The BAFTAs

I spent so much time (eight posts) on the food topic because -- while there are important issues of culture, racism, and ableism -- it is also kind of a fun topic. You can read the serious things but also get thoughts like "Tacos sound good," or "I haven't made stir-fry for a while; I should pick up some noodles."

Discussing the BAFTAs is not going to be fun like that, maybe it will go more quickly. 

It will be similar in that most of what I write is going to be about reactions and doubling down. Still, I suppose some introduction is in order.

The BAFTAs are the awards presented by the British Academy of Film and Television. This year's awards program happened on February 22nd.

One of the award winners, I Swear, was about the life of John Davidson, who has Tourette's Syndrom and has worked to raise awareness about it. 

More specifically, Davidson has coprolalia, which results in the involuntary utterance of offensive words. That included hurling the N-word at Black presenters Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo, as well as production designer Hannah Beachler:

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cz6edwg06n1o 

One other important thing to know is that Davidson also yelled at a slur at host Alan Cumming, relating to his sexual orientation. That was edited out of the show, which was on a tape delay. 

A statement in support of Palestine was also edited out. They could edit, and apparently they did edit out a second racial slur (which I assume was the other N-word, though that has not been confirmed; the third one happened on the way to dinner). The BBC says leaving that one in was a mistake, but there are different ways of handling mistakes. 

One thing I find odd about it is that they then removed the entire broadcast, rather than editing out one word. Sure, people would still know it had been there, but if they were okay with editing some, why not just remove that word? 

That was one problem on the BBC/BAFTAs end. 

Another issue was that Davidson says that he had asked to be seated where he could not be heard, and he had thought that would happen.

Different award shows have different ways of placing mics -- especially depending on whether the seating is at tables or in rows -- but it is normal to have some mics on the audience to capture applause. It would be reasonable to keep someone with Tourette's away from a mic, but that didn't happen.

The third issue was insufficient care demonstrated toward presenters and guests. There was only one of those "We're sorry if you were offended" statements. 

There are starting to be better apologies now as the anger continues to grow, but they really need to dig deeper. 

There needs to be a better statement about all of those factors. 

I hesitate to blame it on "British humor", because that covers a broad range. I do worry that there was someone who thought it would be funny to have the mic near the person with Tourette's, and who was fine with leaving it in, even though people clearly knew it happened based on the first insincere apology. Those could very well be two different people, but that needs to figured out. If that is the case, those people need to be let go.

Without that, even using better-sounding words for the apology doesn't make it sincere.

If that doesn't happen, I would like to see lots of actors boycotting next year's BAFTAs. 

As nice as it can be to be nominated and asked to present, it is ultimately one of many award shows. If they will not show care for their guests -- and I maintain that there was unfair treatment of Davidson, as well as of Jordan, Lindo, and Beachler -- then the Academy should feel the pain of that. 

Award shows are generally quite boring, but people still watch for the stars. Take those away and people can just read the press release the next day.

Extreme? Well, racism and ableism have both gotten really loud lately, along with pretty much every other terrible bigotry. It's worth fighting back.

Because, yes, ableism is a real thing, even if many of the people crying about it now are demonstrably more insincere than the BBC. 

Songs of grief: February Daily Songs

Hey, my mother is still alive!

That's not bad news, but having a month of songs that were primarily about her and then a month of songs intended to be about grief, so whenever it happened I would be ready...

That didn't work out.

To be fair, grief songs didn't work out the way I thought either.

I love the collection of January songs and I know I will listen to that playlist again.

For February, there are some songs I really like, and some that are okay, but there is not the same level and connection. I did not create a playlist, whereas if I loved the way things fit together I definitely would have.

Part of the problem was that most sad songs are about romantic relationships. Also, if you get into songs about mothers, those can get weird pretty quickly.

I had a few songs in mind at the start. Some, like "Each Tear" and "The Greatest Love of All" were songs that I had thought about for January, but they got moved around. 

"Happy Birthday" I put on my sisters' birthday, with no disrespect to Martin Luther King Jr. It is a joyful song, even though it starts in a loss.

I felt like I didn't have enough songs, so I went looking and found this article:

https://www.lovetoknow.com/life/grief-loss/40-best-r-b-funeral-songs-saying-goodbye

I used a lot from there, many of which were new to me, but I rejected many too. 

I think that given recent revelations, Puff Daddy and "I'll Be Missing You" should fall out of favor.

I was using a lot of Marvin Gaye. Boyz II Men too, but especially Marvin Gaye.

That worked for me because I have a deep sadness over him. That's not just for his death, but also for Tammi Terrell's illness and death. I am glad to have them in here.

Still needing more songs, I remembered the time when I had songs by Black women and girls from February until late July, to see if I could find anything from there. 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/07/musical-black-girls.html

That's why I know about Joan Armatrading and Abbey Lincoln and more about Minnie Riperton and Mary J. Blige.

I did find more songs, and some of them do mean a lot to me, but most of them are still not really about me or my losses. 

"Dance With My Father" is far from my experience, but I read about the writing in Stories to Tell by Richard Marx, and I found that touching. Then, as Vandross was hospitalized, the video contains various people writing a get well card to him while appearing with their fathers, or pictures of their fathers, or sometimes being the father (I love seeing Damon Wayans picking up his sons). There is a lot of love and grief in that video, for fathers and for Vandross. 

It's great when there are songs that are just right, but that just isn't always going to happen.

Sometimes you keep digging, sometimes you make do, and sometimes you may need to write your own song. 

2/1 "There’ll Be Sad Songs (To Make You Cry)" by Billy Ocean
2/2 “It’s So Hard To Say Goodbye to Yesterday” by Boyz II Men
2/3 “Try Sleeping With a Broken Heart” by Alicia Keys
2/4 “I’ll Be Seeing You” by Billie Holiday
2/5 “These Three Words” by Stevie Wonder
2/6 “One Sweet Day” by Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men
2/7 “Walk Around Heaven” by Patti Labelle
2/8 “If Ever You’re In My Arms Again” by Peabo Bryson
2/9 “Throw It Away” by Abbey Lincoln
2/10 “God Is Love” by Marvin Gaye
2/11 “Easier” by Kandi with Faith Evans
2/12 “Missing You” by Brandy, Tamia, Gladys Knight, and Chaka Khan
2/13 “Happy Birthday” by Stevie Wonder
2/14 “More Than One Kind of Love” by Joan Armatrading
2/15 “Wholly Holy” by Marvin Gaye
2/16 “You’re All I Need To Get By” by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell
2/17 “Dance With My Father” by Luther Vandross
2/18 “A Song for Mama” by Boyz II Men
2/19 “A Mother’s Prayer” by K. Michelle
2/20 “Love Me Now” by John Legend
2/21 “Memory Lane” by Minnie Riperton
2/22 “Clouds” by Chaka Khan
2/23 "Jesus Love Is Like A River" by Gladys Knight
2/24 "Plant My Feet On Higher Ground" by The Davis Sisters
2/25 “Sparrow” by Emilo Sandé
2/26 “Each Tear” by Mary J. Blige feat. Jay Sean
2/27 "No Tears (In The End) by Roberta Flack
2/28 “The Greatest Love of All” by Whitney Houston 

Many different but true things

I spent more time on those olives than intended.

