Eat Local Challenge (revisited)
I was starting a response in the comments but then it just kept going… So here it is. If you have not yet read the comments to the Eat Local Challenge post, do so now. Then you may better understand the following post.
To comment from the very beginning of Manipadme’s critique, I am currently operating to my own disadvantage. I am not exercising the perfect solution to our system. Instead I am pushing my diet to an extreme so that when October rolls in, the challenge is over, and I can snap back to my regular eating habits… well, maybe I will not snap all the way back. With hope I will be finding a new balance.
If by religious you mean meditative, then yes. Perhaps I am making things more complex than need be, but I do spend a fair amount of time planning and preparing (meditating on) my meals. Cooking is far more an event than it was a week ago. I have begun to feel like an ancestor of long ago, where I spend hours of the day foraging for food. I have in fact spent hours on meals, and am fortunate to have a schedule that abides.
But by religious you probably mean the group-think aspect. In everyone I talk to about the challenge, I try my best to emphasize the personal approach. Folks can take on the local diet to the extent that they deem reasonable. For me to drink coffee I would only be “disloyal” to myself and my own goals. I am not a week in and I miss coffee. I do not dwell on my loss but instead think beyond coffee. What else can I have? Where else can I go?
The crutches have been kicked out: pasta, rice, oils, spices. I leaned quite heavily upon certain base ingredients. Now that they are purged from my diet I am teetering. I am off kilter and actively searching for replacements. Meals take so much more effort because in a way, I am starting from scratch. I made a salsa last Sunday based on pumpkin. It was good. I also made a more typical tomato salsa, but at least my mind is moving.
To clarify on Just Local Foods, yes they are a business. JLF is a sponsor of the challenge. Though the challenge did not stem from our local co-op, it sprouted in San Francisco. The idea was introduced by A Second Opinion Magazine to Just Local Foods, and they jumped on board. Why would they not? The challenge completely fits the niche that JLF works within. And to consider their partnership to be purely one of profit is a bit dark. Owning and operating a cooperative grocery store in Eau Claire is not a business move for the profit minded. It is a good business and they are ready to expand, but there are other far more lucrative avenues than an employee owned local and organic food shop. They do what they do because it allows them to sleep well at night. Their’s is a business of social growth, as well as profit.
To close this response up, this is an exercise in compromise. I do not foresee living out the rest of my life upon the diet of one hundred miles. The severity of this challenge is opening my eyes to things I otherwise may have never encountered. You mentioned the concept of balance. I am working toward a farther reaching balance than what I knew in August. Life until this month has been the thesis. Right now (Eat Local Challenge) I am operating within the Antithesis. October comes and I will hope to arrive at new understanding, a synthesis if you will.
Thank you Manipadme, for the thoughtful critique.
P.S. Bjorn is correct. I did at one time weigh out my options on the McDonald’s menu.