Klarinet Archive - Posting 000163.txt from 1999/02

From: Lisa Clayton <lisakc@-----.com>
Subj: Re: [kl] Women and orchestras
Date: Thu, 4 Feb 1999 14:07:21 -0500

At 12:32 AM 2/4/99 -0600, you wrote:
>Someone wrote:
>
>> Women learned to grow their own vegetables.....
>
>I think this is one of the most astonishing statements I have ever read on
>the internet or perhaps anywhere else. Perhaps the writer was engaging in
>a bit of hyperbole or invoking poetic license, but the statement evokes
>memories of my grandmother, wife of a share-cropper, who spent almost her
>entire life raising vegetables and doing all sorts of farm work. She
>worked alongside the men, and could work as long and hard as any of them.
>
>I think you would have had a hard time convincing her that there would be
>anything extraordinary about a woman growing vegetables. But, it would
>have been even more inconceivable to her that, having been grown, a
>vegetable could have a gender identification. Man's vegetable or woman's
>vegetable? As my grandmother would have said, "Hogwash!"

Heavens no! You got my intention wrong, if my hyperbole turned out rather
bad. The whole sentence was something to the effect of "Women learned to
grow their own vegetables, opened cafes and became chefs". Before the
70's, owning a restaurant and being an executive chef was pretty much a
male business. I was more or less thinking of Alice Waters over here in
the Bay Area who broke open a *lot* of doors for women in restaurant
management and culinary work. Thanks to her and a lot of pioneers like
her, it isn't considered unusual to see women working as executive chefs or
owning restaurants anymore. The part about the vegetables was because
that's where she got her inspiration for California Cuisine-- grow your own
food rather than having it shipped in. Makes for much tastier, fresher and
leaner food.

As an aside, my Grandma grew *all* her own food. She bought meat, bread &
ice cream, and that was about it. Everything else she grew, cooked,
canned, jelled, froze or gave to her church. On the rare occasions when I
get my garden together, I thank her silently and wish that I had the
maturity as a kid to eat more beets, chow-chow and poke salad and less
blackberry cobbler and pecan potica.

Anyway, hope this clears it up. Again, I apologize if my defensiveness
overcame my reason.

Lisa Canjura-Clayton
lisakc@-----.com

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