Domestically challenged.
I grew up in a VERY Christian home. I mean my mom was so intent on playing the piano at church that the pastor had to beg her to go to the hospital when she was having me. I jokingly say that I was born under the piano. She just knew that she could finish the service. Well thank God for common sense.
As I was growing up I admired my mothers ability to play the piano. I found out that while I was an infant she would put me under the piano while she played for the service. Doomed from the start to be a musician! Thank God she didn’t milk cows or race cars, who knows what I would have become. Maybe the first cow baby or the first race car baby? I mean my mother is definitely committed to whatever she’s doing. Very project and purpose oriented. While growing up she used to sew our clothes, dresses, hats, coats, etc. SUPER MOM. Until one day... I’ll never forget it. She was sewing away and I was young enough to be home and hear her scream and tell me to go get the neighbor. Yep, the needle went all the way through her fingernail and finger. No! Please erase that memory. She pretty much stopped sewing a lot after that and let me tell you, I was traumatized. Mom had big visions and dreams and was what I call, on stage, all the time. She even cooked with a wig on. Have you ever smelled burned wig? I’m sorry mom, but your cooking and my sense of eating were not meant for each other. I was born in California. Mom was from, “Back East”, whatever that means. All I knew was that the things she cooked were not conducive to my California pallet. She loved to cook vegetables. I do mean cook them. Now, I’m not talking about her behind her back because I’ve already mentioned these issues to her personally. My father was from "Back East" too so, he liked stuff that she cooked. Me, not so much. She tried, but there was little to no hope that I was going to eat whatever she cooked. I saw food do things that nothing you put in your mouth should ever do. For example: okra. Is is supposed to slime out of the pan and slush over the plate? One time she made egg plant and put it on my plate. I was like, are you kidding me? She insisted I take a bite, so I did . I gagged so hard that my dad made her promise never to try feeding me that again. Growing up in the city I didn’t think about where things came from. I mean, didn’t everything come from the grocery store? I never thought about what it was before the grocery store. Hamburger was hamburger from the store, meat was something they made at the store. I had no idea it came from something. Until one fateful day. We were eating fried chicken, I loved fried chicken. I had eaten a breast portion a time or two until I pulled out this one part of the chicken breast and said, “what is this” “oh” my mother replied. “That’s the heart.” WHAT? I decided to eat only chicken legs. I didn’t care about legless chickens, but a chicken without a heart.,. That meant it was dead. Isn’t it funny how our (well my) mind processed things? One time she served up this huge piece of fried meat. I decided that it wasn’t that bad. Then I found out that it was.... get this...LIVER! I had major trust issues with my mothers cooking. How could she betray me by putting chicken hearts and livers on the table. And what in the world is an eggplant? Plants can’t lay eggs. One of my dads favorite meals was what I called, “gravy bread” . I’ve heard people tell me that it’s a normal food and that a lot of people eat it. To me it was a bunch of lumpy stuff on a piece of soggy toast. You’ve got to be kidding me. The vegetable aversion continued. She would put it on my plate, I would chop it up and roll it under the plate and politely volunteer to do the dishes. Anything except eating green food. She never really caught on. Hi Mom!😁 Everywhere we went I ordered the same thing and if they didn’t have it, I didn’t eat. I think I alone made McDonald’s the largest fast food chain in the world. The conversation went something like this, “Barjeana , what do you want to eat?” My favorite words always came out of my mouth, even when I was just learning to talk. “Hamburger and French Fries.” Yep, that was the only food in the world that I enjoyed. I mean when you got it from McDonald’s it came in a bun with tiny onions? Ketchup and mustard and pickles, what more could you ask for? Oh, I didn’t realize that pickles were vegetables for a long time. Now see , you think I’m making all of this up. That is not possible. It’s all true, just ask my mother. So, when I got older and decided to get married I told XMAN right up front. I will clean, but I will not cook. I’d seen what food looked like before it was cooked and I was not touching it! Listen, this is s judgement free zone! So, according to what I believed there were four DO NOT's. 1) DO NOT do drugs. 2) DO NOT smoke. 3) DO NOT cook and for heavens sake never do number 4) sew. I was once told that I was domestically challenged. WHAT? I did my part, I had babies? I changed diapers, I mowed the law, I did the laundry and I cleaned up the kitchen. A deal is a deal! So now that I’m .. older... I’ve discovered several things. You should have seen everyone’s faces when I ordered chicken at a restaurant for the first time. Then I ate a salad ! Then I made a salad, on purpose mind you! I cooked chili, spaghetti , tacos, comfort foods and the Lord said ,”it was good.” I’ve learned to cook. However I will not eat any food that follows you out of the pan after it’s cooked. Just say NO to Okra! I've actually been asked to make salads. I figured out the secret. Put stuff all over it and make it unrecognizable. I put sunflower seeds, bacon bits, tiny tomatoes , sometimes grapes, craisins, and my favorite: “Olive Garden dressing”. Who knew you could buy that stuff at the store? I’ve been blessed because my children loved vegetables. They didn’t experience the horror of the state my food was in. My mom made their salad fun. There were flowers (cauliflower) and trees (broccoli) and they were dipped in nice ranch dressing. It wasn’t fair. Where was ranch dressing while I was a kid? So this past year I felt the need to sew. Yes, I did. I had no idea how, but there were things I wanted to make that I couldn’t do without a machine. (Commercial break) go to my Etsy.com page and search for HatsandHeadbandsShop and find out what challenged my "DO NOT" sew thinking . Commercial over now. So, who does a grown woman ask to teach her to sew? That was a problem. It would require patience and someone who would not laugh. I found such a woman. My sister introduced us. She met me at a Walmart and asked me what kind of machine I wanted. I wanted to laugh and say? “ do you know who you’re talking to?” But I didn’t, I just looked at her and said, “ I have no idea!” So, we located the simplest machine possible. I mean it even had Braille markings for sewing in the dark. (Not really ) However it did have pictures on it . Sewing for dummies! Now I realized that if I could get through physics, geology, and algebra and not die, sewing should not be that hard. Well, thanks to my curiosity about cooking and my sewing angel, I am now fully domesticated! Ha! I have broken half of the mythical rules. I now cook and sew and I’m quite proud of it. Of course people who have known me for any length of time think that I’ve been taken over by aliens, but hey, I’m happy and no food has been murdered by my hands? Yet...  |
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