That is partly due to my fascination with tangents, but also there is some complexity. That makes it seem like a good idea to review before we move on to other things.

Cooking is a life skill that can be useful for all. It does not belong specifically to either gender, and you can find a lot of sexism in looking at attitudes about cooking.

Despite being a life skill, it is not something that is transmitted automatically. 

There are various levels of difficulty to cooking. Experience can be a great teacher, and lead to more comprehension of what will work, but finding a good entry point may not come easily.

Cooking ability is not just a matter of the basic knowledge, but also can be a matter of physical skills requiring practice. Disability can affect multiple functions.

Gadgets and convenience items exist that can bridge some of these gaps in knowledge and physical ability.

Shortcuts can have an impact on flavor and aesthetic factors, but sometimes they don't make much of a difference.

Some cooking processes take a lot of time, which can often be in short supply. There are items that can help shorten that time, but also having someone else prepare the food (and maybe deliver it) can be a real time-saver.

Dining out or ordering in is usually not a money-saver, though you can get good deals sometimes. 

People do need to eat; there is not necessarily a moral high ground in having been the one to cook.

Getting ideas and making decisions about what to eat, then getting those ingredients and preparing them, does require some executive function. Some people struggle with this more, but various circumstances can mean that sometimes you just don't have enough. Adding more pressure does not improve that situation.

There are delicious foods from every culture. There are differences, but there will be similarities too. It seems like everyone has dumplings of some kind.

Some recipes and preparations are more complicated than others, but that does not mean that all of that cuisine is similarly involved.

Sometimes what makes something seem complicated is a lack of familiarity or a lack of motivation for that particular process. 

It is generally healthier to eat more natural, less-processed foods. That may involve much more cost and effort.

Sometimes people who purchase cheap, processed foods are just trying to get by. Putting restraints on what is available may not be intended to be cruel, but may work out that way. 

In Ratatouille, Colette shows some disdain for the title food, as it is a peasant dish. 

Well, it's generally a stew, which as a single-dish, slow-cooking recipe has some convenience that appeals to busy people (shades of casseroles signalling the "dark ages of American culinary culture).

Perhaps there was a history of the dish being not respected, and that is why Remy "elevates" it into the confit byaldi version served to Anton Ego. However, if the flavors had not reminded Ego of that stew from his childhood, far away from the Michelin-starred restaurants of Paris, he would not have loved it so much.

Tastes vary. Some preferences can be cultural or habitual or have a lot of nostalgia built in, but there are also differences in how individuals react to the same substances. The most famous example of this is cilantro. 

Over the course of the last few posts (Tuesday through Thursday posts starting February 18th), I have mentioned various foods that I don't like or will not eat.

There are things that I won't eat that I will still cook for my sisters, but other foods that they must seek elsewhere. 

There are things they don't like that I make for myself, but usually when they are not around.

Also, many of the foods that I can't abide are considered very healthy. It's probably a coincidence.

This is beautiful. 

There are so many different fruits and vegetables and greens and grains and ways of cooking all of them. 

Sticking with the familiar can be comforting and it can be monotonous. Trying something new can be exciting and rewarding, or mildly disappointing, or kind of gross. 

No one else has to feel the same way you do about it.

It's seems so obvious, doesn't it? 

Except somehow people are still jerks a lot. 

Related posts:

https://preparedspork.blogspot.com/2026/03/feed-someone.html  

Food racism

You know, sometimes I also make quesadillas. You can add that to my "expertise" but I mention it more because that is one more dish that is incredibly simple and easy (especially if you microwave them).

I should note that when Gray wrote about decanting the olives, in that particular post she referred specifically to "white people tacos":

https://x.com/briebriejoy/status/2019200627641884919 

I believe the criticism of her only naming foods of brown people as "too complicated" being racist was starting to get to her. I think it was also too late for that criticism to be mitigated by adding a white person food in there, especially a white person food that was inspired by Mexican food.

Well, given her background, she would probably say it is not racism but classism, and that once you economically abolish class then racism no longer exists, but she'd be wrong about that too.

Lots of ways to be wrong.

Still, I think there are some things worth exploring. 

In the post, she says that her mother described it as an easy meal, whereas Gray herself finds it unnecessarily complicated.

People can have different perceptions. As Gray is blaming her issue with these cuisines on executive function, maybe her mother has a higher level of executive function. Gray also mentions cleanup requirements as part of what makes it too complicated. While cleanup could be simplified, taking cleanup in mind is completely valid.

The funny thing is that this post was done quote-tweeting a different user, @PinstripeBungle who had not replied to or quote-tweeted her. He is clearly responding to the discourse, and lists tacos and Thai curry as very easy, so it is relevant. He probably had Gray's posts in mind -- maybe along with others -- but he did not name her. As she has 24 times the followers he does, it's interesting that she saw it and responded.

The other thing that is kind of interesting is that the post that started it all about the sesame noodles had nothing to do with executive function. It exaggerated the expenditure and convenience of trying something new, but those are separate issues.

This is the grace that I will give Gray: if you struggle with executive function and are just starting to cook, learning new cuisine is probably going to be harder. The familiar may be a better starting place.

However, if you don't have anything you are already used to cooking, there are many easy Asian and Mexican dishes and techniques that might be more satisfying than salmon in butter with salt and pepper (and also less expensive).

I think there is a combination of two things here.

1. Gray wants to brag about knowing French cooking, as well, perhaps, as being able to cook simple healthy meals with the knowledge to teach others even though she has executive function. You know what? It's okay to like your accomplishments and want to share them, except...
2. Gray has also bought in to the thinking where foods that are not from the European tradition are lower class. There is a disdain there that has racist origins.

It's important to note that a Black woman can buy into racism. 

Usually I am as much "listen to Black women" as anyone, because at the intersection of multiple marginalizations they often have a greater awareness of how various issues play out. 

Gray's parents taught in international schools where she experienced different cultures and she graduated from Harvard Law School. If a somewhat privileged upbringing made it easier for her to ignore some things, that is exactly how privilege works. 

The real problem is not that she prefers French cooking techniques or that she made racist comments without intending to do so.

The real problem is that for each opportunity she was given to reflect and learn and do better, she just kept doubling down.

Of course she's a leftist!

I know I pick on leftists a lot, and I shall continue to do so (though I hope you will notice me giving Gray the points that I can).  

One thing I am going to add to it in this post is not acknowledging one's part in the current whole.

