Jen's Mom

This is my mom, Olivia.  Those of you who read comments on the blogs of my friends Shuna, Sam and Cookiecrumb may know her as "Jen's mom."

I think it all started when I was visiting mom a few months back.  It was early in the morning and she was still in her pajamas.  I went in to say hi to her and she excitedly told me, "I left a comment on 'I'm Mad and I Eat' and she wrote back!".  I had a knot in my stomach as I realized my worlds were colliding, and I looked over her shoulder to read a rather benign comment about the royals coming to the Pt. Reyes farmers' market. 

There were several things about this that cracked me up -- I knew that mom looked at blogs every once in a while, but I didn't know how regularly she was reading some blogs.  Also her handle - "jen's mom" - as if I am the only "jen" on the planet.  I often comment on blogs as "jen," but I only feel I can do that because I include a link to my blog which makes it obvious which of the many (many many) jen's I am. 

The next time I saw one of mom's comments on a blog was in the litany of get well wishes that Fred received on Sam's blog when he wasn't well. 

Fred! Mystery solved! I just took a peek at what you've been eating! "BRAT diet for you," says an American mom, "Bananas, Rice, Applesauce, Toast"....just kidding. I'm jealous. Be better. Sam, caregivers give better care when fortified with French wine.
Happy ending to you both.

I was innocently reading through the comments and realized that the advice for a BRAT diet sounded familiar.  By the time I read the advice to Sam to drink wine I didn't even have to read the handle to know that my mom had struck again.

Around this time, I noticed a real shift with mom.  She would insert bloggers' names into regular conversations with me.  Whenever we were talking about blogs, she would have a little piece of paper and take notes on new blogs I was telling her about.  "Did you see what happened to the Food Whore and that Bridezilla," she would ask in the same breath as "have you called your grandparents?" 

"How do you find these blogs?" I asked her one day.  "From Food Porn Watch, of course."  She admitted that she is hooked on many of them and astonished that so many blogs feature such compelling writing. 

The coolest was when I received a note from her the other day.  She included a quote -- not from Walt Whitman or from Shakespeare or the Bible ... but from Shuna:

We preserve people by making the dishes they taught us. Dishes they loved, were proud of, gave us permission to start making when their hands stopped working. Sharing food with others is about tradition. About a desire to reach in and pull close. About re-remembering. Closing our eyes and taking us there.

I am really glad that she is a part of this blog world.  I love that she reads the same blogs that I do, but brings her own perspective to the posts.  I love that she noticed the amazingness in Shuna's blog post about cooking and intentionality, while I read it and loved it but moved on quickly and forgot about it in my backlog of bloglines feeds.  So if you ever receive a comment on your blog from the vague handle "jen's mom" just know that it's my mom and she is having so much fun reading your blog.

Comments

[Shuna]

Hello jen & jen's mom,

Thank you thank you. I am a little misty I dare to say. When our worlds collide it can be so many things but most especially fuller. Last year my mother was calling me excitedly about what she had recently read in Gourmet! It was wondrous to share foodtalk with her.

Thank you for another beautiful homage. My love to you both.

[Stacy]

Now I'm hoping to find a comment from "Jen's Mom"! ;)

[Heather]

The sound of worlds colliding tends to be scary to me. But if my mom were into blogs maybe I wouldn't have to censor when I hear myself start to include news from a favorite blogger in my litany of 'what's new since I talked to her last.'

[kalyn]

What an absolutely wonderful post. You are so lucky to be able to share something like this with your mom. (By the way, she looks great in the photo to be your mother. Tell her I said so. I am a *bit* older than you myself, so I know how much those comments mean.) I do like your new photo too Jen. Been meaning to tell you that.

[sam]

And of course, it should be mentioned that Jen's mum started a little craze.

Now Cookiecrumb also gets comments from "Sam's Mum" (not mOm). In fact, yesterday, I was on the phone with my mother a million miles away across the Atlantic ocean and she said "Have you seen Cookiecrumb's picture of Beansprout today, it's so cute, it almost makes me want to get another dog". Seriously!

And then, I received comments from "Cookiecrumb's mom" too.

It's nice - oh - and there is only one "Jen's Mom" in my book!

Sam

[Jen's mom]

Sheeeee's baaaaaack...I have things to say but I have to leave to go air out Grandma and Grandpa. More later. (qlknrf!) :)

[Tana]

This is so sweet...and timely. My mother e-mailed me last week to say that she'd just read my entire blog from start to finish, and how proud she is of me. (Shhh, don't tell her it doesn't pay anything!)

Your mom is beautiful, Jen. It's wonderful that you can share this part of your lives.

