Home is where my kitchen is

When I began this blog I was waiting for a batch of cookies to come out of the oven and looking out the window of my beautiful kitchen overlooking Central Park.

That lovely place was sold and the odyssey of my homelessness began.

Let me be clear. I am far from out on the street. I want for just about nothing. But I've been bouncing from apartment to apartment - all quite temporary places - looking for a home to share with my cookie monster. And while he's been trying to find the perfect house, I've been trying to find my place to live within it.

Home is where my kitchen is. It is where years of accumulated knives and bowls and boards and cookbooks, recipe scraps, wooden spoons and spices, all sorted and stored, whisper to me when I walk in the door.

My kitchen has always been a place of creative expression. It satisfies my longing to nurture others and to be nutured. With busy hands and a free mind, it is my place of meditation. I solve all kinds of problems in my kitchen - from getting shortbread cookies just crumbly enough to nailing a brand positioning problem, to quieting a troubled heart (usually my own).

Not having my kitchen leaves me frustrated and sad and confused and far too ready to reach to ordinary restaurants and prepared foods that leave me unsatisfied and unfulfilled. Food sinks to the lowest common denominator space in my life - a utility.

My precious bits and bobs have been in storage for the better part of the three years since selling the Central Park place. And my cooking and baking have been sporadic at best. My hand and my palette are yearning and shaky like an unused muscle. I miss my kitchen like I'd miss a dear friend whom I hadn't seen for a while.

Time to find my kitchen again - long overdue really.

(Image: flickr~cottonblue)