Half in the Bag

I’ll tell you why I REALLY look forward to summer; it’s not because I like the heat, and anyone who knows me knows that I’d rather do a Wisconsin winter over July anywhere, HOWEVER, I do my own subtle rejoicing as the end of May approaches simply because of the break I get from having to make school lunches.

It was much harder when the kids were even younger because we were making 4-5 different lunches a night, preparing ahead so that the mornings could be seamless and, above all, speedy. Historically, my kids didn’t like the public school’s hot lunches although they each had specific ones they would tolerate – never the same as anyone else on the same day though, and I remember pleading my way through an occasional night off from lunch-making, whining to a fourth grader “…but you used to LOVE that mac ‘n cheese lunch…..”

“Well I hate it now”.

Me, whining: “…but it comes with chocolate cake….” (this is SICK…I take full responsibility)

“Oh, alright….fine…if I have to…”

(I recall my friend Maggie telling me that her method for getting out of making lunches was that she and her husband would let her kids know that whoever would [be KIND ENOUGH to] choose HOT LUNCH would be the MOST LOVED KID…as in FAVORITE CHILD).

As soon as kids go to Middle School, their choices are much less like Hospital food and much closer to FAST FOOD – the ultimate kid-pleaser…this gives your average 11 year old a sense of gratification that can only come with “getting away with murder” on the nutritional front. I remember how I felt when I finally discovered that – yep – my kids who are currently in Middle School and High School have French fries every day. It’s a let down. I wish for more. I blame the schools. I blame my kids. I blame myself. I blame the French fries for being so DAMN GOOD. I blame everything and anything that could COMPETE with the French Fries and WIN but hasn’t figured out how to pull it off, yet. And, as other parents have discovered over time, we cannot BE THERE, WATCHING THOSE KIDS, MAKING THEM CHEW AND SWALLOW those fantasy lunches that we dream up in our “I-could-be-a-GREAT-MOM-if-they-would-just-listen-to-what-I-know-is-good-for-them” heads. And we all want them to eat “something”, right? How else would they have the energy to chew gum all day and come home famished? So French Fries it is.

Great. So, I have one kid who has NOT yet entered this 6^th. grade intro to food/french fry-orgy-at-school, and that’s OLLIE, my Food Critic (Criticizer) who, interestingly enough, has a slim list of foods he likes (kind of) that are also at least somewhat healthy, BUT, for reasons that I am unable to crack the code on, are REJECTED IMMEDIATELY, by default, if sent to school: strawberries (taste different at school), LIFE cereal, Cheerios, green apples with peanut butter (apples get brown, PB too messy), Morningstar Farms Vegetarian Sausage Links (wouldn’t work cold, anyway), bagels (have to be right out of the toaster, hot-steamy-hot), eggs (I could consider sending these hard boiled except that …I can’t…) plums (taste different at school), grilled cheese sandwiches, PB&J sandwiches (get too mushy and prefer them microwaved for 12 seconds and eaten outside). Hmmm.

Every other day or so, I ask my husband to make Ollie’s school lunch these days– not because it is so completely taxing for me to DO this on my own, but because it is truly depressing and baffling to pull off. It’s a head-scratcher. We send him with “Gushers” or “Fruit-by-the-Foot” for a snack and a couple oversized Pretzels for his lunch (or 2 Chocolate Rice Cakes – nutritionally close to styro-foam, although better than candy…). I try again and again - hoping that my FOOD MIRACLE has happened while he slept, asking "...would you eat one of [THESE] if I put it in your lunch bag?"

"Nope".

Anyway, Ollie’s lunch bags – (which are your classic paper bags, usually brown, although they have them in red, white, or blue also, these days) – are packed with as much love and devotion as we have the energy for, after doing this for what seems like a lifetime with 4 other kids, and typically I personalize the whole dang thing and draw a cartoon of Ollie on his bag OUT OF LOVE & GOOD MOTHERING : ) and yet…really these lunches are pathetic, a classic example of aiming-to-please-but-feeling-like-shit parenting – perfectly satisfying as far as Ollie is concerned, but lame…an exercise in minimalism…an attempt at NOT WASTING efforts and resources, as much as anything. In the past, we have thrown out ENTIRE lunches, not acknowledged, not opened, obviously and certainly not eaten…and this never fares well. So he has trained us, like good puppies, to do this his way…to make a lunch that is no more than what he can handle with his ga-zillion food aversions…to make what we believe he WILL eat, to supply SOME calories and a moment of engagement in the course of his school day…the lowest of all expectations on our part and yet…as always, with LOVE…