Insta Un-Worthy/Un-Insta-Worthy
Last week was Thanksgiving! (In Canada.) Happy Thanksgiving!
I made a pumpkin cake. It was fine. It was good! I mean, it tasted good. Looked okay, I guess. (Except I didn't think through the whole "dust with icing sugar" thing and cinnamon kind of gunked up my sifter, but that's a problem to be solved some other time.) It came out of the pan looking a bit fancy, as bundt cakes do.
It was also relatively easy to produce. I'd make it again except that it's suddenly hard to find spice cake mixes on grocery store shelves (possibly because of the time of the year). I could also make a spice cake from scratch and add in the add-ins, but let's not get crazy.
I took a picture of it (obviously) but decided not to post it on Instagram. It didn't really feel "Insta-worthy." And that led me to consider whether my tens of followers there would have really cared.
It's the kind of thing you think about when you've been quietly working in relative obscurity for years, with kind and rewarding encouragement along the way, and then something happens that sort of amps up the possibility for recognition. Or, you know, criticism. Like making a pumpkin cake from a cake mix with add-ins for Thanksgiving with a wonky topping. Or like having a book come out.
In a world of best-sellers and prize culture and glamorous invitations, and other trappings of the writing life it's hard to remember this: "Success" can mean different things to different people. And books. And cakes, and photos thereof.
So my cake may not be Insta-worthy. So what? I made it and it tasted good. It fulfilled its purpose.
I have similar modest ambitions for my book. Mostly, I'm excited, because books are exciting things. Inherently! I'm excited about this book because people will have the chance to read about my parents, and about Northwestern Ontario.
Books are also enduring things, even though such things as remainder bins exist. There's a chance that this book will speak to someone who doesn't even know they want to read it, at some future time when I'm off doing my next thing.
Perhaps that future version of me will be baking another pumpkin spice cake. Perhaps it will be a different kind of cake. I'm still not sure why I'm suddenly baking cakes after years of mostly not, but I enjoy doing it and we enjoy eating them. And we enjoy reading, and writing.
You know what? I think I'll post that photo of my cake after all. Why not? It celebrates gratitude, and what's more Insta-worthy than that?
I made a pumpkin cake. It was fine. It was good! I mean, it tasted good. Looked okay, I guess. (Except I didn't think through the whole "dust with icing sugar" thing and cinnamon kind of gunked up my sifter, but that's a problem to be solved some other time.) It came out of the pan looking a bit fancy, as bundt cakes do.
It was also relatively easy to produce. I'd make it again except that it's suddenly hard to find spice cake mixes on grocery store shelves (possibly because of the time of the year). I could also make a spice cake from scratch and add in the add-ins, but let's not get crazy.
I took a picture of it (obviously) but decided not to post it on Instagram. It didn't really feel "Insta-worthy." And that led me to consider whether my tens of followers there would have really cared.
It's the kind of thing you think about when you've been quietly working in relative obscurity for years, with kind and rewarding encouragement along the way, and then something happens that sort of amps up the possibility for recognition. Or, you know, criticism. Like making a pumpkin cake from a cake mix with add-ins for Thanksgiving with a wonky topping. Or like having a book come out.
In a world of best-sellers and prize culture and glamorous invitations, and other trappings of the writing life it's hard to remember this: "Success" can mean different things to different people. And books. And cakes, and photos thereof.
So my cake may not be Insta-worthy. So what? I made it and it tasted good. It fulfilled its purpose.
I have similar modest ambitions for my book. Mostly, I'm excited, because books are exciting things. Inherently! I'm excited about this book because people will have the chance to read about my parents, and about Northwestern Ontario.
Books are also enduring things, even though such things as remainder bins exist. There's a chance that this book will speak to someone who doesn't even know they want to read it, at some future time when I'm off doing my next thing.
Perhaps that future version of me will be baking another pumpkin spice cake. Perhaps it will be a different kind of cake. I'm still not sure why I'm suddenly baking cakes after years of mostly not, but I enjoy doing it and we enjoy eating them. And we enjoy reading, and writing.
You know what? I think I'll post that photo of my cake after all. Why not? It celebrates gratitude, and what's more Insta-worthy than that?