A celebration of those little moments of grace we'd like to belatedly inherit—and the talents we never mastered (because she didn't know how).
The Art of Beautiful Ws
Whenever I have to actually write something by hand, I feel obligated to make some self-deprecating aside about the results, which resemble hieroglyphics after many millennia of erosion. But our mothers, who grew up in pre-typing-everything times, really know how to write fancy cursive Fs and Gs and Ws, and as a result there is a bit of everyday elegance infused into even their shopping lists.
Making Banana Bread Without a Recipe
You used to make fun of your mother for rescuing mushy, overripe bananas from a trash-can fate, but listen, guess where all that delicious banana bread came from? We know how to cook the holiday favorites we helped our mothers make, and probably a cultural biggest hit—hello, noodle kugel! But what about the everyday, unglamorous, using-the-leftovers standbys? We're all capable of transforming rotisserie-chicken guts into a delicious soup, but when do you get that special ability to do such a thing without consulting six recipes on the iPad as you go?
How to Do Bangs
When I went to junior high, there were two kinds of girls: the ones who knew how to do their bangs into the de rigueur sprayed-stiff rainbow-shape and the much less cool ones who didn't. I didn't.
Needlepointing a Hedgehog
Our mothers wanted to spare us the pre-feminist skillset—the needlepoint, the quilting, the sewing our own clothes. We were raised to study hard and go to college and manage our money, and those things are good, but also, think about how smart we look and how much cash we save when we hem our own pants. (Meanwhile, I have no idea how to make a needlepoint hedgehog, so I have to buy mine on Etsy.)