Lovers of opposition, lovers of spice, especially Ginger

I love to read my blogger-buddy and fellow corporate-hell denizen, Ginger Baran's blog, not because I most often agree with her (which I do) but because, on the occasion that I don't agree with her, I find her arguments so well-reasoned that they are difficult to dispute. In her most recent post (at least, at the moment of the composition of THIS post), I found I had a number of bones to pick with her-- too many, in fact, to respond in a comment. However, from here on, I'm going to directly address Ginger:

You know, Ginger, I find it challenging the ways in which I both disagree with you and completely agree with you. I, for one, have never smoked a cigarette in my life and am hopelessly allergic and HATE going places wherein I feel smoke is being inflicted upon me. While I really think folks should have the right to screw with their health if they feel the need-- and I'm extremely wary of actual legislation that says differently-- I gotta say, man, I love it that I can sometimes go to a bar and not feel like I've got some primeval, Pandora's box variety of flu at the end of the night. Frankly, I do not think social venues like bars should be the prerogative of smokers, and those with lungs and sinuses of titanic strength, alone. Regardless of how this issue is solved, it's going to be unfair to someone--either those who feel their rights are being infringed upon by non-smoking legislation or those who feel their health is being infringed upon by those who legitimately assert their right to do with their bodies as they will. For my money, though, I'd kinda rather the law err on the side of the health-conscious-- mostly because the great out-of-doors is a large area, and though subject to inclement weather it may be, it seems to have quite a good sense about how to circulate smoke-polluted air away from the delicate flowers among us.

And I should probably also cop to the fact that I'm one of those health food Nazis that are, according to your post, among the Haters of Joy. True enough, I've been known to lecture many a friend, colleague, passing stranger, anyone who'll listen, about the evils of artificial sweeteners (neuro-toxins, all) and the repugnance of the gloppy substance known as margarine. Real, honest-to-god sugar and real, honest-to-god butter aren't the greatest things you can put in your body, but my basic food rule-of-thumb says that if it comes from a plant or an animal, it's OK. If it comes from a lab, steer clear! Of course, my food philosophy goes quite a bit deeper. For those who've been reading my blog for a while, you're probably well aware that buying organic is more than just a health issue for me-- it's moral and it's ethical. Because I do not want to a)destroy the planet with my consumerist habits, b)destroy my body with chemicals and genetically modified weirdness, c) mistreat animals solely for my gastronomic delectation, and d) deny honest, hard-working, small-scale farmers their daily bread, well, I try to be very conscientious with my food-buying habits. Am I a killjoy when I see someone eating a preternaturally blue cupcake from the local mainstream grocery? You bet! Would I deny anyone the joy of real Tennessee pork barbecue or a gooey old-fashioned buttercream cake? No way on earth! Truly, I must acknowledge that a lot of the best food is really fattening and doesn't do any favors for one's girlish figure... but so long so said items are made from naturally occurring food items, I have no beef (ha! I'm so punny.)

However, I can't help but believe that a trans-fat ban is a great thing for everyone. Trans-fats do not occur in nature. A trans-fat is what you get when you force a vegetable fat, which should be liquid at room temperature, to be a solid at room temperature-- a la margarine. Basically, you're taking an unsaturated fat (the good, necessary kind that helps your body function correctly) and chemically altering it so that it becomes a saturated fat (the evil, heart-clogging, obesity-inducing kind)... so then stuff like margarine, which is misleadingly marketed as cholesterol-free, becomes a substance that your body THINKS is cholesterol-like... and so, you have all the bad repercussions of an animal fat like butter, plus a bunch of mysterious and creepy chemicals that you've just ingested... and, because most people think margarine is better for them than real butter, they use MORE of it, thus compounding the evilness of said product. (Mom, do I have all that right? That's pretty much how it works, right?)

So, yes, I'm invested in the so-called "healthy living movement." I'm even rather evangelical about it. But I actually think it makes my experiences with food and eating MORE joyful. Since I completed my fast, I've been pretty much eating vegan and wheat-free. When I go out to eat (rarely more than once a week), I break my rules about meat, dairy and wheat... but try to still choose sensible food. Albeit, I've been having a miserable craving for yellow cake with big fluffy vanilla icing lately-- and I'm hoping I'll have a reason to give into it soon (I'm thinking if I pretend to be a supportive friend to someone whose depression takes the form of a sweet tooth, I can disguise my own craving as bonhomie and general generosity of spirit.) But truth be told, my fridge has a big, bright halo hovering above it, so full of fresh vegetables, tofu and fruit it is! And thus far, my body is rather happy that I've been eating so carefully lately. I'm cooking for myself more than I have in a couple of years, and I'm beginning to recall the joys of having intimate knowledge of each component of a meal, the joys of not having to read the label for some hidden high-fructose corn syrup or monosodium glutamate, the joys of knowing the things I eat are not only going to fuel my body, but support it, too. Yeah, it's about being healthy. And yeah, I wish everyone else would come to see what's so great about eating the way that I do. It's like a high, I swear! I'm downright languorous after a good, hardcore Ashtanga yoga practice and a bowl of spinach-and-chickpea curry! But, yeah, Ginger, your questioning whether we should have LAWS about such things is dead on. It is, after all, a free country and we are all entitled to the right to a slow, crazy-making death by aspartame.

Now, about this country being run, not by Big Brother and other looming enigmas, but by the equally appalling pharmaceutical companies, you know you have my full agreement. Though, I would argue that, those of us who do not trust conventional medicine because it's funded by the drug business and because it's far too focused on fixing what's broken, rather than preventing stuff from breaking in the first place are, in fact, the (whole-grain, artisan) bread and (non-GMO, antibiotic-free) butter of the "healthy living movement." I mean, the best way to avoid having some well-intentioned but also very well-paid guy with a stethoscope try to foist something that comes in a light-resistant bottle on you is to eat good things and avoid ingesting and inhaling toxic things. But, then again, for those of us who have been blessed with relative freedom from congenital disease and handicap, health is very much a matter of cause and effect. When you take care of yourself, you stay healthy. When you mistreat yourself, there are consequences--and far too often, those consequences require us to involve medical professionals who either are well-meaning but do not have a naturopathic philosophy, or are highly motivated by the mortgage on that summer cottage in the Hamptons that was built on a wobbly foundation of Vioxx and Cialis and Ortho-tri-cyclen and Propecia and Phen-fen and Botox and Zanex and Zoloft and Effexor and Allegra and... and ... and ...

But as far as alcohol, and judgementalism regarding it, go, well, I could care less. I don't much like getting drunk myself and I don't much care to hang out with drunk people. But so long as you don't throw up in my car, in my house, on my person, or in my line of vision, well, I could REALLY care less. A glass of wine sipped while leaning over a pot full of vegan, wheat-free goodness is a a great relief after yet another day of demoralizing, soul-squelching work, ain't it?

