Tony and I have reached a point in our lives of just eating what's available.
This may sound worse than it actually is. We don't dumpster dive or gnaw on bark, but meal planning and grocery shopping has become a chore. It's easier to just manage with what's in the fridge, foraged from the garden, or picked up from the fruit and corn stands on the way home. We live off watermelon, lemon elberta peaches, and salsa made from his mother's garden tomatoes.
For several days, excluding a much appreciated dinner invite, literally, my mainstay was peaches and ice cream, salsa and chips. After the unavoidable tummy bump, I'm scaling back: peaches without ice cream, less cheese on the chips, and lots more salsa. A smothering of salsa--fresh tomatoes, jalapenos, an overload of sweet onions and cilantro...
And salt.
The flavor of the watermelons have peaked, and the sad day nears when we will buy the last watermelon, knowing so because the flavor just isn't the same anymore..
For too many years, I've chided my mother for failing to take more care in her eating. She is currently content to buy a loaf of cinnamon bread, a hunk of cheese and wedge them together in the morning. She may head off to a meeting where she'll eat the bagels or the donuts, and if gets hungry, she'll slap together another sandwich.
Knowing older people tend not to make meals for themselves, I tried to remember my sweet elderly neighbor whenever I cooked. I'd walk over with a container of soup, and she frequently mentioned she'd just eaten while pointing to a box of Sees chocolates sitting on the stand next to her comfy television chair. Sometimes, she seemed bothered that I'd brought her real, wholesome food.
Wholesome homemade food has always been important to me, so why now are Tony and I making the eat-what's-available transition in our lives?
Foremost, busyness. Life has not slowed down, it's accelerated--our choice. Urgent matters have taken precedent over meal preparation--we've learned we can always run to the taqueira and grab a burrito.
Second-most is the absence of the children. It's what forced me to most-nights, make a nutritious dinner. Greens, beans, protein, salads, and fruits. Behind every chopped cabbage, there was purpose--behind every action there must be purpose. When the purpose has passed, the action stops.
My friend-since-the-first-grade is a Psychologist. She frequently inquires as to my mother's health and state of mind, because the majority of her patients are aged and seek her wisdom in rekindling their joy de vivre. What she finds is that her patients have lost their purpose. When purpose is absent, so is meaning to life.
One summer, Tony and I spent a month on the southern coast of France and we noticed consistently grandparents, both a grandma and a grandpa, who were the caretakers of a grandchild. They looked to be retirement age, but it appeared that they'd taken on a new responsibility, a new purpose--childcare. My same psychologist friend had grandparents who'd taken care of her.
It's hard work, but I can see no greater purpose to life than devotion to another generation.
Living in an older neighborhood, I am surrounded by older people who are examples of finding purpose in life. They serve one another, they travel together, they meet for dinner, for soirees, for company. They volunteer for caucuses, for election duty; some help children read at the elementary school.
Life is a constant shift.
~~
Most of our cars in 2018 come with automatic shifting. Rare is the car that requires manual shifting from one gear to another. I'm not so sure that as we age, that we shift automatically, and hence, it's easy to stay in low gear. Like a manual transmission, we must consciously step on the clutch, grasp the shift, grind the gears a few times, but work towards moving into high gear.
The happy gear, the purposeful gear.
This may sound worse than it actually is. We don't dumpster dive or gnaw on bark, but meal planning and grocery shopping has become a chore. It's easier to just manage with what's in the fridge, foraged from the garden, or picked up from the fruit and corn stands on the way home. We live off watermelon, lemon elberta peaches, and salsa made from his mother's garden tomatoes.
For several days, excluding a much appreciated dinner invite, literally, my mainstay was peaches and ice cream, salsa and chips. After the unavoidable tummy bump, I'm scaling back: peaches without ice cream, less cheese on the chips, and lots more salsa. A smothering of salsa--fresh tomatoes, jalapenos, an overload of sweet onions and cilantro...
And salt.
The flavor of the watermelons have peaked, and the sad day nears when we will buy the last watermelon, knowing so because the flavor just isn't the same anymore..
For too many years, I've chided my mother for failing to take more care in her eating. She is currently content to buy a loaf of cinnamon bread, a hunk of cheese and wedge them together in the morning. She may head off to a meeting where she'll eat the bagels or the donuts, and if gets hungry, she'll slap together another sandwich.
Knowing older people tend not to make meals for themselves, I tried to remember my sweet elderly neighbor whenever I cooked. I'd walk over with a container of soup, and she frequently mentioned she'd just eaten while pointing to a box of Sees chocolates sitting on the stand next to her comfy television chair. Sometimes, she seemed bothered that I'd brought her real, wholesome food.
Wholesome homemade food has always been important to me, so why now are Tony and I making the eat-what's-available transition in our lives?
Foremost, busyness. Life has not slowed down, it's accelerated--our choice. Urgent matters have taken precedent over meal preparation--we've learned we can always run to the taqueira and grab a burrito.
Second-most is the absence of the children. It's what forced me to most-nights, make a nutritious dinner. Greens, beans, protein, salads, and fruits. Behind every chopped cabbage, there was purpose--behind every action there must be purpose. When the purpose has passed, the action stops.
My friend-since-the-first-grade is a Psychologist. She frequently inquires as to my mother's health and state of mind, because the majority of her patients are aged and seek her wisdom in rekindling their joy de vivre. What she finds is that her patients have lost their purpose. When purpose is absent, so is meaning to life.
One summer, Tony and I spent a month on the southern coast of France and we noticed consistently grandparents, both a grandma and a grandpa, who were the caretakers of a grandchild. They looked to be retirement age, but it appeared that they'd taken on a new responsibility, a new purpose--childcare. My same psychologist friend had grandparents who'd taken care of her.
It's hard work, but I can see no greater purpose to life than devotion to another generation.
Living in an older neighborhood, I am surrounded by older people who are examples of finding purpose in life. They serve one another, they travel together, they meet for dinner, for soirees, for company. They volunteer for caucuses, for election duty; some help children read at the elementary school.
Life is a constant shift.
~~
Most of our cars in 2018 come with automatic shifting. Rare is the car that requires manual shifting from one gear to another. I'm not so sure that as we age, that we shift automatically, and hence, it's easy to stay in low gear. Like a manual transmission, we must consciously step on the clutch, grasp the shift, grind the gears a few times, but work towards moving into high gear.
The happy gear, the purposeful gear.
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