Does your back sometimes ache when you’re standing in the kitchen?  If not, you’re either very young or lucky.  Most middle aged women have a touch of arthritis  or a back out of kilter.  If you had been a housewife in earlier times,  you might not have had that problem. Old fashioned sinks were free standing. That left plenty of room  underneath for your knees if you sat on a stool.   But modern kitchen sinks are always enclosed in a cabinet.  You don’t sit at them.  You stand.  And then your back begins to ache. Especially now, when you’re cooking more at home during covid-19.  It’s time for the return of the kitchen stool.

I used to think my mother was the only one who used a kitchen stool because of her arthritis.  But when I told my husband about my mom’s stool, he said, his mom had one too.  Back in Nebraska, all the farm women he knew sat on stools while working at the sink.  I think they knew something that modern kitchen designers have overlooked.  Standing at a sink can be hard on the back.

The old fashioned kitchen stool was metal, with a rounded back. Last week, I finally decided I couldn’t take it any more.  I was tired of back aches while fixing dinner.   It was time to go back in time, and get myself a kitchen stool..  Because of social distancing during the covid pandemic, we couldn’t afford to shop around. On the way back from the cemetery on Monday, we stopped at Menards.

When I asked where I could find a kitchen stool, I got some blank looks.  They suggested I look for bar stools in the kitchen section.  No, they did not have any retro stools like my mother used to have.   (you can get them on Amazon). But they did have some wooden bar stools that might help.  We picked it up, took it home, and my handy husband managed to get it assembled.  No, it doesn’t work like the ones in the old days because there’s no place to tuck in my knees under the sink. .  But the stool  is there for me to stop and rest a minute while doing food prep and clean up.

If your back has begun to ache while in the kitchen,  you might think about getting a stool.   Kitchen designers, take note! Leave some knee room under the sink.  And bring back the kitchen stool.