On Tuesday morning, I left the house to take a jog with Gabriel. We had just started out when a fox darted in front of us, running from one neighbor's yard, across the street, and into the woods behind another neighbor's house. We were flabbergasted. A fox! An enormous, red, black-tipped tailed fox! It ran with such impressive intensity - as if it were zipping through space on an invisible track - because its torso, face and tail were almost motionless, on the same horizontal plane, while its legs moved so fast they were a blur.
The day before, Gabriel and I were at a playground, killing some time before we had to pick up Frances from school. There were some other mothers and children there (it was unseasonably warm) and Gabriel was going down the slide again and again. My post was at the top of the slide, to help him sit down. Just at the moment when every blond head was bowed over a small person, to tie a shoe or offer a snack or to chastise, a deer bounded across the grassy field separating the parking lot from the playground. It came from the direction of the busy street we were but a few yards from, and ran straight into a stand of trees and then stood there, motionless, staring at us. It is strange, given how close this large wild animal was, but we were the only ones to see it. Everyone else was distracted, and Gabriel and I happened to be standing high up at the top of the slide, just the perfect viewing spot, and he looked at me, and I looked at him, and I whispered: a deer. A DEER!! shouted Gabriel. Then: GALLOP, GALLOP! (It had been running pretty fast). Then: BIG. Bi-i-i-i-g. Big Deer.
The two wild animal sitings have become linked for both of us. Sometimes, apropos of nothing, Gabriel will stop what he's doing and look at me in his unblinking serious soul window kind of way. With great intention he utters the words: a fox. Yes, Gabriel, we saw a fox. A deer! Big! Yes, we saw a deer too. A fox!!! And on and on, for a little while, we relive the events and feel little spine shivers all over again.
Even before this week, I've been thinking a lot about the intensity of feeling with which children seem to regard animals. From their earliest days we sing about farm animals, and read them books about talking animals; often first loves are dogs and cats. Perhaps we condition all this - perhaps we all have this intense feeling towards animals but it seems most manageable and appropriate in small children so we foist it onto them - but I think it is something deeper. I have this intuitive sense that children and animals are supposed to live together. Work together. What does that mean? I'm not sure. I have not, by any means, been fantasizing about getting a dog. No thank you. I have, however, been dreaming of chickens and goats in the backyard.
At the risk of getting all fuzzy and "spiritual" on you, I think small children feel a connection with animals that is fundamental and real; something for grown ups to respect and honor. And having a puppy in the house that acts like one extra kid doesn't seem to get to the nature of the thing. A goat that has a role in the family, a job to do (eat scraps, keep the grass short, whatever it is that goats do) - a kid could feel that such a goat was a partner in family life and work. A goat that lives outside, thus preserving its animal-ness. Not an animal that wears a sweater and has a flannel bed, but an animal that communicates the natural world to us, that is a bridge of sorts, that we care for and respect - this is what I'm longing for, for myself and for my kids.
Sometimes we run around the yard with leftover lengths of clothesline wrapped across the kids' chests and yell Gallop!! (hence Gabriel's response to the running deer) and Neigh!! and take turns being the horse and rider. Except after a few minutes, no one really knows who is what; we're just a wild jumble of kid and (pretend) animal, running and making noise. I love that. We're trying to touch something, something beyond the world of other people and the spaces they live in.
We've been to two zoos in the last couple of months (more than I'd been to in years). The children were fascinated. In Providence, we were able to hang out in the 'giraffe house' and watch a giraffe family munch hay but a few feet away. Just us and the giraffes (the zoo was remarkably empty that day). We were wide-eyed, awed, mesmerized - utterly caught by their gaze. In DC, Frances and Gabriel would have clung to a stone wall, staring at a gorilla mama and baby all day long, had we not eventually dislodged them. In this case, I too felt the possibility of forgetting time, watching these extraordinary human-like animals do human-like things...but I was struck violently by the suspicion that I was participating in an act of voyeurism that was completely wrong. That mama gorilla looked right into my eyes and I felt her accusing me. I am a mother too. So how could I stare like this? It seemed to me she deserved privacy and space to roam. I left conflicted about what a zoo is, and what it should be - the awe and wonder my children felt before the animals seem positive things, to be nurtured - but is encountering them in captivity the way to do it?
