My Peace

I had a crappy day, yesterday...I mean, a really shitty, awful day. I was in the "hate" side of my love/hate struggle with my job, my husband was being as most husbands are, needy...more so than usual due to a stomach bug that struck him the night before, the bills were beginning their monthly resurgence of needing to be paid, our home (a vintage/retro 1958 stone on a quaint pecan tree covered, corner in Taylor Texas) was looking yet again like it needed another Saturday spent picking up, cleaning, mopping...I was a knot of anxiety and it was all I could do not to call my boss when I made my lunch run to say "Bitch, I am out...I can't take this shit anymore today." Of course I would say it in my oh so elegant way…no cursing...BUT no..I stayed on like the trooper I am, and pulled back into the parking lot of the dreaded call center after picking up my food from a local Taco Cabana...I even drove home, and only made one stop to the Goodwill store in Hutto and looked around, blowing off the steam of the last 24 hours. Even when I got back into my car after making a small $20 purchase (3 tank tops, 1 pair of RED shorts and 1 enclosed glass hurricane type lantern that my imagination saw as a cool fairy garden, or succulent paradise, or BOTH)…cramming it into my car almost haphazardly, I drove home, thinking I needed to keep driving for a while, but I didn’t. I pulled into my driveway, got out of my car and headed inside, closing myself off from the outside world and entering s shared world of weirdness and at the time more frustrations that I could count. My husband came home 30 minutes later and crowded me on the bed where I was laying cross ways playing a quick game of Mahjong on my tablet…again being needy. I got up, madder still. I went into the kitchen and stood there, breathing with all the thoughts of the day and the feelings about those thoughts going round and round inside me, building and building to an almost atomic level. I looked around, and realized I needed to cook. I pulled a spaghetti squash from the fridge, cut it down the middle, scooped out the seeds, brought some water to boil in my largest stock pot, salted it, and dropped the squash halves in. I then spun around, grabbed some garlic from a wire basket on my counter, waltz over to another basket I have hanging from the ceiling on the opposite side of this all too small vintage space, and grabbed a yellow onion. Cutting board and the knife I used to cut the squash were used to cut both up as small as I could get. I grabbed some left over bacon from the fridge, pulled four slices from the package and resealed it, putting it back into the deli drawer of the ice box. I minced up the meat, heated a sauté pan and slid the little pork hunks, the onions and garlic in…the smell hit my nose and filled the space almost instantly. Bacony, salty, slightly sweet, spicy smell wafted as I stirred the mixture…finally, while all of this was going on, I pulled some Portobello caps, smeared them with olive oil from our favorite specialty store, heated my grill pan, and plopped them in, pressing them down with a bacon press. I took another breathe as I came to a stopping point in this dinner show, and realized I was excited about what I was making and about to feed my husband. I was proud of the dishes that were coming together so effortlessly, and that was when I realized that I was no longer angry, frustrated or overwhelmed… I was at peace. I was happy, excited and most of all, hungry…and I was at peace. My kitchen is where I find this Zen like state each and every time I cook. The distraction of noise, smell, heat, cutting, flipping, watching…it brings me peace and joy. I can come to this space, create something wonderful, whether by recipe or the creative electricity that flows through me, and enjoy every twirl, whirl, step and spin. It is a dance…a dance I am not ashamed of, a dance where I think of nothing but can almost hear my Granny whispering, almost singing to to me “Not too much heat, turn that down…salt this…pepper that…stir that sauce or it will stick…”Her voice is my tune and the pots, pans, knives, graters, juicers, stove, oven all the utensils are my instruments. I am a one man band in this show and I find peace in it. What I find when I fianlly sit down to eat is whole other ball of wax...