Yesterday (Tuesday) was officially day 2 for me.I spent the morning getting the mundane things of the month cleared off my calendar. Paid the bills, made new “To Do” lists, cleaned up a bit & listened to my personal development. I worked for a good 2-3 hours clearing out my IG messenger & reminding myself to eat.
By 3PM I had finally showered and made my way out of the house. I set out to grab some fresh strawberries at our local supermarket. A small store in town (15 min. drive for me) that has a decent selection of what we would need to make good wholesome meals, some organic produce & and even a few “fancy” items you might find at an inner city market. Everything is usually more than slightly overpriced. The price you pay for small town living I guess.
Next thing I know it was 5:20 P.M. and we had already been in town for a few hours earlier in the day,(waiting in line at the post office) , visited the grocery store once before to pick up more Fish & mangos for the taco tuesday idea I had planned, only to realize I did not grab strawberries. I had just come from picking Jonas (my oldest) up from his Future Problem Solvers competition at school. Apparently he had called me a few times and I ignored the call.” I never answer phone calls from numbers I do not recognize,” I reminded him. “You should have left me a voicemail.”
I’m not sure if that was an event parents could or should attend but clearly I didn’t make it if it was. We also had cub scouts meeting that night for him, so I figured I could make dinner quickly after the meeting and start my jam when they were all in bed. I rushed into the store, grabbed 2lbs, priced almost $2 more than my curbside price, some Jimmy Dean sausage & jelly jars. I had a ton of mason jars I picked up 2 years ago for a friends baby shower but had no idea where the lids were or if they were the right size. I spent more on those 3 items than I do for fresh fruit and veggies on my weekly grocery list. Clearly Joan and I still have very different lifestyles.
Coming home was chaos, in my mind at least. We had spent way too long at the cub scout meeting, where I’m sure I dropped way to many F bombs for the moms. We are planning our boys CrossOver ceremony and sharing ideas, opinions, and volunteering for what we can do. I did not grow up doing extracurriculars much less having parents involved, I also have a hard time feigning interest in things like this, keeping a fake “I have it all together & want to be here face” lately. Especially since my mantra this year is “Fuck it”. I’m betting the double shot of espresso in my coffee I had just chugged had a lot to do with my even more laid back attitude about how we should handle things.
Amongst other things on my mind I thought it would be a good idea to have a conversation with Jonas about how he should expect to assume more responsibility over his activities and communicate more effectively with me and his father so we can all plan according to what’s going on. This did not go well at all. It left me tense and frustrated, wondering if he pretends to not get what I mean or if he just really doesn’t grasp that he is 2 years from the teenage realm and maturity is part of that.
Tacos were made, but not by me. Demarcus had taken it upon himself to whip up some ground turkey tacos and feed the littles that were at home & my sister in law (she stays with us M-Th for nursing school). I almost gave way to a poor attitude where that goes & picked his tacos apart but I caught myself pretty quickly this time.
8 PM rolled around pretty quick, kids were showering & getting ready for bed, my weekly team call was wrapping up & I had managed to get a little more work done. I was almost ready to get started, but I didn’t. It was 10 pm pretty quickly and while everyone slowly fell asleep I worked a little more, scrolled the new Fabletics line & ordered an outfit. Not the most productive use of my time. I know. It’s something I am working to improve.
It was close to 11:30 when I finally decided I better workout get my 20 min it. So I did then I did an extra 20 since I was still hopped up on caffeine and was feeling pretty good.
I finally made it back into the kitchen close to 12:30 and started going over this recipe. Thinking as I had in the store that it was such a waste to see these beautiful strawberries turn into jam. As part of my healthier habits I have learned to appreciate how sweet fruit is on its own & although I do indulge on sweets, it’s rare that I indulge in a jam. Oh well, I made a commitment.
Washing & hulling the strawberries was no big deal. I ate the hulls as a kind of apology for what I was about to do to the entire batch of fruit. I pulled out my jars, washed & set to dry. Ingredients were pretty simple sugar, pectin (not sure what this is but I bought it) and butter. Yup, so far so good.
Canner? Jar lifter?Yeah, I don’t have those so I’m going to improvise. I’ve seen Sweet Home Alabama too many time to know that there’s another way to do this. YouTube is my best friend if you don’t already know that about me. So the next 5 min go to finding out what I have vs what I need. It took me another 30 min to find everything I had and could use to make this shit happen. It was now 2AM and I was ready to begin boiling more than just water.
I blended, stirred, boiled and sugared the strawberries just like the recipe asked. I boiled jelly jars in a huge pot I once used in an attempt for tamales (I failed btw). I used a rubber oven-mit instead of the Jar lifter to pull and fill jars, burned my thumb with wayyy to hot for your hands jam. Maybe it’s the strawberries way of telling me how dare you turn me into Jam. Maybe I’m finally off my caffein high and getting tired.
Jars filled, tightened and placed back into the large tamale pot to boil. It was now 3 AM and I was tired. I forced myself to eat dinner, because I had totally skipped it and was just now realizing it. Sat down and watched Game of Thrones reruns as I waited for the water to come to a rolling boil. Which took forever btw!
Finally 45 min and 10 trips to the kitchen to see what the hold up was we had a rolling boil!! Yass!! 10 more min of boiling and 5 min of waiting to cool. The timers rang and I peeled my but off the Oversized lazy boy recliner I had been sitting in. Pulled every jar out carefully and placed them on a towel, where they will sit for the next 24 hours. I made note that NO ONE is to touch or move these jars for 24 hours!!
I dragged my ass to bed, closed my eyes not feeling proud, not feeling accomplished just extremely exhausted. I forced my mind to shut down bc it was still going and going random thoughts crossing my mind. Not tonight I need sleep.
5 hours later I’m up again. I let the dogs out, offer Addison breakfast which she quickly declined with a NOPE, and checked on my jam.
All in one piece, unmoved jars, note in place. Maybe they read the note maybe no one else cared about my jam, but in this moment I felt proud and once again the word accomplished flashed in my mind.
I’m beginning to wonder if the reason all these years I’ve never felt proud of what I had done was because of my upbringing. A quick thought goes to how different my childhood was compare to my kids. I’m definitely a very different parent than I had, for the short time I had them. I love on them, discipline them, encourage them & allow them to be proud of themselves for doing things well.
I guess I’ll never know what it would have been like for me to have those things, but I can learn to own my accomplishments & allow myself to feel right along with them.
Up next, the Gravy train!
