back and forth.

I haven't been writing here, lately. It isn't that I haven't been eating out, which I have, or cooking, ditto, or thinking about food, which occupies most of my waking hours. There have been dinners with old friends and brunches with new ones. Over Chinese New Year my parents were in town, which meant endless meals with their friends. There were parties I spent talking so much my voice went hoarse and laughing so hard I could barely eat. Often there were smiling babies with their messy hair and fat starfish hands, and I found myself concentrating more on their giggles and sweet babble than what was on my plate. When I do write, my thoughts are turning more to literature, theatre, poetry; that other side of my life apart from food. These are the twin poles, food and literature, betwixt which the pendulum of my life swings back and forth.

The other night I was telling some friends that I don't really consider myself a "food blogger." There was a pause. "But you kind of are," D. said. I always forget that there are people in my life now who are aware of my blogs. When I started writing, five years ago, it was something of an open secret. I didn't mind if people read it - I still don't - but we never discussed it, and I liked it that way. The first few years, I wrote as though a fever was working its way through my body, every single day. I needed it, but I didn't need other people to read what I'd written. Even now, I'll rarely admit to even having a blog. ("Why don't you just leave it anonymous?" asked B. "Because I still have a little core of narcissism in me," I said).

I won't ever be the kind of food blogger who posts photographs and recipes, who attends blogger conferences and cares about things like SEOs (I'm still not clear what their purpose is) and maybe even aims for the ultimate goal: the book deal. That's not what I'm here for. I love food, and I think about it all the time. I love writing, but I love photography more, and I'm more comfortable about sharing it. I always have been more confident as a photographer than a writer. So I go back and forth. What I am doing here? I don't know. But I'll be back.