Thank God it’s Monday, again. I always look forward to each and every Monday because they’re my 52 Chances a year, in which I get to share Memories of My Mom with you. Thus, I hope this blog post brings you a happy Monday.
This past weekend, we celebrated America’s 250th birthday – our National Independence Day. These days, Americans normally spend over one billion dollars a year on fireworks, a tradition for celebrating this holiday that dates back to 1777.
In fact, watching a public fireworks display is still the #1 tradition for reveling in the country’s birthday celebration, followed closely by backyard barbecues, in second place. Of course, this year, being a milestone year, celebrations across the country have been bigger and better than ever, despite the continuous rising costs of everything.
Fireworks symbolize freedom and hope. They boost morale and entice patriotic pride, like “the bombs bursting in air” and “the rockets’ red glare” of the Revolutionary War; such as in the lyrics of the United States’ national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner”.
Did you know that the oldest and longest, continuous-running, 4th of July celebration belongs to Bristol, Rhode Island – the unofficial “4th of July Capitol of the U.S.”? Bristol’s Independence Day traditions date back to 1785 – that’s 241 total celebrations, to date. Every year, in this country, the 4th of July is celebrated with red, white, and blue décor everywhere.
JULY IS SPECIAL
July is the seventh month. The midway point of the year. It’s represented by many symbols such as its birthstone, the ruby, and flowers like the larkspur and water lily. This month is also represented by the eagle (the national symbol of freedom).
The element of fire is said to be July’s “soul symbol”. Orange (like a fire’s flame) is said to be the color that represents July. However, every American town is bathed in red, white, and blue decorations this month, in honor of our Independence Day. Everything is decorated with orange (and other fall colors) in October, mostly for Halloween.
July is considered to be the height of summer in the Northern Hemisphere. It’s the most favored month for taking vacations because of its consistently warm and sultry weather. I have many happy memories from my summers, as a child. Every year, there were always backyard barbecues and picnics to host or attend in July.
This national birthday is usually celebrated with friends, family, and even strangers gathering for cookouts and yard games, block parties, beach picnics, festivals and carnivals, pie baking contests, hot dog or pie eating contests, fishing contests, antique car and boat shows, community parades, fireworks displays, outdoor concerts, and more.
Billions of dollars are spent on grilling foods for this holiday. The most eaten foods on the 4th of July are hot dogs, at #1 – consuming about 155 million – followed closely by hamburgers, at #2, and BBQ chicken, at #3, of the main dishes category. Incidentally, it’s also National Hot Dog Month.
Other top “cookout” foods include four classic sides – coleslaw, potato salad, corn-on-the-cob, and baked beans (by the way, it’s also National Baked Bean Month) – plus deviled eggs (for #1 appetizer) and watermelon (for #1 dessert – followed closely by cherry or apple pie and strawberry shortcake). All are picnic classics and it’s National Picnic Month.
As usual, beer is the undisputed champion in the holiday drinks category (as it is for most holidays and special celebrations). However, for the country’s national birthday, it is followed closely by patriotic (red, white, and blue) colored cocktails and spritzers.
EVERY BIRTHDAY IS SPECIAL
In our family, my oldest and youngest siblings, Bill and Cheryl, share the same birthday – July 3rd – 9 years apart. Mom made sure that their “special holidays”, even though they’re on the same day, were celebrated individually, as well as together, and they weren’t overshadowed by the 4th of July celebrations.
Traditionally, on our birthdays, we each got to pick what flavor cake (and frosting) and ice cream we wanted; as well as what we wanted to eat for dinner that day, too. I continued those traditions with my own children – and still do, even though they’re grown adults, living on their own.
No matter what year or age it is, every birthday celebration is a powerful confirmation of life, personal growth, and self-worth. Every life matters and celebrating them on each and every birthday affirms that. Birthday celebrations bring friends and family together. They also bring the guests of honor happiness, recognition, and love.
Being celebrated additionally reinforces self-esteem and reminds the honorees that their presence matters to others around them. Like the dawning of a new calendar year, it also acts as an annual time for reflection of the past year’s accomplishments and downfalls, allowing for new resolutions for the coming year.
