Smultronstället

This post has nothing to do with food.

Back in the days when I was stupid and bold, I tried to make a film based on a series of dream sequences. In the film, a man falls out of a tree to find himself living simultaneously in twin parallel universes. In the first, he is damned to sit in a high school cafeteria for all eternity. In the other, he is hunted by a polar bear.

I never managed to acquire a bear.

It only took a matter of weeks before I gave up on the project in frustration. But all through the ordeal, I was inspired and overwhelmed by this initial sequence from 'Wild Strawberries'. I think it to be one of the more subtly horrifying scenes in any movie I've ever seen. And what really gets me is not so much what happens, but the implication of what happens. The idea that time is just a construct, recognition of death only comes through chance, in the end we -- like Ivan in Tolstoy's short story -- may be more revolted by ourselves than by anything else.

These are big issues, obviously. And I think now -- in reflection -- that these sorts of issues are exactly why I started writing this blog and why I've kept it going (I honestly didn't think I'd make it a fortnight).

I hope this silly blog -- about food, drink, and sustenance -- can be something worthwhile. And despite my tendencies to screw things up with my special first-person brand of neuroses, I hope this blog in a simple way can express something greater than the whole of its parts.

Ingmar Bergman has nothing left to fear. Farewell, maestro.