bearing blog

bearing blog


bear – ing n 1  the manner in which one comports oneself;  2  the act, power, or time of bringing forth offspring or fruit; 3 a machine part in which another part turns [a journal ~];  4  pl comprehension of one’s position, environment, or situation;   5  the act of moving while supporting the weight of something [the ~ of the cross].

  • The hipster PDA

    There are times when I slip into the worst gadget-centered materialism.  This morning, no doubt spurred by Ann Althouse, I caught myself wondering if I should buy an iPod.  Further examination revealed the following motives:

    1. I am ashamed that I haven’t regularly listened to music since my first son (now 4) reached toddlerhood and we packed our CD collection away to protect it.
    2. I am ashamed that a new technology has swept the nation and I have never once touched it, played with it, or caused it to do my bidding.
    3. I think I might look cool with one displayed prominently on my body somewhere.  (Note to self:  Also file this post under Category: Self-Delusions)

    But I’m still finding a certain amount of satisfaction in low-tech solutions to daily life.  Example: the hipster PDA. 

    Used mine in the coffeeshop the other day to construct a warning flag on my power cord, which otherwise posed a trip/flying laptop/clothesline hazard stretched across the rear exit.

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  • What the World Needs…

    …are drive-through window grocery stores.

    Imagine.  You’re driving home.  It’s four-thirty.  In your back seat, a baby sleeps in his infant seat and a four-year-old has zonked out next to him.  You need to make dinner when you get home.  To do that, you need to pick up a few things at the grocery store.  But those kids really need that nap right now.

    So you pull into your local Cub, or Kroger, or Piggly Wiggly, or Big Bear (aw, who’m I kidding; around here the first to offer it would be Byerly’s or Lunds.   They don’t even bag your groceries at Cub) and maneuver your car into the drive-through lane, waiting your turn and listening to "All Things Considered" while your children sleep.

    It’s rush hour, so the "10 Item Limit, Please" sign is illuminated.  You brake and peer up at the "menu" of available items, a small but carefully crafted selection of emergency groceries:

    • Half-gallons of milk
    • Coffee
    • Eggs
    • Butter (sold by the stick!)
    • Half-gallons of orange juice
    • Bread
    • Bagged shredded cheese
    • Ground beef
    • Boneless, skinless chicken breasts
    • Spaghetti
    • Cans of diced tomatoes
    • Bagged prewashed salad greens
    • One or two kinds of cereal
    • A "fresh vegetable of the day."  Today, it’s green beans, preweighed in half pound bags.
    • Toilet paper
    • Diapers (remember the target market here)
    • Maybe some other very basic toiletries

    Hm, at home there’s onions and tortilla chips and salsa and chili powder… You order a pound of ground beef, a bag of cheese, some bagged lettuce—oh yeah, we’re almost out of milk, that too.  All set to make some taco salad.  You really like sour cream on it too, but oh well, have to put some yogurt on it instead.

    "Your total is $12.22," says the cashier, leaning out the window for your credit card.  Not bad; a little more expensive than shopping in the store.  When it clears, you pull forward, wait a couple of minutes while she retrieves your items, and then reach out the window to receive a plastic grocery bag containing a pound of ground round double-wrapped in a second bag, a one-pound bag of shredded cheese, and a ten-ounce bag of Dole Classic Iceberg salad.  The milk is handed out next, a half-gallon of 2% in another plastic grocery bag. 

    "Thanks," you say, and drive home, where you just might be able to get the kids, or at least the baby, inside and onto the couch without waking them up.

    The list above is all most people, given a little creativity and enough odds and ends in their pantry at home, would need to get through 24 hours without going to the store.  The stocking space would have to be limited for customers to be served promptly; you’d want all these items to be right at hand for the one or two employees running the drive-through to be able to quickly assemble an order. 

    I suppose, though, a few more items could be added that would increase the traffic:

    • Two or three popular brands of soda, sold by the can or in two-liters (or just position a soda machine downstream of the window)
    • Two or three types of salted snacks, e.g. tortilla chips, potato chips, and pretzels.  Maybe pork rinds for the low-carb folks.  Salsa too.
    • Frozen or take-and-bake pizzas. 
    • Jars of plain spaghetti sauce
    • Hamburger Helper (TM)
    • How could I forget!?  Rotisserie Chickens.
    • Cans of soup—probably chicken noodle and tomato.
    • Doughnuts from the bakery.

