I’m back! (kind of)

Disclaimer: recipe not included

Hello to all my subscribers who have probably forgotten that you are a subscriber. I know - it’s been awhile. It’s been since September 6th. Not that anyone except for myself is counting, but that’s like almost eight weeks. Normally I emotionally berate myself for my lack of motivation to write and don’t worry this time hasn’t been any different. Throughout the past eight weeks I have written on my to do list over and over again: WRITE BLOG. I have sat at my kitchen table and Googled “why do I procrastinate?”. No matter, time quickly flowed from one week to the next without my written words being a part of them. But as time has flowed away from me, my perspective has shifted. There’s definitely no need to force myself into doing something that I don’t want to do. I’m trying to be kinder to myself. I figured the writing would happen when it was time.

So here I am again. A lot has happened throughout the past eight weeks of my writing hiatus. Most notable to my “food blog space” would be a broken wrist and the loss of my physical ability to cook. But I’m getting ahead of myself. I’ll back up a bit.

Mid-September had suddenly snuck up on me. Work on the UBC Farm bustled on, as did my work at the coffee shop. The Bean Wall was simultaneously mourned and disassembled. We harvested and cooked more tomatoes than I ever thought possible. I slowly organized a job for myself for winter, and found a Pemberton home for Joe and I to move into come December. The morning air turned sharper, and the colours warmed. The mountain bike trails became my friends again, and my days alternated between school, work and biking. A folk concert and a few margaritas turned into a hungover bike ride which turned into the day I broke my wrist. My positivity was up-kept with the novelty of my first bone break and the mandatory time off work. Although farm tasks were suddenly more restricted with the use of only one hand, I spent all the time there that my schedule allowed. I finished end-of-season reports, helped to organize graduation and extracted dry beans from their pods. The end of school crept closer as the air became fragrant with earthy decay and wood-burning fireplaces. As my cast got stinkier, we pulled squash plants out of the ground and spread cover crop seeds over bare fields. My heart ached as the temperatures cooled and the final day of farm school was upon us. Graduation brought tears and smiles and cakes and friends and families and music and garlic presents. I immediately went home to puppy-sit for my parents, with the hope of distracting myself from a jobless and school-less existence. At home I bounced between emotions of frustration, relaxation, love and sadness; a puppy full of trouble-making energy, a broken wrist and alone time with my thoughts proved to be a strange mix.

I have struggled through the past month or two without cooking, which also means I have spent the past month or two without recipe developing. My inability to create new recipes means this current post has no recipe associated with it. For that I apologize. But - if healing my wrist has taught me anything - patience is a virtue. Recipes will come that will round out the blur of my past eight weeks. And, with those recipes will be the stories that are carried with them. My gratitude for the Bean Wall, the overwhelming abundance of tomatoes, the Great Squash Harvest, the heart-ache of farm school graduation, the frustration of a broken wrist, the list goes on. In the spirit of being kinder to myself, these will all come with time.

I don’t have much else to say, but if you’ve made it this far - thank you for reading my little update. If this post does anything this week, I hope it reminds you that it’s ok if you don’t do it all (re: me trying to be kinder to myself). In the meantime I will be patiently waiting for my cast to come off next week, reading my book while my frozen pizza (sigh) cooks in the oven.