THE BABY FOOD PHENOMENON
aka how vaguely embarrassing food combinations can aid in a girlie's Saturn Return
Is a key element of deciphering adulthood… kind of being a baby? Let me explain.
The past month, I lived somewhere I don’t normally live (Los Angeles), doing things I don’t normally do (drive, be alone). I felt like a flaneur, a New Girl in Town, a clumsy traveler. I drove with Google Maps up because I had no idea where I was in space. I would get so excited to go to a food destination I had been curious about— then get overwhelmed, socially disoriented, and order the complete most wrong and random thing. And then eat it anyway :)
I kind of bask in that form of humiliation — it warms my cheeks and makes everything a bit absurd. Details of mundanity feel like signs. Inexplicably, whenever I turned the car on (a Kia Soul), the automatic radio played exclusively The Eagles: either “Hotel California” or “Take It Easy”. I tried to. I kind of actually did do that.
I drove around and tried to figure out some more material aspects of my life. The world in general feels overwhelming, painful, and chaotic. Still I managed to locate the gentle hum of individualized questions: how to live, where to live, how to make money, how to feel good? What is adulthood, how am I spending my time, who am I growing into? Appropriate questions, a healthy amount of existential and silly because who can answer them in realtime? They were not LA-dependent, though it definitely was nice to think somewhere so sunny and pleasant. These are questions I am actually asking myself at all times. You see, I’m in my Saturn Return. It is good at finding me, wherever I go.
Saturn Return is when the planet Saturn finds its way back to where it was when a person was born. Usually this first happens for people between the ages of 27 and 30. From what I gather, it’s when you kind of grow up. Saturn is the planet of structure and reality checks and important questions. The ‘How Should a Person Be?’ questions come on strong, so forceful that it’s kind of funny.
If these growing up questions are always popping off, WHY THEN HAVE I FOUND MYSELF GRAVITATING TOWARD A TREMENDOUSLY SPECIFIC kind of food? Sigh!!!!
There is something that happens, and it’s started happening a lot. I am home, alone. There’s not much in the fridge. I take a piece of pita or lavash, grate some cheese onto it, and put it in the microwave. I let it go for like 30-45 seconds. It comes out steaming, greasy, smelling of salt. Edges are crisp and the house smells entirely of melted cheese.
When I eat it, something happens where my entire body feels warm and sedated. To put it plainly, this food makes me feel like a TOTAL AND COMPLETE BABY. This snack has minimal nutritional value, takes zero effort, feels terribly lazy. I also am vaguely lactose intolerant, so it feels like a logic-defying risk every time I engage with it. I have tried to dig into why this has brought me such joy. It feels like a rebellion, lunar, shadowed, euphoric. I would never eat this food with another person. I only eat it alone, barely believing that I am not getting in trouble.
Let me be clear: I’m not saying Baby Food as in the “I’m Baby” internet language which is — I’m sorry — infantile, twee, and doesn’t serve us at all. Instead, I’m talking about what I might call, a “Baby Food Phenomenon”. This is the desire to eat food that feels so soft and familiar that it vaguely sedates you. I’m also not talking about Comfort Food, which tends to be attached to community and enjoyed with others. The BFP, instead, is what you make for yourself when you forgo all adult rules in favor of self-soothing. It is, perhaps, what Tiny You would have made for Tiny You if it had been safe to use a kitchen.
I think about Baby Food as I read one of my Esoteric Books for Adults: A Psychoanalytic Exploration of the Body in Today’s World. In it, a quote by Marion Milner:
“The inner conscience we have of our own body takes back the role of the external mother, in a way where we create a kind of psychic sphere from the image we have of our own body, as the only safe place to live, from when we can extend our antennas toward the world.”
When I eat my Weird Melted Cheese Moment, sure perhaps I am being strange and simply not very healthy! Or maybe I’m too focused on my nutrition, trying to locate control where it doesn’t exist. It wouldn’t be the first time for either experience! But there’s more here, and I think Milner knows it.
I wonder if I am engaging in Baby Food Phenomenon so that I can more sustainably submit myself to adulthood. Perhaps a person needs to employ eating as alchemy, fortifying the insides with what feels gentlest. We table the questions of logics, pragmatism, aspiration, and adulthood for a brief moment — enough to enjoy the wash of the soft soothing tide, through the mouth, toward the belly, keeping us full. In the same way that Saturn returns to where it started, in glimmering moments alone, we are called in the direction of Baby.
It’s all very weird, but I’m not in charge. I am excited to keep growing up. Most of all, I am excited for a new craving — I know it will come.
For paid subscribers, this weekend, I promise: a list of Baby Foods for Grown Ups, in written and audio form, built to provide great comfort to you.
Rosa thank you for this. It really hit as I go through my own Saturn return. I feel like childhood me is informing the evolution of present day me. A few weeks ago, with my students, we saw goodnight moon LIVE at the children’s theater. It was captivating and I felt so giddy after