Food discourse has included many comments about white people not seasoning their food, with mayonnaise being a part of some white people getting very offended.

Of course, you do not have to identify with whiteness in this way. You can embrace other cuisines. You can embrace your cultural heritage in the form of the Italian food of your grandparents or the hot dishes of the place you come from.

Or, you can try and find a way to reassert the supremacy of whiteness. 

Lately, I am seeing more of this: 

https://x.com/AniseNot/status/1754181222341705874 

The myth that white people food doesn’t taste good or lacks seasoning is a massive cope When your ingredients are fresh & superior in taste & texture you don’t need to mask it with braising or spices

Mexican food and olives

Without intending to, I am embarking on another tangent.

One friend replied to a previous post that Mexican food doesn't have olives. I was inclined to agree; maybe we learned that from Taco Bell.

Then I started to wonder.

For some background on me, I am not in any way an expert on Mexican food. 

Avocados repulse me, ruling out guacamole, and the only kind of legumes I can tolerate is green beans, where you are eating the case, not the seed. Removing the beans and the guacamole from Mexican food takes away a lot of options.

The closest I regularly come to Mexican cooking myself is an enchilada recipe that does not use a red sauce (there is sour cream, and it is even a taco spice packet rather than enchilada) and then sometimes I will make nacho toppings, but I am more likely to put them on tater tots, so they are "tot-chos."

Not very authentic, and I use sliced olives for both of those. (Olives are also my favorite pizza topping, right up there with sausage.)

There were so many people saying so many things about food that I started to wonder about the olives.

Maybe that was partly because of Michael Genhart.

I know, that doesn't sound Mexican.

One of the Pura Belpré 2022 Honors books was May Your Life Be Deliciosa by Genhart, illustrated by Loris Lora.

It is about the tamaladas of his mother's childhood, with her grandmother teaching them how to make the tamales and folding in her love for them.

I happened to read it shortly before we were going to have a friend over for a tamale dinner. 

That's not another recipe; I buy the bag from Costco and either steam or microwave them, depending on how many I am making. 

I love children's books that are expressions of love and encouragement: Little You by Richard Van Camp, I'll Love You Till the Cows Come Home by Kathryn Cristaldi... here was another one, and timely to boot.

I read the book to my sisters and friend after dinner. I believe they started out as "What is this weirdo doing now?" and ended up surprisingly touched.

Anyway, Abuela puts an olive inside each tamale. I did not put olives into the tamales, but I had them on the table.

Still, I think that family was in California. 

All right, let's do some searching.

I saw various things, attributing it to more Baja California or Veracruz, with some votes for not so much Mexican as Cuban, plus more in the Caribbean in general.

There was also this Reddit discussion: 

https://www.reddit.com/r/mexicanfood/comments/hwpnqw/how_does_the_community_feel_about_olives_in/ 

One thing I find interesting about that is that while Veracruz is on the East Coast, so might be more open to Caribbean influence, Baja California is not. However, it is adjacent to Alta California, where they are more likely to use olives and go to Taco Bell.

It also reminds me of some posts I have seen about getting good Mexican food. 

I don't think that was related to the food discourse I have been building on; which areas have good food is a common argument, with people on the side of California and New York and Colorado and California again, but not in restaurants, under tents. (I have seen those tents.)

One thing that was more interesting to me recently was someone saying that the complaints that Tex-Mex is just adulterated Mexican food are wrong; it's its own thing.

That resonated with me because my sisters have not been able to find a replacement for Chevy's. They have Mexican restaurants they like, but they don't satisfy the Chevy's itch.

This time someone pointed out that New Mexico is also its own thing, not merely because of the green chili peppers, but they're a factor.

When I was writing about Asia years ago -- that it was a large area with different terrains and resources and cultures -- is also true of Mexico. That is especially true if we include California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Florida. There are going to be different kinds of food.

Within that, there are different tastes. My sisters love bean burritos and hummus (not together); that disgusts me, but that's okay. They should be able to have food they like.

Again, I find these topics so interesting -- possibly more interesting than my readers do, sorry -- because there is so much variety. The more you look, the more you find.

You can have these amazing, interesting discussions, or you can be quick to tell someone how wrong they are.

That unfortunate tendency is going to keep coming back. 

More Black History Month reading

I could easily write about more children's books, but I thought it might be better to catch up on some of the grown-up books I have been reading. There are overlaps.

I had mentioned Marley Dias with her #1000BlackGirlBooks drive and the book she wrote. I came to that through A Centennial Celebration of The Brownies' Book.

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/02/more-literature-centered-on-black.html 

Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson 

This is one of the books Dias mentions. In fact, I had read it in April.

It had a huge impact on Dias, but not the first time she read it. She thought maybe she had grown into it when she picked it up again. 

I suspect it may be that you need to read it twice. There is a lot of atmosphere and mood with it; maybe you need to go through one time to get the feel of it and then you can absorb it.

But, Dias also did age between readings, which can affect readiness and perception.

The Enduring Legacy of Portland's Black Panthers: The Roots of Free Healthcare, Free Breakfast, and Neighborhood Control in Oregon by Joe Biel

The Black Panther Party: A Graphic Novel History by David F. Walker and Marcus Kwame Anderson

It had been about ten years since my last round of reading on the Black Panther party. 

I had purchased Biel's book when it first came out, but not gotten around to reading it. Then I saw a movie about Kent Ford, who gives Portland tours, and is featured in the book. There was also a library summer reading challenge where one of the categories was a book set in Oregon. I figured it was time to read it. Enduring Legacy was okay, and led me directly to the graphic novel, which was excellent.

Biel's sub-title is really long, but free healthcare and breakfast are only going to get more important. The Black Panthers did some great things and we should think about what we can do through similar efforts.

Watch Me Fly: What I Learned on the Way to Becoming the Woman I Was Meant to Be by Myrlie Evers-Williams

That is an amazing life right there. Evers-Williams tells her story with a lot of insight, some of it about functioning in the business world, and probably considerably more realistically than Lean In.

Balthazar: A Black African King in Medieval and Renaissance Art edited by Kristen Collins and Bryan C. Keene 

I don't remember what searches led to this one coming up in my results, but I had to read it because I still miss when medievalpoc was active.

Obviously the subject was Balthazar of the three kings. While the idea is interesting, the various essays strung together repeat. Maybe that is on the editors. I don't regret reading it, but there is unfulfilled potential.

There was a worse book yet.

Acting White: The Curious History of a Racial Slur by Ron Christie 

Christie's problem is that he is a Black Republican who keeps getting offended when that gets criticized, connecting it to how he used to be mocked (and told he was "acting white") for doing well in school.

I don't doubt that there would have been some mocking; that can happen to nerds. It is also common to hear of academically inclined Black youth being supported in their communities and steered away from trouble. Maybe no one liked him. That would be hard, especially if it wasn't his fault. 