And now, about the closing of birthing centers... my god, it makes me want to collapse into one of those big, overwrought, Shakespearian sobs. The notion of having a baby while someone was leaning over me, trying to convince me that I should be drugged into oblivion during an act so important as forcing a small human out of my vagina? You've gotta be kidding me! I have a friend who had her first daughter in a birthing center similar to the ones you've described, but in Tucson. Truly, she was in full-on labor for 36 hours, the last 3 of which were all about the pushing.. and truly, she tore, um, forward instead of backwards (wow, I can't even think about that scenario in terms of nerve endings; can you?), but she told me that she never once felt out of control of the situation or her own body throughout the entire process. And her second kid, she had at home with, I believe, a doula. Because I am wont to ask pregnant women a million questions, I recall asking her about her specific reasons for not even procuring the services of a conventional OB-GYN-- and she said that she felt childbirth was one of the few last truly gendered activities and she didn't want hers corrupted by a male-minded model of medicine. And this notion may be completely and totally gender-separatist, but I GOT that when she said it. More or less, she didn't want any man (because obstetrics, like all medical specialties, is still dominated by men) telling her what to do when she was at her most female-- her most feminine!

On a quasi-related note, I was flipping channels at some point over the weekend, and I briefly stopped on a Shania Twain interview. She was saying that though she's made a career off of, as she puts it, lyrics that speak from "the woman's point of view," she has decided, once and for all, that she's not a feminist. She went on to say that she simply loves men and what they contribute to her life too much for her to consider herself to be a feminist. And I gotta tell ya, this irked me somethin' fierce!!! Feminism does not now, nor has it ever, meant that those who identify with pro-woman sentiments are man-haters. Admittedly, there is always some fury that arises when folks are clamoring for equality, and much of that, over the years, has been directed at men in general, because, well, they've had all the power. But that doesn't mean that one who claims to be a feminist can't still love individual men. Or occasionally even want to get laid by one. And earlier incarnations of feminism have also encouraged women to aspire to a standard of maleness: that old "if you want to be taken seriously in a man's world, you better act like a man" bit. I find this equally problematic because all I ever wanted to be was a girl. And I find nothing disempowering (quite the opposite, really) about being girly, wanting to be cute/pretty/sexy/whatever, wanting to own my own sexuality without having to negotiate anyone's age-old, tired, saggy, and/or pitiful virgin/whore dichotomies. And for the girls who feel disempowered by having doors opened for them, well, I think perhaps they've done the disempowering themselves! I, for one, could care less if some guy opens the door for me or doesn't-- so long as he doesn't slow me down, right?

So, all this is just to say that every woman, like my friend, has a right to decide what happens to her own body through every step of the reproductive process--from everything that happens leading up to conception to everything that happens leading up to birth. And the more we drug her and financially force her into the hands of the narrowly defined confines of Western medicine, the louder the outcry from both women and men who value basic human rights SHOULD be. So, folks, let's here it! Cry and cry and cry some more!

And don't get me started on insurance companies...

Jesus, Ginger, do you whip out these soapboxes just for little ol' me?

the confines of the poem

I've been thinking some lately about the course of events that led me to believing that poetry was a valid and necessary pursuit. Why is it that I love this particular art form so very much, when most folks think it's rarified and elitist at best and utter nonsense at worst. And truth be told, I keep coming back to one small classroom experience that I had in high school.

Whenever I sheepishly confess to some new acquaintance that I went to private school (what good liberal wants to confess to such a privileged childhood?), and an all-girls' school at that, I frequently feel like I have to disillusion folks of all the rich-bitch, spoiled-brat, silver-spoon, socially-oblivious stereotypes that they might hold about such institutions. And this feeling is, of course, ridiculous. The stereotypes are all true. But they're also not true at all. But I don't really want to delve into the good and bad of single-sex private education. I should say, however, that I got really lucky in terms of teachers-- and in terms of the rather subversive methods some of them employed in order to impart the desire for abstract thinking to us. They didn't just teach us how to do it... they made us WANT to do so. Or at least, they made ME want to.

So, anyway, I had one particularly no-adjective-positive-enough sort of teacher for my junior year advanced English class. She later went on to become the book editor for The Nashville Scene, the independent free paper to which I often refer for great film reviews. But I have a very specific memory of a discussion we once had in that English class about how writers come to terms with and make decisions about which parts of themselves they want to make public and which parts they'd rather obfuscate in their work. Truth be told, I think writers have less control over where they draw the line between what they actually display and what they actually hide... though, we do like to put forth the valiant effort, right? However, I think the discussion was an important one to have with 15- and 16-year-old girls. Mostly, I think this is true because it plants the idea that writing can be more than just catharsis or therapy or confessions. It can, after all, be a vehicle for communication that doesn't have to be anywhere near as self-involved as all that. It's true, you write about yourself no matter what your write-- because you're you and you can't escape being you-- but it's hard for readers to care about your work if it's ONLY about you, right? In this way, objective distance as an artistic discipline can be a tremendously useful tool.

And the poem that my great teacher used as an illustration of this negotiation between the writerly private and the writerlypublic?

The Ballad of the Lonely Masturbator

The end of the affair is always death.
She's my workshop. Slippery eye,
out of the tribe of myself my breath
finds you gone. I horrify
those who stand by. I am fed.
At night, alone, I marry the bed.

Finger to finger, now she's mine.
She's not too far. She's my encounter.
I beat her like a bell. I recline
in the bower where you used to mount her.
You borrowed me on the flowered spread.
At night, alone, I marry the bed.

Take for instance this night, my love,
that every single couple puts together
with a joint overturning, beneath, above,
the abundant two on sponge and feather,
kneeling and pushing, head to head.
At night alone, I marry the bed.

I break out of my body this way,
an annoying miracle. Could I
put the dream market on display?
I am spread out. I crucify.
My little plum is what you said.
At night, alone, I marry the bed.

Then my black-eyed rival came.
The lady of water, rising on the beach,
a piano at her fingertips, shame
on her lips and a flute's speech.
And I was the knock-kneed broom instead.
At night, alone, I marry the bed.

She took you the way a woman takes
a bargain dress off the rack
and I broke the way a stone breaks.
I give back your books and fishing tack.
Today's paper says that you are wed.
At night, alone, I marry the bed.

The boys and girls are one tonight.
They unbutton blouses. They unzip flies.
They take off shoes. They turn off the light.
The glimmering creatures are full of lies.
They are eating each other. They are overfed.
At night, alone, I marry the bed.


--Anne Sexton, from Love Poems



I do so love this poem-- not because it's dirty and not because it was so audacious when it was first published in 1967 and not because it is so very evocative of heartbreak. I love it because it contains within it both a metaphorical exploration of self and a very literal one. And because, even outside of its subject matter, Sexton's sense of language is paramount. Simply put, I find more artistic rigor here than I find titillating confession.

And the fact that this was the sort of work put before me at a formative age, I think, had a great deal to do with my falling ass over teakettle in love with poetry. Would I have ever seen this poem had I not sat in Margaret Renkl's English IIIA class? Maybe so. But would it have been presented to me in a fashion that affected the course of my life and my artistic aspirations? Maybe not. But as it stands, this poem represents, to me, the greatest possibility for engagement with the world that writing can hold. Bless its little heart for finding such a prominent position in my personal mythology!

Traffic of the weird

Ever since my post about The Urim and Thummim a couple of days ago in which I briefly mentioned my feelings about circumcision, I've been getting in inordinate amount of traffic from folks either looking for information about or pictures of said ritual. And, apparently, it's something of a hot button because a bunch of other bloggers are railing against it, too.

So I figured I'd post a link to this review in The New Republic about a documentary about a Jewish spy who was able to operate undetected among Nazis in Egypt primarily because his parents had the foresight to allow him to keep his foreskin. I don't know how many stories there are about people's lives being saved by the status of their genitals-- and this film looks completely fascinating for a slew of other reasons --but I figured the existence thereof merited a heads-up post all of it's own.

