After my wanderings of the last couple of years through the world of Permaculture and all things sustainable, a reconnection and immersion in organic gardening and growing food, watching and working with the local food movement in a couple of different places, working as a cook at a green grocer and a university cafeteria, and cooking for all kinds of families and groups, I've decided to create something a bit different using the parts of those things I think work, and trying some new twists in the areas I feel don't serve us well.
While I don't know exactly how to best combine some of these things I love doing, or pick one and do something different with it that helps us get going in a new direction, that will come. I do have a very good sense of what we need though. We need to use the fact that we have to eat every day, as opportunities to improve our lives and our health. Food can be the glue that holds us together individually, and collectively if we just adopt a better approach to what we're doing.
There are some amazing people doing amazing work in our world right now in so many different areas of need. If you doubt that I direct you to Paul Hawken's book, "Blessed Unrest". We are reaching an unprecedented time it seems with how many people are getting involved and working to make change. I decided a few years ago I was going to be one of those people but wasn't sure of the best way to use my gifts and experiences to help. It became obvious pretty quickly that it was going to have something to do with food. Food has always been a pretty important part of my life, from spending summers on my uncle's farm when I was a kid to rediscovering the food my mom cooked in my youth when I watched her and learned much of what is the soul in my cooking now. Food is also where I find my bliss, which I've come to understand is something to pay attention to. My most connected moments usually come when I'm in a kitchen or garden.
It's taken a tremendous shift in thinking for me to get to where I'm at, and it's been a fantastic journey getting to now. I've learned new perspectives and developed new motivations for why I'm here and what I do. I've discovered along the way that many of the institutions I grew up thinking were working or just, really aren't. I've also come to know that the world I want to live in includes all of us. We're all needed and we're all important. I am also grateful to be alive in this time of tremendous change. I give many thanks that I'm still able to learn, and still have the fire to stay engaged.
Ove the years I've learned lots, some of it useful, much of it not. I have always been an entrepreneur at heart, and get a thrill out of creating something new. When I went to business school no one even had a concept of social justice or environmental accounting. These days I think of myself as a social entrepreneur for lack of a better term. Really what has changed for me is the motivation for what I do, seeing some things that could work better for us, and some vision of what can help. If whatever I create is to be important, it must serve, or be available to everyone. Especially when it comes to food, we all deserve the best there is. I think it's possible to do that.
I want to co-create a process that provides food for people in a conscious, nurturing way, and it will likely look a bit different than most traditional organizations, more like a co-op or collective. I know it's going to happen here in Portland, because I love this place and the awesome people in it. I've never lived anywhere that works for me like Portland does, and like many of you I have never been to a place where so many get it.
One thing I do have at this point is a name: Calliope's Table. The table really says it all for me. What we are ultimately trying to do every day is feed ourselves good food without too much wear and tear on us. But it's a battle, no? Even though we need to eat every day we often run out of time for the shopping and cooking it takes to eat the way we want to. Sadly feeding ourselves often has to take a backseat to other things.
The table is symbolic to me as something we don't sit around often enough anymore while we are eating. There have been times in my life when I ate while driving, and at my desk, and ALONE! That feels so wrong to me now. Every time I eat alone now it seems like a lost opportunity to share a meal with someone. When we're sitting around a table eating together with other people the food can become the glue that connects us.
Tables build communities too. The old adage about the family gathered around the kitchen table in times of crisis or celebration, or just sharing meals together was not because they didn't have other places to sit. It was where they shared themselves with each other.
So welcome to Calliope's Table. I'll try to keep you posted as things start to take shape.
Peace and Peas,
Calliope
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