Pork Chop Promises

I took the pork chops out of the freezer this morning and set them on a plate in the refrigerator.

This may sound insignificant...but it's not. Taking frozen meat out of the freezer is a promise to yourself. It's a promise that sometime in the next 2 or 3 days...you will return to the meat and actually spend time preparing and cooking it before it spoils. Meat is expensive.

Our pork chops came from a local student who raised a pig for FFA. The 1/2 pig that we purchased cost about $4.00 a pound which is not bad when you consider that it was locally raised, killed, and butchered in healthy conditions. For me to actually remove the meat from its frozen security, thereby risking high-quality humane organic $4.00/lb meat to the possibility that I will be too busy to prepare it before it spoils was a big deal. It signifies that I have something very valuable in my life again: TIME.

It's been at least 3 months since I defrosted meat. Most of the people I know my age are in the same situation my husband and I are. Both people work full time and spend the weekends trying to tackle the dishes and laundry that accumulated throughout the week. I can't imagine trying to do all that with kids, too- but people do.

We've been eating a lot of peanut butter in the meantime. Is this what the feminists envisioned when they pressed for equality in the workplace...that husbands and wives would be equally stressed and have equally small amounts of time to take care of their families? I don't know.

In any case, the play I was directing is over. The yearbook I was creating is done. All I have to do for the rest of the school year is just teach, which all I really wanted to do from the beginning.

I actually got to sleep in until 6AM this morning...it felt like heaven.

I feel so good...I am even thinking about defrosting a chicken!