He does not come off as particularly likable. 

However, after writing this book in 2010 and then Blackwards: How Black Leadership Is Returning America to the Days of Separate but Equal in 2012 (maybe he meant Michael Steele, because he was critical of him around that time) I wonder if he has started to find any issues in white supremacy. 

Decanting the olives

That day's food discourse started with a report showing that spending on food from food service had increased as sales of food purchased from stores had decreased, and people trying to explain that.

https://x.com/SPnoir/status/2018456699313734091 

Just looking at the data, it's not as dramatic a difference as you might expect; I can't help wondering how much of it is delivery fees. The lines cross right around 2020 when a lot of people started ordering in more and that has remained popular.

Regardless, people start replying about the wasting of money. On Mike Bird's post, someone with username "TheWealthCoach" admonishes that people learn to cook, and a rjurney below him replies "You can read his class within his response. He’s got time to be thrifty. He’s affluent."

(Because of how the replies are threaded, there is not a good link for that.)

Then, what really started the discussion I saw was this response from SPnoir:

I wanted to make sesame noodles with cucumber last week. Had to buy sesame oil, chili oil, sesame seeds, rice vinegar... let me know if you have these handy in your cupboard. That's not even getting to the main ingredients.

There were replies from many people who had those in their cupboards, and also that those are all reusable. 

There were also some replies that there were swaps you could do, like that you could probably use any vinegar if you did not specifically have rice vinegar, and sesame seeds are more of a garnish, so you could probably skip them.

That brings us back to my earlier Worcestershire sauce example. The initial outlay can be expensive, but then the use per meal ends up being very inexpensive. If you bought a jar of nutmeg every time you were going to use it, that would add up (and is a good reason to check your cupboards first).

As you are getting into cooking, by all means take your time and build up gradually. You can look up recipes that use ingredients you already have.

Then BrieBrieJoy entered the chat.

Briahna Joy Gray was the press secretary for Bernie Sanders and now hosts the Bad Faith podcast. It's not the first time she has made anyone roll her eyes. 

https://x.com/briebriejoy/status/2019074357125853529 

She agreed with SPnoir, because people don't have these ingredients and they are overwhelmed. If you want to help people cook, you should focus on single ingredients that taste good with salt, pepper, butter, and olive oil, because everybody has those.

There is a lot you can do with those four ingredients, I am not going to lie. I am also currently out of butter (which I regularly restock) and olive oil, which I have gotten out of using.

Things start to fall apart in Gray's replies to ashley_quan, who points out that the sesame noodle ingredients are Asian staples and that if you are going to make the dish even once a month having them is not unreasonable.

This would have been a really easy time to acknowledge that different pantries have different ingredients, and that every culture has simpler and easier recipes, even if you personally are not familiar with them.

This is someone who worked for Sanders; she was never going to be able to admit she was wrong.

It devolves and then there are different threads, where I can't capture them all. 

Gray uses executive function as a reason that it is just too hard to make Asian or Mexican food, where it is much easier to do French cooking instead.

While that is questionable, familiarity is a real factor. If she is used to French cooking, then something a little more complicated might still seem more manageable than a simple stir fry.

However, when you say that sauteing vegetables doesn't sound very Chinese, that just makes you seem ignorant.   

What you will see in the link is Gray suggesting adobo as being easier, except that it could easily fit within the Asian cooking that she was decrying. It's traditionally Filipino but I got my adobo recipe out of a Hawaiian cookbook, which also had a strong Japanese influence so bring back the rice vinegar!

Also, to ashley_quan's reply that chicken adobo has eight ingredients, Gray replied with a photo of a seasoning mix from famous Trump supporters Goya.

Yes, I have bought jars of sauce and shakers and packets of seasonings, but willingness to do that is one of those things that puts cooking different types of food within reach. 

My favorite part came when she tried to explain how Mexican food is too complicated, like decanting the olives for making tacos: 

https://x.com/briebriejoy/status/2019200627641884919 

I was not the only one who got hung up on that. There were so many replies and new threads that I am surprised that no one has written it up, for clickbait if nothing else. I couldn't find anything, so I guess it's me.

Decanting is a process for removing sediment. It happens most often with wine, and sometimes with olive oil. I  did some searching for olives themselves, and there was one person asking about it because when they open olives and don't eat them all within two weeks they start to see mold. 

At the risk of sounding like a snob, don't let opened olives sit around for two weeks. If you do and they start molding, let them go.

I believe there is racism here, and that is not surprising. This post is really more reveling in the ridiculousness of it, so I guess I will get more serious next week. 

For now, every time I open a can of olives and hold the detached lid on while I turn the can upside down over the sink to drain the liquid...

I'm decanting them y'all! 

Related posts:

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/01/asian-food.html 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/01/baby-corn.html 

Ableism in cooking discourse

Just to preview, the conversation that inspired this series of posts touched on ableism, classism, and racism... pretty normal.

Ableism is probably the -ism that comes up the most in cooking discourse, with some very legitimate points and some points that stretch credibility more.

Still sadly normal.

A big part of why it all happens is that aspect of dominator culture where there are always people who are eager to demonstrate their superiority and look down on others.

This frequently comes up with convenience items; someone will deride the laziness or incompetence of something like a tool for cracking eggs or packages of fruit that is already cut up.

The inspiration often comes because there are people who do not have the full use of their hands, or there is limited mobility in some other way. Someone will imagine people with unhampered physical abilities using it and question "How lazy do you have to be?"

One of the things I loved about the latest Knives Out movie, Wake Up Dead Man, is when Simone stands up and Martha exclaims about the miracle but Simone stops her: "I can walk; it just hurts."

It's not just that it is easy to not think about disability, but that when we do we often think of it very narrowly, getting mad if it inconveniences other or if it doesn't inconvenience the person with the disability enough.

(Or enjoying it when the disability works to enforce racism. Lots of ways to be wrong.)

The truth is, for there to be a profit, it often requires that lots of people who don't need the convenience will still want it. Maybe there is some "laziness" there. I do worry about packaging waste, but I worry more about us getting these ideas that people don't deserve food or that they need to suffer to eat well... I don't think that should be true.

When you realize that things you take for granted can be very difficult for others, appropriate responses are gratitude for those abilities, humility in knowing that having those abilities is generally independent of merit, and empathy for those who do not have those same options, ideally without any condescension.

The other way ability tends to come up relates to executive function.

This is not so much about having the motor skills and knowledge to be able to cook, but about being able to make a decision about what to eat based on what you have in the house, then follow through. That can also include regularly bringing in supplies of ingredients that you can use.

Just as mobility issues can fluctuate -- sometimes being more or less difficult -- executive function can as well. 

I have had days where the thought of trying to come up with dinner made me want to cry. That's not common for me, but when you have enough other things going on, one additional thing can put you over the edge.

