Nourish Me: more open of heart

Occasionally it feels as though rural life is a little beyond me. A calf was lowing for her herd, wandering aimlessly up and down the hill late last week as I huffed and puffed my way back home in the early morning mist. Poor girl, she'd been left alone like that for two days. I've been hearing gunshots in the forest of late when I'm out walking, the kangaroo-culling variety cracking the morning stillness, stopping me in my tracks. Their soft bodies are thrown on bonfire piles waiting for the burning off season to get into full swing. Brutal, but there you have it. Life on the land.

This limited country knowledge means I don't know which farm to ask about her welfare - those guns say fuq off in a very particular way. Thankfully I saw her in a paddock with her family this morning, a fact that made me happier than I'd imagined. She ignored me of course, which in a way makes her adventure seem less traumatic to me.

I've been thinking a lot lately about family, about finding your herd, your tribe, and feeling loved. Edward rang to say Happy Mother's Day yesterday, a loving kindness that assuaged some of the feelings that have been welling in me for about a year or so, big questions about why I seek the affection of disinterested peeps. How lovely it was (is!) is to be valued for the step- role I've played for 18 years. I've had a couple of run-ins with Qi Vampires of late, encounters that keep me awake at night. Lots of time to think, naturally, staring at the ceiling at midnight and I've just realised that the older I get the more empathetic I'm becoming, softer at the edges, more open of heart. Not such a bad place to be, but I need to protect those treasures.

I wish I had a recipe to share, but I just make the same things on rotation; baked beans, kale and pea burgers from a Donna Hay magazine, minestrone, tray after tray of roasted vegetables. I'm hoping my cooking mojo returns with the cooler weather that is, at long last, upon us. What have you been cooking, tribe?