Food

Kitchen Work

Short Feature

**“Is it ready yet, is it ready now?”**
**[Source – Pixabay]**

Like a quick meal that you make yourself, yes, yourself, standing in the kitchen, looking for items, finding none, finding some, maybe it is not something you regularly do or maybe you do it regularly but always in a rush, you add a pinch of salt after applying butter or vice-versa, the heat is too much or too low, you fix it, but after slightly burning your fingertips, and when this meal makes you wait, oh, for howsoever quick it is, it still needs time, you think of brewing a hot cup of tea or coffee, hustle and bustle, tin-tin-tinaa-tuk-tun-tunaa, and the quick meal along with a hot beverage when tasted and sipped, you feel full and good, it is a buttery sweet moment.

You suddenly also start to feel confident about life in general.

Oh, but when you return to the kitchen after finishing the meal, the anxious shelf, the sticky stubborn utensils and crumbles all over the place stare at you in cold anticipation – now or later, late evening or tomorrow morning, my turn or roommate’s turn, or, or, or the maid’s?

You suddenly feel late, like it is only the washing dishes and cleaning shelf bit that stands between you and the attainment of your dream.

**I guess, the dish is ready, dear Rabbit.** **Bon appétit!**
**No, I won’t join, I am fasting today. Goodbye!**
**[Source – Pixabay]**

If you very often do the cleaning part too, not just as a chore, your cooking abilities will bloom, like a wild vine that climbs and trails wondrously without worry, much more than it does when you stick to a rough routine like a straight, pruned plant in a plastic pot.

While a plant even in a plastic pot is rich, full of warmth and it rules, we tend to limit ourselves to a routine too easily, especially if it is comfortably dull.

Kitchen work is all about exuberance, love, patience and meditation that serves best when mixed with prudence.

Cooking and cleaning is a complex task; your kitchen is no less than a PhD student’s lab, yet truly welcoming, forgiving and accepting.

Anyone’s progress happens only gradually and is incomplete without the cleaning part.

Steadily, if you keep going, you’ll learn when to add a pinch of salt, before or after applying the butter, without burning your fingertips.

And you’ll get used to the tricky teasing waiting part, you’ll know it adds great value, and you’ll see, when it’s time, how grandly patience prepares a rich dish.

Weekly Newsletter

Recent Posts

CHARLIE

Posted on May 25, 2013 by Jagriti Rumi Charlie Food Happiness Shoes

Charlie was a happy kid but his shoes were sad. The shoes weren’t wrong to feel so you know, because they were badly torn. White was their initial colour but now they looked dull brown and dirty green. Charlie loved the shoes; he loved everything, especially food. Most of the time, i.e. 93% to be precise, he had food thoughts like about a cupcake or a milkshake, a chocolate or a marmalade, or a lime pie perhaps. The other 7% he gave to the rest of the world that talked to him. Hence, Charlie lived in his tasty world and enjoyed it immensely.

That day while he was going to the school it started to rain. Charlie didn’t miss a single puddle on the way, making his trousers and shoes wet. The trousers were fine but the shoes weren’t. The water entered the shoes and soaked both Charlie’s socks and his feet. The shoes thought them to be a failure; after all they couldn’t protect the feet from getting wet. But Charlie didn’t know about remorse, rather he was relishing the sound that was coming from the wet shoes – ‘Puchuk Puchuk’.

Charlie had brought bread and jam that day for the lunch break and his mind was stuck with the wonderful image of the bread and jam (complementing each other so well). He had no intention to attend any class before the lunch break. Luckily his wish was almost granted. First of all he was punished in the assembly for wearing dirty shoes, which meant at least a ten minute late entry in the class. This was huge for Charlie. Nothing much happened in the first four periods that allowed Charlie to be out of the class, except twice for the toilet break. But his wet shoes took all his concentration from whatever the teachers were teaching and he never realised how the time passed.

Sometimes he was busy in making sounds ‘Puchuk Puchuk’ and make his bench mate laugh along or else he got himself involved in opening the shoes and removing the socks, then laughing at his pink wrinkled feet; then again wasting time in wearing them back. Oh! Time rushed quickly for Charlie, this is not a tough task for Time. It rushes…as if it’ll miss a train.

Back to Charlie, who is now eating his lunch. His eyes close every time he takes a bite. A delightful moment for Charlie, a fulfilment, a never forgetting instant. And the shoes are also not sad anymore. They are dried up and ready for a walk or even a run.

Charlie you radiate happiness. And I love you.

Greetings!

A storyteller, following the ancient tradition of cave chroniclers, standing in vrikshasana (the tree pose) on a hill top (it is sunny, but windy), breathing in and out stories (relishing it all, but at times overwhelmed), declares animatedly that she will continue to – tell stories, share rare story gems, and connect with the pacy universe while also keeping the website ad-free.

Big thanks to my readers. Stay tuned!

Also, a humble request to the new subscribers to check the spam folder after subscribing. Silly (but necessary) confirmation emails often land there instead of the bright inboxes. Merci!

Ya-hoy!

Chiming Stories (formerly Home Chimes)

P.S – Supporting a storyteller is good for the world’s health (and undoubtedly, for the storyteller’s health as well). Shower some love via Patreon.