Clutch Cargo Lips

Carolina

Several years ago the parents of a friend of my son told us we were in for a treat. Their very best friends in the world were moving up the street from us. It turned out that the friends had a daughter the same age as our daughter and they ended up hanging out for a few years.

Times change, people change, kids change. Clare and Isabel didn’t hang out so much after a while but they always kept in touch.

What I didn’t know about the new family was that the mother, Carolina, was a breast cancer survivor. And a breast cancer survivor champion. She founded an organization for educating Hispanic women about breast cancer, then worked for a national breast cancer organization after leaving the one she founded in good hands.

When I heard that her cancer was back I fully expected her to beat it because that is who she was.

Carolina died last night.

Rest in peace.

Fuck you cancer.

Back in the day people used to make other people music compilations — mostly based on music they, for whatever reason, wanted the other person to hear. These were put on cassette tapes, and I suppose, when CD burning software was available, burned on CDs. Now people share mp3 playlists, which is pretty much the same thing, but a lot less work.

I have an mp3 player — not an iPod — but it only holds books on tape and the sample music that came with it — I’m too lazy to sit down and delete the sample music and I don’t know if I want to put my own music on it.

Anyway, that was just to say that no one has ever actually made me a playlist. I did get a sort of mix tape once — but there was also talking on it so that doesn’t count.

So, the other day in the car on the way to our niece’s wedding in Kokomo, Indiana, I wished aloud that we had music that was relevant to our trip. Like Kokomo. Or Indiana Wants Me. Dean and I talked about how much fun we’d have if we did have some fun music like that. When it was my turn to drive, Dean brought out his laptop and his work-provided broadband wifi doohickey. He then connected to Groveshark and began playing some songs. At first he played some music he liked, but then he began playing songs I liked — old ones, still older ones and some newer ones. He played Simon and Garfunkel and Kate Bush (even the early screechy ones) and Dan Bern and Crosby, Stills Nash and Young.

I felt like each time a new song played I was getting a gift.  It was a blast and proved that he’d actually been listening (to what I listened to, if not what I said). It was a bonding moment — when I thought all bonding had been done earlier in our marriage.

So, even though he’s on a business trip and not here today to take me to dinner or bring me flowers or give me a personal gift for our 24th wedding anniversary, he gave me a really special gift on Friday with the Grooveshark Playlist.

The highlight? It’s gotta be this one:

Midway through the very long graduation ceremony for the graduating class of Walt Whitman 2009 the principal announced an award that was an unknown award for the recipient (and apparently everyone else).

He said that it was a new (2 year old) tradition.

It was a recognition of the poet laureate of the year.

Then he said my daughter’s name.

We’d not heard of this award.

Apparently I jumped several inches out of my seat.

Poet laureate — Carl Sandburg came to mind. Maya Angelou too.

My daughter.

My baby.

My Poet Laureate.

Clare

For years and years I avoided processed foods. I made cakes and brownies from scratch. I rarely bought pre-made spaghetti sauce. I cooked only fresh (or sometimes frozen) vegetables. The only processed food I’d make was Kraft Macaroni and Cheese because it was such a comfort food.

If I made anything (except Kraft Mac & Cheese) from a mix, jar or bag I felt guilty. I’m not sure what I felt guilty for, but I felt guilty nonetheless.

Lately, however, I’ve been making more and more meals out of processed foods. I almost always have a jar of Barilla (or Rao or Bertolli or Classico — what’s ever on sale at Giant) in the pantry and often use it in place of the tomato sauce in a spaghetti sauce recipe. I rarely make deserts from scratch anymore — in fact I don’t remember the last time I made a cake or brownies not from a mix.

I’d noticed other people cutting corners by using processed foods and figured it would be ok if I did it too.

Really lately (like in the past couple of weeks) I’ve made a lot of processed food. The most notable is Bertolli’s frozen entrees. I’d seen them at the grocery store and thought they might taste ok and longed for a quick and easy meal to make when I didn’t feel like cooking or for something the kids could make for themselves. I finally bought one when it was on sale and served it for dinner (just Andrew and me, but Dean tasted it) and liked what I tasted. It was pretty good. And I didn’t have to cook the pasta, make the sauce, brown and cook the meat. All I had to do was throw it in a pan and heat it for 10 minutes.

So last night I made one of these meals for dinner. Dean had eaten, Clare was at Prom, Andrew had a sandwich earlier but I was hungry. I thought the food tasted good, but then remembered why I’d avoided procesed foods for so long. It wasn’t the price. It wasn’t to keep me busy. It wasn’t even the taste. It was because these things are unhealthy. I could feel my body absorbing the salt in the entree and I’m sure there are chemicals in the meals that would not have been in anything I’d made fresh. According to this web site, the portion I had last night (1/2 a bag) would be walked off in 158 minutes. That’s a lot of walking for an easy meal.Plus the sodium in that serving was nearly half my daily allowance. (assuming I’m a 37 year old 144lb female which I am not)

So, I once knew why I tried to make fresh food and limited my processed food intake, but the lure of convenience blinded me — made me forget the real reason I liked to cook from scratch. It wasn’t because I loved cooking. It wasn’t because we couldn’t afford to buy processed foods. It wasn’t because processed foods tasted bad. It was because they are full of things that should not be regularly ingested.

Damn. I gotta start cooking for real again.