Something I learned about myself

I suppose no matter how old you are you can still learn things about yourself that you didn’t already know. That happened to me this weekend when I discovered, quite by accident, that there are websites that specialize in selling vintage cookbooks.

I was thrilled! . . . kind of like being in cookbook heaven, since you all know by now that I have an extensive collection of cookbooks, some dating back 40 years. And the prices were low – most under $7.00. Yet I quickly became bored going through these sites. Yes, there were one or two, out of hundreds, that I could have been moved to buy, but didn’t.

Not understanding my feelings, I stared out the window, gazing at the large lilac bush in the front yard covered with blooms.

Then it struck me! Yes, I love collecting cookbooks. But what tugs at my heart when thinking about my collection are the memories of using these cookbooks over the years and how I came to acquire each one. . . the compliments I’ve gotten from family and dinner guests when serving something from one of my cookbooks. One of my recent cookbook posts here took me back more than 20 years to an evening with dinner guests and the fun times we had that night. I have an old bread baking cookbook – haven’t featured it yet on my blog! – I learned to make bread from its pages and have used it so many times over the years. With that cookbook, I went from a big failure with my first loaf of bread to becoming an accomplished bread baker.

I don’t know what my family will do with my collection when I die. I hope those cherished volumes of recipes will go to someone who will get as much joy and satisfaction out of them as I have gotten.