The air is warm today, and there's rain in it. I eye the painfully beautiful clouds with mistrust- I know there's lightning up there somewhere and I don't like it. But the air is warm and the rain has that smell, that new rain smell I love. Kind of like asphalt. It's not that it smells good, it's just I like the way it makes me feel.
I'm in Mazama now, one of the places my heart lives. I get to be here the whole Summer, this time as the cook for my beloved Outward Bound home-base. I'm tired of being in the field and being uncomfortable, but still want to be involved with Outward Bound, still love the community, still want to be part of the magic. So I swallowed whatever egotistical pride I felt about wanting to be the kind of person who is generally a baddass in the mountains and who knows about ropes and rocks and plants and group dynamics. Instead I'm indulging the part of me that loves to feed and serve people. And be creative with food.
I'd like to take a moment here to thank my former girlfriend and my ex-girlfriend for helping me learn to enjoy feeding and serving people. Without them, my own resistance at being in a role that I feel societally pressured to be in would never have allowed me the freedom to find out if I even enjoyed it. Something about being with a woman who loved me and who also cooked for me freed me up to love and cook in return. Thanks girlfriends.
So here I am, a skilled and experienced career outdoor educator staying indoors cooking, and almost thoroughly enjoying it. Half the time I'm just making shit up with a ratio of 80% inspiration and 20% panic (will it be enough? will it be on time? will it be delicious?). The other half of the time I'm cooking things I actually know how to make, or following recipes. This changes my ratios to 90% work and 10% worry. Outward Bound staff are hungry and grateful eaters. There's no group I'd rather be cooking for.
Maybe I'll post some of my recipes. Today though, I'll keep wandering around smelling the air, inspecting the cilantro seedlings, worrying over the tomato plants, keeping one ear to the sky for any distant thunderings coming to shake my heart and make me grateful for my indoor job.
I'm in Mazama now, one of the places my heart lives. I get to be here the whole Summer, this time as the cook for my beloved Outward Bound home-base. I'm tired of being in the field and being uncomfortable, but still want to be involved with Outward Bound, still love the community, still want to be part of the magic. So I swallowed whatever egotistical pride I felt about wanting to be the kind of person who is generally a baddass in the mountains and who knows about ropes and rocks and plants and group dynamics. Instead I'm indulging the part of me that loves to feed and serve people. And be creative with food.
I'd like to take a moment here to thank my former girlfriend and my ex-girlfriend for helping me learn to enjoy feeding and serving people. Without them, my own resistance at being in a role that I feel societally pressured to be in would never have allowed me the freedom to find out if I even enjoyed it. Something about being with a woman who loved me and who also cooked for me freed me up to love and cook in return. Thanks girlfriends.
So here I am, a skilled and experienced career outdoor educator staying indoors cooking, and almost thoroughly enjoying it. Half the time I'm just making shit up with a ratio of 80% inspiration and 20% panic (will it be enough? will it be on time? will it be delicious?). The other half of the time I'm cooking things I actually know how to make, or following recipes. This changes my ratios to 90% work and 10% worry. Outward Bound staff are hungry and grateful eaters. There's no group I'd rather be cooking for.
Maybe I'll post some of my recipes. Today though, I'll keep wandering around smelling the air, inspecting the cilantro seedlings, worrying over the tomato plants, keeping one ear to the sky for any distant thunderings coming to shake my heart and make me grateful for my indoor job.
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