I've also - no surprise - been feeling drawn back towards vegetarianism. At the very least, I have resolved (again) to not participate in factory-farmed animal consumption. And I guess I feel like part of respecting the bond my children (all children?) feel with wild and domestic animals would be to keep industrial meat out of their orbits as well. They don't really eat meat anyway, but I've never suggested they shouldn't, and it has never bothered me if we're at other people's homes and meat is on offer - basically, I haven't enforced any rules. In fact, I've often thought that graciousness and flexibility with other people should trump preferences about diet. But now I'm not so sure.
All kinds of people surround their children with animals by way of pets, petting farms, zoos, animal-print clothes, animal books, music, etc. For many families, there doesn't seem to be any connection - or rather disconnection - between feeding children animals and simultaneously encouraging an intense (if arm's length) relationship with animals. But shouldn't there be? Maybe for much of our history, pre-industrial agriculture and pre-factory farming, the small scale proximity of humans and animals made for a more continuous and holistic world for children to enter in, to play and work in. I imagine that for most children growing up in Anne Arundel county 100 years ago, life presented many occasions - both mundane and spiritual - to be face to face with a horse, a deer, a fox, a rabbit. Maybe, then, eating some of those animals would not seem so very strange.
Thanks for hanging with all these disparate musings. For now, we're on the lookout for that fox.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
special magic green sauce for everyone!
Some of you, I know, have children who eat actual food. They even enjoy it! The first time I met Henry he was munching on defrosted-in-Mommy's-purse frozen spinach with gusto. Katie and Elie once complimented me on my vegetable-heavy lentil soup, and with such disarming sincerity I could barely remember to say thank you.
Even my own little Gabriel slurped down a bit of curried sweet potato soup this evening. I still can't believe it when he happily eats my cooking. Frances is, and has almost always been, very into purity. White foods make her happiest. Plain, Mama! Will you make some plain for me? Pleeeeeeeze!
So the following recipes may not really be something you're looking for, but since we have found them so helpful, I thought I'd share them with you. I don't think this stuff officially falls into the sneaky-vegetable style cooking that Jerry Seinfeld's wife and others have advocated - or maybe it does - all I know is it makes this mama feel a tiny bit better about the mostly cheese and pasta diet my eldest adheres to. Disclaimer: I am a sloppy fast-and-loose sort of cook, so you may have to play around with the quantities to get it just right.
Special Magic Green Sauce
1/2 - 3/4 c cottage cheese
glug of olive oil
1/3 - 1/2 c frozen spinach
1/3 - 1/2 c grated parmesan (or pecorino, also good)
tiny splash of milk, if you want a runnier sauce
tiny pinch of salt
Blend it all up! I let everything sit for a couple of minutes so the spinach begins to thaw, then use our immersion blender. Pour it over just-cooked pasta. You can also do this without the spinach - it's creamier, and a perfectly good substitute for macaroni and cheese. I found I was able to resist the Annie's after we started making this sauce, in part because Frances actually likes it better, and if I buy an exciting shape of pasta she's especially happy.
**Addendum! Milena made this with fresh (raw) spinach leaves and also added garlic; Nathaniel had two helpings. Success!
Rice-Carrot Pancakes
1 c cooked brown rice
1/2 - 3/4 c grated carrots
about 1/2 a small onion, diced tiny
an egg
2 - 3 tbsp flour (I used chick pea flour)
pinch of salt
oil to fry
This is a new one. A nice way to use up extra rice - just mix everything together, add enough flour to make it stick together, heat up some oil and fry little patties of the stuff. The carrots become golden, the rice browns a little. We ate them latke-style, with applesauce. Yum.
