Paying it Forward: Rhubarb or Potato? #110
Comfort food, why does it comfort us? Habits form early and last forever. The memories that surround early choices are the comfort of family in our memories. Lifelong learning makes it interesting.
Jack Browne, March 30, 2025 Times Record News
Our taste changes our behavior. One experience can become a lifelong choice, never changing.
My friend Don shared his love for his grandmother’s deserts in discussing gardens grown by our grandmothers.
She would call, “Don, have some hot strawberry- rhubarb pie and ice cream. I made it just for you.”
We both savored Don’s emotional memory. My memories of rhubarb also come from my grandmother’s garden.
Of three brothers, no one was a fan of grandmother’s inclination to combining rhubarb with other fruit as she made jelly. We preferred grape or strawberry jelly. Summer vacations included bringing home jellies for the year. Funny how the rhubarb combinations lasted the longest.
As a boomer, I didn’t know the depression. My parents and grandparents lived it; rhubarb made the fruit go farther and sugar made it work. As a young boy, Dad’s pet chicken was gone one evening. He never ate chicken again in his life.
Twenty-five years ago on a business trip with Max, I learned about his dislikes from growing up in Uzbekistan where his parents were university professors. Max worked as a technician part time while pursuing his engineering degree.
Max ordered a big steak, with no potato. I ordered steak and potato with all the trimmings.
I asked, “Why didn’t you get a potato?”
Max shared memories of potatoes as a child in Uzbekistan. At harvest time his family would receive a bag of potatoes to last through the winter.
Not wanting the potatoes to go to waste, the first priority was to eat those most likely to spoil.
I eat chicken and potatoes, but don’t choose rhubarb. How are your tastes?
The Lifelong Learning Center at MSU, hosts speakers sharing engaging stories on Tuesday’s and Thursdays. Over 20 sessions till the end of the semester – upcoming sessions topi x include Hummingbirds, Dementia, Evolution of Medicine, Computer Ethics, Art, History, Religion and much more.
Thanks to Sarah Fidley at MSU’s Lifelong Learning Center for curating an amazing spring semester; details at https://msutexas.edu/lifelong-learning-center/
Jack Browne is a community activist and past technology engineer, sales and marketing executive at Motorola, MIPS Technologies and other companies. How are the children doing?