When life gets busy, just cook a salmon.

Busyness is the theme of the summer. At least my summer... what with yoga classes, work projects, events, gardening, farmer's markets, networking, and sleep, even the longer days fill up fast. Out of a bit of laziness, and sure exhaustion, I slept on my couch two nights in a row this week because my clean sheets were piled on top of my bed rather than on it, and I just couldn't muster the drive to make the bed at 11PM.

As I enter into this busy season, I've noticed that I've been eating a lot more food of convenience, rather than food of sustenance. Which is pretty much a tragedy considering that this is the season of farmers markets, fresh greens, strawberries etc. My garden is getting bigger by the day... And yet looking at my food spending there are way too many receipts for burritos (even for me). I feel as though I am stuck in this cycle.... the 12 hour work days certainly don't inspire much creativity in the kitchen, and yet its the leftovers from the moments I do have to cook that sustain me through the long work days. The last thing I want to do when I get home from a long day is cook, but then again, maybe that is exactly what I should be doing! When I get stressed, I tend to internalize it... which leads to awesome bouts of eczema and chronic tonsillitis. But is it really any wonder? I start sleeping less, eating less healthy, and I don't allow my mind and body to get the rest and nourishment they need. I usually wait till I'm at the brink of disaster, and then start popping vitamins and tea like there is no tomorrow.... healthy right? Maybe one of these days I will become a mature adult and realize that if I actually sleep regularly, and eat healthily, and take my vitamins all the time and not just when I'm about to drop off the edge of the earth, I'd be a little happier.... as with everything in life, there are excuses.... I'm a night owl, I'm busy, I hardly ever eat breakfast at home, so I forget to take my vitamins....

Over the weekend I was helping a friend pack, clean and move. She just graduated from Vet school, and had essentially 24 hours to pack up her house of 3 years... it was an epic evening of loud music, cleaning supplies, alcohol.... all the basics. Even though we weren't particularly hungry, as we began to clean out the fridge her roommate pulled out half of a salmon that had been defrosted and was just waiting to be cooked. We contemplated for a few moments, looked at the kitchen (half packed, half trashed) threw the salmon on a cookie sheet, added a bit of soy sauce, and went about our frantic cleaning and packing. 20 minutes later, the smell of baking salmon filled the house, and suddenly we realized that cooking half a fish was the best thing we could have done. We picked at the flakey pink fish with our fingers as we packed away books & glassware.  We completely annihilated the salmon, and it gave us just the strength and motivation we needed to keep on packing.

It makes sense, that in times when we are at our most stressed, we should be feeding ourselves well balanced nutritious meals... and yet it seems like so much work when a drive-through is just a quite trip away... but I'm rallying this week, trying to change my habits, and get into the routine of simple healthy meals to get me through my stressful weeks.... and really who says that taking a break and getting a little creative in the kitchen isn't just what I need? My brain is on over-drive so much of the time, I'm constantly thinking about the next deadline, the next project, the next event... that I'm sure my brain would appreciate a little creative wind down in the kitchen. So even though I might feel frantic, I'm going to attempt to spend more time in the kitchen, and less time eating fast food. Let's be honest, I will never give up going to Martha's Tacos.... but I do think its high time that I spend a little quality time unwinding in my kitchen.... and maybe, just maybe I'll actually start using my days of the week pill case for that multivitamin....