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Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Food & Life Dear Santa: a Christmas letter from Paul Luna

Posted by Besha Rodell @BeshaRodell on Tue, Dec 20, 2011 at 11:15 AM

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BeckyStein.com

Since I posted my Dear Santy letter last week, I've had quite a response from readers with their own Christmas wishes. Over the next few days I'll be posting these responses and Santa letters, beginning today with a letter from chef Paul Luna. In true Luna style, it's a tad more esoteric than most Christmas lists.

Got a Christmas list for Atlanta dining that you want broadcast? Email me at besha.rodell@creativeloafing.com and I might include it here in the days leading up to Christmas (I'm on vacation for the next few days, but that doesn't mean I won't read emails and use them if I can in these posts...but if you send them today I'm more likely to not be drunk on Champagne and gorged on candy canes).

Without further ado, Paul Luna's letter to Santa:

Dear Santa,

I write to you not as a chef or a cook who wants a new kitchen gadget, a different clientele or a new restaurant concept, but as an Atlantan- or just a human being- with a question.

Santa, this is a question which you cannot answer (or send down a chimney) but one that you can only question for yourself.

You see, Santa, living should be simple not complex. So why have we, you and I, complicated our life? I know understanding cannot be wrapped in a gift. It arrives when there is no doubt in questioning what you know. Perhaps one can say when the truth lies without doubt there is understanding.

In continuous observation of what the year has been, I often wonder, give thought, to the way we live. Nothing much has changed or there has not been any change at all whatsoever. We are still at war with ourselves. Always projecting outwardly never looking at our self. The problem today, now, is not where we are not, but who am I? Is “me” not me completely? Why do I think “me is different? Why the need to be different?

The fact is that we, you and I, are not different. What you think is different is the difference of one in the same. We, all of humanity, are the creation of one whole complete being, not separated, not divided. We all possess “me” psychologically emotionally inward. “Me” has created a world of greed, ambition, prejudice, religions, jealousy and brutality.

I often wonder: What would the world look like without me? Not selfishly but selflessly. A world in which I am an observer, observing me. A world that is a heaven and not the destruction of what we think is evil. A place where we, you and I, can live harmoniously without destroying one another. A place where knowing yourself completely means living life knowing our differences.

At the end of the days, months, years, we are the creation of one. The truth is not found outside of you but inside the lies of one’s own entity.

Just a thought, Santa.