Zooming Along

"Life is about perspective and how you look at something…ultimately you have to zoom out.” ---Whitney Wolfe Herd 

 Remember back in the day when your parents would tell you how lucky you were? How many starving children there were in (insert faraway location here) and how fortunate you were to have a home, and food, and clothes? While it’s true that daily gratitude can improve your mood and lessen the chance of you having an epic fit in the paper towel aisle, it's a fact that gratitude is in shorter supply now than bleach wipes and Chromebooks. We've passed the early stages of the pandemic when we were mostly fine to stay home, wear the mask and wait it out. We were in it together, right? Summer was coming, the heat would kill the virus and it would just go away. 

Well, things change. 

 The nip of fall is in the air now though, and people are so damn tired of all of this. Outdoor cafes will start to close in a month or so; the reality of a New England Fall, with winter weather on its way, means sitting oceanside for a plate of clams is in the rearview. So, what’s ahead? Remote learning, flu season, less sunlight, more snowstorms, and I think the news said there is also a large asteroid headed straight for Earth in early November. We can all be forgiven for not being able to find gratitude in that dark mix. I'm in the bargaining stage right now, "OK, listen up here Universe, if I promise not to complain about the weather, the masks, the TP, and the flu, and also do better with recycling, do you promise to re-route the asteroid? Lemme know, k?" This week though, due to the Facebook function that shows me what I was doing on a certain date in other years, I found the following post about the silly complaints of some parents I knew. 

 1) A teacher asked college students to think up a funny title for an essay, something to make them laugh. Much gnashing of teeth and wailing ensued from parents who thought it was completely inappropriate to require a one-liner title at the LAST MINUTE. One mom is convinced her child will be ‘up all night’ and tearfully asked, ‘What are we doing to these kids?’ 2) Another kid is traumatized (the parent's word) because the school counselor suggested the kid should be the one handling college applications and interviews. 3) A parent insisting that they must oversee grades and have weekly conversations with her college sophomore's professors and residence hall staff because ‘I’m the customer, I’m paying the bills, they work for me.’ 4) A parent that refused to let her high-achieving, never in trouble kid, go back to college unless they agreed to a phone tracker, a car speed monitor, and daily 30 minute FaceTime check-in visits. 

 

Seems kind of stupid given what parents are dealing with now, right? Tracker mom seems especially off the chain, because at 20 years old, the kid who has never put a foot wrong, been in trouble, or gotten anything less than A, doesn’t need an ankle bracelet and a probation officer parent. While Facebook is something I’m trying to limit, because it really can be quite a sewer sometimes, the Memories feature does offer the opportunity to “zoom out” and gain a better perspective. Back in April, a post came up that had me in a silly selfie, wearing a surgical mask at the doctor. Turns out, I had the flu. So, a year later, swamped in a pandemic that is way worse than the flu, sure, I might still wear a mask, but I’m healthy, so that’s good, right? 

 It’s not just parents that are struggling to find the gratitude in their attitude. It’s all of us, though I do feel like right now, as we begin getting back to education, parents (and educators too!) are under a buttload of stress. There’s also an election looming that will impact all of us. I'm no political scholar, but I can't recall an election that has been this divisive, this anxiety-inducing, this…well…FUBAR’d. We all need that wide-angle view about now. Those curved mirrors that they put on blind corners, so you can see what's coming at you? Wouldn't it be awesome if they worked as a harbinger of other matters? Wouldn't just a small glimpse at what's coming up be helpful? There's almost no way to tell if the light at the end of a tunnel is a new day or an oncoming train. For now, while I've never been a fan of looking backward, I will definitely try to widen my view a little and not focus so much on the stressful parts but rather try to zoom out and include happier parts, like the sound of seagulls I can hear in my yard, my neighbor having his windows open when he plays the piano, and maybe one last plate of clams before the chill makes it impossible.

The Real Cold War

“Kitchens should be designed around what's truly important-fun, food, and life.”

