A simple question from a friend got me wondering.
I had posted a photograph of my latest culinary effort which happened to be a salmon filet baked with mayonnaise and herbs on Instagram and she asked me how I managed to get groceries. Her question was innocent enough considering that we were on week two of a social distancing project which did not as yet have an end date and different people were handling the situation differently. Grocery shopping was not easy, but was manageable. You had to stand in line to get into the store and maintain a gap of 6 feet from other shoppers, but overall the stores were well stocked ( if you weren't looking for toilet paper or hand sanitizer) and for a few minutes you could actually forget that you were in an alternate universe where you could not casually pass someone in the grocery store aisle, but had to swerve or stop and sidle away to maintain the six feet gap.
For someone like me whose go to when stressed, is the kitchen, this was a very good thing. I did not shop with specific dishes in mind, but I did stock up with everything that I usually buy. I haven't cracked open recipe books looking for exotic recipes , but I do look at what I have and come up with some speciality I can whip up, because I have everything I need and a captive bunch of diners at home.
So when my friend asked me that question, it set me thinking. I have the luxury of waking up in the morning and deciding what I cook that day. Countless people have lost their jobs and therefore their incomes and to them, the question might possibly be about what they have left in the pantry and if they could make a decent meal out of it and if they had enough to make things last a bit longer until...until things went back to what? We are standing at a plateau and looking ahead at flatlands ( assuming things don't get worse) till the eye can see and we have no idea what lies beyond the horizon. We all hope the world will go back to normal. Back to where it was, when we could saunter out when we feel like it, run into friends at the mall and go have a hot chocolate at the cafe and walk into Macy's with absolutely no intention of buying anything, but march right to the sale rack and look at every single item and its price tag, shrug our shoulders and say,"Hmmm...not my style"..those were the days!
For a vast number of people, going back to where we left off a few weeks ago would actually mean a secure job and food on the table. The effect of this lockdown or social distancing or whatever this experiment is, is very different based on your circumstances. A restaurant employee bears the brunt of this this tempest far worse than say, a doctor or an engineer does. But life in its barest is all about nourishing yourself to live another day. But the vagaries of disease make a sous chef's job more of a problem than other mundane ones. My mother in law mentioned how farmers were forced to leave fruits and flowers and vegetables unharvested. The loss not just of his livelihood, but of food that would have assuaged the hunger of humanity...
I looked at my Instagram posts and it hit me that it seemed remarkably tone deaf..here people were not sure if the federal aid promised will get to them in time and I was off posting pictures of dishes that I'd made because I felt like it?
All the migrant workers in India, walking back to their native villages because there is no job to feed and clothe them now that the whole country is at a standstill? Walking hundreds of kilometers, without food or shelter, children in tow, at the mercy of nature. The very image is painful to contemplate. Any economic catastrophe seems to unfairly affect segments of society that are exactly the ones that cannot absorb the shock. It can obliterate the slow progress that they make to claw their way out of a social strata that held them back for years and they hope will not be a deterrent for their children. But they are probably back where they started. Disillusioned.
The unfairness of the whole situation made me think...people who can rebound out of this economic pummeling, owe it to those who, for no fault of their's, cannot .We owe them not just our thoughts and prayers, but actual help. Be it a donation to a charitable organisation, or a gift card purchased from a restaurant for later use, or a dollar handed out to a homeless person at a street corner. Everything counts. The Coronavirus doesn't differentiate. Looking at celebrities who have caught it and the ones who have died from it..we know it is a great equalizer. But, why should the economic fallout be borne by the ones who actually can't bear it?
Let us all give them our help. We donated through my husband's workplace which, God bless them, matches our donation. Find out if your workplace does that.
Anything, small or big, will make a difference. Let's do it!
I had posted a photograph of my latest culinary effort which happened to be a salmon filet baked with mayonnaise and herbs on Instagram and she asked me how I managed to get groceries. Her question was innocent enough considering that we were on week two of a social distancing project which did not as yet have an end date and different people were handling the situation differently. Grocery shopping was not easy, but was manageable. You had to stand in line to get into the store and maintain a gap of 6 feet from other shoppers, but overall the stores were well stocked ( if you weren't looking for toilet paper or hand sanitizer) and for a few minutes you could actually forget that you were in an alternate universe where you could not casually pass someone in the grocery store aisle, but had to swerve or stop and sidle away to maintain the six feet gap.
For someone like me whose go to when stressed, is the kitchen, this was a very good thing. I did not shop with specific dishes in mind, but I did stock up with everything that I usually buy. I haven't cracked open recipe books looking for exotic recipes , but I do look at what I have and come up with some speciality I can whip up, because I have everything I need and a captive bunch of diners at home.
So when my friend asked me that question, it set me thinking. I have the luxury of waking up in the morning and deciding what I cook that day. Countless people have lost their jobs and therefore their incomes and to them, the question might possibly be about what they have left in the pantry and if they could make a decent meal out of it and if they had enough to make things last a bit longer until...until things went back to what? We are standing at a plateau and looking ahead at flatlands ( assuming things don't get worse) till the eye can see and we have no idea what lies beyond the horizon. We all hope the world will go back to normal. Back to where it was, when we could saunter out when we feel like it, run into friends at the mall and go have a hot chocolate at the cafe and walk into Macy's with absolutely no intention of buying anything, but march right to the sale rack and look at every single item and its price tag, shrug our shoulders and say,"Hmmm...not my style"..those were the days!
For a vast number of people, going back to where we left off a few weeks ago would actually mean a secure job and food on the table. The effect of this lockdown or social distancing or whatever this experiment is, is very different based on your circumstances. A restaurant employee bears the brunt of this this tempest far worse than say, a doctor or an engineer does. But life in its barest is all about nourishing yourself to live another day. But the vagaries of disease make a sous chef's job more of a problem than other mundane ones. My mother in law mentioned how farmers were forced to leave fruits and flowers and vegetables unharvested. The loss not just of his livelihood, but of food that would have assuaged the hunger of humanity...
I looked at my Instagram posts and it hit me that it seemed remarkably tone deaf..here people were not sure if the federal aid promised will get to them in time and I was off posting pictures of dishes that I'd made because I felt like it?
All the migrant workers in India, walking back to their native villages because there is no job to feed and clothe them now that the whole country is at a standstill? Walking hundreds of kilometers, without food or shelter, children in tow, at the mercy of nature. The very image is painful to contemplate. Any economic catastrophe seems to unfairly affect segments of society that are exactly the ones that cannot absorb the shock. It can obliterate the slow progress that they make to claw their way out of a social strata that held them back for years and they hope will not be a deterrent for their children. But they are probably back where they started. Disillusioned.
The unfairness of the whole situation made me think...people who can rebound out of this economic pummeling, owe it to those who, for no fault of their's, cannot .We owe them not just our thoughts and prayers, but actual help. Be it a donation to a charitable organisation, or a gift card purchased from a restaurant for later use, or a dollar handed out to a homeless person at a street corner. Everything counts. The Coronavirus doesn't differentiate. Looking at celebrities who have caught it and the ones who have died from it..we know it is a great equalizer. But, why should the economic fallout be borne by the ones who actually can't bear it?
Let us all give them our help. We donated through my husband's workplace which, God bless them, matches our donation. Find out if your workplace does that.
Anything, small or big, will make a difference. Let's do it!
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