.png)
 |
| Benjamin Whitlock Class of 2015 |
Around the beginning of each year, most Americans make a New Years Resolution. January seems to be the perfect time to start a life-changing regiment, a life-changing habit, a life-changing diet...etc. etc.
Usually, I make life-changing decisions as needed. For example, I realized last April that I should read for myself. I should read something fun. So I went to my friendly neighborhood Barnes and Noble and came out with a stack of great reads!! And I read them!! I was thrilled at myself.... Repeat... Repeat... Then in August I realized that I needed
to manage my budget better, so I get books from the library now.... But this year, I took up the gauntlet of the New Year spirit and I ran with it.
I suppose it started in China. I was amazed at the range of flavors that I had never tried before. In China, I tried foods that I loved instantly- it was like a few flavors unlocked a euphoric part of myself. I now crave for those flavors... I dream and yearn for some of them... But alas! I cannot have them. (I'll save it for another blog)... I've been thinking though, are their flavors that are indigenous to my homeland - to Kentucky and the greater United States that I have not yet tapped into? Are there things that my grandparents ate; things that are yet lost to me?
My New Years Resolution is, like so many others, to eat healthy. But I have taken it to a new level. For this year, I will cook for myself. I will peruse ancient cookbooks in search of recipes, I will experiment with garden fresh produce, I will talk and ask questions of my elders, and I shall feast like a Nordic god in my stunningly small studio apartment Valhalla.
I like to think that I will be a healthier, happier, more euphoric self by eating food. But the beauty of my experience is that I can share the food with my own budding family one day... And with you. Because really, the great thing about food - as I've said before - is that it brings us all together.
As I prepare to leave the McConnell Center, my hope is that my class and I can, in some small way, be brought together from time to time... And that's really my resolution.
Benjamin Whitlock is a senior McConnell Scholar majoring in history and political science. He is from Campbellsville, Ky.