---Daniel Boulud

 I really like fun, food, and life. I mean, who doesn’t, right? It’s just difficult to make it happen in my kitchen. First, there is the issue of safety. There have been fires, concussions, slips, falls, near misses with the knives, and at least one small explosion. In my defense, the explosion was a faulty electrical socket. The rest? Ya, that was all me. Besides the safety aspect there is the fact that cooking isn’t my strong suit, organization eludes me, and I definitely get way too much takeout. When you have forty-seven packets of soy sauce and more than a few containers of duck sauce, it’s time to lay off the Pu Pu platters and have a salad once in a while.

This past week, my faithful refrigerator breathed its last. It shuffled off the mortal cooling coil and became bereft of life, after having a massive ice maker malfunction that was almost as epic as the calving of the glaciers I saw once in Alaska. The hunt was on to replace it, but before that, there were all the usual kitchen nightmares. Cleaning up melted ice cream, finding a place to store food, and disconnecting the water line became urgent tasks. There was also the stark realization that the rear corners of my fridge were populated with at least a dozen bottles of old salad dressing,  three expired blocks of cream cheese, and some shriveled up veggies that might have been cherry tomatoes at one point but were now some new species of petrified produce. Who knows what evil lurks in the bottom bin of a side-by-side? I do, and it’s not pretty. I watched the video below, and all due respect, she knows her stuff, but I kind of wanted to shove this overly organized, way too happy, neat freak into the deep freeze. 

You’d think purchasing a fridge wouldn’t be that challenging, but you’d be wrong. They have them with TVs on the front, others have remote control temperature settings from a smartphone app. They make fridges that are WiFi-enabled; some have a door within a door, which is some kind of culinary sorcery that makes me question everything I ever knew about condiments and ideal temperatures for dairy. Lucky for me, most of the ones with all the bells and whistles were out of my price range and too big for my space. Oh, and bells and whistles? That’s a literal term, not an expression. One model has a bell that chimes if the door is left open too long. Another has a high-pitched whistle to indicate when the ice maker is done. I passed on those features, because honestly, there’s enough on my plate right now, without my appliances freaking out on me too.

Thankfully, the Internet kept me from having to brave the big box stores unaware of everything I should be considering. Comparing models on websites, I was able to narrow it down to two units that were priced right, would fit, and didn’t require an engineering degree to set up. Math and finance are not areas in which I excel, so for the longest time, there was no way I could understand why the larger of the two fridges was less expensive. Apparently, in the appliance world, size doesn’t matter.  The more expensive one had an additional bin, even though it had less space, and that was the deciding factor. When it comes right down to it, every refrigerator needs a deli drawer, OK? Where else would you put the turkey, the cold cuts, and the cheese?

Delivery day arrived, and the old fridge was dispatched to the appliance graveyard, and the new one was installed. Then the games began. Milk jug Jenga, tomato Tetris, and, the ever-popular soda Suduko. As it turns out, there are tons of web pages to help. One friend, who is a professional chef sent me a graphic of where foods should go based on cooking temperatures and other factors so you don’t poison your cottage cheese when bloody steak juice drips on it. It’s a miracle I’ve not given anyone salmonella all these years because putting fresh haddock next to ground beef is a bad idea.

Sing it with me..."Hotttttt......pockets!"

Finally, everything is now neatly squared away. The ice maker and water dispenser are humming along, and the light works. But wait, there’s more!  My old fridge was stainless steel, which wasn’t magnetic, so for years I had no way to hang up those school pics, and important notices. This one is magnetic, while also being the shiny, silvery stainless steel that I love. Life is good. There is healthy food in my home, nothing is leaking (well, except my wallet) and one small section of my life is neat and orderly. Who wants some ice-cold milk and a cookie? Come on by!

Temptation

 "I can resist everything except temptation."

