sally (not-)homemaker

I didn't take home economics in high school. So I never learned how to sew, make a perfect pancake, or take care of a fake baby. Looking back, I don't regret the hole in my curriculum. But it leaves me wanting, relative to some of my colleagues.

For example, several of my friends are sewing (or contemplating sewing) quilts. Quilts!

I am surrounded by amateur chefs who can whip up spring rolls with peanut butter coconut sauce, stuffed dumplings with a salty vinegar sauce, and fried chicken with sweet and sour vegetables. All this on a meager Mauritanian budget and with even more meager supplies. I ate this just two days ago. Delicious.

Mauritanian girls a third younger than me care for infants tied to their backs in multicolored wax prints, spines bowed as they prepare a steaming plate of fish and rice and darn a ripped boubou. Simultaneously. A trifecta I don't even pretend to accomplish.

So sue me if I'm not playing house quite yet. It would probably sabotage my wanderlust thing.