I'm deathly afraid of pressure cookers after my college roommate shared a story about her dad being sprayed and badly burned with boiling pasta sauce when his pressure cooker exploded when she was a child. I approach the pressure cooker with great trepidation, and have only cooked two or three meals in it in the five years I've owned one.
The weight that is placed on the regulator valve, aka "the jiggler," wiggles on top of the pressure cooker, indicating that with one false move, it could blow at any time. This week, I have likened myself to a pressure cooker many times. I am in the middle of a kitchen renovation, with sawdust and drywall dust covering my house, and among the boxes and wreckage of my kitchen cabinets, I am trying to make three meals a day and act as if life is normal. Needless to say, my "jiggler" is doing it's thing at full throttle and my family knows to keep their distance and not make sudden moves: pressure cookers are dangerous, and I might blow at any minute.
All people have moments when they just lose their minds, but there's something extra scary when it's a mom on the rampage. Moms are expected to have the most patience in our species. Moms maintain the peace and moms do NOT use bad words, so when we find ourselves observing moms gone wild, screaming and cursing like a drunken girls on "Jersey Shore," we can't help but stare with mouths agape.
Recently, I heard two "Moms Gone Wild" stories that had me floored, and made me wonder, "What turned that mom into such a pressure cooker?" Everyone has had a parking lot misunderstanding with another driver, but on one such occasion a fellow mom found herself and her four-year-old in the backseat berated with F-bombs and the middle finger, leaving her child in a stunned-like state for the course of their grocery-shopping trip.
Another mom shouted at a reckless driver to "Slow down; there are kids here!" in a community park parking lot, and later, when the family encounter the vehicle a second time, the driver shouted out the window, "I have F-ing kids too!" Yeah, she had a car full of children.
Before I get on a soap box about being a good example, let me just say, I get it. Moms can reach their boiling point and one little thing can set them off; a pile of naked Barbies sent me spiraling the other day. However, when I feel the pressure building I try to be proactive and release some of the steam. Even pressure cookers have a pop-up valve in case of emergency.
So, fellow moms, don't explode. Take a time-out. Go for a run or walk. Read a magazine. Get out of the house. Have a glass of wine. Vent your steam. Sometimes life's pressure builds, and we need to take extra measures to keep being that mom that we should be. Take care of yourself when the "jiggler" starts wobbling too fast, and the whole family will keep its cool.
If taken care of properly, pressure cookers produce the most tender results; moms are pretty much the same way.
