I believe a woman's life is significant, no matter her destiny. I believe that the majority of women share a lot of common ground. I think a lot of women also think their daily tasks are so insignifant that they feel it's not worth recording them.
One book I really want to read but haven't yet is A Midwife's Tale by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich. It is based on the diaries of Martha Ballard, a wife, mother, homemaker and midwife in Maine in the mid to late 17th century. She was not a fastidious journal-keeper, but she was a frequent one. Ballard was audacious and confident enough to feel that her daily goings-on warranted recording. Years later, Ulrich won the Pulitzer for compiling and editing Ballard's journals. There's no way Ballard could have known what her journal would bring about, but she did it anyway.
One of those daily tasks that consitute common ground among women is the feeding of themselves and their families. Now this isn't the sole responsibility of women in every society or household, but it is a task many women are either given or a task that is often taken up by women.
In my house, I do the majority of the cooking for several reasons:
Derrick is an awful cook.
I enjoy cooking.
I'm relatively good at it.
If I want to stave my hunger before 8 o'clock, I'm going to have to do it.
I feel comfortable being responsible for this since I am at home in the early evenings and Derrick isn't.
Martha Ballard sometimes documented the meals she would make, among other household tasks. To follow in her noble example, and to someday leave a legacy for my own grandsons and granddaughters, I will do the same this week.
Monday: Pumpkin soup with pumpkin (obviously), chicken stock, sliced potatoes, celery, milk and onion.
Tuesday: Too tired to cook. We had leftovers of pumpkin soup and eggplant parmesan (note that I chose to eat the yummiest before Derrick could get to it).
Wednesday: Masman curry.
Thursday: Bratwurst with mashed potatoes and sauerkraut (my dad would be so proud!).
Friday (tomorrow): Banana squash with pork loin and pinto beans (the last two will go in the crockpot so I don't have to worry about it until it's time to eat).
Three things make NOT eating out and eating homecooked meals easier for me:
Bountiful Baskets with fresh produce each week.
Costco for meat, milk, eggs, cottage cheese and yogurt every two weeks.
My planner: I take stock of what we have every night and write what we'll have for dinner on the next day's agenda.
So enough of my boring life. What tasks of your foremothers would you be interested to know more about? or, how or do you handle the task of feeding your family?
3 comments:
Your blog posts are always so thought-provoking, and I enjoy reading them, even if I don't always comment. I also make most of the meals in our home too. I love trying new recipes and learning new cooking skills. When I look back on the recipes I used when I was first married compared to what I use today, it amazes me that I actually learned to cook! Dan and I are firm believers in eating dinner as a family, and I want to make sure I can feed my kids healthy and delicious meals so they will want to come to dinner each night.
Thanks for validating the little notebook I keep of various lists: meals I intend to make throughout the month, people to invite to house parties, long-term to-do lists, wish-list items for our house, etc. Instead of keeping these lists on pieces of scratch paper, I keep them in a cute notebook, because I see as journal entries :)
What's this cooking you speak of?? Never heard of it. I kid...I want exactly what Kristin describes only without having to do any of the cooking. Is that so much to ask? I would like to read book lists -- I'm sure some of my foremothers did not have the luxury of reading, but I would like to know about those that did. I have kept a list of everything I've read since 1998; maybe someone will want to read my list someday.
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