the regret of leaving, the grief of staying.
wanting credit for shit we don’t do, sadness around what could’ve been, and the frustration of being misunderstood.
“Will it make me something? Will I be something? Am I something?
…And the answer comes: you already are, you always were, you still have time to be.”
—Anis Mojgani
CW: this post briefly references some incidences of obstetric violence.
I am a culinary school drop-out.
I went to the Culinary Institute of America when I was 18. I knew for awhile that this was what I wanted to do, but I dropped out after one month.
I reasoned, when I dropped out, that I was doing it because culinary school is scoffed at as haughty and indulgent by many well-respected chefs; that it’s insanely expensive, that it’s all just ego-stroking, that I don’t need a lofty degree to learn to cook, that having real-life kitchen experience usually means a lot more to the big leaguers than having a piece of paper from some curated institution.
All of that is true— but it’s not really why I left.