Food Porn

Tonight I've got Food Porn to show and tomorrow I'll post some jewelry porn.

I've slipped so happily back into my wonderful life and even though I'm stumbling a little, trying to find my equilibrium, I'm lovin' it in a major, huge way.

I'm slowly shedding stress, which I find sort of interesting. One would think that I'd just shake it off and go on but it's easy to stay in stress mode where everything takes on more importance than is strictly necessary. It takes conscious acceptance of grace and thankfulness and peace and those are slippery little buggers, apt to crawl away when you're not looking.

"Stay please,"  I say, and wrap them like the softest of cashmere blankets around my shoulders. If I do it often enough my body relaxes and my brain follows, letting the warmth seep in deeply.

Occasionally I experience something so profound that it can take me days or weeks to process.

Last week I attended "Feasting at the Grinding Stone," a dinner prepared by Sean Sherman, The Sioux Chef from Minneapolis. He specializes in cooking pre-colonization foods of the Native American peoples, no flour, no chicken, beef, or pork and no dairy. It's hard to describe eating a meal composed of ingredients that grow all around us.

This was an incredible experience and not only for the food. Sean Sherman is a Native American and this meal was attended by many members of our local and more distant tribes including the Nisenan from this area. We were welcomed by these peoples in various ways, both in songs and stories. This meal became a blessing and a union, for a short time, of the old and the new. We talked about food and seed culture and the importance of remembering those local food gifts that we rarely think about.

We need this intimate joining with the earth and each other now more than ever. There are lessons to be learned, stories to hear, songs that root us to the dirt and green things that feed, shelter and nuture us.

Peace