I Should Love Myself More

WOMANIST

I should love myself more. This may be entirely too deep for the intro, but it's my truth. I can not deny my truth, because it's my subjective truth which I'm attempting to change into an objective reality. As a kid, I struggled with weight, I was "normal" sized in elementary school, but by the time middle school hit I became disproportionate, oddly tall, chubby cheeks, thick legs, and budding breasts. By the beginning of high school, I began to see what I should look like, comparing myself to other females and noting what I lacked. I remember going shopping with my mom one day when velour track suits were hot and trying to find one. Every single one I tried on made me look even bigger, I cried. 10th grade, I stopped eating lunch at school, I would bring a small pack of crackers, fruit snacks, and a bottled water. That would be all I ate for the day, then go to track practice. I remember giving up a lot of food at that time, it's when I stopped eating beef and drinking soda. I remember dropping weight so drastically my dad one day weighed me and said that if I didn't get to a certain number "I don't care if you have to eat Twinkies, you're going to gain weight". 

Today, my self image is something I continue to struggle with. I've stared myself down in a mirror picking out every error in my body. I've wondered why I didn't look more racially ambiguous, with lighter eyes, and a pointier nose, wished I was half Korean, and so on and so forth.

 

This continues to be a struggle, so much so that I began writing this post a few months ago, but wasn't sure if I wanted to spill my guts. I decided to write it because at my first Secret Dinner event, Whit and I sat next to a group of guys and I was asked when I began to love food so much. I didn't know how to answer without getting too deep and I told them that. They still wanted to know. I quickly shared "I was young and chubby when I was little, I had a complex. So now when I eat, I enjoy my food because there once was a time when I didn't". I continue to struggle with this idea that I should "lose a few pounds" and "I've been working out for 10 years, it's a shame I don't have defined abs yet," but I've become okay with the fact that I enjoy food more than I would enjoy abs. I continue to have this evil thought of "I know I shouldn't be eating these french fries, I'm going to be fat" and it's absolutely ridiculous, but that voice has always been in my head. Believe me, I don't need anyone saying "you're just fine, you don't need to lose any weight" because it's absolutely annoying and deep down inside I know that. But it's like telling an overweight person they need to lose weight for health reasons, they know, so just leave them be. You know?

 

 

DOMESTICATED

I've been thinking lately about some of the irrational thoughts I have, besides the aforementioned, I cook on the weekends for the work week so I don't have to cook Monday-Friday. What's been happening recently is I'll get off work Friday, work out (maybe), wash my hair, then go to the grocery store late that night. I like going late because no one is in there and I can have peace and quiet. There have been times when I'll feel myself becoming a little anxious because I haven't had time to grocery shop and I panic over what I'm going to eat for that upcoming week. It's a combo of "I need to know what good food I'm going to eat" and also "How am I going to eat healthy if I haven't had time to cook my meals".
So anyways, now to the fun stuff: Friday night I had a Secret Dinner event, Saturday evening Justyn and I went to Drink the District, then Sunday we binge watched Orange is the New Black and completed the season. Let's begin with the dinner event. It was held at the Maurice Electric Supply Company at 500 New York Ave NE. I believe I've mentioned this before, but the dinners are never in a restaurant, always some funky place like last time's art gallery. I was a little upset when I got there because the menu was different than what I initially paid for. Seeing as how the dinner was $75, I want exactly what I paid for, with no substitutions unless it's for seafood or some rare exotic meat like ostrich.

 

 

First Course: Green apple & Scallop crudo. I wasn't a fan. It had no texture except for something that tasted like raddish which I wasn't feeling. The scallops were cut so thin it melted in my mouth, which I wasn't happy about. Only thing I like to melt is a warm Krispy Kreme doughnut when I eat it.

Each course was paired with a beer. I don't like beer AT ALL, but I made a point to at least taste each of them to see if there was any change. There wasn't.

Second Course: Smoked watermelon soup. This is the pork belly for the soup. The soup is below. They put it in cute little mason jars, then we poured it over the pork belly. I'm telling you, you wouldn't even guess it was watermelon, the smokiness took over. It was very flavorful and the pork belly was cooked perfectly. If you've never had pork belly, you can order it at any Korean BBQ place.

Watermelon soup for course 2.

Third Course: Seared Asparagus. This was tasty as well. I was upset because we were supposed to have duck breasts for one of the courses. They changed the menu when they added a chef apparently. I wasn't pleased.

This lamb was heavenly. It's on the menu below which was supposed to be the original menu. My only complaint was, there was a bit of fat on the meat that I believe could have been cut off although if cut prior to cooking, it would have made the meat dry. There were brussel sprouts under the lamb that were good too.

Original menu. The lamb portion is what I had.

Fifth course: Tres leches. This was my first time having this traditinally Latino dessert. The cake was extremely moist and I just can't complain about a dessert with fruit in it, especially since I'm not a chocolate kind of girl.

Another angle of the tres leches.

One of the chefs and myself.

Some of the beer. I actually passed all my beer over to Whitney since I didn't like it.


After dinner, Whit and I walked out, heard some artist (I believe Freddie or something) Whit was familiar with and walked into a Gay pride event. It resembled a rave that you'd see on TV. There were lots of costumes, men walking around in undies, booties out, just everything. LOL! Everyone was drunk,  but it looked like a good time. We only stayed for about 30 minutes. I love things like that and I love the randomness to the end of our night, especially since we got in free.

 

Saturday, Justyn and I went to Drink the District. It was similar to Taste of DC (slightly), but Taste of DC was better because it was a larger venue, Drink the District was only about 2 blocks and the wine was under tents, but it wasn't categorized like Taste of DC. At Taste of DC, the wine was organized from dry to sweet to dessert. Instead at Drink the District, you just had to go to the tent and taste it to see what you were getting. Lucky for me, I know which wines I dislike and like, so I could turn down the ones I knew I wasn't a fan of.

 

One of my favorite's from Drink the District. They had a really tasty peach flvaor as well. It reminded me of Welch's but do you see that it's 12%?!?! My word! I've never had a wine that I liked (that was sweet) with that high of a percentage. I'll be ordering some from their site.

These perverse signs were at every table. LOL!

One of the food trucks Rio Churrasco. They made the fish tacos below.

The chipotle sauce on these fish tacos were so good. I mean like so good I'm going on the truck's website and contacting them about what brand it was so I can order some.

This burrito was from the Rito Loco food truck. It was the Mojito Rito burrito with pulled chicken, cheeses, and citrus flavor. No rice, bens, or lettuce like Chipotle. The salsa verde was good, but the red salsa was better, they ran out unfortunately, so I was unable to indulge in that one.

On the train headed home from the festivities. He's clearly my Ride or Die. He typically (95% of the time) answers yes when I say I wanna get into some food activity especially when there's drinks involved. LOL!