I processed cabbage. And it felt so liberating.
The thing about motherhood is that it takes so much of me. Of anyone. Especially when the babies are so new. I just am not . . . me for awhile there. There is no existence beyond caring for the baby and the rest of my family. So when I can reclaim any part of my pre-baby life, it feels like a small step towards reclaiming my vision of myself as my own person.
If this seems too deep in reference to cabbage, well, yes. But food--growing, processing, and cooking--is my thing. It's about my only hobby. And not being able to do those things is frustrating to me. The fact that I can go to a store and buy a bag of sauerkraut is not the point. The food is not the point. Me getting to do something that I want to do--something that makes me feel like me-- is the point.
So when we came home from our excursion on Friday with one enormous red cabbage and one enormous green cabbage after a stop at a farm, I thought, "Hey, I could make sauerkraut. And German red cabbage."
I could! There would be a time before those cabbages rotted when I would be able to shred the hell out of them and ferment the shreds! Glory be!
So I did. And it was good.
6 comments:
I remember all of that. Thank you for articulating it.
I remember all of that. Thank you for expressing it.
Creating your own world....it is was is most fulfilling.
It is wonderful for you that cooking is a hobby and not a chore. Beth
The simple things in life are the best, and so is your sauerkraut!
Oh that is the BEST way to describe the early days. Just so much is focused on the grub, that nothing much is left over for anything else.
For a bit.
Then, hopefully, the load is lightened somewhat as time goes on.
Yay, sauerkraut!
I imagine I'd feel just the same and be in the kitchen shredding cabbage (or canning tomatoes or processing chicken broth) with the same kind of YES IT'S ME TIME abandon.
Go you.
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