For now, I'll be, um, breathlessly (?) anticipating the mainstream release of The Champagne Sky.

Having cool friends

A couple of months ago, I learned that Kore Press, a Tucson small, indie press that publishes women writers, had picked up my friend Spring's book for publication. Seeing as I've known for a long time that the world is in desperate need of her work and her passion and her wholehearted activistic philosophy, I couldn't have been more thrilled for her and for the rest of us that get to read her forthcoming book, Benjamin's Spectacles. However, the book won't be out until later this summer.

In the meantime, please head over to the Kore Press blog, where Spring has posted a delicious, sensitive, thoughtful and moving essay about the state of political poetry today and why political poetry is still valid, important, and worth our time 40 years after the fieriest moments of the Civil Rights movement. And why it's still good writing.

And, for more of her writings, the link to Spring's blog about her work in Rwanda is here. There's some of her great photography and drawings there, too.

As much as I'm glad that I get to be friends with a cool and amazing woman like Spring, I'm equally glad that there are folks like her fighting the real fight-- and that the world has access to the full import of what I'm inclined to call her "mission." So, this is me, doing my part to spread the word of her good deeds and good writings.

Thank you, Spring, for all you do.

New Religion Dawning

I don't know exactly when I became such a non-fiction film junkie. But I must note that several of my favorite films that I've seen in the last year have been documentaries. From Milk in the Land to I am a Sex Addict to F*ck, I think some remarkable stylistic progress is being made in documentary filmmaking. No longer are these movies populated with nothing but talking heads and/or nature footage. They're dynamic and moving and funny and weird and often every bit as engaging as other types of narrative features. And so, to wrap up my discussion of the Nashville Film Festival, I want to talk about yet another little oddball that piqued my curiosity called The Urim and Thummim.

In the Bible, the Urim and Thummim (pronounced "oor-EEM" and "toom-EEM") is a mysterious oracle about which theological and Biblical scholars know very little. In this film, however, the Urim and Thummim (pronounced much more phonetically), appears to be a small incense burner carved out of black stone that three tile-setters from Kentucky found in a Goodwill store just north of Nashville in Madison, Tennessee. These three guys claim to be able to see visions within the little trinket. And they are, quite possibly, founding their very own sect of Christianity.

It would be so easy to discount these three nuts as just that-- nuts! Truly, they are over-the-top and earnest in their commitment to their belief in that thing-- in a way that is comical at the very least. But, ultimately, it is their commitment that makes it impossible to not be won over by these guys, particularly, the ringleader, Todd Walker. One of the most interesting parts of seeing this movie screened was trying to gauge the temperature of the room with respect to this Todd person throughout the course of the film. Several times, his enthusiasm reaches a pitch near lunacy, and yet we audience-members felt palpably uncomfortable laughing at him and his cronies, Dale and Dave. Judging from the audience's questions during the Q&A session with the directors, I would venture to say that, for the most part, we were all very busy being good little liberals--skeptical and a little edgy and maybe even a little scared-to-the-point-of-constipation when faced with subject matter that smacks of Deep South, Right-Wing, Evangelical religiosity, but also reluctant to dismiss such subject matter out of hand as crazy or Jesus-freaky or to apply some other connotatively negative modifier to it--because no lefty worth his/her granola-and-righteous-indignation EVER wants to be called "close-minded."

Yeah, Todd is a funny, weird, larger-than-life sorta guy-- and about all we could muster was a carefully stifled twitter now and again. And the directors said they were even a little disappointed that the audiences didn't seem to be able to put aside either their skepticism or their bleeding hearts long enough to acknowledge the ridiculousness of the idea that some paunchy Kentuckian thinks he found God in the Madison Goodwill. The screening that I saw was the second in the festival and, apparently, Todd, Dale and Dave were in attendance at the first (dammit all! Can't believe I missed 'em!). Dub Cornett, one of the two directors (the chatty one) said that those three were near hysterics with laughter throughout the screening because they are so fully aware that, for those who lack the faith in the Urim and Thummim, well, the whole affair is pretty silly. So, really, the experience of sitting through this film-- in rough cut, even--gives me something of a nagging twinge of dismay that, in this era of Jesus freaks and jihadists, that we may have lost our senses of humor about religion for good. Anyone up for a good priest/rabbi/Buddhist monk joke? Anyone? Um, ok, well, anyway...

So, with or without any issues of audience receptivity, I feel like the filmmakers did a rather remarkable job of withholding judgement, pro or con, on these guys. I mean, more or less, they just let the cameras run... and let Todd repeatedly make a jackass of himself and then repeatedly redeem himself. Among Todd's newfound followers, however, we find a former pro-wrestler-turned-evangelical-preacher and his wife (both of whom claim to have seen some very exciting things within the little cavity of the object) --and these two seem to have been plucked right out of the sort of small-town American landscape that likes to show its panties on Jerry Springer-like shows and, occasionally, do the same on the nightly news when somebody's dog attacks somebody else's backyard herd of goats.

And yet, these guys also make a little pilgrimage to Nashville's own Vanderbilt University in order to confer with assorted scholars about the sanctity and validity of their remarkable thrift-store-archaeological find. And to me, this is really where the film got most interesting. They encountered one Mormon scholar who was very nearly hostile (apparently, there is some discussion of the Urim and Thummim in The Book of Mormon and she felt a little like they were treading on her turf, perhaps) and an archaeologist who encouraged the guys to get the thing carbon-dated (they refused, ostensibly on grounds of expense, but also, probably out of fear that the jig would be up-- and, of course, they worried the scratch tests would damage the precious artifact).

But then, there was a mightily handsome rabbi and Hebrew scholar who was so steadfast in his refusal to speak to Todd and company as though they were anything less than legitimate and faithful religious seekers, much like himself, that I think I fell a little bit in love with him. OK, fine, I could never find happiness with a rabbi, I'll admit, due to my distrust of sets of rules--any rules--that get established once a group of people think they've found the one right and true path to God. And this guy in particular said something to the effect that he "really believes in Religion (capital R) as a concept that has the potential to guide people!" Which makes me think, "Yeah! It guides them right into my-way-is-better-than-your-way sorts of thinking and other varieties of problematic superiority complexes!" (Oh, heavens! Have I digressed?) And I also tend to think circumcision is a little bit medieval (all those little nerve endings go bye-bye-- so SAD for those boys! Oh, man. Am I really saying that one of the primary factors in my denying my Jewish heritage is my affection for penises? When did I get to be THAT hetero?). It just wouldn't do for a rabbi to have a spiritually frustrated and rebelliously agnostic wife, would it? Oh, well. So much for that fancy. However, this rabbi's earnestness rivaled Todd's own--and made him so completely appealing.

But Todd's interactions with the Vandy professors, as displayed in this film, walked a very tenuous tightwire. The fact that every time one of the academics gave Todd more information about the Urim and Thummim, (like, for instance, the fact that the words translate to "light" and "perfection"), he was all too willing to incorporate every little tidbit into his homegrown theology, as though he had already intuitively ascertained every ounce of Urim and Thummim scholarship in existence. And that aforementioned tightwire falls smack dab on the county line between Patheticville and Charming Heights. It's an odd note for a film to hit-- and a complicated one --but the filmmakers managed to prevent the overall timbre of these moments from falling into outright condescension. I feel pretty confident in accrediting their particularly soft touch with making the subject matter of the film simultaneously completely preposterous and completely authentic. It's as if preposterousness and authenticity were both so wholly parts of Todd's very soul that Cornett and his partner, Jacob Young, merely had to put them on parade to create that sort of tension on the screen.

