#4 - March 2005
Popcorn Culture
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By MaryJane Butters
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Sometimes you have to stop doing chores and find some time to laugh
There's a standing joke at my farm about me and my knowledge of pop culture. I'm pop-culture challenged. I never watch TV. It just doesn't work for a farmer like me. I can't imagine being at my farm and coming in at the end of the day and watching the news. In the evenings, even when my children were young, we've always had dinner together, then read books or did such evening chores as locking up the chickens and bringing in the night's supply of firewood.
I always liked movies but almost never got to see one when I was growing up. We were working-class Mormons without a penny to spare, so we made our lives better by growing almost all of our own food and sewing all of our own clothes. So much for pop culture. For my own kids, movies were a big deal, but we still didn't see all that many of them. Whenever we rented a movie, we had to rent a TV, too—we didn't have one. We tended to watch the same movies over and over. Sentimentalism and positive messages were our fare; we watched It's a Wonderful Life and Pollyanna countless times. Because I loved Jimmy Stewart's “life” movie so much, it was the only gift I gave to my children and husband one Christmas. Later that year, when my teenage son lost one of his best friends in a car wreck, he brought home a TV and found comfort by waking me up at 2 a.m. to watch it with him.
I remember going to only one movie with my parents. They took us out of school early, and we drove all the way to Salt Lake City to a grand, ornate theater to see It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. For us, it was like going to Disneyland. And we laughed until we couldn't laugh anymore. My parents were big fans of laughter, but their idea of entertainment was getting together with friends and finding something to laugh about—stories, games, bowling, jokes, recounting the practical jokes my father was famous for. They were big fans of Bob Hope. At least once, I sneaked downstairs when they were laughing late at night only to hear these lifelong Mormons listening to an off-color comedy record while playing cards. Years later, I was living on a remote ranch, working as a milkmaid. No electricity, no neighbors, just me and my then-husband and hundreds of jars of home-canned vegetables. My parents came to visit, and as they were leaving, my father took me aside.
“This place is too isolated,” he said. “Your mother hasn't thrown her head back and laughed once since we got here. It's not good for you.” He was right.
In the February 1902 issue of Woman's Home Companion, (I collect old women's magazines), I found an editorial that puts laughter on a par with a woman's right to vote.
“Girl children must not only be allowed to laugh, but should be encouraged to do so.…Gradually the world is beginning to understand what the long-dreaded emancipation of woman really means: the doing away with small prejudices, and small waists, with nerves and with too-copious tears, and, above all, that it means the ability to look the world in the face and be glad that one is a woman and not afraid to laugh!” Even the right to laugh has been hard won, and we have people to thank for that.
And now that we can laugh more easily, there are people to thank for the laughs they bring. I'm grateful, for one, to Gene Kelly. Recently, one of my farmhands stopped just teasing me about all the great movies I hadn't seen and instead introduced me to some of them, starting with Gene Kelly's Summer Stock. It's my favorite; a high-stepping musical filmed on a family farm. Judy Garland singing “(Howdy, Neighbor), Happy Harvest” as she drives her new tractor home is just pure joy. All those old movies I missed, I've discovered, are a great excuse to laugh, feel joy, experience innocence, and eat popcorn. And I still have a lot to see. So share your pop culture. I'll bring the laughter and the popcorn.
MaryJane Butters is an organic farmer, teacher, and author in Idaho. Write to her at maryjane@maryjanesfarm.org or visit www.maryjanesfarm.org.
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Healthy Popcorn
Here’s a recipe that kids love. The nutritional yeast makes the popcorn taste like those cheesy covered (unhealthy) corn puffs. Honest.
1/2 cup organic popcorn kernels
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast powder
Pop kernels in an air popper or microwave. Drizzle on half the oil. Mix. Drizzle on remaining oil. Sprinkle with salt and nutritional yeast. Toss.
Yield: fifteen cups popcorn
Cracklejack Popcorn
Not the least bit healthy, but a quick and easy—and fabulous—alternative to complicated caramel corn.
1/2 cup organic popcorn kernels
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon brewed coffee
Mix butter, sugar, and brewed coffee in a small saucepan. Bring to a rolling boil and cook for about 5 minutes or until thickened. Pop kernels in an air popper or a microwave. Drizzle caramel mixture over popped popcorn.
Yield: 14 cups popcorn