I think the important thing to remember (before we get to someone whom I am going to be judging pretty hard) is that there can be lots of differences and nuances. 

Yes, absolutely there are times when people are capable of doing more than they do. 

People can also be capable most of the time but not sometimes. 

People can be capable, but not want to.

People might have the ability, but not the knowledge or the motivation to get the knowledge. They might not seem to need it, like if they have someone else who cooks or they have a budget that allows frequent ordering out.

Because people need to regularly eat and things like the availability of that budget for ordering out or that other person who does the cooking might change, there can be really good reasons for having some supplies and some knowledge on how to use them (I am still very interested in preparedness and planning), but not everything needs to be a contest or a moral judgment.

If we care about each other, we should want there to be lots of options available, and be willing to help as we can.  

That's not too much to ask. 

Reading and writing

I was going to title this post "But is it ableism?"

Sadly, that would imply a completely different meaning after the BAFTAs. (Though I have some thoughts on those as well.)

Anyway, ableism does come up a lot in cooking discourse. Another type of discourse that comes up a lot is things that are wrong with students.

This started with a teacher and author posting that he talks to students who want to be novelists but don't read novels:

https://x.com/AmericanGwyn/status/2023820821182247127

You can try reading about it from that thread, but there were so many replies that it is hard to follow.

He later adds that the students are generally taking their inspiration from video games or manga. That makes the reasonable follow-up question why they want to write novels instead of manga or video games; maybe they don't think they can, but that process would involve collaboration with artists or programmers or something; Only being able to create the story is not the end of the world.

Not enjoying novels does seem like a pity, and there is plenty we could say about the benefits of reading fiction and the influences that are causing that to become less common. 

Right now, there are two different paths I want to follow. You can find both of them in the next link:

https://x.com/iproposethis/status/2024542646342209690 

I had thought about Ana Mardoll before someone posted that infamous thread in the replies, but first the person offended by that: Joanna Schroeder, parenting writer who lists her excuses for not reading but still writing, and feels that Gwyn's take is privileged, if not ableist.

What she soon admits is that she does read 40 - 60 books a year, related to her work. 

I don't think anyone was implying that you need to read novel to write non-fiction. With that level of reading, she should be getting pretty well-versed in the style of writing that she is doing. That makes sense.

There may be a little resentment about not having time to read for pleasure, and maybe some implication that she doesn't enjoy her work, but I don't think anything there is invalidating her ability to do her job.

On to Ana!

The first time I saw any posts by Mardoll, they seemed fairly reasonable. There was context missing and then weirder tweets until eventually I think they left the site and later got back on with a protected account. 

This post -- which you can see in the second link -- is one that a lot of people were merciless about.

There's a thread going around mocking writers "who don't read very much" and I'm trying not to haul out my soapbox but... this is ableist? Not everyone can read for pleasure (or indeed at all) and some of those people are writers.

I spent some time thinking about it, wanting to give the benefit of the doubt. 

At the time, the most likely scenario in my head -- focused on disability -- was someone who had once read a lot and started writing, but had suffered something debilitating that made doing so harder. I've known people who have lost a lot of their ability to function where they have to choose what they are going to do with the limited time they have.

Laura Hillenbrand might be a good example, though I don't know how much ME affected her ability to read. I know she had to make other choices for how to do things. 

Regardless, if writing is your profession, you might have to prioritize that over reading, but you would probably have still read a fair amount before.

More recently it occurred to me that someone from an oral storytelling tradition might have words to put down, without having done a lot of reading. However, there are conventions like dividing into chapters and things where it is really helpful to have experience with how other people do it. That could also mean collaborating with someone rather than starting to read a lot in preparation. 

Of course, back when Mardoll that, AI wasn't really a thing, whereas NANOWRIMO allows it now. I have always had an attitude about that anyway, so my first reaction is a hearty "Whatever!", but if you're going to write, write.

And also, yes, if you want to write, read. But if you want to write and have not read, why do you want to write? Maybe you actually want something different, and figuring that out will help you.

While I do think Gwyn is a bit condescending about his students (and possibly other people too), I agree that reading a lot of what you want to write is a good idea. Maybe that should be combined with reading about the field as well. 

Celebrities often get opportunities to write children's books. They often show that they do not know much about what makes a children's book good.

Mainly, I hope when those students think that they want to be novelists, that it is not because they believe that is a path to being rich and famous.

I truly believe that there are many rewards to the writing process, but they aren't financial nearly as often as you'd hope. 

More literature centered on Black children!

This started with an article in Esquire about James Baldwin as remembered by his nephews:

https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/a61751831/james-baldwin-nephews/ 

That introduced me to the book Little Man, Little Man, Baldwin's 1976 children's novel, illustrated by Yoraz Cazac.

Of course I needed to read that, and I did. There was an introduction that mentioned other significant works, sending me to read more, but then it becomes more complicated, especially with chronology. 

To Be A Slave by Julius Lester (1968) 

The Big Box by Toni Morrison and Slade Morrison, illustrated by Giselle Potter (1999)

Those two are pretty straightforward, but you might wonder how much they are influencing each other spread so much apart.  

The Pasteboard Bandit by Langston Hughes and Arna Bontemps (1997*) 

This was written in 1935, but it took a long time to get published.

Then, what puzzled me the most: The Brownies' Book.

I did not initially find a book called that. 

In fact, it was a children's magazine, spun off from the NAACP magazine, The Crisis.

It only lasted for two years, being well-received but not getting enough subscribers to self-fund (the Depression did not help). It did influence other magazines at the time, and contained early writing from Langston Hughes, including at least one recounting of a trip he took to Mexico like the one that inspired The Pasteboard Bandit.

As 100-year anniversaries for The Brownies' Book were reached, it inspired other efforts.

A Centennial Celebration of The Brownies' Book edited by Dianne Johnson-Feelings and Jonda C. McNair

The New Brownies' Book: A Love Letter to Black Families by Karida L. Brown and Charly Palmer

A Centennial Celebration starts with the first issue, includes several scholarly articles, then ends with the final issue. The Love Letter creates new art to recreate the effect. A lot of the visual art is quite good, but some of the writings are less so, especially the play about the early contributors.  

There is such a wide variety here that it is hard to make any comparisons, but the thing that may have been most important was being reminded of the necessity. When The Brownies' Book originally started, there were not many positive representations of Black children. Now there were not only stories, poems, and historical highlights, but children could send in letters and poetry of their own and pictures. 

Representation still matters. 

That makes it nice that one of the literary articles in A Centennial Celebration introduced me to a new book, Marley Dias Gets It Done: And So Can You! (2018),

In her own words, Marley Dias tells about getting inspired when she was 11 to do a #1000BlackGirlBooks drive after finding that all of the assigned reading focused on white boys and their dogs.

She is a kid, and the writing sounds like a kid talking, but she did something extraordinary, and something that was still necessary.

