There's no place like food.
| |  | | The Always-Invited, Always-Welcome Guest at the Party | | | Dorothy Gale: "It wasn't a dream, it was a place, and you and you, and you, and you were there."
I was on a walk with a friend this morning, talking about Eating Disorder Awareness Week, deciding whether to write about my own disorder. Not today, it's too private but the food struggle is real for me. So: It's Eating Disorder Awareness Week, and if you struggle with food, or care about someone struggling, you are not alone. Here is a resource for information and support: https://anad.org/.
What struck me as I talked to my friend is a question about how we show and talk about food. I induce longing. All day long, I elicit an ooo or an ahhh and then deliver a recipe. It can be delightful to want something, especially something attainable. My friend reminded me that food is a lot of other things, too. It is health, artistry, community, history, and connection. So much of our joy comes from it.
Almost every winter since my daughter was small, I spent this weekend in winter family camp—snowshoeing outside and doing puzzles and singing goofy camp songs inside. As single moms, it was amazing to see our city children to roam freely around in the distance. But the most delightful thing for me was that someone else cooked. The food there was serviceable—plain, clean, modest. The opposite of fancy. The food was where we gathered, holding little wooden bowls of beef barley soup, salad bar-salad with sliced black olives, winter tomatoes, croutons, shredded cheese, and one of several dressings. A warming, glowing light in the shortest month.
Remember, at the end of the Wizard of Oz, when Dorothy looks up from her bed at the faces around her? She realizes that they were there, through her odyssey in Oz. They are the hinge between her imperfect life in Kansas and her trippy, exhausting life-changing journey. That's what I say to food today: Salad bar, sliced olive, baked potato, cafeteira coffee, slice of cheesecake: you were there. The always-invited, always-welcome guest at the party.
In all of my memories from birthdays to funerals and plain-old Tuesdays, when I am most securely connected to the people in my life, the most cared for and comforted, food is there. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The Spruce Eats on YouTube | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | Follow us:      | | You are receiving this newsletter because you subscribed to The Spruce Eats newsletter. Unsubscribe | | © 2022 Dotdash.com — All rights reserved. Privacy Policy. | | A DOTDASH BRAND | 28 Liberty Street, 7th Floor, New York, NY, 10005 | | | | | | |
No comments:
Post a Comment