Nourish my family? What? No.

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Flickr/dok1Last week I did something stupid. I tried to cook food for myself and my family.

I used to cook plenty before I had the kid. As long as I didn't have too much else to do, an evening puttering around in the kitchen while listening to Pandora or a baseball game was a nice way for me to unwind and feel like I was doing something wholesome and productive. Since I had the baby, though, cooking is one of the few things that just doesn't happen much anymore (along with meticulous nail-painting sessions and making our dog's happiness our priority.) Here's my typical schedule these days:

5:30-6:15: Get up, work out, walk the dog.
7:30 Hang with baby, get baby ready for the day, get myself ready for the day.
8:30ish Leave for work
5:30ish Home from work, walk the dog
5:30-6:30ish Playtime
6:30-7ish Baby dinner/bath/bedtime
7:30ish We eat dinner in front of the TV and by "food" I mean some things we assembled/heated up in the microwave
7:30-9:30/10ish Whatever the hell else...watch TV, laundry, work, read (sometimes even a real book and not just a catalog)
after that: bed

We are actually blessed with a kid that sleeps pretty well so I probably am cheating by sleeping the whole 7ish hours per night, but whatever, it's a packed schedule. Every now and then, though, I sense that I'm not a real mom unless I'm making a dinner that we all eat. Even though the kid can barely handle cheerios or oatmeal, I start having this very boring fantasy where I make some mythical pot of something or other that is both delicious and healthy and involves ingredients I can just place on the high chair tray that the baby will feed himself, neatly, probably right before he says "Yum mama! I love you!"

I don't know where this comes from. Food is either a toy or a comfort to the baby--he doesn't really have preferences yet aside from certain textures he can't handle. Meanwhile, I am married to a man who doesn't care whether I cook for him or even if we eat the same dinner. Most of the time we eat two totally separate meals (on the couch, watching TV, because we are terrible.) He's not one of those guys who sits at the table, bereft, waiting for someone to put a hot plate in front of him (one that of course must contain some sort of meat.) 

But I grew up with a mom who did cook for us almost every night, so it's hard to surrender the idea that that's what moms do. However, my mom didn't do some of the things I do above: she didn't have to walk the dog, she didn't go to the gym, and she didn't work downtown five days a week. This isn't to say that she wasn't busy, quite the contrary, but she had a different time setup.

Anyway, last week I decided I was going to make all these salads because it's summer and stuff and also I was going to cook a lot of food for the baby because I have these baby cookbooks and I should use them despite the fact that he would be fine with just eating Gerber jarred stuff all day long. It was exhausting and I was sick of washing dishes. And I wasn't even cooking for my husband--just myself by this point, but the effort of assembling a salad vs. pulling out a frozen meal was significant. I couldn't even imagine doing this for a full actual meal for more than one person. "Do women like me really do this?" I wondered. And I think the answer is no.

There is a saying in freelance writing that I love for its simplicity: fast, cheap or accurate--if you're a client, you can only have two of those things. For being a mom, I think there is a somewhat similar bargain--physically fit, making money, present for the childrearing, cooking, mentally healthy--if you're a child or a partner you at best get two, maybe three things. Four is pretty special.

I may become one of those moms someday who does cook for her family frequently (or I could just be okay with eating a lot more sandwiches, which the husband does make, and well, but I'm watching my carbs right now, because, you know, baby weight plus swimsuit season equals good times.) In the meantime, I'm just aiming for the other three or four things. And waiting for a 3-D printer that can print out meals--along with someone to clean up after.