    Another idea would be to include some "value combos"—something that would enable you to put together an entire dinner for four, already assembled, perhaps with a recipe included.  For example:

    • A prebaked pizza shell, can of sauce, package of pepperoni, bag of pizza cheese, one green pepper and one onion.
    • One and a half pounds of skinless, boneless chicken breasts, a green vegetable such as broccoli, one box of packaged rice pilaf, and a lemon.
    • A box of Hamburger Helper (TM) along with the hamburger to be helped and, if necessary, supporting items such as cans of tomato paste.  (Just for the record, I do not eat the stuff.  I’m thinking mass appeal here).
    • Some beef sliced for stir-fry, a package of frozen mixed vegetables, and a package of rice.
    • A bag of corn tortillas, a couple cans of imported refried beans, a couple of cans of imported salsa, a tub of queso fresco, and a few fresh tomatoes.
    • A box of spaghetti, two cans of whole tomatoes, an onion, a loaf of bread from the bakery, a chunk of Parmesan cheese (or some pre-shredded cheese), and a bagged Caesar salad.  Four ounces of Italian sausage could be added for an upcharge.

    I’m not saying that all of these options should be available on any given day, but one or two could be nice.

    If I had my way, I’d be able to get

    • Brown rice
    • Old-fashioned oats
    • Butter
    • Canned or aseptically packaged chicken broth
    • Packages of tofu
    • Fresh salmon filets
    • Lemons
    • Chard
    • Garlic
    • Fresh ginger
    • Red and green bell peppers
    • Spinach
    • Cans of whole tomatoes
    • Cans of tuna
    • Quarts of plain yogurt

    Add the chicken breasts and I could feed my family for weeks.

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  • “Well-behaved women rarely make history.”

    That’s the text of a bumper sticker on a car I drive past once or twice a week. 

    Today The Anchoress pretty much blows that theory out of the water.  Or confirms it.  Depending on how you define "well-behaved."

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  • Music for Mass

    Some music isn’t appropriate for Mass.  Why?

    Until pretty recently, I uncritically enjoyed the folksy, eclectic, heavy-on-the-Celtic style of liturgical music that is common at many Catholic churches in the U.S.  I was proud to see in my little parish choir all kinds of instruments thrown together, from piano to electric bass to saxophones to African drums; even a little pipe organ tossed in from time to time. I used to brag to my Protestant friends about the quality of the music at my parish, and sniff at one friend’s "conservative" distinction between "hymns" and "praise songs."  We Catholics adapted all kinds of styles to our worship, I thought proudly.  Diversity and sanctification of the worldly and all that. 

    Sure, some places you only hear a pipe organ; but hey, "traditional" Mass is just as good as "contemporary" Mass.  There’s room for everyone’s preferences.  Isn’t there?

    My first collision with this came when I attended the late Sunday evening Mass at my old parish not long after they’d instituted a "contemporary worship style."  Perhaps I would have been less discomfited by the Christian rock band if it hadn’t been Palm Sunday.  Don’t get me wrong, I like rock music.  Good rock music, that is.  Which is one reason why I’ve never liked Christian rock much:  not very good Christianity, not very good rock.  But especially today, the combination was sour: the cymbals and electric guitars and over-the-top vocals clashed with the story of the Lord’s Passion we’d just heard. The lyrics didn’t have anything to do with Passion Sunday, either—just some religious-sounding words, transcending nothing, ordinary and ever-mediocre pop.

    On the bright side, remaining in the pews probably qualified as mortification of the flesh.

    I learned only later that the Church has a history of specifying which styles of music, indeed which instruments, are appropriate for Mass.  The most recent significant document on the subject seems to be "Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy," or Sacrosanctum Concilium, starting at paragraph 112. 

    Turns out that only the pipe organ is given the blessing of the whole Church, and the local bishop is empowered to decide what other instruments are appropriate or inappropriate for Mass:

    120. In the Latin Church the pipe organ is to be held in high esteem, for it is the traditional musical instrument which adds a wonderful splendor to the Church’s ceremonies and powerfully lifts up man’s mind to God and to higher things.

    But other instruments also may be admitted for use in divine worship, with the knowledge and consent of the competent territorial authority, as laid down in Art. 22, 52, 37, and 40. This may be done, however, only on condition that the instruments are suitable, or can be made suitable, for sacred use, accord with the dignity of the temple, and truly contribute to the edification of the faithful.

