To Work or Not to Work, That is the Question

I read a lot of blogs written by Happy Homemakers. They love cooking and cleaning and making their homes an inviting haven from the outside world. Many of them have small children and it is natural that they center their lives around hearth and home. Among the elderblogs that I read, there are a few Happy Homemakers; most are retired or out of the workforce for one reason or another. I love my home, I love my dear family, I love our OakMeadows land but....I confess, I am your basic Worker Bee. If I were not paid well or if I were mistreated at work, I may not feel the same way. I spent years at home when DD was small and I consider that time well spent; I flat don't see how women with small children manage to be back on the job 6-12 weeks after having a baby. Sheesh, I didn't get a night's sleep until DD was 3 years old. As DD grew older, I grew tired of being dependent and wanted to know that I could take care of myself. So I went back to school and became a Pharmacist. There are irritations and sometimes I want to chunk it but the thought of being without an income gives me an anxiety attack. Yes, not working would give me more time to quilt and cook and read and clean but I don't much like to cook, I can hire the cleaning done, and I can quilt & read on the weekends. At 60 I am fortunate to have the choice to work or not to work. For now the answer is Work.

Fit, Fat, or Forget it

Losing weight. Most everyone wants to be physically fit, trim, and thin; most everyone is actually physically unfit, flabby, and fat. Is this national obsession just a means to pick our pockets with books, DVDs, Jenny Craig & Weight Watchers, gym memberships, and talk shows?? Or is it our national desire to have it both ways—eat whatever, whenever and still be healthy?

We/I know what is healthy and we/I flat don’t want to do it. I want my Cokes and Cheetoes and I don’t want to exercise. But I do want to be healthy. People didn’t used to be so fat; yes there were some fat people but not in such proportions. Why? I think it is the prevalence of junk food and massive portion sizes. A big part of my overweightedness is my life long addiction to Cokes. Although I have never smoked, I know how smokers feel—I love the taste of, smell of, bubbly feel of Cokes, Cokes calm me down and help me think, it’s part of the daily ritual, how could you ever not have a Coke with pizza?? Or should I even be ruminating over weight?? For Heaven sakes, I’m 60 years old and other than my CMT, healthy. Why not just forget the whole thing?

Quote for the day:
Middle age is when you have a choice of two temptations and choose the one that will get you home earlier. Anom.

What's for dinner?

When I was growing up my mother never had any idea of what to cook for dinner. She had a small repertoire of evening meals—fried steak, fried potatoes, and salad; roast and potatoes and carrots; fried chicken, mashed potatoes, & cream gravy. Vegetables were green beans, peas, corn, or asparagus all strictly from a can; where else would a vegetable come from?? But every day there was the question of what to cook for dinner. So when I married 40 years ago we were starting cooking from ground zero. Fortunately I was given two cookbooks—McCall’s and Better Homes & Gardens—and could follow directions. With a few notable disasters, JMM thought I was a really good cook and I never chose to enlighten him. I found it efficient & economical to plan meals a week at the time and then shop once a week. This has been my “system” for many years.
So what’s to ruminate about? Enter the food patrol. First it was vegetarianism which theoretically has a lot going for it; however, when reality rears its ugly head, the fact is that I could never find enough vegetarian meals that JMM, TSM, & I would actually eat. Next on the scene were the whole grain purists who grind their own grain.; not being that pure, I thought buying a bag of Gold Medal Whole Wheat flour would be satisfactory. I was wrong, enter the organic-or-die crew. OK, Whole Foods has organic whole grains and my soul was redeemed…temporarily. The latest tormentors are the Buy Local or Grow It Yourself and Save the Planet crusaders. Frankly, all the farmers I know grow either rice or cotton and none of them sell their rice or cotton at the local Farmers Market. (Actually, there isn’t a local Farmer’s Market; there are 2 approximately 35 miles from me but what would the purists say about my CO2 emissions by driving 70 miles to buy pure and even then it might not really be organic?) Maybe my mother had the right idea—just buy it and fry it.

Quote for today:

Character may be manifested in the great moments, but it is made in the small ones. Phillips Brooks

You'd think by now I'd have things figured out

By age 60, you'd think I'd have things figured out by now with clearly defined parameters but alas, I still seem to be muddling about with more ambiguousness than ever. There are people who know that they know, and those who think they know, and those who are quite aware that they really don't know. I am pretty much in the last category. There are blogs by people who know answers to any question you might ask: religions of all persuasions; politics with the really true, very right answers; God or no god, no problem; homeschooling; vegetarian or not; and so on. These people are sure, they have answers, they KNOW things. I've become rather comfortable with not having answers to big questions; the little questions seem rather more important in the end anyway. This blog will contain my ruminations on some of the big questions but mostly the little questions.

Quote for today:It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters in the end. - Ursula K. LeGuin