Sentimental Feminist?
I suck.
After last year's Thanksgiving, when I complained about feeling too overworked, I thought there's no way I'm going to put myself in that position again. If anybody wants turkey this year, they're gonna have to make it themselves.
Then, as always, I started getting sentimental. There's apparently something genetically wired into me that frickin loves the smell of turkey as it is baking for hours. Eating Stove Top and Mashed Potato Flakes and basking in the cleverness of substituting these for the time-consuming counterparts my grandma would make. Topping it with gravy that I always think I'm going to screw up and it ends up boiling over and spilling on the whole stove but apparently the boiling-over is the secret ingredient in making it taste awesome to me. That, and a lot of salt and grease.
But the feminist part of me said "No!".
So when Rod suggested tonight bringing home a pre-made turkey meal from a restaurant for Thanksgiving, my brain was at 100% CPU usage for nearly 60 full seconds, not sure how to respond. At first I thought my feelings were hurt, as in "MY HUSBAND DOESN'T LIKE MY COOKING!", and then I thought "Wow, that's so Debra Barone of me. I hate Debra Barone.", and then I thought "No, he's probably just trying to think of a way to make things easier this year."
The sentimental part of my brain started getting sad and accusing the feminist part of my brain of ruining Thanksgiving. The feminist part of my brain told the sentimental part of my brain to grow a pair.
Tradition is important to me. But so is being valued like an equal and getting as much time to relax as the men in my family do. I need to learn how to give something up. Not caring about the emotional value of a meal is probably a good way to start.
After last year's Thanksgiving, when I complained about feeling too overworked, I thought there's no way I'm going to put myself in that position again. If anybody wants turkey this year, they're gonna have to make it themselves.
Then, as always, I started getting sentimental. There's apparently something genetically wired into me that frickin loves the smell of turkey as it is baking for hours. Eating Stove Top and Mashed Potato Flakes and basking in the cleverness of substituting these for the time-consuming counterparts my grandma would make. Topping it with gravy that I always think I'm going to screw up and it ends up boiling over and spilling on the whole stove but apparently the boiling-over is the secret ingredient in making it taste awesome to me. That, and a lot of salt and grease.
But the feminist part of me said "No!".
So when Rod suggested tonight bringing home a pre-made turkey meal from a restaurant for Thanksgiving, my brain was at 100% CPU usage for nearly 60 full seconds, not sure how to respond. At first I thought my feelings were hurt, as in "MY HUSBAND DOESN'T LIKE MY COOKING!", and then I thought "Wow, that's so Debra Barone of me. I hate Debra Barone.", and then I thought "No, he's probably just trying to think of a way to make things easier this year."
The sentimental part of my brain started getting sad and accusing the feminist part of my brain of ruining Thanksgiving. The feminist part of my brain told the sentimental part of my brain to grow a pair.
Tradition is important to me. But so is being valued like an equal and getting as much time to relax as the men in my family do. I need to learn how to give something up. Not caring about the emotional value of a meal is probably a good way to start.
posted by Amanda Shankle-Knowlton | 6:16 PM
3 Comments:
The pre-made turkey idea is a fine one (and probably my personal choice if this were my decision).
BUT - I think it's odd how you've framed this issue. There are many ways that you could preserve both feminism and sentimentality/tradition.
1) You and your husband could both make the turkey.
2) You could make the turkey and your husband could make the sides (or vice-versa).
3) You could enjoy yourself making just a turkey and gravy and the rest of the meal is pot-luck (assuming you have other guests?).
4) You could make the whole meal and your husband could clean up afterwards while you take a nap.
5) Your husband could do everything while you watch TV.
6) You could do all the work because you've decided you legitimately enjoy it, assuming that your family genuinely appreciates it (in the form of verbal thanks AND reciprocating in some manner at a later time).
In all of these options, traditional Thanksgiving dinner and feminism are not mutually exclusive things. The fact that you feel that YOU "need to give something up" makes me think that something is not quite right here. I've been a feminist for a long time and I can tell you that the emotional value of a meal is very important to me, and not in any way at odds with my feminism!
Now, in my case I can muster quite a bit of emotional value from a store-bought turkey. (And maybe you can too.) But if for some reason you truly see it as a loss, then this should be set on the negotiating table alongside everything else. The end result may not be exactly what you want (Like, if your husband doesn't really care about home-made turkey and gravy, the result of negotiation will probably NOT be option #5.) But, IMHO, your desire for "the real thing" is legitimate and should be accorded a value/weight by the whole family, not just something you grapple with yourself. And please note, I am not commenting your actual family (which I know little about) so much as how I would see this in a generic sense!
I'm sort-of laughing at myself going on quite this much about Thanksgiving minutiae, but actually, it's pretty important. Ideally, we can enjoy the sentimental tradition of shared cooking, cleaning up and chilling out with our families, to whatever extent we all decide, but not necessarily according to the gender roles placed before us.
Also, since I'm responding to this on Thanksgiving Day itself, I hope that whatever you end up doing results in a very happy YOU! Enjoy your day!
Thanks for your comment! It ended up turning out just fine. We went with the pre-cooked turkey, which actually tasted pretty good. It was much better than the one I had before. Getting the pre-made sides was actually good too. It didn't taste perfect but they were okay. I made a green bean casserole - probably my only dealbreaker tradition but it's pretty easy.
But the extra time I wasn't trying to juggle potatoes, gravy, and stuffing was very well spent - I went outside and played some ball with the baby and my brother and got some good photos of them.
So I'm feeling much better about how today went compared with last year. I ordered the turkey meal, Rod picked it up. I put the turkey in the oven, Rod took it out. My brother helped me put everything back in the fridge, and I left a stack of dishes in the sink for Rod to do at his leisure.
Happy Thanksgiving to you too!
Hi !.
might , probably very interested to know how one can manage to receive high yields .
There is no need to invest much at first. You may begin to get income with as small sum of money as 20-100 dollars.
AimTrust is what you haven`t ever dreamt of such a chance to become rich
AimTrust incorporates an offshore structure with advanced asset management technologies in production and delivery of pipes for oil and gas.
It is based in Panama with affiliates everywhere: In USA, Canada, Cyprus.
Do you want to become a happy investor?
That`s your choice That`s what you wish in the long run!
I`m happy and lucky, I began to take up real money with the help of this company,
and I invite you to do the same. If it gets down to choose a proper companion utilizes your funds in a right way - that`s it!.
I make 2G daily, and what I started with was a funny sum of 500 bucks!
It`s easy to start , just click this link http://mecytybu.freewebsitehosting.com/wevoxec.html
and go! Let`s take this option together to feel the smell of real money
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home