Yes, I'm an outsider...

At almost every lark, I'm approached by a guest or passerby who asks, "Are you the chef?". I hate to disappoint, so I slow roll into explaining what I do..."no, I am the one who pulls lark together".

You see, I am an outsider. Although I am nostalgic for my youthful and crafty survival tactics playing low-paying-never-hungry-cash-on-hand role of hostess & cocktail waitress from my college days, I don’t have a solid restaurant or culinary background.

Oh, I still love the big energy of a bustling restaurant where you can either get lost (or be found) in it’s rhythmic scenarios––it can be a beautiful dance or you can just boogie down with your co-worker waiting in the wells, not a care in the world.

My job resume is comprised of a variety of fun jobs (Ski Lift Operator) interspersed with long stints in Corporate America (Sr. Sales Analyst). So how does one ended up producing pop-up communal dinner parties? I explain a bit in my previous post cutting a long story short by stating an “intersection” of reasons.

But none of those intersections involve running a restaurant, rather they mostly involve falling out of favor with the promises of working for companies big and small, fun or serious. It was pure luck steered by bit of ambition that lead to the collaborative experience, but all others? I think they were just selling a dream–or perhaps grifting from one–that we could have it all…and the benefits? Well, they would maybe come later, you know, in retirement.

It’s having so many experiences under my belt, it’s looking in the eyes of my co-workers, it’s watching and reading the news, it’s having a beautiful baby that you can only see outside of office hours, it’s wondering what do I really want my life to look like? What gifts can I offer? How can I tie these together?

So I did some serious pondering and arrived at the desire to have an interesting and charming life…now. In this moment. And I wasn’t ever sure it would come to reality, but here we are!

Of course, you don’t every actually arrive at a goal. It’s the process, the doing, the action where all the living takes place. Oh and the Chef? Yes, s/he is over there!

p.s. Here’s an old interview where I geek out with the inspirational go-getter Jennifer McCune on the how/why of lark: