In seventh grade, my middle school offered home economics class. I have no idea if they still offer such classes. It would be a pity if they didn't.
As incoming seventh graders, all the students were rotated through a series of fine arts classes for 6 weeks: painting; home economics (i.e., baking and sewing); music; shop (woodworking); dance and one other class now forgotten to the fogs of memory. At the end of the semester, we selected the class we wanted to take for the remaining semester in the school year. Selection was determined by the order of the number each student drew in a random lottery; I, by strange fortune, managed to draw number six. Thus, I had my pick of any class I wanted.
The two most popular choices were home economics, taught by a very warm and friendly woman, and the woodworking class taught by an irascible sexist who likely would be sued for sexual harassment ten thousands ways to Sunday if he were still alive and teaching, but whose charisma made him a favorite of most students. His was definitely the "in" class.
Guess who I, in juvenile and puerile peer pressure stupidity chose when I had carte blanche? Yes. Instead of baking and sewing, which I infinitely would have preferred for six weeks I ended up making a wood replica of the Playboy Bunny logo. I am not @#$%^&*( kidding you. Somewhere, my mother still has this monstrosity (which [cringe] is mounted on a plaque board, God help me). Unlike my sister Kaly's Matisse-inspired collages which are framed and hang throughout my parents' house, this thing has never seen the light of day after I gave it to her because (thank God), my mother is a woman of exceptional aesthetics.
I distinctly remember the recipe our home ec teacher taught during that trial home ec class week: muffins. I remember learning how to measure flours and how to measure liquids. I remember how muffin batter is supposed to be lumpy and gooey. I remember most of all...how warm that class kitchen felt, how holding a spatula felt so right (in a way that the sandpaper block to smooth around the Playboy bunny's ears never did), how simply at home I felt with a recipe and with measuring cups and baking tins.
The funny thing is...I haven't baked muffins since that time, not until this past week. I was looking to give Puggle something new to munch on in the mornings, now that he likes to feed himself (by jamming food into his mouth with a chubby fist) and Marcus Wareing's cookbook has a lovely blueberry muffin recipe.
So, twenty years three post-facto, I still regret not taking that home ec class. I probably shouldn't be so exasperated; regardless of childhood insecurity and the inability to pick what I really wanted, my cooking self eventually found me. It's a bloody good thing. Can you imagine me with a bandsaw?
