Sometimes the JOURNEY is the DESTINATION

Sometimes we get confused! We think that the destination is at the end of the journey. It has been my experience that the journey itself is the destination. 46 years ago, I fell in love with the kitchen. As a gregarious 12 year old, I was learning to cook. I thought that this would be my work forever. By the time I was 18 I had plans to travel to Europe. I wanted to train as a French chef. Of course, finances prevented my travel, and I hung up my apron for a while. But cooking was to become what the French call "from the heart." I was an amature. I would, over the years, collect recipes and techniques for a wide variety of international foods, becoming adept at Greek, Japanese, Chinese, and First Nations cooking. But, I was never to arrive; that is until today. Beginning Monday, August 26, 2007, I will enter the kitchen as a professional. Starting from the bottom, I will first wash the dishes that others dirty, then I will prep the food for others cooking, finally I will graduate to the status of a line cook, doing all the final prepartations.

The journey has had many twists and turns; and this cannot be the end; but it is a mile post in my culunary life. It is not the destination at the end of the trail that holds my attention, but the trail itself. who would have thought that 46 years ago, my dream of culunary expertise would come in bits and pieces. I don't really know where it will end; it is simply too much fun "on the way."