# If you could do anything...



## botanique (Mar 23, 2005)

We all come to a point in our lives (sometimes multiple times) when we have that epiphany in the shower and say "Good gravy, what am I doing?!" Grasping life is a risk, but what a magnificent ride....

So, what is it, no boundaries, no holding back, would you want to do, where would you want to be, and who would you want to share your experience with....

Me? Cook in the kitchen I was allowed to for a week in northern Italy again, publish my memoires, with best friend and husband at my side prepping for me  .... Oh, have to add gardenning in a bikinni, living on the ocean, and tasting wines around the world....

Cheers mates! Stevie


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## felixe the dog (Jul 16, 2006)

If I could do anything?
I would just like to stay at home for the day and hug my dog!


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## lady therese (Apr 28, 2007)

I really wish for a day with my family with nothing to worry about. Just fun and food in the beach... I am still in a girl boarding school right now so that moment is quite far from reality. I could do some good planning for that day. What food to prepare, which island, what to bring, etc...


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## jock (Dec 4, 2001)

Travel the world, photograph it and on my travels I'd like to study cooking with some of the great masters of the craft. I so want to be more than a good cook, I want to be great at it. 

Jock


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## blade55440 (Sep 9, 2005)

Barring the fact that I'm only 22 and barely have the life experience to stop and go "What in the heck am I doing?"...

I'd honestly prefer to do a huge cook's tour of the world. Just go around working here a little while to fund where I stay and enjoy the food/area...then move on to the next adventure.


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## abgstat (Apr 22, 2007)

Blade, do it! Don't wait till your older because more than likely, at that point in your life, you won't be able to.
If I could do anything it would be to get out of healthcare and into a job I love......food, travel, or animal care. Unfortunately, my daughter's in college right now and I'd never be able to make the money I am now by trading professions.


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## mezzaluna (Aug 29, 2000)

In the absence of reality to limit my flight of fancy, I'd do what Blade mentioned: take a cook's tour of the world. Unfortunately, my husband has little interest in an itinerary built on cooking, so I'd make sure his world tour has destinations that he's eager to see, things he's eager to do. 

How best to travel in this fantasy? By private yacht with a helicopter, launch and touring car on board. 

Dream big!


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## ishbel (Jan 5, 2007)

I'd like to keep visiting other lands, doing cookery courses in the cuisines which are of most interest to me. I've taken courses in Greece, Italy, France, the UK and Eire. 

My idea of bliss!


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## anneke (Jan 5, 2001)

Mezz, this is FANTASY. Come now....
Enter Sean Connery. Who LOVES a gastronomic itinerary. Imagine what luck!!


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## dc sunshine (Feb 26, 2007)

Oooh so many choices...providing money was no issue......lets go freelance photography, painting, running a small holding farm. And never having to answer a phone again!!!!


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## mezzaluna (Aug 29, 2000)

Anneke, how did you read my mind??? As a teenager I had posters of him and Michael Caine in my bedroom.


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## anneke (Jan 5, 2001)

Ha!!!!!!!!
I did my research.


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## deltadoc (Aug 15, 2004)

Me? I'd go to Cheyenne Mountain Underground Complex, go through the Stargate to the Pegasus Galaxy and visit Atlantis. They don't seem to have any great culinary adventures to speak of.

Maybe I could help out. And helping defend Atlantis from the many enemies would make life seem worthy, exciting and fun! Also, intergalactic food and wine tasting would literally be an "out of this world" experience for me!!!!

doc


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## beemerchef (Sep 17, 2006)

Great question that hits home!!! I am DOING my dream... living on the road... with my Dog Spirit... still cooking for a "Micro Cooking Camping Cookbook"... all within my means of course!!!

I hope that everyone gets there someday... life is too short of a one way trip not too...

Be well...

Ara & Spirit


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## botanique (Mar 23, 2005)

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: 

I love it. :bounce: 

Oh, and dd -- I'll help out with Atlantis -- as long as I can wear my Wonder Woman outfit and pilot that invisible plane of hers....


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

yep Sean Connery.....it's the twinkle in his eyes and that yummy accent.