Interestingly, though, the rabbi also said that Todd bore all the markings of a real religious leader--scoffed-at in his own time, extremely and passionately steadfast in his faith, and possessing of a charisma great enough to attract and maintain a handful of loyal believers (managers of Auto Zones and wrestling circuit has-beens, though they may be). And really, the possibility that Todd and Dave and Dale just might not be full of complete and utter shit is what makes the film, little artifact of Americana anthropology that it is, so resonant and fascinating. I mean, what if Todd Walker's thrift-store gewgaw (rigged up with mini-LCD light and magnifying glass, no less) really does hold so many secrets of the universe? All those secrets that these people claim to have seen within its cavity? Just suspending the natural skepticism just for a heartbeat opens up the window for this very possibility. For those of us disinclined to find comfort in any sort of organized religion in the first place, well, Todd seems no more or less viable a religious leader than, say, Pat Robertson or the Dalai Lama in exile, right? And who am I to begrudge him his faith?

Or to doubt that those of us in the audience of the screening of the rough cut of this documentary were witnessing the very dawn of a brand new faith?

YouTube is for poets, too!

Please note my new link over there on the right for The Continental Review. For those who feel poetry-reading-deprived, now you can watch some of the good ones read their work right from the privacy of your office cubicle or kitchen counter or, if you're feeling particularly fearless about electrocution, your own bathtub! This is a new video poetics online magazine. How exciting, yeah?

In particular, have a look at Joshua Marie Wilkinson's readings. He's got one solo and one pretty great duet reading of 8 poems with Noah Eli Gordon. Really, I just felt like plugging him because I went to grad school with him (even though he had a different name then) and I always respected his work quite a lot.

Enjoy!

Marjorie's Post-Fast Soup of Vegan Fun

1 tbsp cold-press extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp cold press organic flax seed oil
1 large yellow onion
4 stalks celery
4 small carrots
2 cloves garlic
1 cup green lentils
8 cups water
3 small turnips
5 baby Yukon gold potatoes
4 small baby sweet potatoes (or one medium-sized regular one)
1 small yellow summer squash
4 big leaves of bok choi
2 medium-sized tomatoes
1 cup chopped green beans
4 leaves green kale (you can also add turnip greens here if you want more greens--I couldn't find them at the store)
1 1/2 tbsp chopped fresh ginger
1 long stalk fresh lemon grass
2 tbsp fresh basil leaves
2 tbsp fresh cilantro
the juice of 2 limes
1 1/2 tbsp salt
a generous splash of soy sauce
cayenne pepper (if you've just been through the fast, you should be able to tolerate quite a bit of cayenne)


In a large pot (the biggest I've got is my Dutch oven and it was overflowing by the end of this process), saute the chopped onion in the olive and flax seed oils until it begins to become translucent. Add the chopped celery and carrots and cook until they begin to soften. Then add the garlic and saute until fragrant. Add the lentils and stir so that they become coated with the oil and heated through. Then add 6 cups of the water and bring to a good simmer.

Once the water is hot, add the chopped turnips, potatoes and sweet potatoes. While those are beginning to cook, chop the rest of the vegetables. Add the squash and green beans and let them begin to cook first. Then, several minutes later, add the tomatoes, bok choi and kale. Sprinkle with salt. Add in the ginger, lemon grass, lime juice, soy sauce and cayenne. If you've been chopping vegetables as you go, it will likely have taken you about 45 minutes to an hour from the time you started sauteing the onions, so the lentils and root vegetables should be cooked through. Be careful not to overcook the vegetables or the soup will lose its fresh taste and begin to taste like every other boring vegetable soup you ever had.

At the last minute, stir in chopped basil and cilantro leaves. And then thank whatever or whoever you usually pray to that food exists. Be happy and feel virtuous, you, with your plaque-free colon! You survived!

After you serve the first bowl, add the remaining 2 cups of water because you will have drained most of the broth. You'll have enough leftover to eat for the next couple of days while your body re-acclimates to having food in it.



And in case you're wondering, yes, I made this up all by myself. The Whole Foods produce section can be immensely inspiring when you haven't eaten for a week.

Days 7, 8 and 9

I would have posted more stuff about my various and assorted gastronomic adventures this weekend, but it was really more of the same and I was bored with that. I did, in fact, manage to make it all the way up until this morning when I broke my fast with a glass of diluted orange juice. I get to drink several glasses of OJ today... and no solid food until late in the day tomorrow. So far, I've had no issues with the orange juice but I'm nervous about having my stomach reject stuff tomorrow. I've got a bottle of pro-biotics at home, and one of the websites recommends that I take some of those to restore the good bacteria to my belly. Usually, pro-biotics (the opposite of antibiotics) do wonders for my general feeling of well-being. If I liked yogurt or Kombucha (fermented green tea-- some whacked-out-tasting stuff!) more, I'd probably stick to those, seeing as they contain similar live active cultures, but I'll admit to breaking my no-pill rule for this particular dietary supplement.

So, anyway, my skin is clearer than it has been since before I hit puberty and I can once again fit into the jeans I bought when I was going through my break-up with my ex-girlfriend, Michelle, three years ago. And the best news of all? I don't itch anymore! So, all in all, I deem this project a success.

However, I'm itching (in a psychic sort of way) to get back to my usual movie rants. I still haven't finished talking about the NaFF and, over the past few weeks, I've been staging an Almodovar retrospective in my living room in celebration of the DVD release of Volver.

And so, let this post mark the official end of my discussion of my fast. There've been laughs. There've been tears. There's been controversy. There's been food-porn. But now it's over.

And to that, I toast with a glass of diluted orange juice.

