Welcome to Day 23 on the journey through The Joy of Writing Journal. Here I share an excerpt from my journey and I hope you will share something about yours—an excerpt, an insight, a challenge, a joy…
Months after 5 days in the hospital and a couple emergency room visits on both ends, I journal about my return to eating a few animal products, after years of eating vegan.
My journaling begins with scrolling the WhatsGood app for organic veggies and mysteriously ending up ogling the prepared foods—salmon entrées, in particular. Here’s an excerpt from my journal.
I order the organic eggs from free roaming, happy (I assume) hens and the flash frozen wild caught Atlantic salmon.
I bake the salmon and devour it. It’s so fresh rich delicious that I immediately cook up the second half pound I planned to save for tomorrow.
When I can’t easily get fresh salmon, I buy canned.
All the while I worry about the possible mercury and PCBS and plastics I may be consuming along with these poor fish.
I try to curb my salmon habit. But when I go to an outdoor restaurant or order takeout with others, it’s hard to find simple foods that won’t aggravate my gut. But salmon, every waitress seems happy to have the cook throw it on the grill unembellished.
This has become the summer of salmon.
In tackling today’s prompt, I struggle with this craving for eggs and fish. I believe my body is telling me it needs such foods to rebuild, something an acupuncturist once told me after a back injury. And yet I have these ideas that such foods may not be healthy for me, and that such choices impact the planet.
My journaling doesn’t necessarily resolve the problem for me, but it does make me aware that these foods do bring pleasure as well as restoring my strength and health.
Sometimes journaling helps us to just be with what is true for us right now, with all its inherent contradictions.
Your Turn
Share an excerpt from your Day 23 exploration in The Joy of Writing Journal: Spark Your Creativity in 8 Minutes a Day. If you don’t have a copy, you can buy it here.
Here’s an easy share—list 3 foods you love in the comments.
Or share an excerpt from your journal exploration about one of those foods.
Looking for the journal prompts? You can get them here.