Latest Quesadilla Filling: I mixed leftover roasted (mashed up) squash with canned refried black beans, added a bit of cheddar cheese, and both children gobbled them happily. I was sort of shocked that Frances went for it. I was inspired by the memory of those delicious sweet potato-black bean burritos out of the Moosewood cookbook. Remember??
And speaking of leftover squash...this one is for Marjorie and Diane:
Pumpkin Muffins
(my apologies to some anonymous baker -- I know I got this online but wrote it on a scrap of paper long ago and tweaked a bit since)
2 c whole wheat pastry flour
1/3 - 1/2 c ground flaxseed
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cloves
3/4 c brown sugar*
3 tbsp molasses
1/4 c oil
2 eggs
1 c pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 c buttermilk**
Mix everything up until the sugar in a medium bowl. Whisk the remaining ingredients - except for buttermilk - together in a large bowl. Then alternate pouring in the dry ingredients and the buttermilk to the wet ingredients, whisking as you go. Depending on how watery your squash is, you may need to add more flour or flaxseed or, come to think of it, wheat germ at the end to get a consistency that seems right to you. I also think grated apples would be a lovely addition to these. Bake at 400 for about 20 minutes.
*I've also used 1/2 c honey instead and they were great.
**I often do the sour milk trick when buttermilk is too much of a pain to get: a dribble of vinegar in your measuring cup, then fill the rest of the way with milk. Let is sit for a few minutes.
Even my own little Gabriel slurped down a bit of curried sweet potato soup this evening. I still can't believe it when he happily eats my cooking. Frances is, and has almost always been, very into purity. White foods make her happiest. Plain, Mama! Will you make some plain for me? Pleeeeeeeze!
So the following recipes may not really be something you're looking for, but since we have found them so helpful, I thought I'd share them with you. I don't think this stuff officially falls into the sneaky-vegetable style cooking that Jerry Seinfeld's wife and others have advocated - or maybe it does - all I know is it makes this mama feel a tiny bit better about the mostly cheese and pasta diet my eldest adheres to. Disclaimer: I am a sloppy fast-and-loose sort of cook, so you may have to play around with the quantities to get it just right.
Special Magic Green Sauce
1/2 - 3/4 c cottage cheese
glug of olive oil
1/3 - 1/2 c frozen spinach
1/3 - 1/2 c grated parmesan (or pecorino, also good)
tiny splash of milk, if you want a runnier sauce
tiny pinch of salt
Blend it all up! I let everything sit for a couple of minutes so the spinach begins to thaw, then use our immersion blender. Pour it over just-cooked pasta. You can also do this without the spinach - it's creamier, and a perfectly good substitute for macaroni and cheese. I found I was able to resist the Annie's after we started making this sauce, in part because Frances actually likes it better, and if I buy an exciting shape of pasta she's especially happy.
**Addendum! Milena made this with fresh (raw) spinach leaves and also added garlic; Nathaniel had two helpings. Success!
Rice-Carrot Pancakes
1 c cooked brown rice
1/2 - 3/4 c grated carrots
about 1/2 a small onion, diced tiny
an egg
2 - 3 tbsp flour (I used chick pea flour)
pinch of salt
oil to fry
This is a new one. A nice way to use up extra rice - just mix everything together, add enough flour to make it stick together, heat up some oil and fry little patties of the stuff. The carrots become golden, the rice browns a little. We ate them latke-style, with applesauce. Yum.
Latest Quesadilla Filling: I mixed leftover roasted (mashed up) squash with canned refried black beans, added a bit of cheddar cheese, and both children gobbled them happily. I was sort of shocked that Frances went for it. I was inspired by the memory of those delicious sweet potato-black bean burritos out of the Moosewood cookbook. Remember??
