Duh...

As September approached, I was dreading the start of school. Seriously, even more than Mr. Mixed Media, whose entire vocabulary during the month of August was reduced to seven (and a half) words: “I do not want to go to school, duh.” The Percussionist, on the other hand, was counting down the days in avid anticipation—“I just want to find out what third grade is like.” His enthusiasm for the structure of school quashed my fantasies of just skipping the whole thing, continuing the summer schedule of relaxed long mornings and fluid bedtimes. If one of them is in school, then we have to get up anyway, so I might as well get some kid-free grocery shopping time. But I wasn’t looking forward to the rushed mornings, the last-minute packing of lunches, the picking up and shuttling to after-school activities, just the whole school year routine, which tends to leave me exhausted and cranky, escalating the ceaseless “PLEASE put on your shoes NOW,” like a CD on repeat with the volume slowly turning up.

Early in the summer, my mother presented me with what she thought would be a question requiring some contemplation to answer. She had been reading “green living” exhortations to simplify as a means toward living more sustainably, and she wanted to know what that really would mean. So she asked what would be the biggest thing that would both simplify my life and have ecological benefits. My mouth answered before my brain even registered the question: “Stop all after-school activities.”

“Because of the driving, right?”

“Well, that, but really because when we are running around all afternoon, we are not only driving, we are also away from home.” As the boys would say: Duh, mom. I tried to recover from my self-evident & idiotic previous statement by adding, “So, I don’t get time to work in the garden, or to prepare non-processed suppers, or hang out the laundry. And we end up grabbing non-organic burritos or pizza way too much. And the kids don’t get time to work in their gardens, either, and it defeats the whole purpose of them having gardens if I do their harvesting while they are at school. ”

So, two months later, there I was, dreading the school year, and the “duh, mom” lightbulb went off: extracurricular activities are actually optional! We can just skip them, and afterschool can be a time to hang out and garden and cook and play. Whoa, Nellie! Who knew? It totally rocks. And the kids still haven’t harvested their gardens very well, which means their main crops will be seeds for next year, but we are all so much more relaxed and fun, not to mention well-fed on cooperatively cooked suppers.

So to my own mom, for giving me that “Duh, mom” moment, I owe you a “thanks, Mom.” (Well, duh.)

In praise of legwarmers: final(ly) installment

In an “Eco-Literacy in Action” workshop last Saturday (sadly, mostly nice folks preaching to the choir, when I could have been out weeding my garden, you know, like “in action”), we talked a lot about the necessity of including tenets of social justice within environmental education. You know, like making sure local organic foods aren’t inaccessible to people without trust funds. Which brought us to the importance of building local communities, which brought me (well, yes, my mind was wandering a bit) right back around to legwarmers. And the schoolyard, my most immediate regularly encountered community, and Chris sitting there on a stump, knitting.

Knitting is a de rigeur activity at my kids’ school. All the kids knit. I, however, do not. But Chris does, and she rocks at it, using large numbers of needles at once, giving the impression that she is fondling a pet porcupine. So of course, when I wanted a new pair of legwarmers, she was the obvious person to ask. She immediately supplied the idea of a much-nicer-than-I-had-in-mind wool, and emailed me several websites with patterns to chose from. And then she sat in the schoolyard working on my legwarmers. Which meant everyone was a part of it, not just me and Chris. Community legwarmers. So when I wore them for crossing guard duty, multiple parents would stick their heads out of their cars to cat-whistle (or, well, at least say “those turned out so great!”). Despite her underestimation of the skinniness of my legs, which meant there was some initial stretching required, the legwarmers from Chris are even cooler and more fun than my other favorite (recycled cotton, stripey, excellent) pair.

So, can legwarmers save the world? Apparently, they can—they meet the strict criteria of being good for individuals, community, and the planet. So, forget Irene Cara, and say it with me: What a feeling!

Better short than never

(I'm trying very hard to figure out how to write something that's actually an appropriate length for a blog post. There's a reason they don't call them "blog rambles," right?)