There is still plenty that needs to be done. 

Food heritage

I think I need to write two more background pieces before I get to the ridiculousness of decanting olives.

This is one of them.

I keep remembering this time in Modesto when an older couple was going to have us over for dinner. The wife asked about our likes. I didn't want to be demanding, so I responded that anything was fine, casseroles or what not.

She looked so puzzled.

She had never made a casserole; they were really meat and potatoes people.

I had a companion around then who was totally into that. I remember thinking that maybe these food preferences were regional. She was from Minnesota and while we were in California then, maybe the older couple were transplants. 

Of course, Modesto was also where I got a handout for the basic elements of casseroles, so I think the one woman would have encountered them before. 

Also, apparently casseroles are big in Minnesota, but they are more likely to be called "hot dish".

I'm not saying that the region doesn't play a role, but that there are many other factors, like family background or economic level or job.

My mother was Italian, but she was from the North where the sauce tends to be less meaty and spicy. Also she was the youngest and got married at seventeen, so she did not have as much Italian cooking knowledge as any of her sisters. The most complicated dish that she made from there was gnocchi, one that her father made, instead of her mother. I suspect his cooking process was more visible.

(That is gnocchi, and I learned that more from observing her than being actually taught as well.) 

My parents' cultures melded somewhat over cornmeal mush. It's kind of like polenta, popular in Northern Italy, but was also poor people food, except then you add milk and raisins. (I know it's a thing, but we never fried it.) 

A lot of Mom's recipes came from women she knew through church. If there was a fair amount of casseroles in her repertoire, I assume part of that was because of their convenience.

The growing popularity of the casserole in the '70s is associate by at least one food critic with "the beginning of the dark ages of American culinary culture."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casserole 

It's easy to look down on someone else's food. Don't do that.

I remember reading once that you should never eat anyone's meatloaf except for your Mom's. I think I have seen that about potato salad, too.

I am not really a big fan of either, but I get that there are things that can seem right or not, and memory and legacy is a big part of that.

The message yesterday was that you do not have to cook, but if you want to and don't know how, that can be changed.

Part of that freedom is the flexibility. There are lots of different types of foods with different ingredients and different cooking methods. If there is something easy to cook, but you don't like it, or something that you love but not enough for it to be worth the effort, those points and various others can all be valid.

There is more to it than equipment and recipes.

I'd like to teach the world to cook

This will seem like a tangent, but I promise it will relate.

There was another outbreak of cooking discourse on Twitter. This one got a little weirder. There was also some racism involved, but that part is pretty normal.

Regardless, there is some groundwork I want to lay down before getting too specific.

Let me clarify that I don't really like to cook. I don't hate it, and I get some satisfaction from being able to do it, but a lot of my motivation for cooking is really just that you can eat better and more economically that way. It can also be more convenient, though that's not a given.

My first tangent here should be that there will be people who swear it is more expensive to cook at home than to eat out. 

Usually they make this case by listing every ingredient in the purchasing quantity. If you needed to buy a new bottle of Worcestershire sauce every time you made Sloppy Joes, and you bought the fancy Lea & Perrins, that would add about $7 per dinner. However, it is a shelf-stable ingredient (it does need to be refrigerated after opening) where a small amount will last a long time, it can be used in multiple dishes, and you can get the store brand for much cheaper. 

It's like when Republicans try and show prices are out of control by pricing a Thanksgiving dinner where they include a sack of flour because they will need a few tablespoons and also the turkey is organic and fresh, or Dr. Oz being outraged about the price of crudites... lots of people are spending a lot less and getting more bang for their buck.

The next area that I want to address (though it feels too germane to be a tangent) is that cooking is not some arcane lore that requires years of studying and expertise, even as it does become easier with practice.

I think sitcoms play a part in this. (Okay, this part may be a tangent.)

Once upon a time, sitcom families like the Cleavers had wise fathers and mothers who were perfect housekeepers. As things got more modern, writers and producers wanted to change that up. The first thing that happened was that many sitcom fathers became buffoons, though generally well-meaning ones.

I have seen many men express displeasure with this because it's disrespectful. Maybe, but very few fathers for my generation were as wise and caring as Ward Cleaver; biased and volatile doesn't always work for humor. 

Maybe for Titus.

The other thing that happened, though, was that television mothers became notoriously bad cooks. 

I don't remember seeing many women offended by this. If you could cook, it wasn't insulting you; just that one particular woman, for laughs. If you couldn't cook, maybe you sympathized, especially if you had a Marie Barone mother-in-law who was a great cook and pretty insulting. 

Maybe there was also a rebellious part that was thinking it was unfair that the husband never had to cook. Regardless, I suspect that the growing depictions of women who could not cook helped make a lack of cooking skills seem practically inevitable. Besides, who has the time?

This is where it was important that I mentioned that I don't particularly enjoy cooking; there are a lot of possible shortcuts.

Sloppy Joes? I have made them from scratch, but now if I am going to do it, I use a canned sauce. (I do add Johnny's seasoning when I am browning the ground beef, and add brown sugar when I pour the sauce on.)

There are a lot of things that I know I can make from scratch -- because I have -- but I simply don't find it a good use of my time. For other foods that does matter.

My point is that cooking can be as easy or as complicated or as quick or as laborious as you want it to be.

The caveat is that you can't always choose what to simplify. 

I tried making tiropita once, which I like but I only ever find at Greek Fest. I am sure there are people with different skills for whom it would be easier, but it is not going to be easy enough for me to justify making it again. 

I once looked at taking an Indian cooking class and I had a cookbook. Looking through it, I realized that I was happier going out for Indian food. However, I do buy jars of sauces that are meant for using with chicken. I used them with sliced potatoes, and sometimes I will put in some apples or green beans or whatever is around. That's easy.

I did take a Chinese cooking class. I learned some good techniques from it, but the only thing I regularly make is fried rice, which is easy. I don't want to spend the time on some of the other things. 

Keeping soy sauce or teriyaki sauce around isn't a problem, and sometimes I will go wild and buy some hoisin sauce or something, and that's fine too. (The stir frying I do is more like teppanyaki, so I guess more Japanese-style, and probably not really Mongolian.)

It can be a completely reasonable decision to not cook some things, but there may be other things that you could totally cook. Maybe that would take some practice or watching a video or taking a class at the rec center. 

It can also be completely reasonable to not pursue cooking if it doesn't interest you. It may be worth considering whether you are getting good nutrition or spending too much, but if ordering in or going out works for you, fine. 

There may be options that you have not thought about yet that would work for you. 

Stay open to that. 

Career concerns

While my current term ends June 30th, I hope to finish up my coursework in April. Then I will need to enter the workforce once more.

Because my schooling is being paid for through the Trade Act, I had to submit various things when I was applying, including openings for jobs in the new field and what salaries they listed. At the time (early 2024), there were lots of good jobs available, all earning more than I had made with my previous education and experience level.

