Mrs. Child and Her Sieve
If your life were a blurb on the back of a book jacket, how would it read?
Don’t think of this as your high school comp. teacher asking you to write your own obituary. Consider it an exercise in sifting life down to its little moments of ecstasy. What–and who–are you going to remember? The Foreword and book jacket cover of Julia Child’s, “My Life in France,” simply states,
“This is a book about some of the things I love most in life—my husband, Paul Child, ‘la belle France’ and the many pleasures of cooking and eating.”
A man. An emotion. The daily joys of life.
Mrs. Child began her book (along with Alex Prud ‘Homme) at the ripe age of 91. I’m sure there were innumerable moments, delights and people to consider. They all beg for a mention in her culinary memoir. The people that she eventually chooses to write about are immortalized in culinary circles. And the others, well…
My “quarter life crisis” (courtesy of the imitable, ingenious singer, John Mayer)—my mid-20’s—have been a sentimental sieve. I’ve cut people out of my life. I’ve added a few new faces. I’ve met men that I adore. I’ve met many more men that I abhor (at least, I detest what they stand for). And, still, there are those people that float in that nebulous world of personal purgatory—do I like them, trust them, really know them? Rather, after reading some of Mrs. Child I can ask, “Will they be part of the book blurb?”
God willing I’ll figure myself (and my needs) out by age 30. Until then, I’m still searching for that one sentence that sums up me, who I love and my life’s ecstasy…
June 8th, 2006 at 2:14 pm
It’s a gift, I think, that today’s twenty-somethings are reflective of their own meaning. Maybe it comes after watching divorcées breakdowns and self-help television, but I feel like we’re more conscious of happiness. We know it doesn’t have to be reserved for old retirees. Like a “special occasion” dress, we know more joy comes with wearing it often rather that waiting ‘til later.
June 9th, 2006 at 1:21 pm
That would be something, turning thirty (aka the demarcation of carefree life and responsibility) and being able to sum up your life in one sentence. I wish you the best of luck in attaining this goal.
I think I might want a full paragraph to do that. Possibly make those who read that paragraph say that this young man has lead a full life before becoming responsible by owning a house, marrying a wife, having 2.1 kids…
June 9th, 2006 at 3:56 pm
To hope to have figured out yourself and your needs by thirty is…well…impossible? While I think that we know ourselves better with time, our needs and certain aspects of ourelves are ever changing. It’s the beauty of possessing higher faculties.
June 9th, 2006 at 8:25 pm
She loved God, her family and friends, beauty, nature and her front porch full of her loved ones!
June 15th, 2006 at 3:45 pm
I’m staring 30 dead in the face in less than 2 months…believe me, you don’t get it figured out by then…unless I were to have a sudden epiphany about the meaning of life, the universe, and everything.
Besides, they say that 40 is the new 20, so that means we’re really only looking forward to being teenagers again—which for some reason, isn’t as appealing as it sounds…
June 23rd, 2006 at 3:41 pm
Belle, why 30?