeably anxious and jumpy wondering what had transpired.

The next morning we found out the grisly details:  a young man had been shot and killed about one third of a mile from our house.  This murder followed three other shootings within half a mile of our house since January of this year.  Then there was also the armed robbery two blocks from the park on the same day of the murder and the armed robbery the week before at the park.  The week after the murder there was a stabbing on the train.  And let us not forget the burglary of our own house in January and the burglaries of dozens of other houses in the neighborhood over the past year.  The phone number to the police department is now programed into my cell phone on speed dial and I have called at least a half a dozen times this year about suspicious cars, drug deals, and kids at the park drinking and bragging about the houses they have broken into.

I distinctly recall one hot July day when Thomas was about eight months old.  Thomas was  particularly fussy and refusing to sleep and so we took him out on a late night walk.  We walked and walked in the refreshingly cool air.  Thomas didn’t fall asleep but the night refreshed us all and Jeff and I chatted happily while Thomas calmly looked around in the stroller.  We didn’t get home until after midnight.  I can’t even count the number of times we’ve taken the train to the farmers market or out to dinner and walked back home well after dark.

We won’t be doing either of those things any more.  We just don’t feel that our neighborhood is safe anymore.

We’ve been thinking about moving, applying for and interviewing for jobs out of state for a couple of years now.  And although we have both had job offers, in the end we decided that we wouldn’t be happier in those particular locations.  Now our equation for happiness has another consideration.  I don’t think that I can be fully happy living somewhere that I don’t feel safe going out after dark.  I don’t think that I can be happy hearing the helicopter overhead two, three, or four times a day.  I don’t think I can be happy when my son asks me when we leave the house, “Mama did you set the alarm, I don’t want any bad guys to get in while we’re gone.”

We don’t know exactly what to do, but we know that we can’t stay here indefinitely anymore.  In the words of one of my neighborhood friends, we need an exit strategy.  So with heavy hearts we have formulated Plan A and Plan B.  Plan A is looking at a few areas to target an intensive job search (right now Portland, Omaha, and Northern VA are under consideration with some Wisconsin and New England possibilities).  However, there is absolutely no guarantee (especially in this shitty economy) of actually finding good job(s) in those areas.  So Plan B is to consider selling our house sometime in the next year and then move to a nearby city with low crime and better schools (assuming we actually find a city with what we believe are better schools – we will be taking tours this fall).  It isn’t clear whether we would buy or rent a house under Plan B.  Both of us are still quite firm in our belief that the housing market has a great deal further to fall, yet renting might send me over the edge of sanity.  Both buying or renting a house in a safer, better school district would cost us considerably more than what we are paying now.  We could afford it – if I worked more and the kids spent more time at daycare – not something any of us want; hence the reason Plan A is our first choice.

In the end, we may be forced by circumstances to choose none of the above and simply stay here.  If it wasn’t for the crime and school issues staying here wouldn’t be keeping me up at night.  I like our house and despite the prevailing American cultural notion of “bigger is better” I am mostly content with the idea of raising three children in a two bedroom house.  In the words of one of our other neighbors who grew up in a rather ghetto area of Los Angeles – this level of crime (and worse) is a way of life in most of the world.  Maybe this is the new normal and we just have to deal with it.

As the parent of two boys I often get asked what my stance is on toy guns.  (I imagine as the parent of a girl I will be asked what my stance is on princess costumes.)  My position is clear:  no toy guns allowed.  Period.  This stance probably won’t surprise anyone who knows me.  Except for my love of high heels and lipstick, it is easy to see me as a poster child for a liberal hippie:  I live in California, I drive a Prius, I compost, I am a vegetarian, and I am planning a home birth – of course I would be opposed to toy guns in the house.  Heck, I probably have a “Down with the NRA!” bumper sticker on my Prius…right?

Not exactly.

In college I worked part-time for a history professor.  She was leading a fascinating project to try to elucidate the reasons why some democracies succeed for a long period of time and others fail, often rapidly.  My job as a lowly undergraduate was to sift though reams of data on every country in the world from 1900 on, recording what type of governments they had, for how long, and what type of constitutions each country had.  An interesting pattern emerged:  those countries with relatively simple constitutions had far more stable governments than those with complex, highly detailed constitutions where every possible law was spelled out.  The United States, of course, has a concise constitution that leaves much of the specifics of government to the legislature to decide.  The United States Constituation is rather difficult to change; and the United States has had, despite whatever else ails it, a very stable government.  That research project made a deep impression on me – on the importance of good, long-lasting government policy.  Policies that spell out the very framework of government and the rights of citizens should require a great deal of thought to change.  It is for this reason that despite the danger of guns, I am quite firmly against laws to restrict gun ownership in the United States.  It is not because I believe “Guns don’t kill people…” but because I believe in the importance of honoring the Constitution.  The second amendment is, to me, quite clear:  A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.  Thanks in part to the scond ammendment, guns – real guns – are part of our socitety and I don’t see that changing any time soon.

