Surrender to the Meat Party: A Cooking Anxiety Dream

Had my first dinner party anxiety dream last night. Compelled to share it. Reveals my cooking control freak perfectly.

I had invited a group of people over to my house for dinner, but had been somewhat lame in making sure to invite everyone and not committed enough to really make sure they were coming.

Instead of preparing for the dinner party, I spent the day snorkeling with Allison and giant earthworms underwater. (This was a whole separate bizarre chapter of the dream).

When it struck 6:00pm, the time when people were supposed to be arriving, I had not yet started to cook anything. Of course, I had bought ingredients to that would require at least 5 hours to prepare and I was debating what to do, I resolved that we would all just get burritos at Jim n' Robs.

When I came downstairs, my little brother Geordie and friend John Fonteyn had cooked up all the food, but not in the way I would have. They had created a 1950's style meat fest. All the food looked like those funny colorized photos from the late 50s, early 60s cookbooks. So as I was scanning the crown roast with ham cold cuts tucked inside, the dried up pork chops slathered in ground beef and onions, the roasted chickens all torn up in caveman portions, and the maraschino cherry pot roast, I was in suspension between feeling grateful and frustrated. Dinner had been made unasked and lovingly, but it was not the way I wanted it. People were already arrived and more were coming, and I was going to be judged on the food.

The tension was unbelievable. And as I watched John from Krotona, a strict vegetarian, scan the offerings and not find anything, my sense of failure was immense. I woke up feeling helpless and ungrateful.

The advice I am gleaning this morning:
1. When you put something in motion, it will happen and you better show up for it.
2. If you are going to insist on doing it all yourself, then really do it.
3. But instead, why don't you notice the support that is there for you and work with it.
4. Your ideas about the way things should be will keep you from growing.
5. Soften your food snobbery.
6. And say thank you.