Childhood Routines

Every family has its own unique routines. These standardized processes enable us all to know who should do what, when, in what order and how often. For example, the easiest childhood routine for me to remember involves waking up and going downstairs to the kitchen for breakfast. My mother was always there to greet me, no matter how badly she might have felt. The Stay-At-Home Mom was a common institution during my childhood and the ladies took their roles very seriously. Part of my Mom's routine was to see us all off to school, and my Dad to work in NYC, with some food in our stomachs, and maybe a ride to the train station or school if the weather was particularly unpleasant outside.

I can recall the classic breakfast foods for us kids from the 1960s and 70s very clearly. There were Pop Tarts; I favored the blueberry variety made by Kelloggs. There were many imitators, and some varieties which included frosting, but nothing quite hit the spot for me like the tartness of the blueberry ones. Maybe because these are how New Jersey blueberries usually taste every June when they hit the market in their season to shine. In terms of cereal, we usually had Post Grapenuts as well as Captain Crunch. The latter had prizes in the boxes and more toys you could send away for if you saved the box tops. Grapenuts never stooped to such levels and simply stated on the box that this cereal was good for you all on its own. We kids would usually make short work of the Grapenuts claim that it was good for you by adding enough sugar to bring it into the same league of desired sweetness as a Captain Crunch style cereal.

This is not to say there weren't things my mother offered which were less sugar laden. I can recall the introduction of Kiwifruit in the early 1970s and how terrible the skin tasted but the fruit inside was delicious and extremely exotic for that time period. We also consumed a tremendous number of oranges and grapefruits. To this day I can't eat a grapefruit for love or money because of all the yellow ones I ate as a child. This sounds funny to people who know me as a "Foodie" who prides himself on having a diverse pallet. Oranges I am less put off by but usually consume them only in juice.

On the weekends my Mom would usually go all out and make us waffles or pancakes, with bacon or sausage. A goodly amount of Vermont syrup would accompany these offerings so as we wouldn't miss the sugar rush of our Monday through Friday breakfasts.

All of this can be summed up by the mantra of the time held in high esteem by Moms like mine: Do not let your family leave the house hungry. We were always filled with Milk, Juice, and something else to fill our bellies. No Stay-At-Home Mom ever wanted to hear that her children left for school without having eaten. I only remember breakfast of a sort being offered in the High School and never in the Junior High. Of course, most everyone went home for lunch in elementary school for a sandwich and milk. We also had a routine for a number of years where we would watch the TV show Jeopardy from 12:00 to 12:30 and then hightail it back to school. Good thing we lived next to Willard or our routine might have also included missing the Final Jeopardy answer.