Nurture vs Destroy

This week I feel lost.

I had planned to start sharing the first chapter of my memoir but the events unfolding like a brutal nightmare in the heart of the Middle East have stopped me in my tracks.

I feel as though I am stuck on the edge of a precipice of tears as I watch and listen to the horrors being unleashed. That difference, of any kind, should still be utilised to destroy and torture another being, another nation, will never cease to fill me with pain that sticks like treacle and makes me wonder how do we manage to still get to this point.

I know there’s not much I can do, but like many of us I funnel my energy into what I can. I am full of words and images I can’t write nor draw; instead, this week, I baked. Florentines and their accidental landscapes of toasted chunks of almonds, caramelised fruity tarte tatin, Battenberg, and a decadent Banoffee pie. We shared them with a handful of our friends, here in our lush little village that, just within our street and over the last two years, has been hit with some of the worst life can unleash. And yet we are so protected. I drop in and out of survivor’s guilt, wondering how to make sense of the senseless.

I guess the act of feeding, of nurturing the only way I know works quite universally, might help bring a little momentary joy both around and within. And joy feeds more joy.

The irony is that I usually encourage healthy eating, but even I can see we need a little break from Buddha bowls and the rest.

Maybe it’s the only fragment of joy I can share at the moment, and creating instead of the overarching destruction we see in so many corners of the world is even more crucial right now. It sounds so trivial, it won’t change a thing, I just don’t know what else to do.

Battenberg with freeze-dried raspberries.

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