    Traditional music of various cultures throughout the world is permitted and to be encouraged, but only where it meets certain requirements:

    112. …[S]acred music is to be considered the more holy in proportion as it is more closely connected with the liturgical action, whether it adds delight to prayer, fosters unity of minds, or confers greater solemnity upon the sacred rites. But the Church approves of all forms of true art having the needed qualities, and admits them into divine worship.

    119. In certain parts of the world, especially mission lands, there are peoples who have their own musical traditions, and these play a great part in their religious and social life. For this reason due importance is to be attached to their music, and a suitable place is to be given to it, not only in forming their attitude toward religion, but also in adapting worship to their native genius, as indicated in Art. 39 and 40.

    Therefore, when missionaries are being given training in music, every effort should be made to see that they become competent in promoting the traditional music of these peoples, both in schools and in sacred services, as far as may be practicable.

    What are the "needed qualities?"  For that we turn to St. Pius X, mentioned in SC as an example of one who "explained… the ministerial function " of sacred music.  In 1903 he wrote "On the Restoration of Sacred Music," Tra le Sollecitudini.  This document is full of specific references to specific instruments.  The piano is forbidden, as are "noisy or frivolous" instruments like cymbals, and "bands."  But he also outlined general principles to follow in the selection of music and instruments.  These principles probably still stand, even if the changing culture has altered their application to specific instruments.

    As I read these documents, I’m coming to agree that much—not necessarily all, but much—contemporary liturgy has departed from the principles that make sacred music sacred.  It lacks transcendence and has devolved to simple entertainment.  It lacks universality and has become instead a hodgepodge of different flavors.

    At the same time I’m sad, because—well—I like a lot of that music.   I can think of many songs I love, some that I’m sure helped me develop as a Christian.  And the idea of banning them from the liturgy seems insane. 

    Till I ask myself, well, why do I need them in the liturgy? 

    And the answer is only:  Because I won’t be able to hear them anywhere else.  So that leads to the question:  Why not?

    Maybe the problem is that a whole class of lovely songs have been culturally restricted to church.   Why do we have to go to Mass to hear this kind of stuff?  Why don’t I have cds that I play at home, for instance? 

    Maybe those songs, with worldly style and holy message, belong in the world calling the people to the Church.  Maybe they don’t belong in the church, recalling us to the world.

    And let’s be honest.  There are a lot of songs in the same hymnal that I positively detest.  I really really really really hate "On Eagle’s Wings,"  (warning: link plays sound) a.k.a. "On Beagle’s Breath," a.k.a. (from its first two syllables) "the yoo-hoo song."  I hate even more, to the point where I feel ill when I hear it, this horrid song called "I Danced In The Morning" (warning:  link plays sound) that everyone seems to call "Lord of the Dance" and that has ruined the tune "Shaker Song" for me. 

    And yet both of those songs were very popular at my old parish.   I resented being trapped in the pews every time they were played, of course, but most people liked them.

    Which brings me to another point.  How contemporary music affects you is largely a matter of taste.  OK, so "I Danced In The Morning" doesn’t appeal to me.  I could pretend "It’s just because the imagery in it is not appropriate for Mass," but frankly anyone else could say the same thing about some of the modern songs that I happen to like.  In Mass itself, in this Universal Church,
    perhaps we should be going for something that transcends personal taste. 

    I don’t know if it’s possible for there to be a truly universal liturgical music. I guess we have to ask what the purpose of music in the Mass is.

    Putting aside for a moment the fact that there are documents giving guidelines about
    music style, let’s pretend that it is our job to design the music for Mass for the church throughout the world:  choose the instruments, the styles, etc.  What would our guiding principles be?

    We can argue back and forth about whether music should be consistent from place to place or reflect the local culture. But until we go back to guiding principles that will be nothing more than the "argument from taste."  Some folks’d never praise with drums, but then again some folk’ll…

    Questions to ponder.

    – Why does the liturgy have music at all?  What elements would be missing without it?

    – Is the music supposed to help us *feel* something?

    – Is the music supposed to make us, or draw us to, *do* something?

    – Is the music supposed to help us *think* something?

    – Is there some music that will affect all of us, or at least those of us who don’t have some kind of pathological association with it, essentially the same way?

    – How is liturgical music analogous to, say, liturgical art (stained glass windows, statuary, altarpieces, etc.)

    – If someone suddenly invented a new kind of musical instrument never heard before, that had no associations with any kind of profane or secular culture, what characteristics would it have that would make it instantly appropriate for Mass?  (Would it be appropriate by default, because of its "purity" of connotation?  If not, why?)

