Our Thanksgiving table, 2012
In high school, I dabbled in veganism. When people asked me why, I was often baffled; I couldn’t tell them that I thought veganism would be a good cover for my eating disorder. But it was. I said no, thank you to all the temptations that public high school had to offer: Krispy Kremes and candy bars on testing days, snacks smuggled into class, even the odd offered Altoid (gelatin). I carried raw oatmeal and cinnamon in snack baggies, eating it dry. I chewed 5-calorie gum for hours, my jaw aching. I grew smaller. I felt very alone.
When I began to inch toward recovery, I gave up veganism, and then vegetarianism, too. I ate with my family again, what they were eating, and we sat at the table talking long after the dishes were clear. Some friends and I had a habit of visiting new restaurants on a weekly basis, or we’d buy frozen pizzas and make cookies. I had missed the food itself, of course–being vegan is not for the unaccomplished cooks among us, which I certainly was at the time–but most of all, I had missed the companionship.
My best friend and her longtime boyfriend visited last weekend, and together, we ate. Joanna and I were once a sad pair, both of us starving, substituting books for sustenance. Now we are softer, happier. We ate tomato risotto, and salad, and bread. We ate pancakes and banana pudding, Indian food and mango lassis. Around the table, we smiled and committed what, at one point, would have been a radical act for the both of us: we ate until we became full.
I love to cook. I love transforming raw ingredients into something fragrant and delicious and often beautiful, if rustic. But what I cherish even more than the act of creating is the gathering which follows. The clinking of spoons, unfolding of napkins, warming of bellies.
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