Anyway, legwarmers. A great word, almost as comforting as "comforter" and "fireside throw." What could be better then warm legs? When I had my temporary medical-writing job last year, my co-writer and I initially discovered our compatibility by comparing our extremity-warming accessories: I had been given this awesome pair of wrist-warmers and he responded by pulling up his pantsleg to show me the socks he had cut the feet off of so he could pull them up his calves and wear them above his other socks. When I told him that legwarmers are having a comeback and you can actually purchase a pair without yarn falling out of one end, he countered, "Not for men," and I realized he was probably right. Not that I'm in Men's Hosiery that often, but I imagine there aren't the racks of legwarmers that the women's section currently has. We worked in a small room with an inadequate electric heater, but That Didn't Matter because we were warm. Simple, knitted conservation of body heat canceling out our need for electricity (except for, um, our laptops). Since then I've taken to wearing them to bed and haven't even minded turning the heater way down at night (plus, I recently had a revelatory experience when I happened to have them on for an x-ray appointment, and I discovered that they are the absolute must-have accessory if you are forced to don a hospital gown and lie on a cold table). Next time you're in Women's Hosiery, check out how you too can give legwarmers a chance to change your life for the better. I mean, how often is saving the earth this fun?

In praise of legwarmers, part 1 of 3

Okay, ladies, just forget Flashdance. Pretend you never cut the neck out of a sweatshirt so it would casually slip off your shoulder, exposing the straps of your jog bra. Delete from your memory the humiliating scrapbooked candids of you and your friends draped over benches, your legwarmers meticulously “slouched” down your calves. I’m being serious here. Legwarmers are back, hopefully to stay. So don’t avert your eyes…

It’s the first week of September, and finally, my father’s doubts that my Ivy League education was a colossal waste of money can be put to rest. I have become a crossing guard. Every Friday for thirty minutes before the school bell quaintly rings, I now heft my octagonal sign to protect dozens of distracted children from vehicular injury.

As I learn the ins and outs of my new job (big rush at 8:25, be prepared!), one of the things I’m realizing is that wardrobe is an issue. Our school is too small and the traffic too slow to necessitate the provision of a reflective orange vest, so my fashion choices are unimpeded by a uniform. The clothing issue centers more on temperature. Once the rain starts, it will be easy: dress warm. But this time of year, the last gasp of summer, it’s more complex. The days are hot (too hot, hotter than a few years ago? I always ask, I can’t help it), but the mornings are blanketed in a damp woolen marine layer. Were I simply dropping off the kids, a quick kiss and hug before jumping back into the car, I could get away with the thin cotton skirt, t-shirt, and flip-flops that will be de rigeur by pick-up time. But I have to stand unprotected in the crosswalk, covered by the long morning shadow of a scrub oak which prevents the sunrays beginning to break through the fog from reaching my goosepimpled legs.

If I were headed home after crosswalk duty, I’d just wear jeans and a sweatshirt, but I’ve got places to go (car needs maintenance), people to see (helping a friend edit a paper for school), and things to do (set up laptop at teahouse to write latest blog post), so I’m loathe to return to the house for a costume change. Plus, I’m recently single, so I’ve got a compulsive desire to look cute as I run my various errands. The answer to my problem lurks demurely in my sock drawer: legwarmers. Now, those of you who do not live in towns as hippified as mine will probably dispute my “cute” claims, but I SWEAR it worked: the skirt/tee/sandals, with an overlay of zip cardigan and, yes, what you were dreading, legwarmers. I was cozy as a kitten, hanging out in the crosswalk, and then somewhere between the oil change and the teahouse, the legwarmers slipped right off to reveal my appropriate-to-the-heat original outfit.

