Resistance

Regular readers will know that I subscribe to the FDA Twitterfeed: with a seemingly endless supply of recalls, they never have to dig deep for content. There were a few drug-related, and "undeclared allergen" recalls this past week, and one voluntary recall each for salad with listeria and ground beef with E. coli. Nothing exceptional. I'm not sure there's much more to say about it, other than the regularity of so many alarms being raised is in itself dangerous, as we become inured and lax about it. After all, what can we do about it?

There is a Calvin & Hobbes strip where Calvin has the hiccups. He asks his tiger buddy to scare them away, so Hobbes mentions the hole in the ozone and nuclear waste piling up. It doesn’t cure the hiccups, but it does drive home just how frightening this is--and how cynical we have become.

I was reminded of this strip when I opened up my virtual papers this morning, and read the headlines from across the pond. The UK press has a frightening tale to tell, of published studies of common bacteria that "have developed near total resistance to all forms of antibiotics." The words "total" and "all" frighten me. A gene in some bacteria has been identified that confers antibiotic resistance to the bacteria. And if that's not scary enough, there are three more bits of information we all need to be aware of:

1. It has been found in two very common bacteria, E.coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae. Yup, the same E. coli you read about in all those FDA recalls.
2. It can spread to other bacteria.
3. It has been found in at least eight countries, including the UK, India and the United States. The study's conclusion? "The potential of NDM-1 to become endemic worldwide is "clear and frightening" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-10925411).

I had the opportunity yesterday to listen to an interview with a friend's mother, who was witness to the murders at Kent State. It was both horrifying and inspiring. A war protester in the 60s, this grandmother is still struggling with understanding why we as a country have settled into complacency over so many things the corruption and lack of political will of both government and industry does. How can we incite to change?

There is no one solution to this, and it is unlikely that any individual will make enough difference on their own, but we simply cannot desist from trying. So the next time you are faced with a skinned knee, don't reach for the antibiotic cream. If you must use anything against germs, walk past the sanitzer dispenser and try soap and water. The next time you decide to buy meat, support a producer who avoids routine anitbiotics by practicing responsible animal husbandry. And, if you are so inclined, write that letter to your representative or the FDA and ask them to clamp down on antibiotic use.

Resist.

Quality time

A large cardboard box of tomatoes from the market is hefted up the stairs with a small bag of basil wrapped around a pinkie finger. Darling Husband gets to work bathing the red beauties. Children filter downstairs, peering into the box.

I place a pot of simmering water on the stove,  and get out two forks and two paring knifes. Even the teenager is interested, and does not resist the chore of peeling, but cannot refrain from complaining about the burnt finger. He would be wise not to complain too loudly, since he is usually the happiest one on spaghetti night in our household.

Little One is drawn to the small fragrant bag and begins the process of picking leaves from stems, making a neat pile. I give him three big cloves of freshly-pulled garlic to peel as well.

An intense hour ensues, with the big man ferrying bowls of now-naked fruit between the two peelers and corers; the food processor makes short order of the batches, and the big stainless pots fill quickly. The compost bucket is nearly overflowing, but these many hands have made truly light work, and it feels very special to all be doing meaningful work together.

The pots go onto the stove to simmer, and while my two big men wipe things down, I help Little One use the food processor to whiz together his labors. He gets the fun of spooning the pesto into an ice cube tray, and the kitchen is starting to smell summer-wonderful.

I dig out the jars and the canning kettle, the rings and the lids. Soon I am ladling the hot summer sun into neat packages for our winter pleasure. Little One stands on a stool to watch them lowered into the bubbling pot. And we all rejoice at the happy 'pling' of sealing jars through the evening.

Righteously content, we have all earned a reward. Some oil in a small pot, a scoop of sugar and a big scoop of popcorn, and we settle down to a good movie with a big bowl of fresh, hot kettle corn.

Stepping back

When I was in sixth grade, oh-so-many years ago, our Teutonic red-haired teacher transfixed us with a cautionary tale: it seems a man had a magic machine that could add, subtract, multiply and divide. He carried it everywhere with him, and any time he needed to do any arithmetic, his magic machine did it for him. One night, as he slept, machine on his nightstand, a fire broke out in his house. He escaped just in time to save his life--but not his precious machine. He found himself bereft of the ability to perform even the most basic mathematical functions that we need in everyday life. Obviously, we were the last generation to not have calculators in the classroom, but I doubt we were the last to question why we had to learn this stuff.

So here we are a generation later, where art classes give way to "calculator skills" and our Swiss-army cell phones take the care of any mental math (calculate the tip? There's an app for that!) that we may encounter. But we know computers aren't perfect--they are programmed by people, after all. If your phone-cum-adding machine told you 2+2=5, only a person with some real math under their belt would know something was wrong.

But what of other "old-fashioned" skills? Europeans are finding it increasing challenging to find stonemasons capable of restoring Gothic cathedrals, and even here in the New World, it can be difficult to find someone to float plaster over cracked walls, or make pendulum clocks tick again, or handily use a light meter and a film cameras (to say nothing of finding someone to develop said film). The basics of washing dishes by hand seem lost past my generation (am I really that old?). A year without a dryer--unthinkable in this country--forced everyone in our family to learn how to hang (and how not to hang) laundry. Thank heavens we old folks were around to help out the young'uns learn that clothespins have a use other than craft projects.

But the biggie these days is the age-old craft of cooking. As the machines and services have made our lives "easier," we have become more and more removed from our physical world. We all should know by now that the supermarkets have erased all semblance of seasonality from our food supply, but it is truly appalling to see how many people simply don't use their kitchens for more than microwaving and refrigeration, taking their Styrofoam clamshells into the living room to watch the Iron Chef.

I put to you that reheating a burrito is not the same as making one. Takeout teriyaki is cheating. Delivered pizza pales in comparison to the real thing. Rolling a feast of sushi takes less time--and is certainly cheaper--than driving to get it. Even confirmed bachelors and Cosmo girls deserve a home-cooked meal, and deserve the satisfaction of knowing they can care well for themselves. Like basic arithmetic, it is not rocket science. You get better at it the more you do it. And the veil of the commercialized, commoditized substitute is brushed aside, revealing that the emporer is in fact, naked.

Let us relegate convenience food, drive-ins, and restaurants to the celebratory, the exception. Let us return to our kitchens and entrust paring knives to our children's hands, model good habits for their lives, and put good food in their bellies. For our future.