School Days

Jane Curtin, my former colleague on Saturday Night Live, characterized school cafeteria food in a way I’d never thought of. One day, on the set, I was waxing poetic about the fact that I loved the stuff. I think Spaghetti Day was my favorite.

“I don’t know what it is. It was pretty simple. Tomato sauce with ground beef and noodles. I usually had chocolate milk with it. You know, the holy trinity, savory, starchy and sweet. It was just so… divine..”

“Oh, yeah.” Jane said, as she tugged slowly on her cigarette. “Institutional food”.

“Hmmm.” I thought. “Really?”

I pictured all the movie close-ups I’d seen of miscellaneous slop being slammed on to metal trays in various pre-riot prison scenes. Some burly lifer upends the new ‘fish’s' meal. But what he doesn’t know is, the new “fish” was often Jean-Claude Van Damme or Chuck Norris. Usually canned corn and peas, white bread and mystery meat. Probably saltpeter as well.

My husband Chad went to New York recently to drop our oldest daughter Lena off at college.   That same week, our 14-year old attended a cheer camp at UCLA for four days giving me a rare glimpse into the gaping maw of my Empty Nest Future and lemme tell ya, it was bleak.

I won’t mince words. I walked around the house weeping. No kidding. I went into Lena’s room and smelled her pillow and the skeletal remains of her wardrobe. Each article of clothing summoned a sweet memory that only served to drive the knife in further, launching another torrent of bawling.

“Oh, those Gladiator’s from Urban Outfitters that I warned her not to wear at Coachella. But didn’t we have a kick-ass time?’ (Sob) “Oh, and look at this high collared floral shirt that she called “sexy secretary” when she wore it with that over-the knee pencil skir-hir-hir-hir-hirt, oh God, oh God, my ba-bee-he-he-he-he-heeeee.” I just stopped short of falling to my knees, pounding my chest and bellowing “WHY, WHY?” 

School has barely started yet and the requests and the obligations are already starting. I am not complaining. I love to do and give. I am the first to respond to the emails offering my services. However, I am wondering where the time goes. Didn’t the kids just get out of school? Didn’t we just begin 12 weeks of lazy days, biking at the beach, basketball in the back yard and staying up late playing Apples to Apples and Bananagrams? Oh, how I am going to miss these long, lazy days of summer.

It is now time to return to packing lunches, the morning rush, the dreaded homework, racing to all the after school, extracurricular activities and driving, driving and more driving. This past week was jam packed. I think I spent almost everyday in the kitchen. I somehow managed to survive.

This torte was the last thing on my very long list. Our school has a tradition of welcoming the teachers and the staff back to school with an appreciation lunch. Nothing says “back to school” like Peanut, butter, and jelly” and this torte was may way of saying, I appreciate all that you do for our community and my children.

I am going to miss our lazy days of summer.  Breakfast, lunch, snack, and dinner doesn’t seem as daunting during the summer as it does during the school year.  First of all, I get a bit of help with the prep, the clean up, and my sons culinary suggestions inspire me.

The school year brings it own set of hurdles.  Breakfast and lunch have to be prepared at the same time – unless I can get my act together to prep the night before.  Then there is the after school rush. Piling them into the car only to hurry home, get their homework done, give them a healthy snack, and hustle them to their various after school activities.  Oh boy am I going to miss summer.

For the past few weeks I have been experimenting with a few ideas.  My kids love pizza, but the stuff in the box leaves much to be desired and I just don’t have enough time to make one from scratch – given our schedule and how limited our time is (sadly said).  Solution: pizza muffins.