Now, I’m not usually one to offer up fashion advice to others, but in this one instance, I’m emboldened by the fact that my whole romance with legwarmers was started by Selena, my way way way hipper-than-me friend who gave me the purse I currently carry, which seriously, without fail, elicits a daily “what a cute purse! Where did you get it?” comment from a random stranger. A couple of years ago for Christmas, I talked Selena into bringing her kids over for our annual Christmas Eve dinner party. It was a basic cultural exchange: my kids came to her seder, hers came to our Noche Buena celebration. Despite my “no gifts” insistence, she showed up with a small package, which I opened after we were all stuffed with traditional Cuban holiday fare.

“Wow, thanks!” I politely said, holding up the navy blue ribbed legwarmers. Legwarmers??? Okay, whatever, I thought.

“Wait!” Selena interjected. “Are those legwarmers?”

“Looks like it.”

“Oh, shit, I thought they were tights. I’m SO SORRY,” she moaned.

“No, no, it’s cool. Legwarmers are great, really. I mean, um, I haven’t had a pair in a really long time.”

“Of course you haven’t. They went out of style about 20 years ago. I’m so sorry—I’ll take them back.”

I insisted on keeping them. I mean, what’s the point in having grown up in the south if you can’t insist on keeping a gift you don’t want. “Really, I love them. Thank you.”

And then they went into my sock drawer to languish for a while…

Coming soon: how legwarmers will SAVE THE PLANET, plus, how to build community through legwarmers. (I’m actually dead serious.) So stay tuned…

I really don't spank my kids, I swear

But if you want to read my theoretical reconsideration of that decision, pick up the current issue of Brain, Child (Fall, 2009).

Summer Vacation: Beech Creek

After the long baking walk across the drought-crisp field, the air of the creek greets us like, well, like a breath of fresh air. A deep inhalation of the water-cooled air on the shady creek bank suddenly makes those ubiquitous yoga t-shirts make sense: breathe. Ah, yes. The heat in the field has worked everyone into not just bodily sweat, but into anxious and cranky mindset, which instantly lifts under the cool sated trees. We savor one more gulp of calm, then plunge in, ankle-deep in clear cold ripples, mud clouds billowing up under our heels, minnows and crawdads shooting away from our footfalls.

My sons explore the creek with reckless little-boy abandon, not yet having internalized my stuffed-down maternal fears of snapping turtles and copperheads. They earnestly construct piles of stones and rotting leaves to dam off channels between platforms of rock, watching with fascination their own power to affect the water’s route. Sunlight, bright through summer’s lace of leaves, dances madly on the pebbles beneath the surface. A fish appears, slides into shadow. A pencil-thin snake shimmers red-brown against the long grass leaning down into the water. The boys splash after him, scaring him off in their attempts to get a closer look.

I grew up here, the creek my source of private sanctuary for the difficulties of childhood, a place to hide within deep banks, its calm coolness a balm to troubled mind or heart. I come back to this Tennessee valley now each year; each year I unexpectedly receive this healing again. The creek is still here. It has not run dry even with the overdevelopment of the surrounding former farmland, even with the hot dry summer after hot dry summer accumulating. The heron who astounded with his wide span floating between the close banks has gone, but look, the hawks are still perched on the dead trees in the fencerows above the banks. Deer tracks and raccoon prints draw a festive calligraphy along the water’s edge. My children will know this place the way I know it, from before memory begins. Their as yet unblemished faces expose a pure joy in connecting their bodies with this creek.

The creek does not cure my deep anxieties about the changed world my children will live in, but it does give me a moment to feel that it perhaps all is not lost. The small power that they discover today in seeing themselves change the water’s flow will grow with them, and I pray that power will be guided by the love of this place, of clean water and animal tracks and cool green shade. May the creek still be here for them to watch their children disappear around the next curve, curious and safe. May they seek sanctuary here, and breathe.

Overmodified

Once upon a time, a chicken was a chicken, and an egg was an egg, and the answer to which came first simply depended on whether you believed in evolution. Ah, the good old days. Nowadays, the chicken-and-egg business is awash in adjectives and hyphens; something as basic as an egg carton teems with descriptions pointing the unwitting consumer in all sorts of labyrinthine directions. When did everything get so complicated?