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  • “I cooked. You clean.” part 3

    Part 3 in a series comparing cooking to cleaning.

    So why can’t I arrange a cleaned-up house and present it to my family (and myself) with as much satisfaction as I would present, say, a pan of brownies baked from scratch with best-quality chocolate and real butter and real buttercream frosting?  I made those brownies for Mark’s birthday cake on Tuesday, and it was a fair amount of work, and I suffered from a terrible sugar buzz from licking the mixer paddle, too. 

    First of all, the house isn’t really analogous to a single dish, especially not something special-occasion like brownies.  It’s more like our family’s overall diet.  Which isn’t entirely made up of dishes that I have fun cooking.   

    Breakfast in our house is often a solo affair.  Mark pours himself some cold cereal most mornings, while I scramble some eggs for myself.  The kids get cold cereal or peanut butter toast or oatmeal or eggs, whatever I feel like putting together for them when they get up, usually an hour or so after I’ve eaten.   And lunch is usually leftovers from dinner or else it’s sandwiches.  It’s not very exciting, but it’s generally healthful. 

    And that’s what a clean house is:  day after day, not very exciting, generally healthful.

    Back to the diet.  On the whole, reasonably enjoyable, healthful, unexciting.  Break it down into individual meals, however, and the picture is different.  Ordinary, good food most of the time.  But there is a good deal of variety in every week:  some chicken, some beef, at least one vegetarian dinner, fish twice.  And a lot of different vegetables, too, changing with the seasons.

    So break down the housecleaning to individual rooms, individual tasks.  Some stuff people notice right away, like a freshly mopped and sparkling floor, or polished silverware, or the kitchen when I clear the countertops and wipe them all down from top to bottom with hot soapy water.  That’s more like a nice dinner, not a particularly special one but a well-executed one, like black-bean enchiladas.  I don’t do these things often, and it’s pleasurable to see the results. 

    On the other hand, some work is barely noticed until it doesn’t get done—then we all suffer.  Like laundry.  Nobody ever says, "Wow, that’s great laundry.  I love the way you folded my pants."  But we do say, "Damn it, I have to leave in ten minutes and all my pants are wadded up wet in the dryer."  It’s kind of like oatmeal.  Not very exciting.  But if there isn’t anything to eat for breakfast, some oatmeal sounds pretty good.

    And even oatmeal can be taken to the next level.  There’s oatmeal soaked overnight to make it extra creamy and, in the morning, simmered in fresh milk with a pat of butter melting on the top, chopped walnuts and raisins stirred in, and a pitcher of warm maple syrup on the side. 

    What’s the next level in housecleaning?  Fresh flowers in a vase?  Maybe.  Depends on the room, probably.

    I start planning meals by constructing a sort of bare-bones foundation (beef.  green vegetable.  yellow vegetable.  salad.) and then I work backwards from the presentation, the details that make it special (dried cherries in the salad.  that lovely zinfandel.) to the recipes.  Maybe I should approach housekeeping tasks by thinking of the finishing details first.

    <draws blank>

    OK, fine.  Today I have to put away two baskets of clean laundry.  (Other stuff too, but let’s take that to start.) 

    Prerequisite:  Make bed, in order to have surface on which to sort laundry.

    Minimum requirement (cold cereal):  Laundry exits basket, winds up in correct drawers and/or hangers.

    Improvement (hot-water oatmeal with sugar):  Clothes are actually folded into drawers and/or hung on hangers reasonably neatly.

    Well-executed (creamy oatmeal with pitcher of syrup):  Several options.  I pick dresser tops are cleared off and smart-looking.

    I wonder how much more time it will take me to do this then simply stuffing the clothes into the drawers.

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  • Brooms are the new mops

    Funny that I should mention mopping with such derision the other day.  Yesterday evening we mopped Hannah’s kitchen and living room floors and it was fun.  The method is everything.  I swear we have to do this at my house next week.  Here’s how:

    Between us we have four walking kids, all boys.  We moved the furniture from the kitchen into the living room (the 4- and 5-year-old boys love moving furniture, the heavier the better) and then Hannah handed out brooms to everyone—she has about a dozen, in various sizes—and we swept. 

    Then out came the bucket of soapy water and everyone dipped his or her broom and scrubbed with it.  It is much faster and more effective than mopping, and the bristles going back and forth make a fun scrubbing sound on the floor.  We were all slipping and tripping over and around each other, barefoot, we two women and the five-year-old, four-year-old, almost-three-year-old and finally the sixteen-month-old with his yellow broom eighteen inches long.  She and I did the baseboards while the kids went vroom all over the whole middle of the floor.  Their brooms were bulldozers and steam shovels; ours were percussion instruments, to the rhythm of the Tom Petty music on the stereo.

