Thoughts on Tradition

Christmas holidays always put me in mind of my grandmother. I have mixed feelings when I remember the holiday feasts she created. There was always roast chicken. My mother contributed embutido (a meatloaf with raisins) stuffing and apple pie. My grandmother always made mashed potatoes, cucumber and corn salad, fish with sweet and sour sauce, and spinach lasagna with handmade fresh noodles. And occasionally she added a new dish as well.
Plus she had spent the weeks before Christmas making sweet treats for gifts and dessert.

As wonderful as these feasts were, they were always accompanied by a barrage of a complaints. I helped as much as I knew how. Male relatives shrugged off the complaining with "if you don't want to do it, don't." Occasionally they might stir a pot or some batter, but kitchen tasks were pretty much regarded as women's work. They didn't help with dishes either. We'd have one maid to help us usually and that was it.

Okay, I admit from the pragmatic point of view it didn't make sense to work so hard on what was supposed to be a holiday. My father felt excessive feasting and presents didn't really reflect the Christmas spirit. The people of Medieval times would have agreed with him. Karen Cushman's book Catherine, Called Birdy
shows that in those days, most of the weeks before Christmas were spent fasting. That meant there was true cause for celebration when Christmas heralded the end of Advent. Everyone could finally eat a full meal! But dishes weren't anything fancy then. Mostly just a lot of meat to make up for the lean weeks.

Obviously traditions have changed. While advent is still treated as a time of prayer, people don't fast anymore. We keep the traditions we enjoy the most.

Except for some people, it isn't that enjoyable. And I don't mean the ones who worry about their diet but the ones who have to worry about producing this fine meal. I also don't see the point of eating something you like only once a year. If it's something as long and as a hassle to cook as turkey, maybe. But we don't do that here. Maybe that's why we feel we have to make lots and lots of elaborate dishes to achieve a fiesta feel.

In my book If You Want to Be Happy Connor's mother and grandmother, both careerwomen, prepare the simplest of Thnaksgiving meals, with canned goods and contributions from neighbors instead of making numerous elaborate side dishes to go with their turkey. While I love good food, I wanted to show the contrast between their home and his rich snooty relatives'. I felt this simplicity was in keeping with the simplicity of his love interest and the beginnings of their relationship.

I also felt it was in keeping with how modern households should regard traditional ways of celebrating. My grandmother had honed her kitchen skills since she hadn't worked outside the home for most of her life. Connor's mother and grandmother, I figured, would be more like my mom, who had learned just a few special recipes because she spent most of her time working.

It's how it is for many women now; still, we are the principal ones expected to make Christmas preparations, especially when it comes to food. Considering that most of us are working and have to struggle through traffic in dense urban areas, it seems unfair if men don't step up more. Do they really want us to not make the effort to prepare? I do think my grandmother could have cooked less, but many of the dishes didn't require any special techniques, just regular cutting, peeling, and mixing. I learned to make all of them gradually over the years. Even before I learned cooking in school, I was stirring pots, rolling pastillas, and scooping out batter. Sometimes my brothers would help a bit, but I was the only one who would stick to filling a cookie sheet till the end. And we had large sheets to fit our industrial sized oven.

The women in your lives in charge of making Christmas happen may well appreciate your presents, but I think even more they will appreciate your presence and help in the kitchen. I always felt an emptiness about our Christmas meal that grew as I got older. It wasn't just the natural loss of excitement over presents but my sense of separation with the family who lay around the living room waiting for the large, invariably late meal to be served. We women bonded as we cooked, but once we "kids "were too old to play with our Christmas presents together, there was little to bind my brothers and me.

So I hope that all will share with the work as well as the joy of the holiday season and experience the difference it makes in developing family closeness. In the modern family, there should be no line between men's and women's work and men should not be shooed out of the kitchen by anxious women but put to a task suited their abilities--there's always something, whether mashing potatoes or mixing salad dressing. My husband only knows how to cook two things, but he peeled chestnuts for our stuffing (a task which I detest) while my eleven-year-old daughter cut bread and made an icebox cake with a little assistance. I expect to draft the younger children too soon--in fact they happily do simple kitchen tasks for me occasionally. This isn't child labor or a punishment; it's something that benefits the whole family and is particularly meaningful during a holiday. Only when all help and contribute as much as they're able will it truly be a family feast.

I do hope you can help or ask for help from your loved ones in preparing your family meal and thus experience true family bonding this Christmas. Happy holidays!