Nothing in Moderation

(originally published at thefrontpageonline.com)

I hate the phrase, “everything in moderation.” I can think of lots of things not good in moderation: Slavery, not so good in moderation; War, not so good in moderation; Arsenic, not good in moderation, either.

For some reason (though likely due to the echo chamber I exist in), I have been fascinated by the idea of school food for the last year. It started with reading a blog, Fed Up with Lunch , by a speech pathologist who ate cafeteria food in the Chicago school district for a full year. She posted nearly every school day and took pictures, the most disgusting thing I’d seen in a long time. First, every “food” had a zillion ingredients. Second, everything came excessively packaged, before it was microwaved in that same cellophane. Third, it looked gross. I will refrain from taking on the moral dilemma of feeding children who are hungry crap food. You can read Janet Poppendieck’s Free for All and decide for yourself. I can’t make that Hobson’s choice.

Although I haven’t written about it in detail (and I won’t today), I’m a bit of a healthy food zealot. Where I fall on the spectrum of what’s healthy does not meet up with conventional wisdom or the USDA. I have three words for you: Weston A. Price. Naturally, that zealotry has extended to my two-year-old son. He’s not in school, so, fortunately I don’t have to address the issue of school food. I am in (almost) complete control of everything that passes his lips. School food isn’t a reality for me, and may never be, but the thought of it horrifies me.

This Is a Scandal 

It was not without horror that I read the accounts of the “chicken nugget” scandal. If you’re a reader of the mommy blogs – which I would advise against –you likely saw the blogosphere light up with the story of a four-year-old North Carolina preschooler whose homemade lunch of a turkey and cheese sandwich, banana, apple juice and potato chips was supplemented or substituted(depending on your interpretation) by USDA guideline-meeting chicken nuggets. Yes, mom was charged a $1.25 for the privilege of her daughter eating a few nuggets.

As a person who thinks, at least half of the time, we need more government not less, this imposition is a horror show. Even given the kindest spin, someone is inspecting home lunches and making her own determination about what children should eat. Would I feed my son that lunch? Probably not. But that mom’s right to feed her daughter that particular lunch should be protected.

What we eat is a personal issue, and in my mind quite sacrosanct. In addition to the fundamental nature of nutrition – we are what we eat – food is so closely aligned with culture, family and tradition, that the idea a random state administrator could alter those choices is horrifying.

What other people want to foist on our kids seems to have no end. If it’s not the USDA, then it’s other parents. For years, mommy bloggers and just plain moms have debated over treats in the classrooms. Not a week goes by that I don’t read something about the absurdly named “cupcake wars.” If you’re unfamiliar – here’s how it goes: Some classrooms allow children to have treats for their birthdays. I was never in one of these classrooms in any of the schools I attended, so I can’t speak of this personally. By all accounts, what seems to happen is that the birthday child’s mother brings cupcakes for the whole class. School time is spent consuming these cupcakes. For various reasons, allergies and obesity among them, schools have started banning cupcakes in the classrooms.

Like every stupid tradition (U.S. Constitution, anyone), parents have come out in full force to defend it. It’s tradition. It’s a precious memory my child needs to celebrate with his peers. They never seem to feel bad feeding crap to your children. The excuse? Everything is okay in moderation.

Time to Call a Halt 

But it’s not. Most school chicken nuggets have at least a zillion ingredients. Okay, I exaggerate. Maybe they have thirty-five. Modified corn starch, soy, beef extract and maltodextrin – among other things – are not something I’d want any human to have in moderation. The same goes for cupcakes. I’m not against cake, and I’m not against most traditions. Just the last two weekends I let my son sing happy birthday and consume cake. But it was my choice. I was there to be his “judgment,” and he ate confections. But I also know he’s not likely to eat cake for another whole year. The birthdays for the February 2010 babies from my mommy groups are all done, and so is the cake. I don’t have to worry about every neighborhood parent running down to the local grocery and bringing a sugar, corn syrup and white flour treat right to his preschool desk.

Other than pro-life advocates, I don’t know when it was decided that other adults could substitute their judgment for my own – and I wasn’t to be offended because it was only a little treat, or a little juice, or a little candy. No matter the rationale, schools shutting down the treat buffet can’t be a bad thing. By the time my child gets to school, I hope to be free of others’ judgment at least when it comes to food. Let’s extend that to all fronts and keep food-based celebrations at home where they belong. And for the state officials inspecting food lunch? God save us all if this is the best thing we can think to do with dwindling school budgets’ time and money.

I’m worth more than $125

(originally published @thefrontpageonline.com)

I have one of those phone messages people complain about. I tell callers what number they have dialed and kindly ask them to leave a message if they are so inclined. My mother hates my message. She asks how people will know whom they’ve reached. I figure you either know me and will leave a message or you hope you know me, leave a message and take your chances. The last thing I want to do is give someone from whom I may not want to hear more information about me. I don’t want to validate telemarketers or let the robocallers know that they’ve reached a live one.

Despite how my essays read, I’m an intensely private person. There are reasons I have an unlisted phone number, a few dummy email addresses that forward to the “real” one, a pseudonym for my fiction writing, and a completely different on-line alter ego. I don’t want everyone in the world to know about everything I do.

