Have you ever had veggie bacon? Truth be told, vegetables and bacon really don’t belong together in the same sentence and it ain’t cheap. Just saying. It is lower fat though and well, it isn’t meat. We have recently discovered the joys of low fat eating. We went from using a stick of butter every three days or so to every three weeks or so. We cut all kinds of high fats foods from our diet. It wasn’t that hard. However, cutting out full Sunday breakfast with bacon, eggs, fried potatoes and toast slathered in butter, did not go down without a fight. We’ve been hunting for new breakfast friends ever since. That’s why this past weekend we tried veggie bacon.
Within a minute of heating, a bacon-like aroma filled the kitchen. I say ‘bacon-like’ because imagination was needed to turn a kind of vitamin-ish smell into hickory smoke. I have an active imagination so I went with it. The strips didn’t crinkle, but they did crackle, like dried cardboard. My husband took one look and wouldn’t even take a bite. I’m stubborn and was not going to give up on the idea so easy. I crumbled some in my turmeric yellow scrambled egg whites and declared it bacon flavored.
That was as close to success as veggie bacon came.
Pulling this experience apart it occurred to me, I could feel cheated or foolish for trying. I could bemoan the loss of the Sunday breakfast extravaganza I dreamt about or I could congratulate myself for delving into an unknown territory and count myself among those brave souls that eat veggie bacon. It’s the difference of wallowing in short term disappointment or packing the experience up as a long term tool.
It’s the same with writing projects. They usually start with a burst of creative joy, all kinds of excitement at bringing new characters to life. Thoughts like, ‘this is the big one’ or ‘my writing is super hot this time’ and the confident assertion ‘I’ve got this’ roll through the mind like the beat of a victory march. But the story hits a snag. A read to someone yields a confused look and tentative smile. Your own perusal causes you to curse about how terrible it sounds. It is veggie bacon, no worse it’s burnt veggie bacon.( I might know a little bit about this too).
So what to do? Ask yourself if you are in it for the short term satisfaction or are you ready for the long road that will require the carrying of tools crafted by disappointment. Totally up to you. As for me, I’m going to try the veggie breakfast sausage. I have high hopes.