Edible Duct Tape. I'm getting that patented right now.
I know that demographically, I'm supposed to be a stressed-out Guilty Mom for whatever reason society is inflicting on us this week. (See the link at the lower right to Judith Warner's "Perfect Madness", currently on my bedside table.) But I will not go gentle into that good night. I'm very particular about my guilt.
You see, I have never liked being typecast. In college, I would walk up to people wearing "Question Authority" pins and say, "Oh yeah, why should I?" So when society is telling me on every magazine cover that as a working mother I'm supposed to be stewing in guilt all the time, I tell society to go [Cheney] itself.
I can't avoid guilt altogether. I was raised by a preternatural worrier and an ex-Catholic in a suburb with a large Jewish population. It was like fluoride in the water, I'm sure. But I can control what I feel guilty about and to what degree. I think of myself as a guilt connoisseur.
Which leads me, logically, to edible duct tape. Work with me here:
Most, but not all, school days, I send my daughter to pre-pre-school with a lovingly packed lunch including a classic peanut butter and jelly sandwich. The bread is usually whole-wheat, never white; the peanut butter is my childhood brand; and for variety, I switch jelly flavors throughout the week.
"Oh my Goddess," I hear the Mommy Police Neighborhood Watch committee moan, "You mean it's not organic? And a steady diet of peanut butter?"
Yes, and I'll tell you why: because whenever I pack her a sandwich with lunchmeat and cheese, Gigi will take it apart, eat the filling, and leave most of the bread. And when bread costs anywhere between 3 and 7 bucks for a one-pound loaf - if you want anything with any nutritional value - I will be damned if I'm gonna let her take it to school every day and NOT eat it. So my choice is to give something that sticks together, or find a way to keep the filling in her sandwiches. To the guilt-floggers, I say either hook me up with a venture capitalist and some food scientists, or get out of my face.