Thank God it’s Monday, once again. I always look forward to Mondays, as they’re my 52 Chances a year, in which I get to share Memories of My Mom with you. Therefore, happy Monday.
Today’s National Working Parents Day. Everyone knows what it’s like to have at least one working parent, if not more. Many of us know what it’s like to be one. Unfortunately, more times than not, co-parents both need to work to make ends meet.
As Mom used to describe it, when I was young – she and Dad would be earning enough between the two of them, just to make ends meet and then the ends would move further apart. It was a struggle for my parents, raising five kids in the 1960s and 1970s.
It’s hardly different for parents, today, as history tends to repeat. Somehow, my parents always found a way to get through the “trying times”. It helped that Mom was very crafty at making a lot of things that she and Dad couldn’t afford to buy, such as clothes and accessories, bedding, curtains, toys, personal care products like soap, and even restaurant dishes and grocery products.
By the way, Sunday is also American Business Women’s Day. Mom’s copycat cookery concept came to fruition when she began imitating grocery products and pet foods/treats, to save money on the household budget. As a food writer at a local paper, in the early 1970s, she often received requests for how to make different dishes.
When a request came in, for duplicating McDonald’s special sauce (which was a copycat version of Big Boy’s special sauce), and another came in for creating a cheesecake like Sara Lee’s, it started a snowball effect. At first, her editor was pleased with her food column’s new direction, until advertisers (whose products she imitated) complained.
Rather than go back to the boring, typical recipes, as her editor requested; Mom quit to start her own family operated, recipe business. Her passion was writing. She also loved to share with others how to save money, by making things at home.
When we couldn’t afford luxuries, like eating out, Mom figured out how to imitate fast food and restaurant dishes. She called it, “eating out at home”. As the old proverb says: “Necessity is the mother of invention.” Her “invention” of copycat cookery came about, when many Americans were likewise struggling to make ends meet.
Mom often wrote about “The Backdoor Bakery” that Dad’s grandma operated out of her own home to help make ends meet, while raising many children and running a farm, as well.
FROM MOM’S MEMORIES…
As seen in…
Eating Out At Home Cookbook (Secret RecipesTM, St. Clair, MI; Sep. 1981, 12th Printing, p. 25)
LIVING AT HOME
(A story by Gloria Pitzer, based on family folklore.)
CROOKED PATH WAS a mid-western, sage brush hamlet, settled shortly before the Civil War by pioneers in covered wagons. Grandma was born there a few years after the war – the oldest daughter of her father’s second marriage.
Fortunately, for Grandma, her father dabbled in a little of this, a little of that; owning the saloon in town, a boarding house, and the town’s mercantile [store]. Her diary tells how she learned to cook at the boarding house, where she met Grandpa, who was renting a room there.
He married her in the parlor – much against her parents’ better judgement. On her 16th birthday and on her 17th birthday, they were blessed with the births of their first two of eleven children – six boys and five girls.
We were never quite certain what work Grandpa was in, but it took them from the plains of Nebraska to Ohio, to West Virginia and, eventually, to Michigan, with abbreviated residencies in Pennsylvania and Indiana.
From her ‘Recipe Journal’ notes, it seemed clear that Grandma’s ‘Backdoor Bakery’ supported the family’s income rather substantially for many years. Grandpa was probably a professional handyman from what we’ve been able to piece together from Grandma’s ‘Recipe Journal’.
She made meticulous notes on recipes, to the effect: ‘This is the pie I baked from the California lemons that Gus Maxwell gave Pa for fixing his plow.’ [Another entry said:] ‘The hens Pa got in payment for the book cases he made for Judge Burns made a fine stew, good soup, and six loaves of chicken sausage.’
[Another said:] ‘The sack of brown sugar Yostman gave Pa for mortaring up his stove pipes made a good caramel pie – sent to ailing Bessie Forbes, down the road.’ From studying the quill-pen entries, I gather that work was the most essential part of life 80 years ago.
By contrast, today’s workmanship is inferior to anything produced by the craftsman of yesterday. I wonder why people, today, are so unhappy with their own work – as if the tedium of labor is not really the problem.
Isn’t it typical that those who hold work to be without value are, themselves, empty? To imply, today, that work is without meaning is actually to also imply that life is without meaning – which most of our social influences do rather thoroughly.
Grandma’s cookery appears to let nothing go to waste. The broth from Judge Burns’ hens also made the gravy for the stew, the meat portion made the sausage and the bones from the carcass were ground fine and buried in the vegetable plot in the back of the firewood shed.
Apparently, Grandma and Grandpa were considered among the prosperous of their community because they were productive, although never wealthy. At least, we do know that they were indeed happy.
But the definition of ‘happiness’ in Grandma’s own handwriting was: ‘Happiness sometimes comes from ignorance – from not knowing how much better our life might be.’
One of the aunts confided that Grandma placed great importance upon the strength of her family and the respect they gave their father because her own life, with her parents, was less than memorable.
Her life centered around her family – the heart of which seemed to be the kitchen. Their nourishment, however, was not food but love that came from ‘actions’…
Stay-at-home parents and homemakers have, for many decades, started their own home-based businesses so they could raise their families, while also helping to make ends meet, financially.
