Life is like a box of chocolates....or in this case chocolate covered strawberries. Yesterday while making a couple dozen of so of chocolate covered strawberries, I realized this really does parallel my life and life in general. I thought I had all the ingredients, and just as I was about to embark on melting the chocolate, I realized I didn't have one key ingredient. So off to the store I went. Flash forward 15 minutes later and I was melting chocolate. It takes 15 second intervals to melt the chocolate and the crisco butter together. The timing has to be slow or else you risk scorching the chocolate...and as much as I love chocolate, I don't know anyone who enjoys the taste of it burnt. The comes the time consuming task of dipping each strawberry, covering all sides and gingerly laying it onto the wax paper covered cookie sheet to cool. This time I opted to try something new, adding sprinkles, which was a learning experience of it's own. The timing of the sprinkles, do I try it when the chocolate is warm, or slightly cool? Then, I tried melting vanilla morsels and realized that it seemed to harden faster than its chocolate counterparts. Next, I attempted to drizzle a unique design of vanilla swirls over the chocolates....and had to figure out how to keep the white chocolate from hardening once inside the condiment container. It was a process, a sweet one indeed. There were messes, and mishaps (strawberry caps cannot often endure the weight of dipping into chocolate if you are twisting them side to side). In the end, I ended up with two very beautiful trays of chocolate covered strawberries that looked every bit as good as they tasted. Then there was the mess, chocolate once it has hardened is not as welcomed as the sight of the wonderful "yumminess" it produces. For two cookie sheets covered with a wonderful spread of goodies, I had a countertop covered with a mess to show for it. Then there is the product itself...delectable strawberries encased in mouth watering semi sweet confection that melts if left out for too long, it needs just the right temperature to harden and will soften if left out too long. One cannot resist from just biting down in one mouthful and enjoying it because it looks so good. But then you realize that if you just take a bite and enjoy and savor every bit of the flavor the second bite is even better than the first. They are so good you want to eat an entire plate, but know that if you did you'd live to regret it. But you also learn that even as good as these treats are, they will not last forever, and after two days the chocolate looses its battle with the strawberry and the strawberry's juice will try to escape. So, life is a lot like a box of chocolates...just as Forrest Gump's mamma told him...."you never know what you are going to get". And after yesterday, it really stuck with me, that life is really like like the chocolate covered strawberries I made yesterday. You know what you want out of life, but even the best laid plans come up short (or short of ingredients). So you try something new, or for the first time....you have trials that pop up, you find ways to adapt and survive. There are messes to be cleaned up, things that go wrong, unexpected delights when things work out. There are wonderful new discoveries and questions as to why somethings worked and other things did not. There is attention to detail, making sure you do as much as you can so that things aren't neglected, handling things with care because you realize how fragile each moment is. There is an issue of timing, planning and coordinating, rearranging and calculating. There will be thoughts of how can I do this better or what can I do different, how can I improve this when I try the next time. In the end you create something beautiful, but no one really knows all the work and all that went on in making it, they just see and experience the beautiful result. You realize that even when things look so good on the outside that too much of a good thing all at one time can be overwhelming. You begin to take your time and enjoying it bit by bit (or in this case bite by bite) for you know that at any point it will be gone, sooner than we'd like. You realize that the joy through all of this and more is when others experience and share in what you are making....the life you are living. It is sweet, it is messy, is a trial and error, sometimes "do over"-best laid plans-missing a few ingredients...but it is your life to enjoy one delicious bite at a time...and to every season there is a purpose, for me it's time to Simplify, Focus and en"Joy"....or better known as Breathe, Seek, and Play!
No comments:
Post a Comment