Instant Pot Life

Part of my identity includes being the daughter of a retired Home Ec teacher - meaning I was in the kitchen learning how to use allthethings before I ever darkened the door of a school. It also means I'm faring pretty well in cooking department of this quarantine business. One of our kitchen's newer gadgets is an Instant Pot. You've likely heard of them, but for those who aren't energized by culinary endeavours, here are the basics. An Instant Pot is a pressure cooker, crock pot combo - translation: you can put frozen chicken in said pot, season it up, close the lid, hit a button and have cooked chicken in about 30 minutes. It's kind of a modern day miracle, tho the process isn't at all new. We use our Instant Pot on the regular - we've made everything from spaghetti & meatballs (in one pot, starting with raw noodles and raw meatballs and it turned out beautifully despite the noodles being a tad overcooked) to cheesecake (best textured cheesecake I've ever had - sorry, mama). It comes in handy on meeting nights, or 'I forgot to thaw the chicken' nights and I'm glad we have it. The new, surprising part of the Instant Pot's reality is its metaphorical relationship to this Covid-19 reality.

If you use an Instant Pot, you're familiar with the terms 'quick release' and 'natural release' - they refer to how quickly the pressure escapes from the pot - a step that must be completed before you can open it. Quick release is exactly what it sounds like - you turn a knob and steam shoots out of the top spraying hot water vapour over whatever is in its path. Natural release lives up to its name as well - happening slowly, over time. The pot stays locked until the pressure dissipates so the pressure has to be released one way or the other for you to get to your dinner. This morning, while having my coffee and watching the Today show during their 'Morning Boost' segment, Hoda and Savannah shared two uplifting stories meant to counteract the 4734 doom and gloom stories about Coronavirus and the boosts hit me right in the feels. The first story was about a retiring State Trooper whose daughter is the dispatcher for his precinct. He signed off for the final time and his daughter thanked him for 30+ years of service and said she and her family were happy to have him home for good. She closed the exchange with, "Love you, Daddy". They followed this story with one about a 3 year old named Mabel who had finished her final round of chemo. Since her friends and family couldn't celebrate with the party they'd hoped to have, her whole neighbourhood participated in a driving parade - complete with a fire truck and signs and balloons. My eyes welled up and I lost it for a minute - maybe a couple of minutes, actually, of cathartic sobs. Then I went on with putting on my makeup and getting ready for the day.

Turns out that Morning Boost hit my quick release button. I needed to release the pressure I didn't even realize had built up to make room for the weight of these pandemic days. These days feel completely bipolar. On the one hand, we've kind of hit our groove and like the casual way we're completing our days with all four of us at home. On another hand, it's absolutely depressing that we can't pick up and go exploring or on some Forced Family Fun adventure. On yet another hand, my heart longs to reconnect, in person, with my family, friends and students. There seems to be no ebb and flow to the day - just disjointed jerking from one layer of reality to another. That jerking around surreptitiously builds pressure that simply has to escape in fits and starts to make room for it to rebuild. Our quick releases are important, just for us to continue functioning. I've found myself wondering what an actual natural release will look like or how we'll get to that place. Some days I wonder if we'll ever feel like the pressure has naturally released and we'll walk through the days and weeks actually feeling relaxed, without all of the 'rules' running through our heads.

I also wonder what yummy delicious feasts may come out of this pressure cooker season we're in. How will we cling to the sweet and savoury pieces of this time when we go back to school, go back to work, go back to lessons and practices and commuting? It's strange to think about - I'm reminded of how I felt when we left the hospital after having our first baby. I wanted to say - Wait! Wait! Wait! Where's the owner's manual? Isn't there a guidebook? But there wasn't and here we are again, no guidebook in the midst of a life changing event. I actually like some of what we've fallen into as our new groove and I mourn for some of what we've lost from our old groove and I wonder how we can weave those fibers together to create a new tapestry that we will later call normal. In these strange days, I will try to remember to continue to make space for my 'quick release' button to be engaged to make space for energy to continue in this journey. I hope you are able to do the same.