Mom integrated me and my siblings into her own home-based, mail-order, recipe business in a variety of ways (for almost a year) before she ever told Dad what she was doing. We were all sworn to secrecy, while she kept us busy, helping her with different things that our ages and personal talents could handle.
“IF SOMEONE WERE to copy our so-called ‘success’, I could give them no blueprint for that condition. Each one of the little steps that we had to take to develop the kitchen table activity into a professional business operation, are like the grains of sand that the oyster requires to form a pearl.” – Gloria Pitzer, My Cup Runneth Over and I Can’t Find My Mop (Secret RecipesTM, St. Clair, MI; Dec. 1989, p. 25)
Whether they work for pay or for perks, homemakers count as “working” parents, according to Wikipedia.com. “How Much Is A Stay-At-Home Parent Worth?”, by Porcshe Moran, claims a homemaker can earn an annual salary of $178,201 (based on the 2019 data she obtained from Salary.com) if they’re paid for every job/task they perform.
A homemaker’s services includes (but isn’t limited to) chef, maid/housekeeper, laundress, nanny, teacher, chauffeur, personal shopper, secretary, counselor, and nurse; plus, a groundskeeper and gardener, too.
The picture below reflects data I collected, myself, in 2020; from Salary.com and Indeed.com, regarding the average salaries paid, in Michigan (at that time), for various homemaker skills. The homemaker’s work and value of their time are often taken for granted.
Porsche’s 5-year-old estimated salary would be considerably higher for 2024. Additionally, I don’t know if her salaries were based on 40-hour workweeks or the actual 112 hours that a stay-at-home parent realistically puts in, at 16 hours per day, seven days a week (and don’t forget about overtime pay).
More families have been going back to being as self-sufficient as possible – including home schooling, which has seen a corresponding rise in the last four years. For decades, people chose to spend their time on other things than cooking from scratch, growing their own vegetables, raising chickens, and the like.
At some point, our time became more valuable than money. We opened the door to convenience products and services, to save us time, even if it costs more. Now that we’re struggling to make ends meet again, things have flipped back to the value of the dollar, being greater than the value of our time.
LAST THOUGHTS…
Speaking of time, it’s flying by – as Sunday is the official start of fall – the Autumnal Equinox. If you haven’t already, it’s time to begin tackling that fall cleaning list, assuming you have one. HouseholdManagement101.com has a great, printable “Fall Cleaning List” that covers all the basics.
“Fall Cleaning As Important As Spring Cleaning”, by Dr. Sally Augustin, Ph.D. (PsychologyToday.com; Oct 09, 2013), focuses on de-cluttering. I like how she wrote… “We continually accumulate stuff and dealing with it is part of Fall cleaning.” I excitedly told my husband, “See. I’m not the only one who accumulates stuff!”
Every fall, I play the TetrisTM shuffle game in my basement – unburying my fall and Halloween décor that’s buried behind my Christmas décor, which is further buried behind our camping gear and all the garage sale stuff I bought, during the summer. More on that next week.
Thanks for visiting! By the way, tomorrow is the 6th anniversary of the start of Mondays & Memories Of My Mom. I hope you enjoy reading about my memories of Mom, her memories, and other related things. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to email me at [email protected]. You can also find me on Facebook: @TheRecipeDetective.
IN CLOSING…
In honor of September, being Whole Grains Month, here’s Mom’s copycat recipe for “J.L. Hudson’s Make Alike Corn Muffins”; as seen in her self-published cookbook, The Original 200 Plus Secret Recipes© Book (Secret RecipesTM, Marysville, MI; June 1997). As always, I’m asking only for proper credit if you care to share it.
P.S. Food-for-thought until next Monday…
September celebrates National Sewing Month, Better Breakfast Month, Little League Month, National Americana Month, National Blueberry Popsicle Month, National Chicken Month, National Courtesy Month, National Honey Month, National Italian Cheese Month, National Library Card Sign Up Month, National Mushroom Month, National Potato Month, National Rice Month, and Self-Improvement Month – among other things.
Plus, as the start of the third week in September, yesterday also kicked off… National Farm Animals Awareness Week and National Indoor Plant Week.
Today is also… National Play-Doh Day, National Cinnamon Raisin Bread Day, National Guacamole Day, and National Step Family Day.
Tomorrow is… National Professional House Cleaners Day, National Apple Dumpling Day, Constitution Day and Citizenship Day, and National Monte Cristo Day.
Wednesday, September 18th, is… Air Force Birthday and National Cheeseburger Day.
September 19th is… National Butterscotch Pudding Day and Talk Like A Pirate Day. Plus, as the third Thursday in September (for 2024), it’s also… National Pawpaw Day.
Friday, September 20th, is… National Fried Rice Day, National Pepperoni Pizza Day, National Punch Day, and National String Cheese Day.
September 21st is… National Chai Day, National Pecan Cookie Day, and National New York Day. Plus, as the third Saturday in September (for 2024), it’s… National Dance Day, National Gymnastics Day, Boys’ and Girls’ Club Day for Kids, Responsible Dog Ownership Day, and National Clean Up Day.
Sunday, September 22nd, is… Car Free Day, Dear Diary Day, National Girls’ Night, Hobbit Day, National Ice Cream Cone Day, and National White Chocolate Day. Plus, as the start of the last week in September, it’s also… National Keep Kids Creative Week.
…38 down and 14 to go!
