Women in Primetime

I'm terrible at keeping a theme here.  Also, I'm terrible at scheduling posts.  That Christmas presents post wasn't supposed to go up until yesterday.  What the hell, Blogger?

Anyway, I was working from home yesterday and turned on the first episode of PBS's America in Primetime, which focused on women in television.  It spanned the timeline of television: from Lucy and June Cleaver to the women of Sex and the City and Desperate Housewives.  I've always been a television watcher--it was way more interesting than anything going on in my life, even as a little child--so I recognized most of these characters, even if I didn't grow up in the original era.

I don't know if you've seen it, but basically it talks about women's roles in television.  June Cleaver was the (a)typical fifties housewife; Mary Tyler Moore as Dick Van Dyke's wife was a game-changer, as was her later role on her own show; Roseanne, Murphy Brown, Carrie Bradshaw--all were iconic in their own ways.  As the social scene changed, female characters did too--sometimes as a cause or an effect, depending on the situation--and there were very few examples of weak, dependent women who left lasting impacts on society (however, they focused on sitcoms only, so the reality television stars of today were nowhere to be found.  I've yet to think of any of them as a role model).

Anyway, I'm watching this as I'm peeling carrots and parsnips and garlic.  I'm watching it as I'm cleaning the giblets out of a chicken.  I'm watching as my boyfriend sits at his office, not even thinking about who will make dinner.  I'm watching and realize I'm actually wearing an apron.  And I'm listening to these women talk about how they didn't just want to be a housewife, how they wanted more, how what they did was good, hard work and how they loved it.  I'm thinking about how I used to yearn for that, and now all I yearn for is bedtime.  I'm wondering what happened.

I tend to be pretty domestic, either as a direct result of my living situation or as a way to cope with it.  Things like sewing, embroidery, cooking, baking--these are comforts to me.  I don't do it because I have to.  I could just as easily not go grocery shopping and buy a rotisserie chicken from Giant every night.  But I take on this role because the responsibility makes me feel important.  I feel like, because I'm not fulfilled in my career, I can possibly fulfill myself at home by making something with my own hands.  I think this is a wholly modern way of looking at this, similar to depression: we live in an age where we actually have time to assign roles and feelings to these actions.  One hundred years ago, that wasn't the case.  You cooked because there was no Chinese takeout.  You didn't have time to sit around and think about how you want more from life.  You worked, and you worked hard, unless you were wealthy and could afford to have others work for you.  Fulfillment?  What's that?

They also brought up the subject of children, and how many of these female television characters who we remember and love (any of the above I mentioned) either chose to not have children or had them, but were very honest about it.  Motherhood wasn't what they expected, and while they are fictional characters, they're voicing the opinions and feelings of millions of women who might not be able to admit it to their friends and families.  That, honestly, scares the shit out of me.  I am inundated with people and blogs who think motherhood is the end-all, be-all, and that's what all women need to do: nurture.  Everyday I read the mommies who seem to have a never-ending supply of fertilized eggs, yet still have time to make melted-crayon art and yarn sculptures.  They seem happy (of course, I'm reading this through a sponsored blog), but is this all it's cracked up to be?

My mom always worked.  I remember her being exhausted, too tired to deal with us, depressed, overwhelmed, overprotective, anxious.  I also remember her being a loving mom.  But there were no misconceptions about her life: it was hard.  It was probably the hardest thing she's ever had to do.  And from the time I was little, I thought, I don't want that.  I don't want to feel so tired and so futile everyday.  No matter what she did, how many Christmas cards she made on her day off or how many pies she baked out of stress, she still had to wake up the next day and do everything over again.  That was my role model.  I love my mother--she is who I trust the most--but she wasn't the omnipresent mommy blogger I see today.  Things were very different, and I wonder if that will be my life someday.  Do I want that?

I wonder if, because I don't like working and also because I don't like the idea of having children, I'll ever find that happy medium.  I couldn't be a housewife, at least not in the typical sense; I hate cleaning and would eventually resent Nicholas for getting to have an outside life.  But I also don't want to feel like I wasted my life because I had children (or didn't), and I don't want to realize this when it's too late to change.

Is it normal to feel so conflicted?  This angst should've left years ago, along with retainers and listening to the Velvet Underground.  I feel that, at 24, I should know what I want out of the next five, ten years.  In actuality, I have no clue.  Do you feel this way too?  Am I the only one left wondering?

