Sharing

Once upon a time I was a tiny bit obsessed with this space.  I would plot and plan what recipe to make next.  I would sometimes delay getting the food on the table so that I could take the perfect photo to convey the deliciousness of the meal at hand.  Fortunately, The Mistah is accommodating to this quirk.  Then I would spend hours at the computer processing photos and trying to come up with new and interesting stories to share.  Admittedly, it’s been a few months since I’ve eagerly picked up the camera.  And it’s been about the same amount of time since I’ve sat down and tried to connect a story to a meal.  And that bothers me.  I feel like something is out of whack.

But at the same time, I keep waiting for someone to throw a switch and for me to be back to my old self.  The reality is that my old self and my current self will probably never inhabit the same space.  They might wave to each other across a crowded room but they won’t be settling in together on the couch for drinks and small talk.  That’s the thing about change, it doesn’t wait for you…it just keeps rolling along.  And at some point, life will change things up again so that my current self will become yet another version of my old self.  It makes my head hurt just to think about that.

My point is that I’ve been waiting around these last few months for someone to take charge and tell me to get on living my life.  And in the absence of that, I have relied on excuses for why I’m not doing the things that I enjoy doing.  The rational part of me knows that there’s no magic switch or even if there were, the only person who could turn it on is me.  So where does that leave my current self when rational me knows the reality of the situation and the rest of me chooses to ignore it?  I’ll tell you where that leaves me…stuck in neutral.

That’s where I’ve been lately.  And then unexpectedly I received a reminder about why the things I’ve let languish were so important to me.  It came wrapped in Christmas paper from a coworker.  When I opened the box and pulled the tissue paper aside, revealing the drawing above, those words were a wake up call.  “tuesdays were reserved for sharing recipes”  For me, there are two more words implied in that sentence.  In my mind, I added “with friends”.  And that’s what’s been missing…feeling like I’m creating opportunities to get together with friends and share recipes.

In a million years I don’t think my coworker can ever know how much I needed that reminder.  And the woman who drew that illustration certainly didn’t create it with me in mind.  But The Universe saw to it that those words, on that illustration, made their way to me.

I said I was waiting for someone to take charge and tell me to get moving.  Guess it’s time that I listen to The Universe and get to getting.