We plan ahead for our family birthday dinners, putting them on our calendars like all the other special holidays. We still continue to gather together for every birthday, every year, as a family; celebrating each of them as a holiday, with the honoree getting their choice of meal (for lunch or dinner) – as well as what flavors of cake, frosting, and ice cream.
About 9,800 babies, on average, are born every day, in the United States. My mom and grandmas always said that “children are blessings in disguise” and believed their birthdays should be celebrated like holidays (no matter what their age). Every day is a celebration for someone.
MORE FROM MOM’S MEMORIES…
As seen in…
Gloria Pitzer’s “No Laughing Matter” Column (Secret Recipes, St. Clair, MI; Circa 1980s)
CHILDREN – A BLESSING IN DISGUISE [Part 2]
EVER SINCE OUR FIVE children have grown up and left the nest to follow their own lives, I’ve been going back in my memories to those days when they were little, and a well-meaning and dear aunt warned me often to love them while they were small because they grew up so fast!
Frankly, I didn’t think they were ever going to grow up. It was during a time when their father and I noticed that the children were outnumbering us, that we found ourselves walking around, asking the question: “what did we ever do to deserve them?”
I mean, we asked everybody – the milkman, the Fuller Brush man, my Avon lady, even that nice person who came to the door, collecting for Mental Health Week!
The closest we ever came to finding an answer was when we both realized we had once promised to love each other “for better or for worse” and figured that was the part that covered having children!
When we were much younger and both glowing with muscle tone and energy, Paul and I thought we knew everything; but having had five children, we now realize that it is what you learn AFTER you know it all that counts!
Frankly, it used to upset me to even talk about children but what else was there for a group of mothers who met in the neighborhood every morning for coffee and conversation.
We were conditioned to concentrate on our position in our homes, minding our hearths and little hearts, which is what mothers in the [1950s and 1960s] did. We were not yet emancipated beyond the home front, in the days during which we raised our children.
And even today, I don’t think motherly feelings have changed all that much, even though their individual activities and privileges and choices have changed a great deal.
We exchanged stories over coffee about the same kids who, when you would install a water cooler next to their beds, still woke you up at 2 AM to tell you they were out of paper cups.
The children, I am sure, felt that parents were invented so that kids could have something to grow up to complain about. They thought Yogi was what you got from eating too much yogurt. If a mother couldn’t say anything else about her children, [she] could at least swear that they were dependable – always there when they needed us.
You had only to meet the kids in our neighborhood to know that the voices crying in the wilderness usually turned out to be one of our kids with a transistor radio affixed to his ear! However, we were then more concerned about a movement that was quickly gaining momentum called the new Child’s Liberation Movement.
The person who conceived that idea probably wouldn’t have bothered if he had ever had to fight for custody of his own TV Guide in his very own living room with five children who claimed, “possession was nine points of the law.”
AGAIN, MORE FROM MOM’S MEMORIES…
As seen in…
Gloria Pitzer’s “No Laughing Matter” Column (Secret Recipes, St. Clair, MI; Circa 1980s)
CHILDREN – A BLESSING IN DISGUISE [Part 3]
THE TROUBLE WITH CHILDREN being a blessing in disguise, is that you have to wait until they’ve grown up to realize that they were when they were small. The Child’s Liberation Movement tickled me when I first heard about it, because I just knew that the founder of that organization had a completely unrealistic approach to the matter.
He probably never had to make an appointment to use his own here dryer, as I had two wooden we had five teenagers at home – nor did he have to explain to an $18-an-hour plumber how G.I. Joe’s head got caught in the sink trap.
He probably never had to watch his own five-year old bathe the neighbor’s cat in your very own Bathtique Bath Oil Beads or sought solace in a dentist’s chair, even when you didn’t need a filling because it was the only chance you had to sit down!
If children, however, were to crusade for their own liberation cause, then as a parent, I would have had to claim equal rights with them.