[jen's mom]

Thank you all for your sweet words.

Reading my daughter's words is a way for me to have her with me even when she is 500 miles away. Reading the words of her friends is a way of being sure of her.

Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind.
Pooh! he whispered.
"Yes, Piglet?"
"Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw. "I just wanted to be sure of you."
The House at Pooh Corner

Tana, Kalyn, Heather and Stacy, your blogs are new to me but I'm looking forward to visiting.

Stacy, you will hear from me because I will recommend a celebrity photographer to you whose name escapes me now...but he created beautiful pix long before Photoshop was dreamt of.

Kalyn, yum. I have a meathenge mind but a vegetarian heart.

Tana, I'm your new best friend.

Shuna, your mother is close by even though she is farther away than 500 miles. Our job (we mothers) doesn't end ever. You honor her with your beautiful, creative writing and your life's work.

Sam and Cookiecrumb, thanks for sharing your thoughts and activities with such humor and warmth.

Heather, it is interesting that you are a quilter. I have said of this blogging phenom that is very like listening in on the chatter at quilting bees of past centuries.

When bloggers are writing about your respective niches you are like magazine writers. But when you are musing your chatter is intimate, even though many of you have not met.

Thank you all for creating and sharing this cyber- community. I admire you.

[sam]

now Jen's mom is bringing tears to my eyes, seriously.
to be appreciated with such thoughfulness is almost more than I can comprehend.
thank you more than I could ever explain.
Sam

[McAuliflower]

What a wonderful intro. We should all be so lucky to receive such support from our families in doing what we love. :)

[cookiecrumb]

Yay! Yippee! Yay!
I loved reading this. Hi, Jen's mom!
Hi, Sam's mum, because I know Sam will ask you to read this lovely tribute.
I'm sending it to my mom now.
Hi, Jen: I was laughing out loud through the entire thing. And then I shrieked when your mom included her word verification thingie!
(BTW: "air out Grandma and Grandpa" ! Har! But what if they're reading this?!)

[jen]

You guys are all so great. Seriously. Thanks Shuna and Stacy and Heather and Kalyn and Sam and Mom and Tana and McAuliflower and Cookiecrumb. Thank you thank you thank you.

Sam - I totally meant to talk about the "moms who comment" craze that is sweeping the nation ... well, sweeping your mom and cookiecrumbs and mine ... but I forgot. Thanks for bringing it up.

Cookiecrumb - She got all freaked out when people were doing the word verification comments on your blog -- thought it was a secret code that she couldn't crack. Ha ha ... and trust me, grandma and grandpa only read my blog when someone prints it out and brings it to them. Besides, she tells them that too - ha.

[Barbara]

Hello, Jen's Mom! (And Sam's Mum, too.)

I think it is great that you are out there, in the blogosphere, being sure of Jen and the rest of us. If only I could get my Mom on the net...she hasn't gotten to read any of my blog, and it is hard to describe to her what it is I am writing about, without seeing it before her eyes.

But--my Aunt Judy and her friends down in Tennessee keep tabs on me, so I am doing allright. She posts on my blog as "Your Aunt Judy," so if she sneaks off to anyone else's blog and posts--that is who it is. My Aunt Judy--one of my greatest culinary inspirations. ;-)

Great post, Jen--thanks for sharing!

[sam's mum]

Hi everyone just like the other 'moms' I am indeed an avid reader of many of the blogs. It certainly helps me to feel part of Sam's life to read her daily musings on food and see the photos on her other blog. What a wonderful supportive community you all are and clearly you have become good friends through a shared interest. Cookiecrumb as you have gathered I am very taken with Beansprout. Jen's mom its lovely to see your photo and know the face behind the comments. I look forward to many more hours of happy readings.

[Jen's mom]

OK, this is what I'm saying...we're all out here. Some of us are more clingy, while others stop by occasionally just to hear you playing then we move on. Others may eventually join in, in their own good time. This electronic parallel universe can be daunting.

Sam's mum, thanks for the kind words, my mug is full of Grandma's Christmas Eve tamales in that picture. Thanks also for your beautiful water color work. Your technique is awesome.

Sam, Becks& Posh has been bookmarked on my computer for a long time. I like reading about Dad's garden and the road trip to see your parents, as well as seeing Mom's
Cookiecrumb, my ancestors have great fun joking about their age. Grandpa needed help making on-line reservations for a Las Vegas show. He wanted an aisle seat. "Just tell them we're in our 85's." (Gma's 88, Gmp's 87)

Good on all of you for using your gifts and talents so effectively.

[Dr. Biggles]

Heh, is your mother a vegetarian? I don't see her peering in on my meaty meanderings.
What does she like to eat? I could fix her up something tasty!

