Anybody who's known me for more than a minute knows that 1) I don't like to cook and 2) I can't cook. (I wrote last year about what happens in my family when I just suggest that I might want to make dinner.) I won't go into my every-dysfunctional-family-is-dysfunctional-in-its-own-way creation myth. After all these years, I'm not sure it's relevant and I'm always one for giving friends and family the unsolicited advice that they can overcome this and overcome that. Obviously, cooking will forever be in the "why bother?" column for me and it's high time I admit it.
Yet, I can't quite get over the knawing (to use a masticatory word) feeling that not wanting to or liking to cook is a moral failing. And like any culinary doubter, I go back and forth about the existence of a benevolent Home Chef. Godknows I've had bursts of energy where I think I'm finally going to have 2 skillets going at 6 o'clock 5 days a week. But then I go back to watching potatoes sprout, fresh basil go to seed, and ground turkey turn green.
So, when I tell you that Husband No. 1 who, as you may remember, loves to cook, does it extraordinarily well and never finishes a meal without saying to no one in particular, "Damn, that's good!" to which he gets a chorus of amens and splayed mashed potatoes, when I tell you that he went out and bought 4 fish from the fish market and cooked 3 -- what would Jesus do? -- and there was one fish left in the refrigerator and my better angels got to me and told me to do something with it before the whole house caved in from the smell, you know this will be a story without a happy ending.
Some context: I am back in school a mere 30 years since I got my one and only degree. I am taking Calculus. As with too many momentous decisions in my life I did not think this through. This summer when I was digging flower beds, sharpening knives, quaffing Jameson's and bitching about my legs turning into tree trunks, I should have been reviewing pre-Calculus and trig and throw in some algebra while yer at it. For the one class that I'm taking now is truly and unremittingly kicking my ass. I mean, I had to purchase a graphing calculator that's got a 400 page manual fer chrissakes. Mercy.
Ye Olde Student is now always in a panicked hurry. The other day I was home alone, and for those who enjoy that kind of thing, you know that you get into The Zone. Floating through your own space multi-tasking, focussed, efficient. I decided to cook the last fish thinking, I'll surprise everyone! They'll get home today and instead of seeing empty potato chip bags strewn all over the kitchen they'll see demurely crossed cutlery and a plate cleaned of everything but fish tail sitting on the kitchen table, the remnants of a Healthy Home-Cooked Meal. Oh my, they'll say, that woman can do anything! So, I glide through the kitchen, pre-heat the oven, spray the pyrex, salt the dish, chop some onions, add a dollop of oil and juice while opening my mail and starting a fresh pot of decaf -- Oh Julia, I said to myself, you are too much!
Then I marched out to my office to do battle with some polynomials. For one whole hour.
When I smugly waltzed back into the kitchen it stank like a trawler. And when I opened the oven and took It out It was black. (I see a red door and I want it painted black ...) The onion had turned into something that resembled a bouillon cube and what was supposed to be baked fish looked like a cheap shoe left out in the rain. Why bother to open all the windows, I reasoned, just fess up when they get home.
I did. (My lame excuse was that I bake chicken for about an hour.) And then I had to sit there while Younger Sister and Husband No. 1 popped their eyes back into their respective heads and lectured me about the difference between a few minutes and one hour. (Will this be on the test?) Now, of course, I will never hear the end of it and come Thanksgiving right after the obligatory, "Damn, that's good!" there will be, "Did I ever tell you the time She (thumbs jerked in my direction while I keep my head down and shovel brussels sprouts in my mouth) tried to cook fish?"
It's official: I give up. Just FedEx me home-cooked meals.
Yet, I can't quite get over the knawing (to use a masticatory word) feeling that not wanting to or liking to cook is a moral failing. And like any culinary doubter, I go back and forth about the existence of a benevolent Home Chef. Godknows I've had bursts of energy where I think I'm finally going to have 2 skillets going at 6 o'clock 5 days a week. But then I go back to watching potatoes sprout, fresh basil go to seed, and ground turkey turn green.
So, when I tell you that Husband No. 1 who, as you may remember, loves to cook, does it extraordinarily well and never finishes a meal without saying to no one in particular, "Damn, that's good!" to which he gets a chorus of amens and splayed mashed potatoes, when I tell you that he went out and bought 4 fish from the fish market and cooked 3 -- what would Jesus do? -- and there was one fish left in the refrigerator and my better angels got to me and told me to do something with it before the whole house caved in from the smell, you know this will be a story without a happy ending.
Some context: I am back in school a mere 30 years since I got my one and only degree. I am taking Calculus. As with too many momentous decisions in my life I did not think this through. This summer when I was digging flower beds, sharpening knives, quaffing Jameson's and bitching about my legs turning into tree trunks, I should have been reviewing pre-Calculus and trig and throw in some algebra while yer at it. For the one class that I'm taking now is truly and unremittingly kicking my ass. I mean, I had to purchase a graphing calculator that's got a 400 page manual fer chrissakes. Mercy.
Ye Olde Student is now always in a panicked hurry. The other day I was home alone, and for those who enjoy that kind of thing, you know that you get into The Zone. Floating through your own space multi-tasking, focussed, efficient. I decided to cook the last fish thinking, I'll surprise everyone! They'll get home today and instead of seeing empty potato chip bags strewn all over the kitchen they'll see demurely crossed cutlery and a plate cleaned of everything but fish tail sitting on the kitchen table, the remnants of a Healthy Home-Cooked Meal. Oh my, they'll say, that woman can do anything! So, I glide through the kitchen, pre-heat the oven, spray the pyrex, salt the dish, chop some onions, add a dollop of oil and juice while opening my mail and starting a fresh pot of decaf -- Oh Julia, I said to myself, you are too much!
Then I marched out to my office to do battle with some polynomials. For one whole hour.
When I smugly waltzed back into the kitchen it stank like a trawler. And when I opened the oven and took It out It was black. (I see a red door and I want it painted black ...) The onion had turned into something that resembled a bouillon cube and what was supposed to be baked fish looked like a cheap shoe left out in the rain. Why bother to open all the windows, I reasoned, just fess up when they get home.
I did. (My lame excuse was that I bake chicken for about an hour.) And then I had to sit there while Younger Sister and Husband No. 1 popped their eyes back into their respective heads and lectured me about the difference between a few minutes and one hour. (Will this be on the test?) Now, of course, I will never hear the end of it and come Thanksgiving right after the obligatory, "Damn, that's good!" there will be, "Did I ever tell you the time She (thumbs jerked in my direction while I keep my head down and shovel brussels sprouts in my mouth) tried to cook fish?"
It's official: I give up. Just FedEx me home-cooked meals.
