Cooking despite the blues
And a recipe for a good pot of beans n greens
It’s been a weird doom-n-gloom few weeks. I started a new antidepressant that made me feel absolutely insane for a few days, though thankfully I think that phase is over. The weather here in NYC has been SAD-inducing as fuck. And I got some bummer health news a couple of weeks ago that I’m not ready to share here yet but will when I’ve processed a bit more.
When I get in this mode, the last thing I feel like doing is cooking, presumably because I’ve subconsciously convinced myself the doom gremlin inside of me doesn’t deserve a nice little meal. So the fact that I’ve got a pot of beans on the stove right now is a big deal. To be clear: This is not a newsletter all about how cooking a beautiful pot of beans cured my depression because, nice as it is to imagine, cooking does not cure depression.
This is about cooking despite the blues (and not always succeeding, at that). I have been trying. Four days ago I set out a bowl of dried pinto beans to soak in a large bowl of water with the intention of turning them into a handful of nice, cozy brothy bowls and soups and whatnot. The bowl of beans is currently still sitting on the dining table, and mold has started to grow on top of the soaking water. Sometimes trying looks like throwing away a bowl of moldy dried beans.