Our family doesn’t hunt, we don’t own a gun.  The only context that my children have for how guns are used and their power to kill is either through friends or through something they might see in the media (Damn the commercials for adult movies during major league baseball games!).  I have seen that when children play with a toy gun that looks like a real gun the play of the children becomes restricted, almost scripted.  There is shooting followed immediately by dying followed by a repeat of the same, mindless scene.  There is generally very little talking except for proclamations of “You’re dead!”, no room for other imaginary characters, no room for the gun to be anything but what it is.  There is simply a “bad buy”, a “good guy”, and a gun.  Contrast that with when children pick up a stick and play with it as a “weapon” or when they build some sort of fighting device out of Legos.  All of a sudden all manner of good, evil, and in between comes into play.  They may fight dragons or zombies, aliens or burglars.   The stick might be a gun, a sword, a “net that shoots out at bad guys to capture them”, or perhaps all three depending on when you ask.  I don’t allow my children toy guns because I don’t want their play to be restricted by an object.  Nor do I want the reality that guns are very, very dangerous taken lightly.

Guns aren’t toys, but I do understand that they are fascinating. Perhaps someday one of the kids will take a real interest in guns; want to learn how to shoot.  And if that happens I think I will, with very strict boundaries and precautions in place, let them.  I suppose that makes me lose my liberal hippie status – I wonder if I am the only parent in America who would ban toy guns but let her (older) children use a real one?

I know that you all must have some interesting and varied opinions on guns – both toy and real.  What do you think?

When you are the parent of a preschooler your weekend social scene revolves around birthday parties.  Perhaps I am hopelessly lame, but I am starting to rather enjoy many of the parties:  someone else provides entertainment for my children for a couple of hours, I get to eat food I did not have to make nor clean up after, and there’s always cake.  We attended one of the more enjoyable parties this past Sunday morning.  It was held outside in a shady, quiet park.  The kids ran around with their friends and I actually found the time to chat with other parents.  The hosts provided brunch, cake, crafts, and a pinata that they had thoughtfully filled with organic treats and goodies such as art supplies and accessories.  After the post-pinata melee Thomas presented me with his bag of loot and as I perused it I sighed; not because it was filled with unhealthy hyperactive-inducing treats (it wasn’t) but because every single non-food item was clearly branded with either a “Spiderman” logo or a “Disney Princess”.  There were rubber Spiderman bracelets and erasers, a heart shaped locket filled with lipstick and emblazoned with Rapunzel, and packages of crayons either boxed and wrapped in red and blue with Spiderman or boxed and wrapped in pink and purple with princesses.  I wondered whether Thomas had noticed the overt gender stereotyping of the goodies – perhaps not.  He had, after all, picked up an equal number of “boy” and “girl” items.   He stuffed his haul into my bag and ignored it until we got home.

Once at home he quickly remembered and began to sort through his treasure.  “Oooo fruit snacks!”  “Oh a necklace…can you put it on me…wait (as he turned it over and saw the smiling face of a princess)…never mind.   Here Mama, you can have it.  It’s for you”  “What are these…crayons?  Oh I thought they were something to eat.  Well, I’ll take these [the Spiderman crayons] and I’ll give these two packs to Theo [the princess crayons].”  I couldn’t help but ask Thomas, “Why don’t you want those [the princess] crayons?”  His answer was direct, “Because, you know, princesses are for girls and Theo doesn’t care yet.”

Thomas has never seen a “princess movie” nor has he seen “Spiderman”.  But he goes to school three days a week, he plays with neighborhood kids, and he is quite observant.  I wasn’t suprised that he had absorbed the pervasive “princesses are for girls” and “superheros are for boys” messages of our cultuure.  And as much as I want to, at times, keep my kids in a bubble free from cultural influences; to do so is neither practical nor truly desireable.  It would be an awfully lonely bubble for all of us and eventually they would inevitably break free regardless.  Instead I am attempting to choose a middle path.  I rather viigallantly control what the boys see in our own home:  no cable TV, very limited viewing (an average of 30 minutes per day) of a pre-approved PBS show or a DVD, no toys that are weapons (they do make some out of Legos, etc. which I have made my peace with), no princess/diva/superhero/action figure toys, books, or movies, no clothes that have gender steroytyped sayings on them (“Daddy’s Little All Star”, “Shopper in Training”), and the boys go to a very gender cooperative/neutral school (they’ve even got two male preschool teachers there which is all kinds of awesome).  And when they are exposed to something like gender packaged crayons I start asking questions.  And so I inquired to Thomas, “Why do they have different packages of crayons for girls and boys?  Are girl and boy crayons different?  Do you know both girls and boys who like art?”  As much as I was annoyed by the stupid crayons by that point, it was gratifying to see Thomas work through the answers to my questions, “I don’t know.  Why are they different?  That doesn’t make any sense.  Art is for boys and for girls.  I don’t think all girls like princesses.”

While we’ve talked about anatomy and gender with both boys time and time again (it turns out that when you are a little boy the concept that not everyone has a penis is quite mind-blowing) we’ve had mercifully little interaction with gender stereotypes.  It seems that we’re just on the cusp of a big change in awareness of gender and culture in general.  I think its going to be a difficult road to walk – at some point at least one, if not all, of my kids are going to test me.  Thomas is going to denounce the pink shirt in his closet, Theo will tell me that there is something that girls “can’t” do, and/or baby girl will tell me that she wants to look “hot”.  In the end the crayons were quickly forgotten for other pursuits.  I hope that some of the questions will be remembered though.  I can’t stop our consumer-driven culture from penetrating our lives but I will keep asking questions, teaching our children to challenge what they see and hear.   Because, damn it, crayons should not have a gender attached to them.  Let’s just let a crayon be a crayon.