Day 6: Eating is sexy again

A sauce for chicken made with lemon, maple syrup, cayenne, shallots and maybe a little cream. The guacamole burgers and Swedish fries from Bobbi's Dairy Dip. Bananas. Bleu cheese. Tomatoes. Tomato soup. Pulled pork shoulder barbecue. Lime sorbet. English clotted cream. Polish sausage. Spanish chorizo. Green tea ice cream. Pita bread. Sopa de albondigas from Maya Quetzal. Dutch process cocoa, no sugar. My famous vegetarian lasagna. My famous beer/chipotle chili. Birthday cake. Stir-fried tofu and vegetables. Pork tenderloin po-boys. Tuna rolls. Cardamom cookies. Chess pie. Red velvet cake. Coconut cake. Thanksgiving stuffing. French onion soup. Portobello mushrooms stuffed with roasted red peppers and ricotta cheese. Baby artichoke risotto. Mangoes. Raspberries. Bing cherries. Strawberries. Pineapple. Tomatoes. Tomatoes. Tomatoes. Mom's famous Grand Marnier pan souffle. Popovers. Shortbread. Apricot scones. Walnut tarts. Lime paletas. Tamarind paletas. Cucumber paletas. Salsa. Coffee and chickory. White peony tea. Greek yogurt with honey. Cashew butter. Pistachios. Gyros. Black beans and rice. Cilantro. Chicken sagwala. Wild mushroom soup. Butternut squash soup. Salt. Maple fudge. Cornbread with jalapenos and onions. Crusty French bread. Aged gouda. Rice pudding. Chicken stuffed with bleu cheese and walnuts. Arugula. Enchiladas with chile verde salsa. Parmisiano Reggiano. Prociutto. Apricots. Nectarines. Plums. Grapefruit. Lentils. Peppercorns. Spicy hot chocolate. Pork tenderloin with prickly pear sauce from Janos. Chicken Mole from Cafe Poca Cosa. Chicken with white wine and shallot sauce. Brown rice. Baked potatoes. Cotton candy. Crystallized ginger. Thai red curry. Green beans. Pork tenderloin with bananas from Virago. Fried plantains. Hot chicken. Hot and sour soup. Steamed broccoli. Gyoza. 75% cacao chocolate. Garlic. Janos' chocolate jalapeno ice cream. Hummus. Soba noodles. Green papaya salad. Tarragon. Mushrooms. Pine nuts. Saffron. Basil. Those mushrooms I said I'd marry from Layl'a Rul. Pears. Spinach pizza from DaVinci's. Okra. Turnips. Yukon golds. Artichokes. Belgian endive. Venison. Poppy seeds. Mustard seeds. Yellow mustard. Dijon mustard. Spicy Chinese mustard. Bagels. Knudsen's Very Veggie juice. Shepherd's pie. Oatmeal. Horchata. Sole with butter-leek sauce. Mom's leek and potato soup. A spoonful of sugar. A spoonful of honey. Whipped cream. Buttercream icing. Blood orange and ricotta cheesecake from Cafe Nonna. Michelle's fried egg, tomato and cheddar sandwiches. Beercan chicken. Grilled lambchops. Avocados. Avocados. Avocados. Lemonade without cayenne pepper in it. Pina colada smoothies. Vanilla. Nutmeg. Mashed potatoes. My chocolate ganache homemade icecream. Creme fraiche. Mascarpone cheese. Pancakes. Key lime pie. Poetry Center Punch. Jicama and lime. Fennel bulb. Mache. Carrots. Sharp cheddar. Tabasco. Zucchini. Zucchini and rice frittatas. Raw green beans.

And Twinkies.


Hunger is supposed to abate on the third day of fasting.

It didn't.

Day 5: stop giving me shit, people!

So, it seems some friends are starting to give me some flack about how unhealthy "fad diets" are and whatnot. This thing that I'm doing is called the Master Cleanse and versions of it have been around for centuries. You can follow this link if you simply must have more information, but I can assure you: it's perfectly safe. Grade B maple syrup is loaded with minerals and assorted vitamins-- not to mention sugar (i.e., calories)-- and let's keep in mind, I'm drinking about a cup and a half of it every day! And lemon juice is a natural antiseptic that kills all kinds of bad stuff. And the cayenne is just yummy. OK, that's just because I like it. Really, I think the concoction tastes pretty good-- and I'm not just saying that because I haven't eaten anything in two days. But folks, seriously. I'm fine. I need to get the evil, toxic, sickening, rash-inducing prescription drugs out of my system. If I go to a conventional doctor, he or she will poopoo my anxieties about taking drugs and then prescribe something new and even more evil. I've taken that avenue before and at this point, I feel like conventional medicine is for emergencies only. If I had to ask someone to sew my arm back on, sure, I'd go to a hospital. But little day-to-day ailments? I do believe that you can use food as medicine -- and as much as I love many things that aren't so good for me, I have to acknowledge the fact that I really do feel a lot better when I don't eat those things. So, folks, lay off it! I'm not trying to kill myself or do damage to my internal organs or starve myself skinny or anything of that nature. I want these toxins out of my body... and I want them out NOW! I don't think this is unreasonable.


However, after that big long disclaimer, I find that I must admit that I'm beginning to lose faith in this project. I was actually far less hungry today than I was yesterday. I feel perfectly normal, actually. I'm having these doubts today mainly I don't think I'm really experiencing too many of the detox symptoms. I'll spare you the details and let the curious follow this link. Except, maybe, I've gotten a little of the tongue-coating thing but I really attribute that back to the maple syrup. It's a hell of a lot of sugar that I'm ingesting. It's only natural that it would do that to the inside of my mouth.

But I'm thinking, well, I don't smoke (not one cigarette in my entire life, thank you) and I drink, really, very little alcohol. I eat meat maybe two or three times a week and, outside of the tablespoon of cream I put in my coffee, dairy things are kind of special-occasions food items for me. So, the worst that I do to myself is that I eat more wheat than I should-- though I try to do whole grains as much as possible-- and the one single cup of coffee in the mornings. My point is that maybe I'm already pretty clean? With the exception of two rounds of antibiotics in the last year (both of which I reacted to) and about three nights last month where I had to take a decongestant so I could sleep, well, how toxic could I be?

Seeing as I feel ok, I think I could probably pull this out for a while if I had to. But I'm not sure I see the point when I feel pretty confident that my body will have gotten rid of the majority its bad stuff by, like, Saturday. And I'm not sure that continuing this just to test my mental fortitude is all that great a reason to do so. My goal is still to hold out until the end of Sunday... and I guess I'll assess if I want to keep going when I get there.

Day 3/4: Food is for sissies

So, I got bored with listing all the things I ate so I didn't post yesterday. It was more vegan, sugar-free, salt-free, caffeine free fun. Or at least, in comparison today, it sure sounds like fun. I went to Trader Joe's (complete and utter torture, by the way... especially the open carton of chocolate-covered soynut samples at the checkout) to pick up some more lemons and water, wondering if my checkout person was going to think I ran a lemonade stand for a living... but instead, he asked me if I was afraid I'd get scurvy. I'm pleased to report that I have no scurvy anxieties whatsoever.

However, as I launch into this fast, I'm encountering a few unanticipated other anxieties. For one, I'm not sure that I trust this lemon/maple syrup/cayenne concoction to actually keep me alive. I mean, the conviction that a body needs food to live runs pretty deep. The deal is, every time I feel hungry, I'm supposed to drink some of this stuff. OK, but the thing is, every time I get hungry I think about food and then I remind myself that I'm not allowed to eat any, I get a little panicked. And really, a good long swig of this stuff does stave off the hunger for, like, 1/2 an hour or so. But every time I get hungry, I can't seem to shake the doubt that I'll get that 1/2 hour of reprieve. On an average day, I have this massive friggin' appetite. I tend wonder if I'm a little sick when I'm NOT just a little bit hungry. So, I drank about 4 1/2 liters of this stuff today. And four more days of this? I'm kinda scared. I mean, what if I wake up in the middle of the night so hungry that I can't sleep? Or, am I ingesting so few calories that my body will require more rest?

But beyond these smaller worries, the desire to eat is so closely related to the desire to keep living that I'm pretty sure food consumption is more than just a habit we've all gotten into and can't quite shake. Hunger is not a state of mind. Generally, I resist the notion that the mind and the body are separate concepts, seeing as that which creates the mind-- i.e., the brain-- is a body part. And so this sort of activity that pits the mind against the body in a contest of wills goes against my general sense of philosophic direction. I'm secretly hoping that either my mind decides this is a hare-brained idea and gives up or my body gets into the swing of things and stops arguing so vehemently about its needs. Because even thinking about them as separate entities isn't making much sense to me. Perhaps this isn't so much of a debate between mind and body-- both of which, in the end, require food to operate-- but between will and necessity. Or between will and desire. See? There you go. I guess my own personal jury is still out on whether hunger is a question of desire or need.