I suspect that at some point in the not-too-distant past, the word “natural” actually had a meaning shared by most of the population. In the new millennium, “natural” is a throwaway—you have to add “all-“ to wring any value at all from it, and it’s still pretty parched. As our choices have expanded, and sustainability in agriculture has begun to enter the popular consciousness, we are barraged by the marketing of “natural” foods, nowhere more apparent than in the egg aisle. But as more and more people want foods produced by humane and earth-friendly methods, the supply doesn’t seem to meet the demand. Those truly all-natural hens can’t lay fast enough. Enter the funhouse of the modifier.

There was always large, extra-large, and jumbo, the egg-producers having beat Starbucks in the race to label everything as superlative by several generations. And white or brown. That used to be the extent of it, two simple decisions, size and aesthetic preference. Now there are moral decisions to be hashed out as you choose between free-range, cage-free, Omega three, family-farmed, no-gmo, veggie-fed, hormone-free, organic, locally-owned, antibiotic-free, artisan-made, sweatshop-free…(oops, I think I got out of the egg cooler just there at the end). What with the large and fine print cluttering the egg cartons, it’s no wonder there’s usually a bottleneck right at the egg section of my local grocer, as my fellow bewildered customers try to figure out if Susie’s Family Farm or Paradise Organics is the right choice. Does Susie treat her workers well, we wonder? Has Paradise been bought out by some major evil corporation? Are ANY chickens ever given hormones, or are the egg folks just borrowing a bit of anxiety-calming rhetoric from the red-meat folks? And does any of it really make a difference to the chickens?

From an aesthetic and ethical standpoint, I want to buy eggs and meat from chickens that were raised the way I picture chickens in my mind, strolling about the farmyard magically unmolested by attentive herding dogs. These chickens populate my toddler’s cardboard books in plenty, pecking at the green tufts of grass with their chicks trailing behind. These chickens look happy, expressing their inner “chicken-ness” by partaking of the activities dictated by their natures: scratching, catching bugs, and whatever else a self-realized chicken does. In a real world, these enlightened chickens would even lay eggs with naturally high amounts of Omega-3 fatty acids and would be resistant to disease because they are healthy and unconfined, living out the picture that “free-range” produces in my mind.

I found some of these storybook chickens last summer at the farmer’s market set up in the parking lot of our town plaza. The fairytale farmer was youthfully handsome and idealistic, flaunting a notebook filled with photos of the hens wandering his acreage, basking in the sunshine and freedom of sustainable farming methods. I gushed with excitement: finally, food I could feel unreservedly good about feeding my children! I happily handed over an exorbitant $5 for a dozen guilt-free eggs and started to walk away, but was lured back by the perfect poultry in the pictures. “Do you happen to have any broilers?” I ventured. “Just one left,” he grinned. He hoisted the sole remaining chicken out of his freezer and looked at the label on it: “Four pounds, okay with you?” I returned his wide-open smile as I handed him a twenty, taking the chicken and dropping it into an old plastic bag as I joked, “Can’t you find a bigger one in there?” pointing to the now-empty freezer. There is an awkward pause after he pocketed the bill I had just given him and said, “Thanks. Hope to see you again.” I was still smiling politely, waiting for the change he did not seem to be getting for me. In my unsureness about how to handle the situation, my eyes scanned the booth, and only then did I actually read the little chalkboard which gave the prices of his various vegetables, listing at the end: chicken, $5/lb. Four pounds at five bucks a pound, shit, that’s TWENTY DOLLARS! I had just bought a twenty dollar chicken, and I was way too embarrassed to hand it back after I had been falling all over myself telling him about how great it was that he’s doing all the right things, how I wished more people were doing it like him. I grinned one last time to cover my confusion and regret, and turned away, swinging the bag with the $20 chicken from one hand.

