What's Aboard the Dream Boat?

I've been down so many roads and with each experience I figured I had found my "final calling" but little did I know that that was the wrong mindset to have. For me, there should be no "final" calling. Just the embarking on many adventures. I've drank the Kool-aid like everyone else, which compelled me to find some traditional means of feeling "purpose" in my life.

Purpose, to me, should be led by passion, but so many are afraid to follow wherever that leads them because there's no explicitly detailed map or guidebook on this type of journey. I certainly include myself in harboring such fear. The map and guidebook has to be created by the passion pursuer when the path is individual and personal.

I really don't know the details of what my future could be, but I know there are certain elements and experiences I definitely want in it and always have wanted. As I've often said, I want to write professionally and interactively (meaning including my illustration skills sometimes), in some sense. Blogs, columns, articles, books, essays, and so forth. When I mention doing writing, I mean in a way that truly excites and allows me to be very creative, expression, inspiring, and informative. I am hoping that this blog, which is centered on food, is a good start to reawakening that spirit in me and leading me down such a path.

Inside Info: I started off writing a lot in my other blog, The Asymptotic Faery. I'd like to return to it someday, but in due time. There's much time for a lot of things and I am trying not to make myself feel so rushed. There's no need to rush. It's all about play, exploration and passion (a word I just love to pieces and that you will see me use often).

So professional and creative writing are on my list. I also want LOTS of travel experience. It's always been a dream to travel and live in many different places or at least several. There's a whole world out there and I have yet to truly break myself in with proper travel. As I mentioned, one of many places I intuitionally feel I'd love to live in, is Paris. I'd love to study there too, by taking courses and classes in pastry-making and confections. I can see specializing in French and Japanese pastry-making over time. I am intrigued by many ethnic pastries but those cultural factions of pastry and dessert culture attract me the most. Those two cultures have many things in common but are starkly differently from one another. I'll elaborate on that in another entry and talk about how I plan to pursue my path in becoming a food expert in my own right. So, that's another goal. But to become an "expert" of any kind, I have a long road ahead of me. I need more experience, more travel, more knowledge...more experimenting. At this point, I'm a novice.

I think it would be fun to be a food critic in some food shows and events, too - to build a name for myself and to be able to feel like I've mastered in a few areas and can put those masterful skills to use. I consider myself a jack of many trades, for now. Many skills, many interests, but haven't quite mastered, especially to my standards. Food critics must be food experts, too. Who'd give any credibility to anyone without any established ethos or logos in their background?

Of course part of that established experience means I'd like to continue more with my exploration of cooking. I've given very strong consideration in attending culinary school for a pastry program that trains in both pastry-making arts and in food business management skills, in the near future. Hopefully, it is sometime this year...in Toronto. I better get moving on some paperwork I plan to do this in a timely manner.

In the meantime, I'd like to look around my city and see if I can get some work in local bakeries to gain some experience in commercial kitchens in a business-managed atmosphere. That should give me more insight into what kind of temperament I'd have with baking outside of a domestic context.