I love this thread, it's just the perfect motivator to look forward.....
still thinking about an accurate response as functional literal creative doing good for the community are integral for my happiness. throw in a stove or at least some burners and I'm in hog heaven.


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## ninja_59 (May 2, 2004)

If it was possible, leave for 6 months, visit Cuba & all the carabbean islands & europe, try all kinds of foods

Dream on


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

Anything is possible my friends.
My neighbor was living hand to mouth and got a job babysitting twins 3 days a week in HI in exchange for an apt. stayed for 4 months.
She then designed and took a group of 6 over for a vision quest, paying her way......
She met a guy over there who came to visit here for 6 weeks then she cleared up shtuff and moved to HI to be with him. This from someone who had not lived anywhere in her 40 years but STL. 

Another friend that is an RD chef and she went to work on a Carribean Island to be able to take guests out on her boat.....it lasted less than a year but she did it.

I moved from Baton Rouge with three young sons, the last with autism. Divorced an angry atty. Lived in one of my brother's bedrooms for 5 months and then started a personal chef business. After not working for 15 years. Within 3 years I started Chef's Collaborative in STL , demoed at a national mushroom convention, taught private classes, was program chair for a professional culinary group, started a farmer's market.....ALL with a severely disabled child. YOU can do whatever you envision.....

Botanique's question was key......figure out what motivates you, what passion drives you, then for goodness sakes go do it. Wonder Woman lassos are pretty darn cool....though I like capes better.


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## blade55440 (Sep 9, 2005)

Well after reading that last post...I guess it leads me to this inevitable question:

How on earth do I go about getting that kind of trip lined up? Especially considering I have less than a year actual cooking experience and am about 8 credits short of a finished culinary degree?


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## mezzaluna (Aug 29, 2000)

I'm holding out for the bracelets!


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

well you can finish your culinary degree if you're still in school it'd be better to stay and finish.

get a job on a ship, see about joining Tony Bourdain's production team, get stages in Europe and go from one place to another.....become a culinary interpretor for a travel group....backpackers, hikers, bikers go on vacations with groups that need to eat,.....scholarships from ACF or James Beard or look on line for culinary scholarships that include travel, find people on cheftalk that live in places you wanna visit and figure out how to work in their country....Have your passport ready for cheap flts, sometimes there are really really cheap air fares being able to take advantage of them would be cool. Ask cheftalkers to brainstorm with you, there is a great resource of info on this site.
Youth hostels...are cheap places to stay. Backpack....so many did it in the 60's.
Start taking language classes or getting tapes/books at the library to learn basics prior to going.


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## jock (Dec 4, 2001)

A friend of mine sent an e-mail today and it spoke of someone he knows who is 40 and just got laid off from his job as an engineer. He wasn't too broke up about it because, he says, I always wanted to be a doctor anyway but at my age...
So my friend says, look, it will take you 5 years to become a doctor. You can be a 45 year old doctor or you can just be 45.
For us older folk, something to think about

Jock


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## pastry maven (Feb 6, 2006)

HEY!!!!! Who ya callin OLD!!!!! :lips: :lol:


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

CIA has international cooking class trips.....The Culinary Institute of America Presents ProChef.com not quite the working your way around the world but it's one option.
How true.....follow your passion.....if you could do whatever you want what would it be? If money were no object what would you do? Great questions.
Really good to ask them on a fairly regular basis, because desires change.

I love the story of the baker who slept on flour sacks at the beginning of her career to help realize her dream of owning a bakery. Or the couple who work at various artisinal cheese dairies around the country prior to buying their own. Same with inner-city farmers that worked on several different sustainable farms prior to buying their acre in the city to start a non-profit teaching low income people how to garden and prepare food.
Same for the young chef that works for next to nothing at a NYC fine dining restaurant just to get the experience, now he's chef de cuisine at STL top restuarant. All have passion and are living their dreams.


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

for the past 9 years I dated Sean Connery's jewish brother......twinkle and all...didn't realize the relationship until last night.  lived the dream without realizing it.


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## mezzaluna (Aug 29, 2000)

Best that I didn't know that! By my DH has his own twinkle.  When I was much younger I dreamed of finding a red-headed Greek Jewish guy. Instead I found a handsome Jewish Michigander engineer.  