I would’ve wanted to be tucked into bed at night and have somebody listen to my prayers for a change – and believe me, when I was saying my prayers as the children were growing up, I made an emphatic and urgent please with our Heavenly Father to send more patients! And I would insist on having it right away, too!
But with equal rights with liberated children, I could also claim a tummy ache to avoid those awful “meet-the-teacher” nights, when nothing would scandalize you more as a mother who didn’t care, then not showing up to find out from a teacher, what you already knew or even suspected about your blessings in disguise!
And in the liberation equality matter, I would also like to have had somebody to tie my shoelaces, defend me to a neighbor who said I was wild, and be allowed to wear ragged blue jeans and headbands to the A&P, without feeling I was being gawked at by respectable citizens.
I would want somebody to cut my meatloaf into tiny pieces for me and excuse me from eating broccoli and talk to the principal in my behalf when I was drafted to ride shotgun on a school bus or summoned to play ground monitoring during a teachers’ strike.
I would even like to have had a grandma to run to when Daddy wouldn’t let me have a new pantsuit or paste pictures of Paul Newman to our bedroom ceiling!
I’d like somebody to pick up all of my close after me, make me take a nap every afternoon, and call me into supper when it was ready but that was probably not considered when the Child’s Liberation Movement was founded.
Whenever I hear of “child abuse” I automatically think of a child who abuses a parent, when it is the other way around. I think of all of those 20-some years, when I was always there and could always be depended upon, when the five children needed me.
During those times, the sacrifices that parents made of our own generation were not unlike what our parents made for us, in their own way; only ours expected more consideration and respect from us then we asked of our children.
When my father raised his finger and pointed it at me, with a look of absolute sternness on his face, I knew then it was too late!
If our own kids were ever to be liberated, I know that having equal rights with them would have been unreasonable; but the right to know what we ever did to deserve them in the first place – or in the last – still provokes me.
For when they are little, they tug at your apron strings; but when they’re grown up, they tug at your heartstrings. The only thing I did not count on, however, was that while we were always there when they needed US, we never counted on their not being here when we needed THEM! Maybe that is the blessing, after all.
LAST THOUGHTS…
Thanks for visiting! I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about my memories of my mom, her memories, and other related things. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to email me at therecipedetective@outlook.com. You can also find me on Facebook: @TheRecipeDetective. I look forward to hearing from you!
IN CLOSING…
In honor of TODAY, being National Fried Chicken Day, and July, being National Picnic Month, here’s Mom’s copycat recipe for “El Pollo Loco Style Chicken”; as seen in her self-published cookbook, Secret Make Alike Recipes – Revised (Secret RecipesTM, Marysville, MI; May 1997, p. 46).
This recipe was originally on TheRecipeDetective.com website, when my brother Mike managed it for Mom and Dad, before he gave the website to me (after they had both passed away). Not everything transferred from his platform to mine. Per usual, I’m asking only for proper credit if you care to re-share it.
P.S. Food-for-thought until next Monday…
The month of July observes… National Culinary Arts Month, National Grilling Month, National Horseradish Month, National Ice Cream Month, National Independent Retailer Month, National Blueberry Month, National Peach Month, and more. Additionally, July 3rd through Aug. 11th is considered The Dog Days of Summer.
Today is also… National Hand Roll Day .
Tomorrow is… National Father Daughter Take a Walk Day, National Strawberry Sundae Day, and National Macaroni Day. [NOTE: July 7th is also… the 45th anniversary of Mom’s FIRST appearance on the Phil Donahue Show, in 1981.]
Wednesday, July 8th, is… National Freezer Pop Day and National Chocolate with Almonds Day.
Thursday, July 9th, is… National Sugar Cookie Day.
Friday, July 10th, is… National Kitten Day and National Pina Colada Day.
Saturday, July 11th, is… National Cheer Up The Lonely Day, National Rainier Cherry Day, National Blueberry Muffin Day, All American Pet Photo Day, National Mojito Day, and National 7-Eleven Day.
Sunday, July 12th, is… National Pecan Pie Day, Paper Bag Day, and Eat Your Jell-O Day.
Have a great week!
…27 down and 25 to go.