Then a horror of a human being associated with racism and violence was re-elected.

Sure, things like Linda McMahon being appointed to Education and a general hostility to knowledge were concerns, but instructional designers don't have to work for public schools. There is a large need for corporate training. I assumed there would still be opportunities in the private sector.

Well, one major corporation's cost-saving measures have -- in addition to lots and lots of layoffs -- eliminated any "unnecessary" training. This includes cutting the fairly standard yearly ethics refresher.

That is something I have taken in both the tech and health sectors. While I acknowledge that a fair amount of it is obvious -- and a lot of the examples were not going to come up for me in my positions -- I thought it was a good reminder. For one thing, they kept using examples of things that really happened. Maybe they didn't happen at your company, but someone out there either did not realize it was a violation or didn't care that much about being unethical.

It then becomes hard to believe that the motivation for ending yearly ethics training is so much that it is unnecessary and wasteful as that some people want to eliminate scrutiny on their actions.

After all, when DOGE goes through and ends software licensing that causes redacted information to become easily viewable and that is highlighted through a case where the rich and powerful just keep getting away with horrific abuse, this does not increase confidence in anyone's ethics or commitment to actually learning and understanding anything.

Add to that the general apparent increase in ignorance and lack of interest in expertise, with lots of shameless lying and artificial intelligence making it much easier to obfuscate and to avoid actually doing your homework and also apparently killing a taste for literature of educational reading...

That then becomes adjacent to an area of more existential dread.

I get why the wealthy and powerful would like to keep others ignorant and averse to changing that ignorance, but I am disappointed in how little resistance there seems to be. 

All of which is to say that while I am still planning on graduating and keeping notes of what I can add to my resume, I am a little worried about my chances of becoming gainfully employed. 

Or my chances of not being constantly angry. 

Checking in with the Pinkneys

I have not finished the Spooky Season writing yet, but we are in Black History Month and I have been doing so much with children's literature that maybe this is a good time to spend some time on that.

I also have not finished reviewing all the works of Jerry Pinkney. I have gotten closer, but he had a long career that spanned decades, including some works that are quite hard to find.

However, I did find another subset among the children. 

Previously, son Myles Pinkney -- a photographer -- had contributed to two of his mother's books:

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2024/06/spotlight-on-gloria-jean-pinkney-black.html 

It turns out that Myles has also done a few books with his wife, Sandra L. Pinkney:

Shades of Black: A Celebration of Our Children (2000)

A Rainbow All Around Me (2002)

Read and Rise (2006)

I Am Latino: The Beauty in Me (2007)

Read and Rise was a collaboration with Scholastic and the National Urban League, celebrating reading. A Rainbow All Around Me highlights lots of other colorful objects, not just people, but the other two are very much about celebrating the beauty of children who might not automatically have their beauty and value recognized.

Sometimes it is easy to forget the progress that we have made. Less so now, but I will also write about that some next week.

Although books are not their primary career focus, they have connections through their family and they use their gifts in supportive ways.

It also occurred to me that Brian and Andrea might have new books too. They did.

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2024/04/spotlight-on-brian-pinkney-black.html 

Brandon and the Baby by Brian Pinkney (2024)

Their kids are pretty well grown now, but Pinkney still shows a good understanding of children's issues, in this case about potential jealousy of a new sibling.

Maybe by now there are grandchildren.

And She Was Loved: Toni Morrison's Life in Stories by Andrea Davis Pinkney, illustrated by Daniel Minter (2025)

I remember the last time I was going through Andrea's work, I was looking for this one, then saw it was not published yet. That's been about three years.

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2023/06/spotlight-on-andrea-davis-pinkney.html 

Over the time I have been doing this, I have read a lot of children's books about very grown-up adults. This one is remarkably balanced, giving a pretty good introduction to The Bluest Eye, and it is beautiful and poetic... I was impressed.

It also reminded me that Morrison has written a few children's books herself.

We will deal with that a little bit next time. 

Along the path

Friends have asked what I want to do after I have graduated.

My most honest answer is that I want to gain all the knowledge of the world and share it with everyone without charging them.

I know this isn't a solid career plan. For one thing, my future desires include continuing to have food and shelter and going on vacations. Maybe getting into clothes that I like better.

Whatever I end up doing to support myself, that will certainly still be a hobby.

I got my BA in 1996, but of course I kept on reading and learning, taking learning very seriously. 

Over time I started noticing how information could support other information. If you knew this piece over here first, when you came across that other piece it would make more sense. My ideas were mostly about putting the pieces together in a helpful order.

Once you start learning about instructional design, that's a relatively small part of it. Then it becomes more about how learning works and what conditions suit it best. What is the essence and what is a distraction? Does the information you are providing and the way you are providing it serve the desired outcome? How do you know if you are achieving the goal?

Realistically, a lot of the job is more about working with people who know the subject; then you help them with the imparting of what they know.

This is fine, as me actually getting to know everything myself isn't really plausible. 

Yesterday I posted about how I would still blog. I could blog about things that I know about, even without creating a full learning module.

That can go beyond blogs. There are books and podcasts and Youtube videos and TikToks and all sorts of ways of getting information out there, some of it interesting and valid and some of it less so.

I have taken a lot of the big online classes through Coursera and other platforms. I had thought of putting out information in ways similar to a PowerPoint presentation. Those classes are a lot like that, except they usually have some quizzes rolled in and maybe some assignments. 

Those are usually peer-reviewed, if anything, because if you want the instructor (or the instructor's graduate assistant) to pay any attention, you need to pay, which I generally wasn't doing.

It's the assignments and tests where the learning tends to really come together. Assessments.

If you just want to give information away, people may not value it, they may not do the work, and they may not actually learn.

It doesn't have to be that way.

Many years ago my friend Rose and I took some classes through the rec center, learning how to make salsas, chutneys, and flavored oils and vinegar.

Learning about the extension service, we wanted to learn more. I ended up becoming a Master Food Preserver and she was going to become a Master Gardener, but I think she moved before she could finish that.

Before that, we put the knowledge into practice. We canned pears together and we picked raspberries and made freezer jam. I later taught a class on how to make salsa, but I seem to remember her making a batch also.

You can do things with knowledge, whether someone is checking up on you or not. 

Of course, you have to want to do so. 

There seems to be less of that around. That's a constant worry.

Putting it out there

While looking for the right capstone project, I put out a general inquiry on Facebook for what topics people were interested in.

I really was looking for ideas, but I also keep meaning to interact more; I am not always good about that.

I got a lot of responses, which was good for the interaction part. 

The ideas were interesting, but mostly not usable.

There are some requirements for completing the project successfully that wouldn't work with most of the suggestions, at least not without the right collaborator. That's it's own topic.

