San Antonio light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1911-1993, 1924-04-27
Iurbing Waste at Its Source
By KATHLEEN NORRIS

tabled black wooden cap unheard. Her
son, who has been employed in the
kitchen of big hotels in the city. is
quite ready to convince you more
over
However, let that pass, Grand
mother does not get a meal by send
ing one child to the baker, and an
other to the delicacy store. She mar
kets deliberately. with SAVIOR, about
once week. For the heavy midday
meal she may have five cents worth
of beef, knowingly Drowned. cunningly
lstewed, enhanced with carrots and on
ions and turnips and gravy until it
looks like full dollars worth. With
il she has potatoes. or great dish
of rice. and a salad. and perhaps
a bit of cheese or fruit, but no other
sweet except on the rare occasions
when the three eggs are TO spare.
Grandmother never apologies for
her meal. she never says: "It's beef
and noodles again; hope you won't
all be sick of it," This is language
the roorer people of Europe have
never heard. 1t is mealtime and there
is meal, hot, plentiful. They ask
no more.
IL anyone chances to leave a crust
of bread, Grandmother toasts it. She
SINNERS odds and ends of onions,
bones, herbs, crumbs, fat, a table
spoon of chopped ham, she bargains
in the market for chickens neck,
for half lambs kidney. When the
American housewife is whirling
| through the pages of a cookbook to
see if anybody ever put a cold baked
potato into a soup, GRANDMOTHER
calmly realizing that baked potato is
food. and that food is the first essen
| tial for living at all, and that melted
ice cream and pate sandwiches can
/ go into soup for that matter. # one
is hungry enough-puts her potato
| in.
And the result is delicious The
bowls of hot, smoking. seasoned, thick.
savory pottage to which almost all
peasants sit down in the peaceful
twilight, are whole meals in them
selves. Follow them with the usual
solid; beans, macaroni, rice OF cereal.
| with coffee and cheese and bread and
it is small wonder that they sit smok-
ing in their doorways during the
long summer evenings, meditatins
upon the whole dollar that will 60
into the bank as usual this week,
and at peace with the world.
Grandma wears a black dress.
merely from the time it is 'ne,. IN
til it wears eut-usually a period Of
years. She has caps, she has slso
plenty of nondescript old dresses and
aprons for kitchen wear. She treas
ures for fifty years a lace collar.
a coat with a care, and an umbrella
with an ivory handle, besides a Bible.
perhaps, and few Drowned photo
graphs. She still sleeps on the linen
she brought her husband as hel. dover.
and her daughter-in-law's linen is
hardly yet in fair use, after ten
years.
Her husband is paid SIS a month
as a vineyardist, her son-in-law. alas,
is not as regular in his habits as she
could wish. and malingers trifle. she
fears, upon the strength of his war
years. But still, he labors. rarely
bringing home less than s1O a month.
The family savings amount to abou.
$500, despite war and high prices.
Out OF an income of $500 n year.
~ 'Vhth save sNDp anu arc con-
sldered conspicuously prosperous.
They pay $50 year rent. They
give to the church. They are self
respecting and well-fed. AMI how
they enjoy the occasional winJfall
The tomato-laden van that breaks
down before the door. scattering its
rich freight in every direction and
providing n whole winter of sauces
and soups from the crushed fruit. the
goat that-"but with what smile
Madam. the excellent creature. as i'll
she might know how we would re-
joice-!" presents them not with one
healthy kid, but two.
Not that we can ever bring this
sort of thing to America. or perhaps
ever want to. This sort of close
ness to the daily WAYS and means IS
after all remnant of the old worlds
way of doing things. vanishing largely
they tell me, even there. But it has
beauty and dignity of its own
non-the-less. There is something of n
mosaic fineness and satisfaction about
it, Not the most lavish waste is so
impressive. To see barely-ta stel
chicken and merely disturbed scallops
being carried away from our own
tables, to be slashed merciless into
garbage barrels. is to realize. per-
haps little sadly. how rich we are
How little we know Of what some
children know, in the European
mountains of actual gnawing hunger.
of that one possessing thought, Food. |
Food. Food" No food in the kitch-
en-, when little Five and Seven come |
home cold and weary at noon. no
food in the pantry-in the store--in |
the big, rat-ridden storehouses down. |
town, No food at all, not this noon.
not this night. not tomorrow. I'M
less-unless perhaps one of the Amer
lean trains get through.
We send them money, We 10 care. |
we keep alive the other hundreds of |
thousands-the hundreds Of thousands !
who are not already dead But how
little we appreciate their problem is
proved this very morning, when we
will say musingly, in the kitchen
door:
"Start off with tomato jelly salad. |
Mary; they like that. And then. i
suppose chops again. and fried pota-
toes. No, don't have macaroni. they |
oil loathe it-they won't eat spinach. |
they won't eat string beans. Find |
out what asparagus is. and il it isn't
too expensive, get two punches. Get |
some OF those nut cookies at the Ex-
change. and make them some sort Of |,
pudding. And tonight see.
Was there any OF the beef left? Was |
there any soupmeat sent yesterday"
COPYRIGHT 1924, by The Mcclure
Newsnnner Syndicate