No cooking for over two months, beginning in 11 days…

The sun reflecting on the sea created the white line of the horizon.

Something startling dawned on me yesterday as I responded to a sweet email message from my new friend Nancy, who left Placencia, Belize a week ago today. Gosh, I miss her. I wrote that when we’re leaving Belize on April 9th, we won’t be cooking another meal until after June 16 when we arrive in Tuscany, Italy.  We’ll be cruising most of the time.

It was around 7:30 am.

What an odd reality, especially for me, the proverbial foodie, ambitious cook, and hostess. It’s hard to wrap my brain around it. 

Cooking has always represented love to me; creating and preparing great recipes, considering the nuances of a loved one’s dietary needs and interests all the while presenting a mouth-watering array of selections at each meal.

We’ll miss this view that we awaken to each morning.

At the end of each day, I’ve padded around the kitchen, banging cabinet doors, leaving the refrigerator door open too long, dropping morsels of food on the floor, and more in my hair, enjoying every moment of the preparation of the next meal.

I’ve never tired of the grocery shopping, putting the groceries away, chopping and dicing, mixing and stirring, standing over the hot pan or oven to eventually plate the delectable meal, proudly handing it over to Tom to partake.

Yesterday afternoon, around 5:00 pm, there was another wedding here. We didn’t want to intrude, taking this photo from our veranda which was much further away than it appears.

He seldom comments about the food.  Our routine is that I ask if he liked his dinner when he puts down his fork. He looks at me and smiles, “It was OK.”

If the sound of the “OK” is uplifting and cheerful, he liked it.  If the sound of the “OK” is a monotone, not so much.  I won’t make that dish for him again. Ah, the language of love. He never needs to criticize. He knows it may hurt my feelings. That, he wouldn’t do.

Yesterday, we hitched a ride to Placencia village for our final grocery shopping trip, taking a cab back when we were done.  I’d made a list, as usual, on the grocery app on my smartphone, reviewing it frequently as we hustle through the store. 

This view as well…

With the Easter holiday upon us, the shelves were well stocked.  There wasn’t an item I couldn’t find including fresh ricotta cheese for a new low carb zucchini recipe I’m making for Easter. I’ll post the menu tomorrow, the recipe after we tried it, to ensure it’s worth posting. You never know. Tom won’t eat zucchini, but perhaps our Easter dinner company (there will be four of us) will like it. I’ll test it on our guests.

After spending our usual $160 at the grocery store, plus another $15 at the vegetable stand and $15 for the cab, we found ourselves well stocked. With plans to dine out twice with new friends, tomorrow night and again next Tuesday, we’ll be left with nine more dinners to prepare. 

Then, I don’t cook again until June 17th, the day after we arrive in Tuscany, Italy, shopping within the first 24 hours of arrival. 

With the upcoming 13 days living in Dubai beginning May 21st, we may not cook.  Instead, we may choose to dine out in order to experience the vast array of extraordinary international cuisine within walking distance from our vacation property. 

It won’t be worth the expense of purchasing spices and other cooking supplies while in Dubai, the only “short stay” of under two months in our upcoming travels. Himalayan Salt, pure, unprocessed, chemical-free salt from the foot of the Himalayan Mountains, is the only seasoning that we pack in our bags, the only salt we use when cooking.

Letting go.  Letting go of people.  Letting go of “things.”  Letting go of that which we know and love is a part of our journey. It’s not all “vacation-like.”  It’s not all romance, sunrises, sunsets and smiling photos.  We miss our children and grandchildren, more than they will ever know. Do we even have a right to say we miss them?  We’re the ones that left. 

All the quotes espousing “living the dream,” all the life-enhancing seminars attended in one’s career, all the wish-fulfillment sayings one ponders in their lives have come to fruition for both of us.  So, we won’t cook.