Polenta is the same thing as grits

It's happened: I'm playing Christmas music in my cubicle.  I officially don't give a shit about it anymore.  I've barely slept, I brought tomato sauce for lunch (more on that later), and someone left me a passive aggressive note about my coffee mug.  Monday, I'm over it.

This weekend was bizarre.  There was snow!  In October!  In Maryland!  What?  Yeah.  So to tally it up, it snowed in Jacksonville last year before we moved, it snowed here in late March after turning to spring, we had an earthquake the same week we had a hurricane, and now it snowed for hours (seriously...like six hours) in October.  I don't really know what's happening anymore, but I want out.

Me in the snow

Snow in our complex

At least none of it stuck.

Christmas Presents

This is one of those times I'm really glad I don't get a whole lot of traffic, because I can post Christmas presents and people will never find out before they're unwrapped.

I decided to put my talents to good use this year and sew some presents for my family.  Not everything's getting something handmade--Jake and Nick aren't, for example, because they'd probably hate whatever I made--but I thought it'd be a nice way to hone my skills and still get some presents done.  I've been working on them for about a month (and planning much longer) at a turtle's pace--I'll cut something out and won't sew it for three weeks.  Terrible.

But before I get into gifts, here's something I did for Nick a week ago that made me want to kill myself:

Elbow patches!  What a pain in the ass, let me tell you.  I had to go to two stores to find the ones he wanted, and then I looked into the process: because he tore a hole in the elbow, I had to darn the hole and then sew the patch over it.  Ugh.  And he has another one waiting for mending.  Someone's learning how to sew next time!

Okay, okay.  Here are the presents:

An iPad case for my dad.  He loves motorcycles, but I felt super weird about making him something with half-naked girls posing on motorcycles--pretty much the only fabric I found.  So the Michael Miller wheels seemed to convey the message, and the black and orange theme is Harley-Davidson-centric.  This also has a pocket and closes with Velcro.  I got the pattern on etsy.

A matching MacBook case for my dad.  The inside is also orange and this closes with Velcro, as well.

A MacBook case for Kali, using Michael Miller fabrics that I originally bought for an Amy Butler Lotus tank, then gave to my mom so she could make a Birdie sling for my cousin Maddie (confused yet?  Me too).  Kali loved the fabric when she saw it at my mom's house and wanted the Birdie sling, but it wasn't meant to be.  I'm making her a Birdie sling, but not out of this.  This pattern is also from Etsy.

Oh, and if things ever get too bad for you, remember: it snowed here Saturday.  That's the scene from Joann's.  I know I mentioned this yesterday, but it bears repeating.

I'm hoping to get the Birdie sling done this weekend, though I've been working on my hand embroidery in the process.  I feel like Holly Hobby over here.  Whatever happened to feminism in the Sposetta household?!

Macaroni and Cheese

I'm a day late on this one because I was too busy being depressed over dinner last night to do anything but watch It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.  Also, Sally is my new role model, I've decided.  She knows what she wants and she may mess up some things along the way but that doesn't stop her.  Also she has fun hair.

Anyway, last night I got home from work and started on my roasted garlic and fennel.  I bought a pork tenderloin on Tuesday from Trader Joe's and decided to make it Thursday.  I found the recipe on Martha Stewart and decided, what the hell, I might as well do it.

So the garlic and fennel are roasting, and I decided to start with the rub on the pork.  One problem: I open the package and I'm hit with the smell of hard-boiled eggs.  Hmm.  I've never made pork tenderloin before; is this typical?  A call to my mother confirms that no, this meat is rotten, and I need to get rid of it.  I wrap it in two bags and take it downstairs.

Nick didn't feel like picking up anything on the way home (when it comes to stuff like this, I think he just expects me to take care of anything, meaning he doesn't need to actually think about what he's eating for dinner), so I sat on the couch and pouted for a while and then heated up the leftovers from the following macaroni and cheese decadence.

Roasted Chicken Success

Is it normal to be tired every second of every day?  I don't think so.  I have a physical scheduled for next week and I feel like my doctor should be able to tell me why I'm always tired.  I know that's over-simplifying things, but that's just how I feel.  I've been exhausted for ten months, and it's time to move on.

Anyway, last night was another successful dinner.  Tuesday was a better night and I didn't let that stupid raw chicken get the best of me (again).  I've never roasted a chicken before, so this was all new territory.  Actually, all of the dinner was all new territory.  There were three new foods included in dinner, and two new recipes.  Can you believe it?