And speaking of leftover squash...this one is for Marjorie and Diane:
Pumpkin Muffins
(my apologies to some anonymous baker -- I know I got this online but wrote it on a scrap of paper long ago and tweaked a bit since)
2 c whole wheat pastry flour
1/3 - 1/2 c ground flaxseed
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cloves
3/4 c brown sugar*
3 tbsp molasses
1/4 c oil
2 eggs
1 c pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 c buttermilk**
Mix everything up until the sugar in a medium bowl. Whisk the remaining ingredients - except for buttermilk - together in a large bowl. Then alternate pouring in the dry ingredients and the buttermilk to the wet ingredients, whisking as you go. Depending on how watery your squash is, you may need to add more flour or flaxseed or, come to think of it, wheat germ at the end to get a consistency that seems right to you. I also think grated apples would be a lovely addition to these. Bake at 400 for about 20 minutes.
*I've also used 1/2 c honey instead and they were great.
**I often do the sour milk trick when buttermilk is too much of a pain to get: a dribble of vinegar in your measuring cup, then fill the rest of the way with milk. Let is sit for a few minutes.
Friday, November 6, 2009
to readers, with love
Tonight I want to thank all of you for actually reading this and sticking with it, even though it isn't quite the mama-friend resource center/support group I originally had planned. It's nothing that useful; just another stay-at-home mama blog all about yours truly and the little ones. I've joined the legions of ladies chatting about life on the homefront and I must admit, it's pretty fun.
This little project has had unanticipated consequences, for which I am deeply grateful. (Here is where you come in.) After 18 months of stay-at-home living, most of it done in a new town where I am relatively unknown outside my roles as wife and mother, I'm afraid my confidence was beginning to crumble. I suspect this is fairly typical for others in my position, but its universality doesn't lessen the sting: it was hard to remember if I was good at things besides getting plastic barrettes to stay in place and executing stand-up diaper changes. We would go to dinner parties and I felt I had nothing to contribute. I felt exposed without my kids, or without the ability to talk about them. I used to be interesting, I swear! Invite me over in a few years, I'll tell charming anecdotes that do not rely on the zany antics of preschoolers, I promise!
Strangely enough, writing about the zany antics of preschoolers has helped enormously to quell this fear that there is a vacuum where my adult self with all its capabilities and agency used to be. Turns out I'm still here. Sharing some of the bits of my daily life with all of you has reminded me of that - and the support, kindness and enthusiasm you've expressed for this funny little family journal has helped shore up some of my crumbling confidence. Writing itself is a restorative pleasure I had forgotten about. But the love and kindness this thing has generated have buoyed me up, up, up to a place where I can look all around and feel sincere gratitude for this time with my children. Yeah, yeah, I complain a lot about the limits of my life now, but your responses have helped me see through all the junk to what's real and true.
Thank you, thank you.
This little project has had unanticipated consequences, for which I am deeply grateful. (Here is where you come in.) After 18 months of stay-at-home living, most of it done in a new town where I am relatively unknown outside my roles as wife and mother, I'm afraid my confidence was beginning to crumble. I suspect this is fairly typical for others in my position, but its universality doesn't lessen the sting: it was hard to remember if I was good at things besides getting plastic barrettes to stay in place and executing stand-up diaper changes. We would go to dinner parties and I felt I had nothing to contribute. I felt exposed without my kids, or without the ability to talk about them. I used to be interesting, I swear! Invite me over in a few years, I'll tell charming anecdotes that do not rely on the zany antics of preschoolers, I promise!
Strangely enough, writing about the zany antics of preschoolers has helped enormously to quell this fear that there is a vacuum where my adult self with all its capabilities and agency used to be. Turns out I'm still here. Sharing some of the bits of my daily life with all of you has reminded me of that - and the support, kindness and enthusiasm you've expressed for this funny little family journal has helped shore up some of my crumbling confidence. Writing itself is a restorative pleasure I had forgotten about. But the love and kindness this thing has generated have buoyed me up, up, up to a place where I can look all around and feel sincere gratitude for this time with my children. Yeah, yeah, I complain a lot about the limits of my life now, but your responses have helped me see through all the junk to what's real and true.
Thank you, thank you.
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