    "Okay, everyone, go put your brooms in the bathtub!"  We trooped into the bathroom while Hannah came back from the linen closet with an armload of bath towels.  Everyone threw a towel onto the floor, stepped on it with both feet, and shuffled around to the music.  I am thankful the blinds were drawn!  Who knows what strange dancers we looked like from outside?  But when we were done the floor was smooth and clean. 

    The kids were tired by then so we moved the furniture back ourselves.  The whole process took only twenty minutes.

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  • Forgotten Sweet Potato Pie

    I brought our dinner ingredients to Hannah’s today, intending to cook them at her house and bring home at five o’clock a ready-to-eat dinner  (spinach ricotta pie from the Moosewood Cookbook ).  Because it’s just as easy to make two, I made an extra pie crust in case we needed it for lunch. 

    The pre-heating oven seemed a little too aromatic, and I opened it to discover a pan of already-roasted sweet potatoes.  "Oh, I forgot about those last night!" said Hannah.  "They weren’t done at dinner time, so we went ahead and ate, and I haven’t thought about them since."

    I suggested she boil them for stock, but then it occurred to me that we could make a pie out of them.  "Something eggy, with nutmeg, like a custard pie, but savory."  Hannah remembered a recipe for a savory custard from one of her cookbooks , and together we developed from it this recipe:

    Savory Sweet Potato Pie

    4                  sweet potatoes, roasted until very soft
    4                 eggs, beaten
    1/2  c.       cream (or milk)
    2 T                minced onion
    1/2  tsp     salt
    1/4 tsp        cayenne
    1  tsp             nutmeg (or more to taste)
    1/2 tsp     freshly ground black pepper (or more to taste)
    1                      unbaked, unsweetened pie crust

    Arrange pie crust in Pyrex pie plate.  Remove sweet potatoes from skins and mash well.  Stir in eggs, onion, cream, salt, and spices.   Taste to correct seasoning; the black pepper should be noticeable.  Pour into pie shell and bake at 375 F for 20 minutes or more until lightly browned.

    We knew this one was a winner as soon as we took a bite.  The kids liked it too.   The savory, slightly spicy, slightly sweet flavor would be nice with some yogurt on the side and a very simply dressed salad.

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  • “I cooked. You clean.” part 2.

    The second part in a series about the difference between cooking and other housework.

    Eating in restaurants is my favorite entertainment. I love the whole process of checking coats and sitting down and examining a menu and listening to the waiter recite the daily specials. I love receiving the courses, one by one, especially if it’s one of those restaurants that is famous for attractive presentation, so that each dish is a little jewel or architectural marvel. I love the whole ritual of dessert and coffee at the end. Mark knows this and never gets me any birthday or anniversary present that isn’t a dinner out. Once, I kid you not, I looked at a menu and it was so lovely and ambitious that tears of appreciation welled up in my eyes.

    I read a lot of restaurant reviews, too. We don’t go out as often as I would, theoretically, like (in practice, with the two little ones, it is sometimes difficult, and we don’t want to spend as much money as that would entail!) but I still can appreciate the experiences vicariously.

    This morning, I looked at my menu plan ("pan fried steak, leftover roast squash, green veg, peppers and onions")—I wrote that Sunday when I was making the grocery list. The meal began in my imagination and I will think of it several times today before four o’clock, when I enter the kitchen to prepare it.

    First I thought of the squash, butternut. I roasted it yesterday in Hannah’s oven, cut side up, rubbed with a little unsalted butter. (I buy Pastureland brand butter. The cows are grass-fed.) Today, I decided, I will saute onions and carrots, simmer them in chicken stock, add the squash and puree it to make a velvety soup. (The texture of butternut squash soup is unbelievable; you would swear it was full of cream, or egg yolks or something.)

    Then my mind turned to the steak. (Formerly a hormone-free, grain-fed and pastured steer that belonged to my in-laws’ neighbor.) I already know I am going to pan-roast it with butter or olive oil, because the grill is buried in snow and I never get it done properly under the broiler. The question is how to sauce and flavor it. Lots of black pepper pressed into the meat? Quick reduction sauce? If so, a simple one with leftover beef stock and a little butter, or a more complex one with red wine boiled down to a syrup? I had some cream (Cedar Summit Farm brand, grass-fed cows again), but I hoarded it too long and it’s gone bad, so I won’t use that… Maybe I’ll just add some balsamic vinegar to the peppers and onions, let them cook down to a marmalade and top the steak with that. In that case, definitely olive oil, not butter.

