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Food Feelings
In college, I worked briefly as a receptionist at an aerobics studio. While this was one of my less stellar career moves, some things linger. I recall an instructor one time saying, after having an unpleasant time with her hair stylist: "Hair turns into feelings so quickly."
What brought her lament out of the Dark Ages and into my mind was a different sort of conversation I had with my friend and neighbor whose daughter is a bit younger than Felix. Our chatter turned to the question of food. There is a quirky truth in the notion that hair turns into feelings, but food and mood- those things for most people are as connected as Chang and Eng.
My friend asked what Felix was eating, and I said that he eats pretty much anything, as long as it is mashed, and sadly he prefers to feed himself with his fingers, so it's a mess. Over the weekend he got to have some super fancy roast pork with cherry sauce (no, no I wasn't cooking) and he often gets leftover chicken or rice and beans, that sort of thing. The pediatrician, at our last visit was almost stern about how babies should get a wide variety of flavors and spices and not to shy away from anything. (Needless to say, his literal hamfistedness thrills the dog. When Felix gets up from a meal, a cascade of taste sensations pours onto the floor, and the dog obligingly Hoovers them up. In spite of this, the celery snack diet seems to be working on the terrier whose waistline is returning.)
This was somewhat unsettling to my friend whose child has been doing wonderfully eating mostly jarred food. And then I felt I had put my foot in it and backpedaled saying that I have jarred food too but that the kid just likes to do it himself and maybe her doctor has different recommendations and who cares anyway, and maybe her child isn't ready for finger foods and I don't know what I’m talking about.
But she remained disconcerted, and to remedy things I spilled everything about the (surely bad) non-organic puff things that my kid likes and that mesh feeder bag that he finds amusing. Suddenly all of these things that I had done mostly for my amusement ("Let's see if he likes cantaloupe!") took on a weight I didn't think they could bear. My friend knows how many ounces of breast milk or formula her child consumes every day. I have no idea at all what Felix gets, but he lets me know when he's hungry.
It was early in the morning, and I had turned food into feelings for this woman. I wish it didn't have to be this way. These things seem so different from the food issues that have clung to me since early adolescence. People seem so frightened that their child is not getting the right foods or getting them too quickly. I suspect I wasn't given a food protocol for a reason, but I see how daunting this wide-open gustatory territory can be.
Finally, Felix held the key to reassurance in his own little maw. My friend's daughter is currently toothless which might account for her love of super pureed food.
Peering at Felix, I see he is getting two more teeth. Six pearly ones. Just in time for Halloween
posted by Elise at 11:12 AM
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