I'm sure I'll have more to say on that, as I have a hunch, along about Friday, I'll be eroticizing everything edible of which I can think.

Also, drinking this much maple syrup has deposited a distinct layer of plaque all over my teeth, and the rest of my mouth, too. Tomorrow, I shall be bringing my toothbrush with me to work. Yuck!

Day 2

The good news is that my headache has abated, to a degree. It's still there but I can think again, which is always nice.

The bad news is that I've been hungry for most of the day.

I forced myself to drink a smoothie made of berries and almonds and a banana well before my hunger cue had kicked in for the day, mostly because I couldn't think of a good way to transport the stuff to work. What would they do if I showed up with my mini-cuisinart and a frozen banana? And then I got to eat 3 plums.. which I tried to drag out all morning because the early smoothie kick-started my appetite. I made it all the way to 10:30 before I was eying the remains of a chocolate bar, still on my desk from my previous life... uh... last week. And then around 11:30, I caved and figured I'd better go investigate the large bowl of chopped raw vegetables I'd brought for lunch. It included alfalfa sprouts, yellow bell pepper, cherry tomatoes, cucumber and the better portion of a bulb of fennel. To dress that big bowl of health, I was allowed a tablespoon of flaxseed oil, some lime juice, an insane amount of garlic and cayenne pepper. I've been eating so much garlic the last couple of days, I don't know how much fun it is to hang out with me. Fortunately for me, I cannot smell myself! And then, my afternoon snack consisted of celery and cucumber sticks for the dipping into tahini. And you know? The first few bites of tahini all by itself (as opposed to in its proper place amongst chickpeas and lemon juice) are ok. But long about your 7th or 8th bite, it occurs to you that tahini tastes a lot like snot. And so, I deemed snack time over. When I finally decided that I was going to vacate my miserable job for the evening, I rushed home because I was already starving and knew I had at least an hour of cooking ahead of me. And here I sit, shoveling down a bowl of pureed vegetable soup that was just awful until I added a buttload of the approved herbs and spices. It's still bland and less satsifying than the squash/potato thing I made last night. I think, in a little while, I get to eat a bowl of fruit with some pecans on top. While I'm sure this sounds festive to all of you, I'm really beginning to doubt my commitment to the post-detox fast part. If I'm this hungry while I'm still eating solid food... yeah, I just don't know...

Man, I'd really love a burger and some icecream right about now.

Day 1

Hunger:
Most of my energy today has gone into food preparation. Really, I haven't been inordinately hungry at all because, although this initial three-day detox consists of eating simple carbs-- i.e., quickly digesting foods-- I've been able to continue feeding myself around the clock. My lunch today consisted of a makeshift guacamole, which I found surprisingly tasty, despite the fact that I couldn't eat it with chips and despite the other fact that I couldn't put salt in it. I also had a sizable bowl of mache with lemon juice and flaxseed oil. So far, this isn't really all that far off from what I usually eat. And then I got a weird afternoon snack of grilled grapefruit with ginger on top (this was a little odd but not too bad). And then for dinner, I made this thing that I thought I was gonna hate-- made from sweet potatoes and acorn squash (I don't like either of these particularly unless I can add a lot of salt to them-- and that's against the rules here) and a turnip (which I didn't have, so I substituted a couple baby Yukon golds). But then I got to load it up with garlic, cayenne, cumin, turmeric, coriander and paprika... and, I swear! I'd eat it even if I weren't on a crazy diet. Hell, I think it's a good option for a the obligatory Thanksgiving sweet potatoes which I resent having to make every year, though, I think I'd add salt if I were going to feed it to anyone else. And then I had another bowl of greens and flaxseed oil.

It's occurred to me as I've been standing in the kitchen all day that I've fallen into some serious single-girl eating habits. I rarely cook anything more often that once a week or so. My evening meal frequently consists of hummus, pitas, a carton of cherry tomatoes and a glass of wine. And the thing is, I eat in front of my computer screen and don't really spend much mental energy on what I'm consuming at all. When I was in my last long-term relationship, I cooked a lot-- and WE cooked a lot. And we grocery shopped together... and I feel like I just thought about food a whole lot more than I have since I moved to DC. It was more than a necessity; it was a part of our little two-person community. I do miss that part of being hooked up, I guess. And truly, food is important to me. More on this later.

Headache:
As I mentioned in my post earlier this morning, I awoke with a slight headache, which I attribute to my caffeine withdrawal. And this headache has swelled and blossomed into a real humdinger throughout the day. At some moments, it feels as though my brain is sloshing about in a bucket of water. It's dizzying and liquidy and thick. And then, at other moments, it's more of a shimmering sort of pain-- pointilistic, almost-- and it feels like it exists in a wide, airy halo OUTSIDE of my skull. It's so big, I swear. I napped briefly this afternoon, hoping to assuage my body's hew and cry for a friggin' cuppa joe... but, when my mom's phone call woke me up, I'm afraid I was barely coherent. And even now, this beast persists.

I had, in fact, been anticipating this headache. A couple of years ago, I found a lump the size of an olive in my right breast. After a visit to the radiologist, it was assessed to be just one of those cysts that a lot of women get, though its size seemed to impress the doctor, especially because I was only 28. The doctor told me that I could shrink the cyst significantly if I cut caffeine out completely. And so, I went through this business back then, too. Slowly, of course, first green tea, then black tea and finally coffee all found their ways back into my grocery cart. And so, here I am, suffering through this swimmy feeling all over again.

It has been suggested to me that perhaps this headache and, also, the rash that's prompted this little experiment, have occurred only because I've anticipated them. But I would venture to say that there's a big difference between hypochondria and being able to recognize the cues that our bodies give us. I mean, pain and physical discomfort have their uses. That's how our bodies tell us when we've done something that they don't like. And in the case of this headache, I know exactly what would make it go away but I'm choosing not to make myself that cup of coffee. And choosing anew with every minute. Ugh. Really, my being able to easily determine and attribute the causes of my weird symptoms-- instead of becoming increasing anxious and frustrated when I can't sleep due to my intensely itchy feet, for example-- is kinda the opposite of hypochondria. There is value to this sort of bodily awareness, I think. At the very least, I can feel proactive towards ridding myself of these annoyances.

Back on task:
So, yes, I've been meditating on food and its relation to self-- my self, in particular-- all day. In my own peculiar world view, food-- even moreso than sex-- is the bottom line for us all. And as such, I've come to see the consumption thereof as a deeply political act. Lucky for me, there are other folks out there with similar ideas...and some of those folks make documentaries! You didn't think I'd stop talking about movies altogether, now, did you?

Probably my favorite film that I saw during the Film Festival was a really-and-truly top-notch documentary called Milk in the Land: Ballad of an American Drink. The two directors, Ariana Gerstein and Monteith McCollum, have gotten a little notoriety in the past for another agricultural documentary called Hybrid, which is, I think, about corn. I don't know if I can get my hands on that film, but I certainly hope to. Part of what's so great about this film is that it's stylistically atypical of documentaries. They use quite a bit of creepy, foggy, time-lapse footage of cows and some other low-fi animation techniques to create an atmosphere that is positively Gothic.