    And so on, and so on. I haven’t even looked in my refrigerator yet to find out what the "green veg" IS, but whatever it is I will probably just steam it.

    Sometimes I aim the dish to please me, sometimes I aim it at one of my children (Oscar loves stewed tomatoes, for example), and sometimes I aim it at Mark. Once before we were married, in my apartment in Columbus, I made an invented dish of chicken marinated in balsamic vinegar and rosemary and sauteed, with a pan sauce made from the vinegar and some butter; he took one bite, looked amazed and told me "Dear, you are an excellent cook," and I’ve been trying to get that expresssion on his face again ever since. Occasionally, I think, I’ve almost got it.

    Cooking pleases my family, it engages my imagination, it reminds me of romance, it allies me (in my mind anyway) with the people behind the swinging kitchen door of my favorite places to go. No wonder I love it. It’s hard to imagine feeling that way about mopping the floor.

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  • “I cooked. You clean up.”

    One of the things I had to make peace with when I came home—that is, became what is called a "stay-at-home mother"—was housework. More accurately, it’s one of the things I am making peace with, now that I’m here.

    And I’m not doing such a great job of it. Back when I was in graduate school and Mark worked part-time, we shared it. I think Mark must have done more, because when we were home together I needed to nurse the baby and so much of the other things would have fallen to him. Even now that I’ve been home for ten months, Mark still seems to do a disproportionate amount.

    There was a time when I would clean the house more; I did it to avoid working on my thesis. Maybe I need to find something else I can avoid through housecleaning. Why don’t I find it more satisfying?

    Because the social expectation is that housework is drudgery? Is it because of generations of articles in women’s magazines bemoaning that men don’t keep up their share of the work (not in my house; see above)? Is it because the people paid to do it by the wealthy aren’t really paid that much? (This link recommends that a self-employed housecleaner charge $25 to $50 per hour, with a quarter to half of that paying the business’s expenses.) Is it because it doesn’t require a lot of thought? Is it because it’s uncreative? Is it because you essentially do the same thing, every day, and each day the previous day’s work is unmade and has to be made again?

    I don’t think the answer is in the nature of the work itself, because a tiny subset of housework is something I love doing, enjoy doing, do enthusiastically every day with great satisfaction: making dinner. I really, really, really love to cook. I love sitting down to plan the meals; I love paging through cookbooks and selecting new recipes to try; I love fine-tuning recipes to fit my family’s tastes and lifestyle; I love chopping, sauteing, deglazing, simmering, checking the seasonings, garnishing, saucing, and plunking the whole thing down on the table.

    I tried just now to think of something I don’t like about cooking, and the only things I could think of were "stirring risotto" (because it hurts my arm, after a while) and "burning my mouth" (I am forever forgetting to blow on the spoon). Come to think of it, I don’t like assembling enchiladas either.

    I do have evenings when I just can’t face making dinner, and we go out or I get carryout.  But those are pretty rare, and to be honest they have more to do with not wanting to make the kitchen any messier than it already is.

    So what’s the difference between cooking and cleaning? More on this later, I hope.

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  • “So that’s what they’re for”

    Editing note years later.  This is one of my earliest posts on the subject.  If I were to write it today, I’d want to make it more clear that the problem, or fault, with just baring one’s breast to nurse a baby doesn’t belong to either mother or baby.  It’s not surprising that we usually don’t feel comfortable doing it here in the States, because people are weird about it, and that makes it potentially not safe for us.  But it’s not the breast or the baby that’s weird.

     

    Interesting discussion over at Amy Welborn’s blog about this photograph showing President Chavez of Venezuela talking with a woman affected by flooding near Caracas.  The woman in the photograph is breastfeeding a young toddler in such a way that her left breast is entirely exposed, except for the nipple.

    Should we nurse this way in the United States?  Should she nurse the way women in the U.S. do, behind closed doors/under a blanket/from under the shirt without exposing cleavage?  I think the answer is no to both.  I don’t think anyone here should nurse under a blanket, either, frankly.  I wish we could, modestly, flop a breast out to feed a hungry baby, but we can’t.  Nor do I agree that we should, in a effort to change attitudes and make people see breastfeeding like this as the normal, healthy, God-created action that it (in fact) is.  Why not?