I also know there are already good sources of information out there for many of the ideas. Now, if those sources are not well known, maybe that's something that I could help with, but it wouldn't make sense for me to develop a learning module on it.

The other thing, though, is I suspect with a lot of the suggested topics it is not so much that people don't know what to do, but more that they aren't doing it.

For example, with parking lot and driving etiquette, there might be a knowledge gap, but I think the bigger issue is that lots of people do not care how their actions affect others. 

If such people then do not respect coworkers or other departments in the workplace, or are rude in stores or on sidewalks... well, the instructional problem isn't the etiquette; it's the motivation to care about the etiquette.

It's the motivation to care about each other.

If you have noticed problems with that, you are not alone and you are not wrong. That might be more of an issue for a support group than a learning module.

It makes the suggestion for a module on burnout understandable, and I have some experience with that. For creating a module and then testing learners on their interaction and to do so responsibly... that takes a different level of qualification.

Obviously, I will still blog about things, and I might work on creating other modules on my own time for things that I care about. For practical reasons I need to focus on graduating and projects that will contribute to that.

However, if you think that my posting about dominator culture might relate to people not caring how they treat others, you are right.

And if you think I am likely to write about dominator culture again, you are probably right about that too. 

I will also keep trying to remember to post more on Facebook and look at others' posts, because that matters to me.

It is just hard to do it all. 

School update

I have selected the topic I am going to work on for my capstone.

What's the capstone?

In the Education and Instructional Design masters program, you learn about both instruction and design. Makes sense.

There were classes that focused more on learning principles and thinking and motivation, and others that were more about design elements, then they were put together in the last class before the capstone, the Design Lab.

For that you had to come up with an instructional problem and create a complete learning module for it. In previous classes, there were mockups and segments and descriptions of approaches, but the lab was a chance to work out all of the kinks when you are doing the whole thing.

Then you tried other students' modules, giving and receiving feedback.

Now I am creating a learning module, but this time there are going to be actual learners, not other students in the same department. We will also have to research something about the impact on the learners, working with analytics to understand things about the effectiveness of the module from the results and write that up.

The process goes over three classes, but all of the assignments within those classes are related; that's the capstone. 

I am working on an issue with licensed clinical social workers treating clients with intellectual disability.

That's an important part of my progress, but the real update is how long it took me to get here.

I struggled with that lab.

Part of it was the tools, most of which I kind of hate now. As I will need to continue to use them, I am going to keep working with those tools and get better at them. Will I improve enough to like them? 

We'll see.

A big part of it was also life circumstances. You know how so many of those recent posts have focused on the coming death of my mother and trying to come to terms with losing her?

Yeah, there was a period where my concentration was pretty shot. That didn't help.

My transcript has two incompletes on it. They are both passed now, but they took too long. 

For the first one, the technical difficulties were not my fault. 

On the most recent one, I like to think that I can and should have done better, but I also thought I was going to finish my degree six months early when I was starting out. 

Maybe I needed to be taken down a peg.

There have been two parts to finally making headway, both of which are important.

One is that you need to keep showing up, day after day. 

I never made it as far in a single day as I wanted to (maybe on the day I actually finished the lab), but I would get something done, which could not happen if I did not show up.

The other thing is that I needed to work out the emotions. If those songs and blog posts about the songs seemed self-indulgent, they were also helpful for me.

I was able to do better work when the emotions started to resolve. 

When I say you can't ignore those things indefinitely, I really mean that. 

January daily songs

There shouldn't be that much to write with this one; there are already several posts.

To recap, the songs for January became a soundtrack that I worked out to tell the story of my parents -- but mostly my mother -- and me.

It is a literal playlist on both Spotify and Youtube, both called Farewell. (The Youtube one is missing "The Long Walk Home" for reasons I discuss in that post.

I listened to the music a lot, often while writing the blog posts but also while writing in my journal and thinking about everything. It has helped me come to terms. 

I'm not saying that process would work for everyone, but I am grateful to be drawn toward healing in the way that works for me. I hope you can find the ways that work for you. 

If ignoring the hurt seems like the way to go, I am familiar with that one. I can't even rule it out as an important temporary step, but it's not a lasting solution.

A lot of this has been about moving the needle from unbearably sad to bearable. That's worth something. 

I have felt a lot of love while going through this. I extend it to you now, with whatever you are going through.

Songs and posts:

The divisions aren't quite perfect. They couldn't be. 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/musically-all-about-my-mother-and-my.html 

1/1 “New Year’s Day” by Reggie and the Full Effect
1/2 “59 Sound” by The Gaslight Anthem 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/fly-my-thoughts-va-pensiero.html

1/3 “Va Pensiero” from Nabucco by Giuseppe Verdi, performed by the Berlin Opera Orchestra
1/4 “Triumphal March” from Aida by Giuseppe Verdi, performed by the Budapest Symphonic Orchestra 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2025/05/a-little-bit-more-on-music.html

1/5 “Volare” by Domenico Modugno
1/6 “Come Prima” by Tony Dallara
1/7 “Lonely Boy” by Paul Anka 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/butterfly.html

1/8 “Un bel di vedremo” from Madame Butterfly by Giacomo Puccini, performed by Maria Callas 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/the-flight-of-butterfly.html

1/9 “Coming to America” by Neil Diamond
1/10 “The Living Years” by Mike + The Mechanics
1/11 “The Holy City” by the Tabernacle Choir 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/hooked-on-culture.html

1/12 “Rondo Alla Turca” 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/more-about-my-father.html 

1/13 “I Can’t Make You Love Me” by Bonnie Raitt 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/ruptures-between-1981-and-1995.html 

1/14 “Theme from The A-Team by Mike Post
1/15 “Take On Me” by A-ha
1/16 “She Works Hard For The Money” by Donna Summer 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/bon-jovi.html 

1/17 “Livin’ On A Prayer” by Bon Jovi 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/01/from-1995-to-2011.html 

1/18 “You’re A Friend of Mine” by Clarence Clemons & Jackson Browne
1/19 “I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor
1/20 “Vacation” by The Go-Go’s
1/21 “Joy and Pain” by Rob Base and DJ E-Z Rock
1/22 “The Big Bang Theory Theme Song” by Barenaked Ladies
1/23 “Howlin’ For You” by the Black Keys 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/02/into-home-stretch.html 

1/24 “The Long Walk Home” by Glen Campbell*
1/25 “Won’t Give In” by The Finn Brothers
1/26 “Time To Say Goodbye” by Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli
1/27 “Torna a Surriento” by Luciano Pavarotti
1/28 “A Better Place” by Glen Campbell 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2026/02/nearing-end.html 

1/29 “Hourglass” by Mary J. Blige
1/30 “Je Ne Regrette Rien” by Edith Piaf
1/31 “The Girl With the Flaxen Hair” by Debussy, performed by Walter Morse Rummel