I'm not sure I actually learned much from this film, which is, I suppose, intended to be informative, but I've also previously sought out most of the information conveyed here. The film opens with a guy discussing the ways in which cow's milk is generally detrimental to one's personal constitution-- he talks about all the cancers and diseases and weight problems and phlegm and skin problems and everything else that are more common amongst populations that consume large amounts of dairy. And I've heard these statistics so many times that I'm inclined to think they're true. But the quirky little zealot they have preaching this particular sermon is totally hilarious and really quite convincing. Well, sorta. There's not much that's gonna make me replace the cheese on my pizza with that pasty soycheese nonsense... or cut out icecream permanently.

There's also a lovely little segment in which they discuss the inherent racism in the promotion of milk as an All-American beverage. It's very well-documented that white folks are less likely to be lactose-intolerant than members of any other race on the planet. I, for one, have absolutely no issues digesting dairy. My Asian friend Brian, however, is quite proud of his puking-up-a-milkshake discovery of his intolerance. It's a gross story. Trust me. And I know that the public school system has always provided under-privileged students with free milk-- thus making them both sick and sleepy (sleepiness is a symptom of low-level food intolerance-- this happens to me every time I eat bread. Gluten, you're a bastard!). An interesting tidbit from the movie: in the early parts of the 20th century, most white babies were fed via bottles with these crazy long rubber tubes attached to the nipples. Bacteria would grow in the tubes and the babies would get sick and die... meanwhile, all the black babies, whose parents could afford milk, were breastfed and thusly, lived. Fascinating, eh? It is to me, anyway!

The movie then launches into a long section about organic and natural farming... and the ethics of food consumption. When I tell people that I do most of my shopping at organic grocery stores, they're frequently appalled that I would spend so much on food. Those with families say things like, "well, I have to buy so much for my kids that spending all that money is just a waste." And this sort of comment sickens my heart a little bit. There was one farmer interviewed in this film who relayed a story about a man approaching him at his farmer's market booth. The man asked the farmer how he could have the gall to charge so much for his eggs. The farmer answered, saying that he hoped to one day be able to achieve the same standard of living as his customers. And guys like him are just one of the beneficiaries of supporting sustainable agriculture. I mean, the effluvia that flow from big corporate farms? That stuff is systematically, unaccountably, destroying the ecosystems of their surrounds. And this film goes on to show plenty of creepy giant robots milking cows that see daylight maybe once a week-- if that! And this doesn't begin to address the fact that the hormone additives in all conventionally-produced animal products cause cancer, infertility, zits, and a host of other human ailments.

Oh, and there was also a rather elucidating segment in which the filmmakers explored these caves that were full, floor to ceiling, with bags and bags and bags of powdered milk that the government has bought off of dairy farms all around the country. And it's all surplus. Basically, they've created a system, now, in which cows lactate all year round (instead of just during calving season, as would be a normal expectation of your average cow body) and they produce about 20 times the milk that cows did 50 years ago... and plain and simple, all the humans in the world do not consume enough milk to keep up with the quantities that the dairies are producing. And so, we send out tax money to pay for the storage of this stuff.. and let's not forget that even powdered milk spoils. And sure, yeah, they ship some of it to other countries as part of assorted relief packages. But, let's also not forget that there aren't that many predominantly white third world countries. So, yeah, essentially, we're sending big pallets of gastrointestinal discomfort in the name of American generosity.

The one thing that I wished they'd talked a little more about is the corporatizing of organic farming. I mean, the big natural food chains like Wild Oats and Whole Foods are primarily supplied by big corporate farms, rather than smaller local operations. And according to my mom, my go-to girl for all things food-related, the Bush administration has taken great strides in lowering the standards for what is considered "organic." So, the jury's still out on whether or not the bigger organic facilities can operate both ethically (in terms of their environmental practices, their animal treatment practices, and their food-handling practices) and cheaply. But the whole thing makes me nervous. Once those sorts of companies get sufficient capital behind them, what's stopping them from bending the rules in favor of making more capital? I just wish Gerstein and McCollum had addressed this issue just a little... but then, the movie could have been 5 hours long and I would have been riveted.

In the end, eating is always going to be a question of values to me. I spend a lot of money on food because I do not want my money, even if it's less of it, to support an industry and companies that operate in opposition to my values. Incidentally, yet another contributor to this movie has a great segment in which she describes the reasons that people are more likely to spend their necessities budget on fancy clothes and houses than on fancy food because the former are visible to others while what we eat is not, in any way, equated with social status. Doesn't that just cut to the quick?

This stuff is so tremendously important to me-- moreso, even, than reaping the health-related benefits of eating primarily organic-- that I get a little hot under the collar when folks tell me that it's a waste. But truly, I think the concept of activistic consumerism is alive and well... and I hope to participate in it as much as I'm able. I'm not really the best audience for this movie because I walked in, already nodding my head in accordance with its sympathies. But I'm really really really hoping that it'll find its way to an audience that can really benefit from the truly fascinating exploration therein... and I hope that they'll also enjoy it for its stylish, funky presentation.

Oh dear god, how my head hurts.

Should I be disappointed?

So, not very much happened with my salt water flush except that initially, I felt very thirsty and very bloated... and then I drank more water and got more bloated. And then I got a little crampy sort of stomachache and then I got very very cold. And then, I expelled a very small quantity of matter. So, though I followed the directions to a T, I guess it's possible that I did it wrong? But then maybe because my usual diet is rather fiber-heavy to begin with, maybe there wasn't a whole lot backed up there? Yeah, I dunno.

So, now that I've arisen and begin the first day of eating monastically, I have fed myself a rather chewy smoothie of orange, papaya, coconut and cinnamon. It tasted quite nice but is no substitute for my Misha's Route 66 Dark Roast Blend. I have a little headache and I think I'm psychosomatically hungry. I mean, I rarely eat much of anything beyond coffee until 10 or 11 in the morning (assuming I've arisen around 6), but the idea that I now have to wait a couple of hours until I allow myself a lovely morning snack of 1 apple and 1 pear (both, unfortunately, out of season) incites in me a deep desire to go gorge on cookies.

I will stay strong.

Much prodding of beach rubble to come

The above title is a reference to one of Sappho's fragments that my friend Frances often quotes. I think the most common translation is something like "Those who are squeamish should not prod the beach rubble." I begin this post, which is likely to lead into a little bit of an intermission between movie posts, in such a way because I am about to begin a detox, followed by a little fast. I do not have plans to do as my friend Jason did and post pictures of the contents of my toilet as I navigate this little project (if anyone really wants to know, I think they're still out there. I can supply the link), but let this serve as fair warning that I do intend to document my progress here... and it may get a little ooky now and again.