    The fundamental concept to understand here is that modesty is a type of the virtue of temperance.  Temperance is the virtue of avoiding extremes of behavior.   Eating with temperance avoids the extremes of malnutrition and gluttony; arguing with temperance avoids the extremes of timid deference nor belligerence.  Modesty, specifically, is temperance in the presentation of the self to others.  Modesty calls me to dress, act, and speak in a way that authentically expresses my true self and allows me to perform the duties proper to my state in life without drawing undue attention to myself.  If I am modest, I avoid both shamelessness (in which I draw undue attention to myself) and prudishness (in which I suppress myself or fail in my duties in an effort to avoid being seen at all).  Ironically, prudishness can also draw undue attention; think of appearing at the beach in a burqa.

    What is the true self, the image that accurately projects us to the world?  It is to be seen as an image of God.  We are created in God’s own image, and to be appropriately modest is to present ourselves so that the image is as clear as possible.  This means we mustn’t hide aspects that are easily seen by all as aspects of God himself.  But it does mean we should downplay aspects that many people will only see as distortions.

    Because the behaviors classified as “modest” depend on the disposition of other people towards them, and because modesty (being a kind of temperance) always modulates a tension between two extremes, those behaviors are culturally and situationally variable.  If it’s typical in that part of Venezuela to expose the breast while breastfeeding—if people view the exposed breast feeding a child, without distortion, as normal and part of God’s plan for feeding babies— the mother in the photograph isn’t being immodest.   Good for her, and good for that culture, because it’s sure more supportive of breastfeeding when the umbrella of “modestly” stretches over a wider spectrum of nursing styles.

    Here, though, it’s immodest, because the female breast is overwhelmingly perceived with a great deal of distortion, as an object of sexual titillation rather than as an organ for nourishing babies.  The two perceptions don’t go hand in hand here; it’s titillation-for-males first, food-for-babies far behind.   American men and women do not typically look at that woman with her wonderful, life-giving breast and think, “God is good and nourishes us like that mother nourishes her child.”  They do not really see her at all, nor can they see God in her, distracted as they are by the distortion in their hearts.

    Jesus said, “Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God.”  One who cannot see God where God is lacks purity.

    This whole culture sorely lacks purity of heart in its perception of the female breast.  And the umbrella of modesty, it is sad to say, depends heavily on the umbrella of purity.  Where the culture’s heart is pure, the culture’s behavior can be modest.  Modesty is a virtue precisely because it protects us from being damaged by others’ impurity, and helps keep others from temptation.

    Like many, many breastfeeding mothers, I wish the culture would change so that breastfeeding openly would not shock or titillate people, so that I could expose my breast to feed my child without being objectifid.  I wish that the umbrella of modesty would widen.  But I know that brazenly exposing skin while nursing—deliberate immodesty—will not change the culture.  We cannot create purity by discarding the virtue of modesty.  The purity of heart has to come first.  If we discard modesty and expose our breasts more often, people will be less shocked but no less titillated.  What will happen instead is that it will become more acceptable for women (particularly mothers) to be sexually  objectified.  We might, for instance, see a mainstreaming of pornography depicting distortions of breastfeeding.

    We can’t create purity by being prudish, either, hiding nursing away from everyone so that no one ever sees a child nurse.  That kind of immodesty prevents the culture from changing, because it suppresses the image of breasts as an organ of nourishment.

    If we breastfeed not prudishly but openly and modestly—if we are matter-of-fact
    about our breastfeeding, don’t hide, make it obvious that we breastfeed (as mothers should) but also make it obvious that we can do so without titillating people—then more people, men in particular, will recognize that the purpose of breasts is primarily to feed babies.  The sexualization of the breast, divorced from their function, is what got us into this situation.  By being clear about the function of the breast while denying satisfaction to those who would objectify us, we CAN change the culture.  When people once again can look at the female breast and see God—when they can look at it in all purity—then we can nurse, exposed, in all modesty.

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  • Poison Control: Cough syrup

    We called Poison Control last night after Milo (16 months) opened a bottle of children’s cold medicine, the kind with pseudephedrine and dextromethorphan. He had spilled some of it, so we weren’t sure how much he’d swallowed, even though it was a new bottle. Mark poured the remains into a measuring cup marked in ounces (note to self: obtain 150-ml graduated cylinder for household use) and estimated he’d had somewhere between three and eight doses. The operator asked me a few questions, put me on hold briefly to get the information, and returned: feed him a snack, give him four to six ounces of milk to dilute, expect jitteriness and dizziness, call back if we have questions.

