My mother is 81 and her mother did not teach her how to cook. My mother learned from Betty Crocker and other simplified sources. I remember "congealed salads" (i.e. jello with other ingredients) and canned pear halves on iceberg lettuce with a dollop of cottage cheese. My grandmother never stooped to such things. She had about 3 dozen items in her entire repertoire for which she had no recipe. Each was delicious; she could not teach you how to make any of them.

I've learned how to cook by cooking, but for me, it's a craft, not an art. By which I mean I can follow a recipe well enough; I know how to use kitchen tools; times, temperatures, and techniques make sense. But I cannot taste a dish and know what would make it perfect, nor can I look in my pantry at a dozen random items and invent dinner. That's what artists do.

I long for Home Economics less with food and more with clothes. If I could just repair that small tear or hem that cuff or take in that jacket, I'd expand my wardrobe by 20%.

Lovely true piece, as usual, Adeline.