Medium rare.

This past year I’ve been working on my boundaries and value system. Strengthening my boundaries and re-defining my values. 

I’ve also let my intuition play a larger role in how I make decisions.

In the end, it’s all worked out and I faired better than I would have had I tried to remain in control. 

Once I entered into an agricultural life it was interesting to observe my life as I did my best to remain in the flow of the seasons. Once the veggies were done, I moved onto apple picking, once the apple picking came to an end I moved onto cooking. And it was cooking that dominated my last weekend in Massachusetts.

I was at a loss as to how to occupy myself during the final week of October and then I got a call on Monday afternoon asking me if I’d like to cook at a retreat that was being held nearby. I said, “Sure.”

In the past my favorite question used to be, “Why?” My new favorite question is, “What have I got to lose?” The answer thus far, has been, “Nothing.” This fits nicely into my Zen-nihilist belief system -- nothing matters so you should do the best you can and go as far and as high as possible.

When I finally got in touch with Steve Hermann I was honest. I don’t remember exactly how the conversation went but I recall saying, “I’m not a cook.” He paused and said, “But you can cook?” I said, “Yeah.” He, and I, didn’t have a choice in the matter. He needed a cook and I needed something to do. He said that I should come up with a vegetarian menu and he’d do the shopping. I said, “Sounds good.” He also mentioned veggie burgers and Lukas came to mind immediately.

When I woke up Tuesday it was so typically autumn in New England – gray, rainy, damp, cold. I thought, “It might as well be November.” I lugged myself to the library and started to create a menu. Breakfasts were going to be simple: fruit, cereal, yogurt, granola, juice, and tea. Lunch and dinner? Now there was the rub.

Since I was only cooking for ten people and only cooking for a few of days I did a couple of things in preparation. First I used a technique that Olympic athletes use where they visualize themselves running through a race. They picture every last detail. So I relaxed and placed myself in the kitchen and saw myself prepping and cooking and serving the food. Then I said, “I can do this.” Next, I decided that I would cook things I’d want to eat. Since I’m not a vegetarian it made it a bit of a challenge.

In the end I settled on the following:

Friday Dinner

Nadine’s Vegetarian Chili (named, by me, after Cara’s Aunt)

Corn bread

Brown rice

Sauteed bok choi

Sauteed beet greens

 

Saturday Breakfast

Fresh-baked lemon poppy seed muffins

 

Saturday Lunch

Quinoa salad (quinoa, green beans, dried cranberries, walnuts, garlic vinaigrette)

Side salad: lettuce and carrots

 

Saturday Dinner

Veggie burgers (black beans, brown rice, beets, red onion, red wine vinegar)

Sautéed kale

Sauteed beet greens

Apple crisp

 

Sunday Lunch

Roasted root vegetables (potato, sweet potato, onion)

Brown rice

Potato salad (red potato, fresh chopped scallion, olive oil, salt)

 

Since I knew that Steve’s group was going to be working to strengthen their Medium skills I wanted them to eat really well and I wanted it to taste good. That kind of work can be very taxing.

Saturday night Carly joined me in prepping and hanging out. She’d never been to Earthlands and wanted to check it out. We had a ton of fun. One of the retreatants told us her life story, going so far as to illustrate and highlight certain chapters by showing us photos on her iphone. And my apple crisp, which has received rave reviews at home, pushed everyone into a happy-food silence and once the power of speech returned, it was unanimously declared, “Delicious!” Sunday after lunch, the woman from India approached me and said, “I’ve been living in this country for 8 years and this was the best vegetarian food I’ve eaten.” The man from Mexico gave me a bear hug and said, “Thank you for the great food!”

And this brings me to one of the most interesting aspects that I have to spend time mulling over -- I didn’t feel connected to making people happy with good food. I thought I would feel something.

How interesting is that?

It was weird. It’s almost like how comedians are usually the saddest people around. Perhaps cooks are the most removed from the effect their cooking has on people. And yet comedians continue to go for laughs and cooks continue to make great tasting food. (The lack of affect might also be the result of the fact that I'm exhausted on every level, so I'll give myself a couple of weeks rest and then see how I feel about all of this.)

I realized that I don’t want to work in a restaurant kitchen. I want to work on food recipes. It was great fun making the food but I want to get into food products.

And perhaps it’s a good thing that I didn’t feel attached to the way people responded to my cooking. It’s not that I’m jaded. Rather I don’t have to go in search of feeling validated. I’m not seeking approval. Although, when it comes down to it -- I do want to create great food and attract a lot of customers. I can feel the competitive part of me kick into high gear on this. But I don’t need to hear each and every person say, “That was great.” I’ll know they’re happy because they’ll keep buying my product.

When Steve and I discussed payment I’d been toying with the idea of charging 20 per hour, then I decided I didn’t really want the money. I wanted a session with Steve and I wanted the cooking experience.

Sunday afternoon, once all the retreatants had departed, Steve gave me an hour-long session. I’ve had several psychic readings in the past (and attended Nancy Weber's workshops) but I’ve never consulted a medium before. And the approaches are really different. It was interesting to watch Steve during the session. He gets very animated and his body language changes when the different people come through. I won’t get into detail on the session because when it comes to this sort of thing, I never kiss and tell. However, should any of what the guides relayed come to pass in the waking state, I will post something about that in the New Year.