    This is the third time we’ve called the poison control number. The first time, Milo had eaten maybe an ounce of bar soap; I hadn’t ever considered soap as a hazardous substance, but he refused to nurse and cried and cried in pain from it while I searched for the phone number. (Give him milk, the operator said. He won’t breastfeed, and he won’t drink either! Give him ice cream, then. He slurped it right down and was instantly better.) The second time, the two-year-old daughter of a friend had bitten into a tube of rubber cement and it squirted into her mouth. I wasn’t in the room for all of this story, so I don’t remember what else the operators told our friend to do, but I remember they said it would make her sleepy, and to let her sleep but keep an eye on her. It did, and she did. After that, I wrote the number down inside a family health reference book. The national toll-free number is 1-800-222-1222.

    Helpful folks, the poison control staffers. Nobody should ever hesitate to call them; if it’s nothing to be worried about, they’ll tell you so and you’ll feel better, and they can also help you help your child feel better. I know that giving milk or water helps in some poisonings or irritations, but I would never have thought of ice cream as the ideal substance to keep around just in case a child refuses milk or water. It makes perfect sense, but I never thought of it.

    The webpage of the American Association of Poison Control Centers has some interesting and useful information. Top of the list: Find Your Poison Control Center by zipcode. There’s also data on the training of the staff (they are mostly nurses and pharmacists) and many informational links.

    I scanned through tables of pediatric (children under six) exposures to pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical substances. The data appears to have been compiled from calls to poison control centers. Among pharmaceutical products, the most frequently reported exposures (more than 10,000 in that year) include children’s acetominophen, children’s ibuprofen, antihistamines, antibiotics, antacids, "topical diaper products," and kids’ multivitamins. To me this suggests the following general rule: If you keep stuff in your house and use it often, your small children will try to eat it.

    Among the non-pharmaceutical substances, "pens and ink" stood out to me, because (a) a large number of people called Poison Control when their kids apparently bit into a pen and (b) my kids have bitten into countless pens, but I never once thought about "ink poisoning." I also noticed that, while cleaning supplies in general accounted for a very large number of calls, common bleach seemed to be the most frequently called-about cleaner. That seemed a bit odd—why would children tend to drink bleach more than, say, window cleaner or dish soap? Then it occurred to me that bleach is one of those substances that Everyone Knows Is Poisonous. Perhaps more people call Poison Control when their child seems to have swallowed bleach than they would if it were window cleaner. Or perhaps the warnings on the side of the bottle are more vigorous. My suspicions were strengthened when I saw the very large number of calls about "desiccants"—I can only assume we are talking about those little packets, found inside new shoes and purses, that are marked in bold capital letters "DO NOT EAT."

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  • Ash Wednesday: Hummus and vegetables

    Today is Ash Wednesday, so Catholics throughout the world are fasting and abstaining from meat.  I just made a batch of hummus, which we’ll have with pita bread and raw vegetables:  carrots, red cabbage, celery, green pepper. 

    When I make hummus, I usually refer back to one or two cookbooks (such as The New Moosewood Cookbook by Mollie Katzen) but I vary the ingredients considerably.  It’s basically garlic, chickpeas, lemon juice, and parsley, plus whatever else I want to throw in or have around.

    I started on Monday night by soaking a bag of chickpeas in warm water to cover with a few tablespoons of whey added.  The whey is optional, but speeds the soak and helps break down the chickpeas a bit.   Tuesday night, I drained them and rinsed them and put them in the Crockpot on low heat, overnight, with water and salt.  By this morning they were cooked, and I transferred them and their liquid to the refrigerator. 

    A little while ago I put five peeled cloves of garlic, five trimmed green onions, and about one and a half bunches of parsley (I love parsley; it’s nutritious and turns the hummus a lovely pale green) into my Cuisinart food processor and chopped it very fine.  That went into the big mixing bowl.  Then in two batches I pureed the drained chickpeas with about three-quarters of a cup, total, of tahini, three-quarters of a cup, total, of lemon juice, a handful of the parsley mixture, and some salt.  I poured a few glugs of olive oil into the feed tube while it was going each time.   Then I folded it all together into the bowl.   I added some black pepper, cumin, and cayenne as well.

    Now I have to ask:  does tasting a dish for purposes of correcting the seasoning count as impermissible between-meal snacking on a fast day?  How about licking the spoon? 

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