Tuesday, February 8, 2005  11:51 am  <|>
<208> Growing Greener: Lately I've been getting on, or in some cases getting BACK on, certain kicks of mine. The theme recently is designed to put me back in tune with some things I've lost touch with, which I suppose was brought on in part by my being sick so much lately. It makes you feel like you want to take control of things someplace, so for me it has started to seep into my diet and other natural cravings. Some friends tell me they are amazed that I am not more in tune with these 'natural' things - being that I decided to be a vegetarian at the ripe age of four. I guess maybe I should be but it can be a way you live without it being a way of life... it's somewhere on par with not buying only organic milk or not wearing anything made of leather... I don't feel the need to express a lot of feelings that seem to come with a large grouping of "like minded" people. I have nothing wrong with the people who do take it steps further, but for some reason it's just never been that way for me. A little background, besides the turning vegetarian so early, is that growing up as a preteen and even into some of the teenage years, I was sending my "hard earned" money to the World Wildlife Fund and the Sierra Club, rather then spending it on more age related goods (or really just in addition to buying these things). I'd go to the nature store and come home with animal adoption kits, you know the ones you could buy for 20 bucks each... well I had every one of them. I'm not sure if I felt like I was really making a difference or if I just enjoyed helping out how I could looking back on it, but either way it felt good at the time and to this day I still support a couple really good causes. The difference is, as I grew older (and thus seemingly poorer as the world got more expensive in the process), I sort of 'grew' out of a lot of it. It wasn't that I cared less, I just got busier, just as little kids forget old toys for new. My money went into computers, cds, and movies instead of rocks, sticks and trees. But, even though I changed and had lots of other things in life distracting me, I guess I never really left my desire to help people and animals and all the like.

Going back to being a vegetarian for a second, it was for plenty of reasons and none specific. I came to understand the impact of my choices as I got older, as I'm sure isn't hard to understand being that I was only 4 at the time of the first portion of my decision. But I've never been sorry for it and it's been kind of funny to grow up now and be surrounded by more people who currently make similar choices more often than not. But for those who don't eat the same way, like Dan for example, it just rarely comes into being a problem. Now, where I find this interesting is when I make my little attempts at jumping deeper into these subcultures. But whenever I try I just come back up not quite getting it, though a little wiser for the effort I suppose. A couple months ago I checked out a magazine called Herbivore. It was well done enough, but the content just wasn't for me I guess. People talking about how to deal with being vegan could have been useful even though I myself am "only" a vegetarian and not vegan, but people giving pointers on how to date "carnivores" I just didn't see the need for such things since it's not something that directly impacts me. The same goes to anything you are interested in really, there will always be degrees. Just like trying to follow Peta, but me never quite being able to handle the forcefulness they make use of. Just like enjoying Harry Potter when it comes out in the movies, but letting someone else explain the whole storyline instead of reading the rest of the books (yes of course that one was for you Concetta ::wink:: ::wink::) It's not a crime not to get further into matters that interest you, but it's kind of funny to me still how much these degrees of people can differ.

At any rate, I've been finding some medium grounds that seem to be great for me and bring me closer to these roots, for lack of a better term, without me diving all the way into them. I've been trying to buy a better selection of groceries... where as for a very long time Dan & I didn't really buy much in the way of groceries (past the basics of course). We'd either buy what we needed as we wanted to make it, which did not make for a good selection in house when we were hungry, or eat out a lot which can be done pretty cheaply actually, but it still gets annoying sometimes no matter how many options you can choose from. But buying groceries is expensive too when you don't have the money to put up front (though we do ok). But once you get me into a Whole Foods or Trader Joes (where we went just yesterday actually), I get so excited about the fresh foods and options available that I don't want money to have to be a concern. So once in a while I've been letting myself spurge on a good selection, even though "organic" type fresh food stores are not usually cheap and you usually get home and unpack to find you have a few days worth of good treats and then the stock starts to break down even though you spent all kinds of money. I tried to buy things that would last, but it's hard when you get some good stuff to eat not to, well, eat it!

I feel like I should be eating better by either eating more, because I really probably don't eat enough, or eating a different variety of things - you know, all that stuff in the pyramid that even though recently changed, most people don't really hit enough items off of each day. Watching Super Size Me a few weeks ago was a good reminder of that! So I am also considering joining a CSA for the next season (they run about May to November). For those that don't know what that is, it's Community Supported Agriculture - where you prepay for the season, usually somewhere between $500-$600 (roughly $26 a week for the one I want to join) and then each week you pick up (or sometimes even get delivered) a selection of fresh foods (mostly veggies, someplaces also fruits, cheese, meat, herbs, etc...) A lot of them pick the weekly goods for you, but the one I want to join let's you pick 10 items each week before pick up day while they are still technically in the ground from a list of all the things that will be in stock that week. It seems like a good deal and while definitely an investment (and one I'm not sure I can afford to prepay for before then but I'm going to try to figure it out) it basically would force me to eat better and use these items much more in my meals. I'm still looking into it further, but if anyone has ever been a part of one of these please let me know what you think of it, I'm definitely interested in learning more especially if you live in a city (which is mostly their point and appeal for people who can't get to a local farm all the time). As a supplement, I always have my dad, who I prefer to call "Farmer Ed" as he just loves his garden.... it expands every year and when you think I'm talking about some small fenced in thing in our backyard, no this garden lives across the street from our house where my great-grandmother's house used to stand a long time ago. We own the land, and so there he spends lots of his time and for this effort, we get all kinds of good veggies (tomatoes being my favorite pick) every season too. He usually has more than he and my mom can eat even after giving a lot away, so for the last few years he's even been able to sell some through a Veggie stand up the street that someone he knows runs. Yeah, my dad is crazy haha. But he loves it.

Well, I'm not going to go so far as to try to grow anything myself. If you saw the dead plant hanging in our bedroom (that somehow still has leaves on it) or the numerous empty pots out on our deck from plants my parents gave us in the summer you'd understand that Dan and I agree we should not handle plant life. If it doesn't sit up and look cute to remind you to fed it, we're not quite ready for it. We're not ashamed. You have a plant you've been trying to kill for sometime? Just bring it on over! ;) But, if other people grow me nice things to eat, I'll gladly (give them to Dan to) cook them up! :) Ok, so I'm not Ms. Organic Cook, at least I can design you a web page while you cook me a meal!

So we'll see how long this particular kick of mine lasts. There are plenty of other related things I've been looking into also, besides eating habits, like natural remedies and things. I can't get super into the herbal and vitamin stuff though, when you take prescription medicines you really have to watch mixing it with that stuff. But enough for now, more later!