Love Letter

when i was offered the job as Kitchen Mother/Manager at the Institute, i was deeply scared. i am STILL scared. imagine if you were an alchoholic and you were offered a prestigious job with a liquor company. the job comes with all sorts of benefits and you the skillset is what you want to learn and you and everyone else agrees that you would be perfect for the job. oh, you also have all the free booze you want. yay or nay?

taking the job here was like stepping into the most tender hotspot of my relationship with food. i enjoy eating but i cannot say that i love food. i know all sorts of things about food culture and i cannot say that i am a foodie. i cook beautiful meals for people everyday but i cannot say i am a chef. however, food as a symbol holds great power over me, and it is all that it symbolizes that i am most in love with.

Most of all, food means comfort. it means nourishment and coziness and warmth. it also does all sorts of amazing things: it calms, soothes, excites and protects. wow. that is a pretty spectacular list of attributes. I don't even do all those things!

sometime, i would like to write a love letter to food. that would mean a lot....i'm not there yet. even though food does all those fancy things i really don't like it. i feel the word "hate" rolling around on my tounge. i don't think this word is quite right...maybe disdain works better. i wish for things like anorexia, so at least i wouldn't be in such close contact with food-at least then i wouldn't be eating.

i'm confused. do i hate the food or do i hate the eating?

right now my letter to food is this:

Dear Food,

this is Eating, writing you. we spend A LOT of time together, but i know I've haven't been very nice to you. I've blamed, used, resisted, and controlled you - and you've always been there for me, taking care of me, helping me get through the day. thank you for that. it would be really great though if I could stop using you as a way to deal with my emotions. it would be so nice if I didn't work you overtime, by making you my favorite coping strategy. i think about you all the time. but you can see that i've idealized you. i've put you on a pedastal and made you more than you actually are. i have cried and cried over you, making myself miserable over your every morsel and taste. there are times when i have thought that it was different, that i've gotten over you and made peace with you-but i've only buried the issues deeper and deeper. so. i'm writing you a letter, because food: i would like to try to really change things this time. i am wanting SO BAD for things to be different between us and i am hoping that my pure desperation will facillitate change.
i would like to see you differently. i would like to just see you as food and nothing else-no solution no answer no prize and no defeat. you will just be what you've been since the beginning of time. you will soothe my physical hunger not my emotional hunger. you will nourish me and give me just the right amount of energy to help me on my life path. you will be carbohydrates, proteins, fats and minerals. that is all.

Love,
Your Friend,
Eating