Biggles

[EP]

Hey, Jen's Mom... visit me! Visit me! (and the BRAT diet thing is hilarious!) This is my first time stopping by because i'm kinda new at the blogging thing (both reading and participating) p.s. Jen, your New Years meal looks absoultely fabulous.

[jen]

Biggles - check out mom's comment above where she says "I have a meathenge mind but a vegetarian heart." I can vouch for that - the woman has a love of all things meat.

[Jen's mom]

When you get off the boat on Catalina Island there is a little shack (or there used to be)that sells a hamburger with a flayed out grilled weiner in it and you can order it with cheese...and chile I think. Like my friend Steve says, "Sometimes your blood gets going just a little too fast and you have to slow it down."
Biggles, I have been a silent admirer. :)

[Steve]

Those of you who have ever met Jen's mom know that she's one-of-a-kind. Food is in her blood: Jen's mom introduced me to Albondigas (among other things), and Jen's mom's mom introduced me to Chilaquiles. And I've spent the last decade ordering and mispronouncing both of them. And if you want to know some of the most out-of-the-way, hole-in-the-wall restaurants and pubs, and the back alleys and side enterances to get there, Jen's mom is the go-to person. This is my first visit to this great site. I shall return!

[jen]

yay, steve's here!

[Steve]

I'll pass this site on to my food friends and relatives, including Mom and Pop.
And I'm always here. Friends are like stars, you can't always see them but you know they're always there. (But then again, some friends you really get tired of after a while, unlike stars. So maybe friends aren't like stars afterall. But it sounded nice, don't you think?)

[Dr. Biggles]

Hey,

Oh criminy I missed that one!

Wait until you see the pork rib dinner, that anyone can make at home, that is due to go up today sometime. Oh man.

Biggles

[Norlinda]

Your mom totally rocks!

[Jeanne]

Mom needs to read my blog too, now that she's a celeb!

[Jamie]

How wonderful. My mom (who always signs herself "mOm" ever since making a capitalization typo about a decade ago--which is why Sam's comment above read funnily to me) reads my blog and, I suspect, a few others. I love knowing that she is part of my world. :-)

[Mia]

Hey Jen's mum, you might as well come and read my site too from Australia. I am continually aware of how strange this universe is. You don't know me, I don't know you yet I am asking you to visit me??
Go figure.
Mia

[Jen's mom]

Mia-went there, loved it, bookmarked it. Go figure! :)
Thanks for the invitation.

Jeanne- Celeb! Ha! Look who's talking Miss Gourmet-mag-contest-winner-pants! Congratulations, Celeb!

Norlinda-Thanks for the compliment...I read it on a day when I was feeling more rocky than rockin' and I've rocked ever since :) I visited your site and enjoyed it.

McAuliflower-your artwork is beautiful, beautiful. I love that it is so organic. I used to have a bracelet that had deep red patterns embedded in it that looked to me like corpuscles. Great idea to take your inspiration from science.

Jen-time to change the wallpaper. It's a good thing I'm not in the witness protection program. (anymore)l,m.

[shauna]

So I'm sitting here in this coffee shop in Seattle, working on a piece of writing on my laptop, and not even caring that I'm a sitting cliche at the moment. I had to take a little break from writing, to clear my mind, and suddenly it occurs to me: I haven't looked at Jen's blog in a long time!" (This means a few days, of course.) So I do.

Now, I'm sitting here with tears in my eyes, not even caring that I'm crying in a coffee shop. This post is not only beautifully, lovingly written, but all the comments back and forth make me feel, viscerally, the force field of love in this community. I'm not kidding. I just love all you food bloggers.

My mother loves the idea of my blog, and I share stories of it with my parents all the time. But they rarely visit -- since they didn't have a computer until last week, when I gave them one -- and they've certainly never left a comment. I wish they would now.

Jen's mom, please visit me! Anyone who quotes Winnie the Pooh that way is a woman after my own heart.

Blessings and memorable mouthfuls to you all.

[Jen's mom]

Ohhhhhkay, Shauna, you got me. I'm a weeper too.

Favorites.
Gluten-Free-Girl.
Create in.
Jen/ Blogs.
OK. :)

Your ancestors will join your blog world in their own good time. It really is a leap into a parallel universe. You're doing a great job of visiting with them on terra firma for now. Thank you. o.

[mrs D]

I totally missed this earlier, but I had to drop by late to say what a lovely post. It gave me a big wide smile! :-)

(Now, if I can just get my mom to figure out how to use her browser...)

[Nona]

every thing about brat diet:
http://bratdiet.tumblr.com/