food. according to me.     Sauce and Sensibility

Over Breakfast

      This morning for breakfast, I stood in my sunny kitchen flipping through the latest issue of Adbusters Magazine, munching on homemade toast with homemade jam and a ripe pear that I picked at Sauvie Island last week, slurpin’ on some locally-roasted coffee. It was pretty awesome.

      Later, I moved to the dining room table to peruse the pamphlets I picked up at the Salmon Nation Blockparty yesterday: the Pangea Project, Zenger Farm, and Slow Food USA. Clearly, all worthy organizations. This perusal, also, was awesome.

      Again, I seem to be in a place of significant possibilities. When I graduate from University in December, I shall be prepared for…nothing specifically… but a whole lot, generally. I have been studying philosophy: ethics, primarily. I do logic well; I like to argue both sides of an issue, at the same time, out loud, alone. Basically, I have been learning how to think.

      When I dropped out of work in the FoodWorld and dropped back into University a few years ago, I thought that I was leaving food. My hands hurt. I can’t do 3 am mornings. I am young, and a woman, and these two conditions particularly can make life in a professional kitchen somewhat less-easy than it could otherwise be. I am beginning to see now, however, how I can weave these two passions – Passion for the Yummy and Passion for the Good – into gainful employment. No, if I take this route I shall almost certainly never be a billionaire (if that kind of thing is important to you), but what is important to me is personal satisfaction. In the words of Lady J, I do not want to be a “waste of space.” There’s so much to do, and I am starting to see how to do it.

      The first spark happened when I read Botany of Desire. The second, during The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter. And then this morning, it was possible. Over breakfast, this frenzied need to DO SOMETHING ALREADY BEFORE ARMAGEDDON, YOU LAZY BASTARD hit a fever pitch. And whereas usually, I fold, hopeless and overwhelmed, this morning was different. Maybe it was the jam, the bread, the sun, but I think I can pull it off. Not saving the world, heavens no. But not leaving it worse than when I arrived, at the very least. I’d say, even, that the outlook for improvement is pretty good. With just a little investigation, you can see the hundreds of organizations, everywhere, run by like-minded people who believe that it is possible, and who are doing it. The time to think and brood is closing. Without forgetting to think, brood, and study, I do believe that the time to act is here. This, I feel, is awesome as well.