Food is love

I once wrote that Italians say I love you with food. If you've ever stayed with Italian friends or attended an Italian wedding, you've probably experienced this utter joy of eating food that delights the senses in the company of those you love. I'm not sure there's a better time a human can have on earth.

But it occurred to me this morning, fresh off of a trip to Europe for a wedding and visiting friends. Everyone says I love you with food. It doesn't matter if it's your cynical 50-something British friend you've served at a bar who has a pounding headache and makes you toast with cheese and tea, the mom from your kid's school who shares a soda and spam musubi with you at a busy San Francisco playground, or the harried parents of toddlers who share the basic veggies and pasta that they're picky children eat. Feeding another person is an expression of kindness and welcoming.

My return really emphasized this. I was so jet-lagged yesterday as I left the rural French domicile of a friend at 3:30 local time (6:30 pm back in Seattle) and arrived home at 12:45 pm the next day in Seattle (9:45 pm back in France). I spent the afternoon in the garden, focusing on tasks and relying on the sunshine to keep me awake until a decent hour to sleep. I couldn't quite wrap my brain around cooking, and kept putting off eating. Also when I'm tired my body forgets it is supposed to eat unless I have food put in front of me, something a neighbor very kindly did in the early evening after I popped into her apartment to say hello.

This morning, I woke up at the very early hour of 4:30. I wanted food, and to make something for my daughter for breakfast. Of course, when I think of love and food, the good Southern-raised woman that I am, I thought of buttermilk biscuits, a food my grandfather made for me as a child with love.

And so, on my first day home, I gave love to my own child with this food that I think for me was the first time I put together in my young mind that someone who loves you feeds you. Because love is an action, really, the emotional state of our minds aside. And giving nourishment to another really is the best way to love another person.

(Edit: I wrote this two days ago. I've had a lot of ruminations on food and community and it's importance. Maybe I'll write a whole set of things on this topic, because it's an interesting one that often feels forgotten and unexplored in a world really obsessed with technology, convenience, and one-up-manship).