---Oscar Wilde

Temptation is a funny concept. There's a belief that temptation, of any kind, is bad. It's some shadowy emotion, leading you to the dark side, drawing you away from everything good, and on to a path of destruction and despair. Honestly though, is every temptation such a big, fat, hairy deal? Aren't we faced with small temptations every day, that, really won't kill us, but probably don't do us any good either? 

Some will tell you that willpower is the solution. That you just have to be strong enough to resist some urges. Well, I agree that it takes a strong person to turn away from something that appears to be shiny and happy and fun. Not everyone can do that. Large issues like addiction, alcohol abuse, and risky behavior are extremely hard to kick for millions. To those who fight the good fight every day to stay clean, sober, and safe, my heart is with you. You're all heroes, even when you slip up. 

That leaves the smaller temptations that we all come across every day. The bag of chips. The candy bar. The pair of red shoes that look so good, and so what if you already have lots of red shoes, you don't have THESE red shoes and…OK, wait, that's just me. Still, we all have something that maybe isn't the best choice, but darn it, it's what we want. Now!

I suppose we could blame the pandemic. Many of us have been shut up in the house, stuck on Zoom meetings. Kids are missing school, camp, and milestones like graduations and proms. Businesses are closed, or severely limited in capacity, so we can't gather as we used to do, socializing over a Bloody or a cup of chowder. There are sports on TV, but we can't go see a game live. Concerts are over unless you count Keytar Bear at Park St in Boston. It's been a long haul, hasn't it? One would think that when bars were closed, clubs were shuttered, and restaurants were left empty, that the temptation to party and overdo would be gone, right? 

Not so much. 

In my house, I've still managed to fall into temptation, and I'm not alone in that. When you're all bummed out about a canceled vacation or a postponed party, it's easy to say, "Why shouldn't I bake three dozen brownies; I deserve something fun, right?" The thing is, those three dozen brownies aren't going to the breakroom at work or a neighborhood potluck. They're going to sit on your kitchen counter and mock you, incessantly, until you have to end them. With a big glass of milk, while binge-watching some Real Housewives. Hey, I don't make the rules, OK? But this is what will happen, if not with brownies and bad television, with something else, like online shopping late at night, or annoying people on social media just because you're spoiling for a fight. Don't deny it; don't say, "Oh, not me." Yes, you, me, and just about everyone else I know has come up against some kind of temptation over these last few months. 

My brownies never look this good, but they go down well

It's not all about the virus and being cooped up, though. I've never been able to keep potato chips in my house. Not any kind of chips. For years, I would buy the cheap chips, the ones that were all broken and dry, thinking "OK, if I buy these, I will have a few with my sandwich, but I won't go overboard." Oh, the lies we tell ourselves. My house is a no-chip zone. Except for last week, and well…we are not going to discuss that. Yes, denial is the twin sister of temptation, and both of those chicks need to go find someone else to peck at.

I suppose chips are not the worst thing to be powerless against, but still, it does annoy me that a soggy bag of fried starch is almost like Kryptonite was for Superman. I don't want to brag, but I've handled bigger crises than a bag of Ruffles and I'm still standing. I have to think that giving in, once in a while, isn't the end of the world. There have been days when I believed everyone needed a high five. To the face. With a hockey stick. I was able to resist that temptation, every time. So, is a bag of chips really so bad? Of course not. 

Now and then, something has to give. No one can hold out 100% of the time against every challenge. My daughter is very good at keeping me on the right track. If she is in the grocery store with me, the Ruffles do not wind up in our cart. Neither do the Tate's chocolate chip cookies. She's my favorite buzzkill. She also will keep me from steering the car into the drive-thru for Mickey Ds French fries, another disciplinary failure of mine…most of the time that is. Every so often, I get the fries. I order the shoes. I buy the chips (and the cookies too) because they're delicious. Life is tough, so, if some small, but guilty pleasure is tugging at you, and it won't ruin your life, your bank account, or your health? Go for it.