I guess I'm back?

Hi.

It's been a while.  I've been gone a while.  Not intentional, but I'm not sure I knew what to say.  It's been a long, weird 20 months, and I've been trying to find my footing in this new world.  Some days I feel like a newborn giraffe, trying to figure out how to stand on my own.  What does the world look like for me, someone in their mid-thirties, in a post (?) pandemic world.  A lot has changed.  Cooking's evolved, I've evolved.  For a while I wasn't sure if I had anything to say so I stayed quiet. 

I've been working, reading, trying to be creative in many different ways.  I've been cooking and baking and pushing myself, challenging myself but it some ways it also feels like I've been trying to convince myself to not stop moving.  If I stop, what do I have to show for myself?  What did I do with my time if I don't spend it making 3 kinds of jam, a pot of beans, a cheese danish, a freezer full of fresh tomato sauce.  Did I accomplish anything?  

Cooking I've come to realize serves a lot of purposes.  Sure, it' feeds me and Tyler but it also is something I use to keep myself busy.  It's a way to pass my time in a tangible way.  Cooking says "Look what I did! Can you believe it?".  But the question I've been wrestling with is why do I feel like I need to prove to everyone I'm always doing something? I think the pandemic in some ways gave us all this time - less commuting, less ability to leave the home, and you had to show you did something with it.  Did you start a business? Figure out how to run a sub 7 minute mile?  Can you plank for 2 minutes? Did you write a book? As a woman, with no kids, I felt like I needed to prove myself even more. It was exhausting in a lot of ways and I'm starting to push back on my inner voice. You don't need to do everything to show you did something. You also don't need to prove anything to anyone.

With all that being said, I have been cooking.  A lot.  More then I've ever cooked.  I've made some amazing things.  Things that 2 years ago I would never think I could do.  I've made laminated pastry, perfect pots of beans, scones for every season. I've done it all in a tiny kitchen with minimal counterspace.    I feel ready to come back here because I feel like I'm coming back for myself - not to prove anything but because I like talking about food and the things I make.  I will probably not come back with any regularity because life has a way of getting in the way but I'll be here, sharing random thoughts, things that taste good, and maybe other things.