Parsnip

I bought a parsnip at the farmers’ market this morning. I don’t believe I’ve eaten any parsnips in many years, but I do have fond memories of them. I’m planning on sliced parsnip and carrot simmered in apple cider with a dash of nutmeg and cinnamon. If I recall correctly, I make that with a mixture of cider and water, not pure cider.

A Memoir of the Sixties

The Washington Post had an opinion feature by Mike Wise, who was born the same year that I was, 1964, about being a child in the Sixties. His family, in his telling, was messed up, with his mother overdosing, and, at one point, a drug-addled babysitter fondling him, mistaking him, a child well short of puberty, for her boyfriend. No doubt things weren’t like that for everyone, not even for everyone whose parents ever smoked pot, listened to rock, or were otherwise the least bit hippieish, but he does have a point about the erosion of constraints against drug use and other disorderly behavior.

Then again, one could imagine a memoir of a dysfunctional buttoned-up family in the Fifties, and how Dad beat his wife and children after too many cocktails, and there was no recourse.

I had grievances against my family when I was a child and teenager, but things could have been much worse. Whatever my parents’ faults, they were not drunkards, and did not indulge in marijuana or LSD; also, my father took his responsibilities seriously, and did not divorce my mother when she had repeated bouts of depression. As a teenager being blamed for my brother’s misbehavior, or for the general imperfection of the world, I don’t think I gave much thought to this, but took a minimally decent family for granted.