Family Traditions

photo by arantxa villa

Family Traditions

second-year claire d’agostino

March 2020: the start of the end of the world and the beginning of an unforgettable era of our lives, one that will certainly go down in history. While future generations will be reading about every major organization shutting down and the insane spread of a virus in their textbooks, we’ll be left defining our youth with memories of Tiktok whipped coffee and performative celebrity covers that attempted to save the world. But for me, quarantine was defined by an oven. 

I distinctly remember the strong opposition from my mother, telling me it was way too late to bake cookies, but I was convinced that baking these Pillsbury cookies was the key to my happiness. I preheated the oven to 350°F while I prepped the cookies on the tray with tin foil so I wouldn’t have to wash the cooking sheet after. 

Unfortunately for me, it caused a mess equivalent to the world’s crisis. Somehow, I had forgotten about my family’s lack of cabinet space which caused our oven to function as additional storage. We kept pots, pans, and even tupperware in the oven, including plastic tupperware. In my excitement to make cookies, I had forgotten to check the oven and by the time the cookies were ready to bake, the house was filled with the smell of burnt plastic and angry screams.

Even in my college home, it has unconsciously become a tradition for me to open my oven every single time I preheat it. It’s like a warning bell of my mother’s voice going off in my head each time I decide to use the oven to make dinner. I have so many memories from making mistakes in the kitchen that each specific item has a memory attached to it (ask me about how I almost cut my finger off with a serrated knife or took the bottom off of my blender and spilled smoothie everywhere). It’s funny how the small things—little pockets of memory—accompany us to any distance we travel.

I personally hate the question, What is your favorite family tradition? because on paper we don’t have many. However, I believe we have the power to redefine tradition. Our generation is known for breaking norms and going against the ordinary, so why shouldn’t we live up to the role? We should be the ones to create unconventional traditions that future generations will yearn to carry on. Traditions do not have to be some dreaded once-a-year family gathering; rather, they can be as common and as simple as opening your oven. 

As young adults, all we want is to get out of our hometown. For some, coming to college was a huge jump outside of their comfort zone; for others, it’s just another pit stop before they finally decide to get out of the state they grew up in. Some of us may even decide to move back to our hometown. Yet no matter where we are, we are practicing traditions that are attached to the places and people which we grew up with.