So Im A 'Foodie?" Whats with THAT label?

I despise labels. Not the kind on a can, or the kind that legitimately categorize by factual association, but the kind that demonstrate some trendy or arbitrary association or illegitimate stereotype.  The ones that are about cliques and fads, excuses for people to behave in certain ways or think they are special without good reason, ways to be part of a group. Ones that make you "fit in" by being "different.
So, naturally, "foodie" strikes me as some kind of smarmy self aggrandising 'make me different by being part of a group' term.  However, I seem to fit into the category in terms of its defining characteristics.

Here are some definitions of the word:
a person keenly interested in food, especially in eating or cooking. (Dictionary.com)
a person having an enthusiastic interest in the preparation and consumption of good food
A person who has an ardent or refined interest in food; a gourmet
a person devoted to refined sensuous enjoyment (especially good food and drink)

bon vivant, epicure, epicurean, gastronome, gourmet (thefreedictionary.com)

I personally associate it also with people who watch FOOD Network and sit around fantasizing about food, chefs and fame and often like to BS everyone into thinking they know something about food because they heard a couple of words from Alton Brown or saw Bobby Flay flip a burger a certain way.  The people who buy from Pampered Chef but arent chefs and dont use the stuff much also fit.  Those who fancy themselves culinarians or gourmets with little more than a desire to be seen as such. (I'm not down on these people or companies, just they way people react to them.  Foodies arent any worse than any other BSers out there, and the world is full of them.)

So, being a chef, (yet another word that requires much explanation- but I refer to myself as one because in laymans terms I am, I have a degree in culinary arts and I cook for a living,)  I, of course, fit the definition.  I dont really like it so have generally rejected being called "foodie."

Here is where it became interesting. Earlier today I had something of an epiphany, thanks to the Maestro himself, the Master of the key of 'Am', Mr. Tom Petty. The man is unbelieveable, undoubtedly supernaturally aided, and if you cant hear it in his music you truly are not listening.

You see, music, both playing and listening to real deal good music, lifts me to an ethereal plane of sorts. (no, not airplane.)  Tom just has an ability to create music that flows deep into your soul and elevates you.  I was listening to Mojo, an album declaimed by foolish critics everywhere who thought that every album should be Full Moon Fever or Damn the Torpedoes.  Not what they expected out of TP, so they didnt listen for what it really was, yet another masterpiece.  Not my favorite perhaps, a masterpiece none-the-less.

Where am I going with this? What does it have to do with foodies?  read on my friends.

The human brain is an amazing thing- in this case specifically the pleasure centers.  Eating, sex, addictive drugs, giving, altruism (I have some intersting explanations why this is and how it applies to advanced society but thats a-whole-nother blog)-all these things can cause pleasure responses in the brain.  We all have things which trigger strong pleasure responses, for me, one of them is music.  It makes me feel good, there is a happiness, a peaceful contentedness, even a thrill of sorts that I get. Not in any kind of false way either, it genuinely makes me feel good, not high so much as just a powerful sense of peace.

As I drove, listening to I should have known it, it occurred to me that music does that for me, and so does food.  I recently had to prepare a large meal for about 64 people, and while I was pulling cabbage rolls from the oven and placing them in a roaster to be taken to the site, I looked in at my creation sitting there and I had to smile and laugh. It was a wonderful thing.

This was when I realized that I am a foodie and should proudly embrace that fact.   I am a foodie because I find great pleasure in food. That is not to say eating or cooking specifically, but the combination of the two.

Im not a glutton (usually) nor am I all about the preparation of food or its technicalities. 

A foodie, then, is someone who truly appreciates good food, in preparing it, tasting it, and observing its preparation, a person who find true pleasure in good food.

Sometimes behind the BS and farces and facades, there is something deeper to grasp and that something is the truth.

So I AM a foodie, and THAT is what is with the label.