On the surface this blog is certainly a food blog. Underneath it is really an exploration of
family and community. I just happen to
think that it is around food that we form those bonds, those shared experiences
that make us community. But food is by
no means the only way.
Walter Cronkite’s autobiography explains a memory of his
childhood. Driving across the fields of
his Midwest in the evening all the farmstead homes lit from the inside would
all go dark at the same time, give or take a few minutes. In that day people only had a few TV stations
and everyone watched the news at the same time then headed off to sleep. Even if in separate homes there was a shared
experience. When I was a kid we had a few more distractions, but we still experienced
what Cronkite describes. Each October we
all watched It’s The Great Pumpkin,
Charlie Brown on the same night on one of the broadcast channels. Each December we all got excited for each of
the Rankin-Bass Christmas specials. Each spring, normally Easter weekend, we
could all watch The Wizard of Oz for
the only time that year. In high school
all this started to change, not just because we got older, but we also got
VCRs. We could watch these “events” at
any time, and it was amazing.
Now we have DVDs (we don’t even have to be kind and rewind),
Netflix and other streaming sources, massive choices online for a multitude of
distractions for any interest, and satellite TV. Anything and everything is available to us
all the time. For an information junky
this is all amazing. But what has been
lost?
Last week in my family and many others we regained
some. Last Monday night we had Monday Night Football on. While that’s not rare at all, this night we
had it on for a commercial, specifically the new Star Wars trailer. As soon as we saw it we went online to buy
tickets for December 17. The internet
slowed to a crawl as millions did the same.
This past weekend we watched The
Phantom Menace as part of our build up to part 7. In Mid-December my entire family will head to
the theater, probably a couple times, and just as I did as a kid, we will all
escape to a galaxy far, far away and share a communal experience like few we
have left. Whether it’s a sporting event
or a massive blockbuster movie, these communal experiences are a tangible part
of what ties us to those around us. Let’s
embrace these opportunities to laugh, cry and cheer alongside others.
Now I think I need to go make some Yoda and Millennium Falcon-shaped
pancakes. May the force be with you.
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