I’m launching a new theme for my blog with today’s post. The theme is Real-world Fairy Godmothers & Wizards – those extraordinary folks I believe have made life better, happier and – yes – more magical for all of us. Today’s extraordinary person: Julia Child!
Name: Julia Child
Magical Power(s): to transform “faults” into assets; to make life fun for everyone around her; to make non-cooks able to turn out perfect souffles; to inspire countless women to live life courageously – in the kitchen and everywhere else.
Motto she kept in her kitchen: “I wasn’t there. It didn’t happen. It was the little people.”
I’ve always known about Julia Child, of course. She is so much a part of our culture, you can’t escape references to her, or catching glimpses of her on TV reruns of one of her cooking shows. But I was never “into cooking” and so I never paid very much attention. Mistake.
I finally caught Nora Ephron’s new movie, Julie & Julia and now I feel I’ve truly “met” Julia Child for the first time. And I’m very grateful I have!
Julie & Julia is about Julie Powell, an aspiring writer from Queens, who finds happiness by launching the Julie/Julia Project, a year of cooking each and every recipe inMastering the Art of French Cooking – Julia Child’s landmark cook book.
Nora’s movie introduced me to a larger than life (literally and metaphorically) character – a woman with a great appetite for life, an exuberance about being alive, a generosity of spirit, and extraordinary courage. I was hooked. Since seeing the movie, I’ve learned more about Julia online and I have her autobiography My Life in France on my “to read” list. And, oh yes, I bought Mastering the Art of French Cooking.
Julia was born with certain advantages – her family was affluent and she attended excellent schools. But she also had disadvantages. She was 6’2 – at a time when the average woman was 5’4. She had an unusual breathy voice. She was not considered a beauty. Her husband, before he fell in love with her, described her in a letter to his brother as an “old maid.”
What is amazing and wonderful and adorable about Julia is that she went forward with her life “as if” everything was wonderful – even when everything clearly was not – and in doing so – she made it wonderful. She chose not to pay attention to her “faults” – and so she ensured others wouldn’t pay attention to them either. I watched a PBS video of The French Chef (Julia’s first cooking show) – the Le Tarte Tatin episode – in which Julia prepares an apple tart that turns out disastrously. Instead of dissolving in whimpers, she simply “fixes it up,” reassures us it’s fine, and proceeds to enjoy a slice. The show becomes not only a cooking lesson – but a lesson about life.
Because she carried herself with confidence and courage alloyed inextricably to exuberance and good will, her appearance and her voice – oddities in the eyes of the average observer – served simply to make her more memorable. And her personality clinched the deal. America fell in love with her from the moment it first set eyes on her in 1962 when a Boston educational station aired her first cooking demonstration. Julia has been amassing admirers ever since.
Julie Powell said this upon hearing of Julia’s death: “There’s so much I would not have done. Because it would not have been there for me to do. Without you here, I would be a different person – a smaller, a sadder, a more frightened person.”
I think this is what so many of us who discover Julia feel – she elevates us, shows us new possibilities, makes each of our little worlds a better place. As for me – yes, I am now into cooking!
Thank you, Julia!