Slowly, I have self-inflicted privacy erosion. When I Google myself, I’m startled with the amount of information I have revealed. The erosion probably started with my blog, which harkens back to May 2003. That’s about nine years of stuff that I can’t remember writing, but likely reveals a whole lot about me. Then three years ago, I got on Facebook. The invites from my real friends poured in. At first, it was fun. The older I get, the busier I am, the less I want to drive all around L.A. to see friends. It was like a wonderful window into the world of people I know well. Then it was a window into the world of people I know less well, but find humorous for some reason. Then it was a window into the world of people I knew from high school and college. It even, unfortunately, became a window into a world of annoying or shamelessly self-promoting people I now mostly block. Which is what real life is about, isn’t it? Growing up gives you the ability to restrict contact with some people, while expanding contact with others. It’s called a filter—and I want it back.

Decision Time 

Now that Facebook is going public, it’s time for me to quit. Slavery is long over (in the U.S., at least), and I’m not ready to be sold for a mere one hundred and twenty-five dollars.

I started the two-step process of deleting my account last week, but stopped amid protest of friends I actually like and who humor me. But I’ve cut back on the excessive checking, posting, etc., that can quickly consume precious free time in an otherwise hectic day. Can you say “toddler,” anyone?

Yes, I know that Google, Facebook, and likely countless other online companies are regularly scooping up information on every key stroke. Yes, I know that unlike those genuinely progressive Western countries, our little backwater nation does not require companies to tell the citizenry what information they are gathering about us. Yes, I’ve read a privacy policy or two, or four, but have not been reassured by any of them. And yes, I think that there is some price to pay for “free” e-mail, “free” searches, “free” social networking.

If I Do Quit, Then What? 

But that price is suddenly getting too high. Google’s latest announcement that they’re going to include people’s social networking posts is both creepy and sad. Do I really want to know what random folks think of that new wallet I’m looking at? How are those peoples’ haphazard comments even relevant to a web search? All this social networking connectivity makes me think of switching to Bing.

I know nothing in life is free. But must my every move be tracked as the basis for new millionaires and billionaires? I was thrilled to finally find a bit of code that hid by web browsing from Facebook. The whole Facebook Connect and its presence on what seemed like zillions of websites, creeped me out. Especially when ads would pop up on FB with contextual ads based on shoes I had looked at or newspaper articles I’d read.

In our Citizen’s United corporatocracy, I’m not sure I want a (soon-to-be) public company to have this kind of access to all my information. Everything I “like.” Everything I click on. Every story I read or post has built a profile of who I am, and probably what I’m likely to buy. I’m not ready to have my profile be just one more commodity up for grabs on the stock exchange. I am a person, not just a consumer.

But quitting is hard. Where will I get to hear about the exploits of some of my friends? How will I connect with people who don’t reach out in any other way? One business I am considering investing in only had updates about its new products on Facebook. But must I serve the last forty years of my life up to these information plunderers on a platter via the new “timeline,” to post pictures of the baby or a vacation?

Email and a blog used to be enough online interaction: Posted a few vacation photos on a website, sent an email, and that was it. If someone didn’t want to call me (and as a native East Coaster, I acknowledge the time difference is hard), they could just drop me a line or two electronically, and I’d respond at my leisure. For the folks not on Facebook, that’s how I still communicate. Because no social network, not Friendster, not MySpace, not Facebook, not Google+ has ever offered all my ‘friends’ in one place.

It’s time to get back to the world of face-to-face interaction. I’d like to hear about your vacations in person, enjoy food together and not just a virtual snapshot of your plate. Perhaps we could actually do something together. There’s even, gasp, real U.S. Mail for those who don’t live close by.

I don’t need a company to “connect to all the areas of my life. Me, a real live person can do the lynchpin act all by myself.

Quick Review – Some Sing, Some Cry – Ntozake Shange, Ifa Bayeza

Some Sing, Some Cry by Ntozake Shange

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I hate those allegorical beginnings of so many books by black authors. But I suffered through this one and was richly rewarded, until I wasn’t. The first half to two-thirds of this book is pretty good. Interesting weave of characters through history and interesting backdrop of Charleston (a city I don’t know much about). After the early nineteen hundreds, though, the book goes off the rails and becomes merely a survey of black music through the twentieth century. Now whether this was due to two authors writing or the fact that Shange had a series of strokes during the writing, I don’t know, but the book could have ended hundreds of pages earlier and would have been a masterpiece.
My other problems with the book? Every time someone gets raped, they get pregnant. What happened to Lizzie’s dad? His disappearance drove me nuts. Oh, and particular to the book on tape version – there were errors. I got to hear the reader start reading, clear her throat, correct herself and ask for another take, not ONCE but TWICE. So sloppy!

View all my reviews

Quick Review – Busted in Bollywood – Nicola Marsh

Busted in Bollywood by Nicola Marsh

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book almost met it’s potential. Despite a ‘C’ review on one of my favorite review sites, I bought this book new. I bought it because most of the main characters were non-white (in a romance! say it ain’t so!). It was romance or chick lit depending on which is less reviled at the moment. And it was almost really great, almost. Some of the subplot was uninteresting, and frankly unnecessary (unless bulking up page count was important). And the use of acronyms drove me nuts, but I’m happy to report the rom-com H got her HEA!

