My favorite meal

Towards the end of my road trip, I meandered through Hawke’s Bay towards Gisborne during high autumn, a cool breeze fluttering leaves down around my car as I drove without care or itinerary. I followed a sign promising waterfalls and several kilometers later found myself in a dirt carpark facing high limestone bluffs embedded in the rolling hillside. The surrounding meadows gleamed in the warm, long rayed autumn sun. The distinctive green and yellow Department of Conservation sign at the beginning of the track promised a three hour return walk to the falls so I started my lunch preparations before setting off.

While watching the giggling horde of energetic schoolchildren having a picnic with their parents at the rustic pavilion after their hike, I spooned a bit of yeast into a bowl and then added a dollop of the manuka honey I’d bought at a roadside stand in the South Island. I added water and stirred, leaving it to let the yeast activate. After a few minutes I returned and added enough flour to make a sticky dough. I covered it with a tea towel and left it in the front seat, cracking the windows of the car so that it would be just warm enough help the dough rise while I was away. 

The walk to Shine Falls was incredible. I was the only person on the trail as it wound through meadows, limestone bluffs, soft forest and all the way into dense forest that suddenly opened to reveal a huge, picturesque, multi-pronged waterfall. It had rained recently so there was plenty of water tumbling down, enough for me to spot a rainbow through the spray. The area is a birdlife sanctuary and you can tell—the soundtrack of the walk was bubbling stream and enchanting birdsong. Friendly piwakawakas flitted beside me, their fan tails flicking in and out as they swooped to eat the bugs disturbed by my passing. There are no natural predators in New Zealand so the native wildlife is often friendly and fearless like this. 

When I returned from my hike three hours later, the dough had risen from the gentle heat of the car. I brought out my gas camp stove and set it up on the ground beside the car, not bothering to lug all of my gear to the picnic tables. I sat crosslegged on the grass, pinching off balls of dough and shaping them into flat discs. I cooked the discs into a stack of flatbreads with the help of some olive oil. I pulled out some feta marinated in spiced oil that I’d bought from a health-food type shop I’d chanced upon the night before somewhere in rural Hawke’s Bay. I slathered the feta and some hummus all over my flatbreads. I ate slowly, savoring the luxuriousness of the experience—the complex flavors hidden within the simplicity of the meal, the care put into it, the marinated oil running down my chin, the warm sunshine tempered by a chill breeze, the aliveness of the meadows around me, and best of all—the fact that I was now the only person there to enjoy the birdsong and staggering limestone formations. 

For dessert, I cut a small watermelon in half and ate the entire thing, scooping out spoonful after spoonful of sweet ruby red flesh. It felt good to not have a care in the world and everything to enjoy. It felt right to nourish myself with good food and exercise and grateful thoughts. The sunlight felt like medicine and I sat there in the tall grass soaking it into every inch of exposed skin. There is nothing more luxurious in life than to be entirely present for these small moments of perfect bliss; than to enjoy them freely.

Good memories like these are vital to a healthy and self-determined life. They’re not just stand-alone enjoyable times or even marks of progress. They provide insulation against life’s negative experiences. They provide perspective: the knowledge of the other extreme of the spectrum of human experience. They gift the profound understanding that life swings around in turns, and that bad times never last. And not dependent on the presence of another person, the memories of my road trip are solely mine. They provide an unshakable foundation for an independent inner world, a certain sense of inner security. 

Attachment theorists talk about earned security: the idea that those who have developed an anxious or avoidant attachment style in childhood can overcome those experiences and learn to interact with others in a balanced and secure way later in life. When I was leaving my parent’s control and for the first few years afterwards, I was overwhelmed with anger that I had had to experience everything that I did. I was angry that other people had gotten to grow up enveloped in love and support, their safety never in question. They stumbled into their security in a lottery of genetics and culture but I earned mine with therapy and grief and maybe I appreciate it more, knowing too well what life is like without this foundation. I wouldn’t say that what I’ve been through is a good thing and I can see a thousand different ways I could’ve gotten lost in all of the traumatic events that have taken place in my life but I also think that maybe I wouldn’t have become the person I was meant to be without them. Through some delicate mixture of personal temperament, adversity, mitigating factors, luck and hard work I’ve come to be where I am now: sitting in sun-warmed grass in a foreign country, perfectly satiated from a delicious and nutritious meal. At peace.