Empoword

Part One: Description, Narration, and Reflection 116 Activities What My Childhood Tastes Like 47 To practice reflection, try this activity writing about something very important—food. First, spend five minutes making a list of every food or drink you remember from childhood. Mine looks like this: - Plain cheese quesadillas, made by my mom in the miniscule kitchenette of our one-bedroom apartment - “Chicken”-flavored ramen noodles, at home alone after school - Cayenne pepper cherry Jell-O at my grandparents’ house - Wheat toast slathered in peanut butter before school - Lime and orange freezy-pops - My stepdad’s meatloaf—ironically, the only meatloaf I’ve ever liked - Cookie Crisp cereal (“It’s cookies—for breakfast!”) - Macintosh apples and creamy Skippy peanut butter - Tostitos Hint of Lime chips and salsa - Love Apple Stew that only my grandma can make right - Caramel brownies, by my grandma who can’t bake anymore Then, identify one of those foods that holds a special place in your memory. Spend another five minutes free-writing about the memories you have surrounding that food. What makes it so special? What relationships are represented by that food? What life circumstances? What does it represent about you ? Here’s my model; I started out with my first list item, but then digressed—you too should feel free to let your reflective writing guide you. My mom became a gourmet with only the most basic ingredients. We lived bare bones in a one-bedroom apartment in the outskirts of Denver; for whatever selfless reason, she gave four-year-old the bedroom and she took a futon in the living room. She would cook for me after caring for other mothers’ four-year-olds all day long: usually plain cheese quesadillas (never any sort of add-ons, meats, or veggies—besides my abundant use of store-brand ketchup) or scrambled eggs (again, with puddles of ketchup). When I was 6, my dad eventually used ketchup as a rationale for my second stepmom: “Shane, look! Judy likes ketchup on her eggs too!” But it was my mom I remembered cooking for me every night—not Judy, and certainly not my father. “I don’t like that anymore. I like barbecue sauce on my eggs.”