View all my reviews

Anderson Cooper Throws Mammas Under the Bus

(originally published @thefrontpageonline.com)

I’ve got to stop reading the “mommy blogs.” The internet thrives on manufactured controversy. There have always been the standbys of politics, religion and the latest celebrity brouhaha – courtesy of Lindsay Lohan. But now the internet punditocracy (and Vanderbilt heir Anderson Cooper) has thrown  mothers under the bus.

There are the standby controversies: stay-at-home vs. working moms, breastfeeding vs. formula feeding moms, moms who cook vs. moms who drive-through, moms who vaccinate vs. moms who don’t, moms who do cry-it-out vs. moms who don’t, peaceful homebirth vs. medicalized hospital birth. You get the idea. The Comment sections give everybody a chance to be judgey. I’m as guilty of judgment as the next person. I mean, who are these moms who give formula, vaccinate blindly, and have elective c-sections? How do they expect that to turn out?

Although I feel no compunction venting it all anonymously on the internet (yes, I have a couple of fake identities – no, I’m not going to tell you what they are), it turns out being judged in person is no fun.

For Example 

Last September, I was driving my mother from Los Angeles – where she’d flown in from the East Coast to visit me – to San Diego where she had a conference, when she asked me the big question: “Do you have any aspirations in life?” I was so shocked that several Californians’ are lucky I didn’t veer out of my lane on the 5 Freeway and kill someone . That was quickly followed by, “other than raising your child, of course.”

In the course of a few seconds I went from educated woman to the ambition-less mother of a toddler. When asked what I do or don’t do, I never have had a good answer.

Yes, I went to college. Yes, I went to law school. When I was attending all that school, I imagined that I’d have a job someday in the same way I imagined that I’d win the lottery. I didn’t go to my liberal arts college with any sort of plan. I didn’t arrange a single job interview while I was in law school. You have to understand I come from one of those families who believes in education for the “sake of education” – which doesn’t prepare one well for the future. Don’t worry about it, my mother, the philosophy major, said. Folks will be knocking down the door to hire someone like you. Exactly who would be bashing down my door? Where would that job materialize? I didn’t bother with those pesky little details back then.

Then Came Marriage 

So, you see where this story is going, right? I got married and followed my husband (and not in the  Ruth Simmons – become a college president-board member- millionaire kind of way). It was more in the get-marginal-job, quit-to-stay-at- home-and-pursue-dreams, move-again, get-marginal- job, etc. At the point where my husband’s not-so-marginal job paid seven times what my marginal legal job paid – that was the point I decided to get off the crap job bandwagon. I’ll spare you the details. In two hundred fifty-six pages, Barbara Ehrenreich adequately explained why horrible jobs are horrible.

Out of the sixteen years I’ve been out of school, I’ve worked, perhaps, six or seven. In the other nine or ten years, I figured out how to fill up my time. I remodeled and sold a couple of houses, I wrote four books, read hundreds of others, and I managed a life with countless pets. In all those years, I never came up with the perfect, pithy, party phrase. An adroit answer to the “What do you do (all day)?” question eluded me. I’d flirted with “yoga,” “Pilates,” “writing,” and “really, nothing much.” But none seemed to satisfy half-drunk partygoers. Alarmingly, after having a child, saying his name is answer enough for most.

All Right, So When? 

Then there are the rest. Even at my grandmother’s funeral, I got quizzed by people as to when I was going to go back to work. They were not impressed when I told them I wasn’t working before Judah was born, so there was nowhere to go back to. They were even less impressed when I told them I felt no compunction to “use” my law degree. To get that same question, not soft-pedaled, from my mother was something else entirely.

So I’m dipping my toe into the mommy wars waters. I take issue with the idea that stay-at-home moms are worthless non-feminists. (FYI, I’m not a feminist myself, but that’s another essay.) Look, being a stay-at-home mom is boring at time. It is boring a lot of times. Another damn puzzle. Mmm, fun. More fake cooking. Blocks, then Legos, then more blocks – count me in. I’m not even sure if it’s as super rewarding as some mothers make it out to be. Mud pies are fun the first day, but not so much the thirty-first day. Talking to a toddler all day doesn’t strike you dumb. Quitting your job after so much education doesn’t render you stupid, either. Yes, that comment from a “friend” who was amazed I still could have an adult conversation after giving birth, smarted.

People make choices. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why other people care. As long as I’m not asking you for money, I figure you don’t have any say on how I live my life. If you are jealous, I think you should shut up and keep it to yourself. If you only feel better after putting others down, that’s just sad. If you’ve got nothing better to do than nose around in other’s lives, I say, “Get a subscription to People magazine. Focus on the aforementioned Lindsay.”

And for my answer to my mother? I’m still working on that. I have one of those mothers for whom I can never do anything right. So I will just live with the judgment from that realm. Like staying at home, that’s a personal choice.