Now bereft of cash, I wandered away from the produce stalls over toward the lawn where several families were picnicking. My own kids were clamoring around in the general mélange of children, and I stopped by to check on them and say hi to the other parents. At each blanket I held up the paltry-seeming bag and flatly announced, “I just bought a $20 chicken,” my shock temporarily trumping the embarrassment I would start to feel shortly.

The sheer indulgence of having spent twenty dollars on one scrawny chicken weighed on my stereotypically middle-class scale of guilt, but it was balanced by the fact that I realized it probably represents the true amount of money a chicken is worth in the world that I, with my liberal ideals, would wish into existence if I had the requisite power to do so. In a world where all workers are paid fair wages to ensure a decent standard of living, in a world where the chickens are outside of their efficient “cage-free” warehouses actually eating wild insects and acres of grass instead of processed chicken feed with its list of suspect ingredients, in a world where the farmer values sustaining the earth over profits, a chicken would cost at least $20. My $20 chicken would probably be in the bargain basement of such a world.

I had to admit, to my untrained palate, fed for years on plump “free-range” roasters that probably never saw sunlight, my $20 chicken tasted pretty bargain basement: rangy and a little tough. Probably, just as with grass-fed beef, truly free-range chicken requires we adjust our cooking methods as well as our taste buds. I’d be happy to make the adjustments, I’m just not sure I can afford it. The “right” solution here would probably be to do some math: figure out how much I spend on chicken and use the same amount to buy only this truly sustainable version. Which would mean less chicken, but less guilt. Or I could raise my own free-ranging fowl in my back yard, an option I considered only until I mentioned it to my city-bred partner, who laid down a clear line in the chicken scratch: if we got chickens, we could eat their eggs but not them. No neck-wringing chez nous. I made a half-hearted attempt to woo my partner into the possibility of setting up our own slaughter house. “Coq au vin,” I murmured seductively. “Poulet provencal.” No go. She usually swoons when I speak French to her, but somehow my murderous plot wasn’t having the same effect as romantic renderings of lines from Jules et Jim.

I loved that she gave me this out, since although chicken is my kids’ favorite meal, and I do want us to eat in the most sustainable way possible, I was already developing a sense of dread about the moment of killing itself. Wring or chop? Of course, my pint-sized barbarians would probably love the literal sight of the proverbial headless chicken. In one of my most vivid memories of my semi-agrarian childhood, the seeming impossibility of that flapping, running bird-sans-head provoked my older brother to a hurricane of laughter. I recall inching backwards, fascinated but afraid, even though the bird’s main weapon was lying still attached to the tiny head near our chopping block. So I’m not in denial that the meat we eat comes from creatures that once lived and breathed, it’s just that I’d rather outsource the slaughter function. Back to the butcher counter for me, where I’ll have to grapple with my conscience and my wallet both.

While I’ve been trying to figure out the chicken conundrum, we’re eating a lot of eggs, without reading a lot of fine print. I’ve recently discovered that I can buy eggs from a neighbor, cheaper than the market eggs, packaged in battered recycled cartons festooned with adjectives no longer tied to the particular eggs within. These eggs, with their irregular sizes, muted palette of blues, greens and tans, and bits of straw still stuck underneath, feel somehow more real than the grocery store version, those homogeneous soldiers lined up ready to march through USDA inspections. With the homegrown version, I don’t need a barrage of modifiers to soothe my maternal health concerns, my environmental anxiety, and my animal welfare fears--the chicken herself was underfoot as I climbed up the neighbor’s porch steps to see how many extras they had today, and she looked plenty happy and healthy to me.

I guess the only thing that could be better would be that family-run, collaboratively-built, no-slaughter, egg-only, recycled-materials, beyond-organic, fully guilt-free henhouse I haven’t given up planning. I’ve got some old boards behind the garage. But until I find the time for a construction project, you’ll find me and the kids walking down the road to the neighbor’s, bringing our empty egg cartons for a refill. And as we walk past fennel and blackberry, Queen Anne’s lace and wild mustard flowers, for a while, life seems simple again.