Table Talk

I’ve been cooking again, and it tastes different. I made a stack of French toast, fruit, and tea. A stack taller than my belly’s depth, a taste crisper than a morning run. It looked good, but it tasted slow.

I taste the smell of something that once was easy. It has all the parts of what I love: soaking the bread in the special mix of egg, milk, nutmeg and vanilla. Dropped down into the pan, it fries, and the sweet smell of beauty floats up, slightly charred but full of life. It was easy to love you this way. I loved to do it.

I still love to cook and when for others, it finds it’s best hope. The food tastes so good, but I miss you. I miss the preparation, the conversation; between me, you and the ingredients. In greediness I lost myself, wanting too much flavor, wanting too much in one bite. I understand a wholesome meal with the full pyramid of health, on top with the veggies and fruits, and hidden are the sweets and breads. I am becoming whole in my vision, in my hopes, in the table of life that has been set before me. Sometimes the table is empty and sometimes it is is really cluttered. I keep cooking, putting food on the table, where it finds its best hope.

One day I know the food will taste different. I will set the table, and it will be less about manna I hoarded and more about the manna that falls fresh, every morning to satisfy me. Out the window I’ll look, and the morning cloud and evening fire will lead me on.