Someone mentioned being a 45-year-old doctor, newly out of medical school. I suppose the opportunty cost would take a long time to recoup, but if that's where your dream takes you, and a school will admit you, GO FOR IT.


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## botanique (Mar 23, 2005)

When I left graduate school, I did some side work at a wine shop and eventually got a gig on the coast.... After I sold my house in AZ, I was able to buy a new one and do whatever I wanted to do at the time.... It was an amazing and overwhelming feeling. After working at the local botanical garden to get away from it all for awhile, I met a gentleman who, after a heartfelt conversation searching for fen's in the dunes, told me "you need to take your camera and go to Costa Rica fen-finder." And I did. I hired an assistant, and freelanced my way through barrio districts in Costa Rica taking pictures of beautiful people, and some not so nice people.... It was the most amazing experience of my life. I was almost abducted at the Nic border, I had police protection shooting one site (and shooting came back, and not from a camera ;-), and I met the most amazing children and their teachers and elders giving them life lessons in growing vegetables and herbs and how to cook with what you have.... With driver (previous race car driver wow) and body guard, with translater I went to places I will always be grateful for. I kissed a dying man in a dishevled corregated shack after helping his wife carry wood down a dirt hill to start a fire in order to kill a chicken and cook him protein.... I met a town leader who was building a house to take in "drug refugees" -- kids that were raised and trained to sell and do drugs that wanted to get out.... 

Sorry, I just realized I am rambling. Not going to do spell check -- so I apologize for typos!!! I think I just wanted to relate that I am so grateful to be able to have such magnificent opportunities -- but it is not easy to know what you really want, or need....

Cheers to all! And thank you for all the posts -- AWESOME PAWSOME! Stevie

BTW -- I hear that capes get in the way... ;-) Tight stars and stripes with, ahem, that little support all the way! :roll:


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

Stevie, that is such a great story.....inspirational....
If you continue waiting for the "right time" it just may not arrive. It's amazing what you can do when you decide what you want. Do those sound trite or what?

Nope no tights for moi, they just don't look right with Crocs or Berkies....but a cape, now that just kinda flutters as you twirl around and around.


Jewish Sean passed away last Oct, and I never realized the similarity.....I'll have to dream tonight to figure out what he would have thought about the comparison....


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

ummmm what is a fen?


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## mezzaluna (Aug 29, 2000)

A marsh?


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## botanique (Mar 23, 2005)

Fen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Thank you wikipedia

I was asked to find a small body of water with vegetation etc amidst the dunes just north of Fort Bragg. It was a ploy to get me alone for a walk in the dunes  However I will never regret the path that afternoon of fen searching took me on.... Cheers! S


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## dc sunshine (Feb 26, 2007)

Fen = Bog  a very damp dank mushy muddy marshy place full of reeds and fog and wayfarers looking to say "Stand and Deliver" to any unsuspecting traveller who happens to wander mistakenly into its gloomy depths......


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## botanique (Mar 23, 2005)

DC oh what a positive ray of sunshine!  Gloomy depths? Oye.... LOL What side of the bed did you wake up on this morning????

All joking aside, thank you for the definition


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## shroomgirl (Aug 11, 2000)

"Stand and Deliver"???!!! Stand in the bog and deliver what? wading boots, an alligator beating stick, a pizza?.....bog special.....


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## blade55440 (Sep 9, 2005)

Deliver us from evil?


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## botanique (Mar 23, 2005)

Aw heck. We're not evil, we're just cooks. Fen finding is highly overrated. How about some grillin tonight??? And, oh, that would be on a beach watching my hunk of burnin love walk out of the ocean from a magnificent dive carying a lobster in his teeth as I grill on the back porch of our glass house....


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## headless chicken (Apr 28, 2003)

Ditto...Wouldn't mind having a P90 tucked underneath the lid of my toolbox. I wonder if they got any F302 flying lessons. Would probrably easier if I just got the gene theropy and ride around in a Puddle Jumper. Go 1on1 with Ronon in sparing...yes and get my arse kicked...I wonder if they'll let me cook for a Wraith Queen...
K this is way beyond fantasy but hey, I just got off work.

Closer to reality, take a world cruise and see every corner and every port possible.


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