I'm doing this because last week, I had yet another one of my recurrent bladder infections. From what I gather, yeah, sure, plenty of girls get these... but I'm telling you! They're really the total opposite of fun. Well, once my usual spasms had progressed to the point where I was peeing pink-- and staying up all night, thinking that reading my friend Jennifer's memoir manuscript-- which is a remarkable onomatopoeic screech of gorgeous writing -- was just about the only thing exciting enough to distract me from the needles in my urinary tract--I figured I'd better succumb and go on an antibiotic. Usually, my body hates foreign chemicals and rebels in all sorts of interesting ways. But this time, I'd made it all the way through my round of pills... and even several more days... but then, yesterday, I awoke to a sensation something akin to spiders crawling around my kneepits. But though I was itchy throughout the day, yesterday was manageable. Today, however, I think I would enjoy ripping the skin right off the palms of my hands and the soles of my feet very very much. And same goes for any place covered with hair. No, I'm not kidding. And no, I don't have crabs ( I did actually check... prior to reminding myself just exactly how unlikely that particular diagnosis is). But, yeah, so, I've got yet another creeping rash... and so, my solution is to smoke out as many nasty synthetic compounds from my body as possible... via my very own amalgam of detoxes and fasts.

My first step-- which will commence upon completion of this post-- will be to guzzle a quart of salt water. Everyone I know says that you really kinda have to be sitting on the pot to do this step because it acts pretty darn fast. I'm a little scared about this part. I don't like peein' out my butt. Really, I don't. And don't you worry. I'll let you know EXACTLY how it goes.

My next step will be to eat three days worth of weird mixtures of vegetables, for which I just went and spent $100 at Whole Foods. My poor checkout girl was slightly flummoxed when I arrived with pretty much one of everything from the entire produce section. The bad part about this step is that I have to eat healthy grains like millet and quinoa, for which I do not particularly care. The good part is that I get to eat a LOT of tomatoes. OK, really? I eat a crazy amount of tomatoes anyway. Pretty much every night, I eat about a pint of cherry tomatoes for dinner. Just because I love them so.

The step after that will be to repeat the unpleasant salt water flushing business.

And then I'll begin my fast in earnest. I hoping to be able to pull it out for at least 5 days. All I get to eat is this concoction made from water, lemon juice, maple syrup and cayenne pepper (that may sound distasteful to some of you, but I enjoy all the ingredients, so I'm hoping for the best). And I also get as much, uh, water (!) as I want!!! The guide to this fast says that I should do it for a minimum of 10 days... and if I really wanted to, I could go for 40 days drinking nothing but that weird lemonade stuff. That seems just a touch ambitious for a hedonist such as myself but we'll see how I feel 5 days in.

So, needless to say, the stuff that's really off my list right now includes caffeine, alcohol, meat, dairy, sugar and wheat. At least, those are the main things. I'm thinking I'll probably have a little caffeine withdrawal headache for the first couple of days... and shortly after that, I'll do that food obsessing thing that happens when you're just so friggin' hungry... but then, all the literature says that that fades and that you start to feel quite normal. I'm hoping to not encounter too many of the odors that the body is supposed to emit while ridding itself of the assorted venoms of the typical American diet (I self-flatteringly assume that my normal diet isn't all that typically American, seeing as it's so heavily weighted with tomatoes and greens and other fruit, but I do keep a pint of icecream in the freezer and I do put heavy cream in my chicory/coffee every morning, so I'm no food-saint). But I'm really really really hoping that I can get a little respite from the spare tire that seemed to show up long about the time I turned 24.. and hasn't loosened one iota since, regardless of strenuousness and frequency of my yoga practice. Oh, spare tire, how I hate you. How eagerly I anticipate your departure.

And now I commence. I may or may not spare you the details.

*Sigh*

Here's a post-vacation list of things I really do miss about my hometown, in no particular order.

1. Seeing Faith Hill at the mall, looking not at all like she does in videos

2. Nola, the Cajun/Uruguayan restaurant on West End

3. The shepherd's pie from Family Wash in East Nashville

4. Lightning 100 (there's not one goddamn decent radio station in DC!)

5. The fried green tomatoes at Jackson's in Hillsboro Village

6. Yazoo beer

7. The dude at daVinci's Pizza who makes googly eyes at me every single solitary time I go in there

8. Woo, the best cosmetics store ever

9. Getting pedicures with my mom

10. The Cotillionistas

11. Finding fruit tea at most restaurants

12. Movie after movie with Jon

13. Not having to Mapquest every-damn-thing so as to find my way around

14. Talking politics with my dad over coffee in the morning

15. Baja Burrito (Chipotle, you don't hold a candle!)

16. La Senorita Holly "Bunnyface" Meadows

17. People who know what both Red Velvet cake AND Chess pie are

18. Las Paletas (I have yet to taste the basil. Basil popsicle, you're waiting for me--taunting me,even-- aren't you?)

19. Seeing deer out the window during my yoga practice

20. And, of course, Noah, my beloved, beloved, beloved schmogface

A Pairing: Two Meditations on the Subject of "Home"

I still have several more Film Fest tasty treats that I want to talk about here… so I’m trying to get my blogposts written while hovering tentatively within the jetBlue hot spots in the airports. Unfortunately, the Nashville airport has no such thing… they charge you for the signal. Tres annoying!

So, anyway, I saw two more little narrative films that were both so pointedly grounded in their sense of place that I feel like I can talk about them together. The first is a really simple, but gorgeously shot, movie that came out of the African nation of Chad. It’s called Dry Season. The film guide for the festival describes it as a story about thwarted revenge... but that’s not entirely accurate. As the story goes, a young man is sent, by his blind, green-robed grandfather, from one dusty little desert town to another dusty little desert town to exact revenge upon the man who killed his father. Except that our villain turns out to be a gruff but generous bread baker-- who quickly takes the young guy on as his apprentice. And then when time comes for our hero to kill his newly adoptive father-figure, well, he fakes it. After all, the grandfather is blind, right? Any ol’ gunshot sound is a good as a true-aimed one.

This is the sort of film that isn’t groundbreaking in its filming or its storytelling, but it’s still pretty impressive that something this fluid and poetic and polished is coming out of a place like Chad. In some ways, it reminded me a little of Burnt by the Sun, a great little film that was one of the first stories-about-home to escape the Communist Soviet Union right after the fall. The characters in both are wholly products of their homeland and yet do not seem exoticized or fetishized for an American audience. Dialogue is employed minimally in Dry Season, but these people are intensely expressive-- the boy pouts and the old baker guy grouses-- and their triumphs and foibles are played out visually in such a way that the audience doesn’t feel led thru the story, but rather the story happens irrespective of the audience. Handholding on the part of the filmmakers is simply unnecessary.

Really, I’d anticipated that this would be a sad story, full of tough consequences, in the way that Tsotsi was. But, I was pleasantly surprised to find a sweet and simple story full of humor and a more complicated form of justice than I expected from a movie billed as a “revenge story." It’s much more of an “adoptive family” sort of movie, I guess. For a real revenge story, I’d be much more likely to direct viewers to the like of Corean director Chan-wook Park's Revenge Trilogy (Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance, Oldboy, and Lady Vengeance—great and wicked films, all). However, for something homey that’s not about YOUR home, Dry Season is a sweet and sharp little film. May it find delicious distribution!

And I’d like to pair this film with a deeply, deeply American movie called Swedish Auto. I must concede that my feelings about this film are a little colored by the fact that I was utterly charmed by the director/screenwriter, Derek Sieg, during his Q&A session after the screening. Most folks seemed interested in asking him about technical filmmaking and marketing issues but I wanted to know how, as a writer, he defines his boundaries of "home." He'd said that he wrote the script while living in L.A., but it's set in Charlottesville, VA... where he grew up. And it's a very Charlottesville movie. Caressingly so. So, I wanted him to talk about writing about home when you're not home.

I suppose this is a thing I notice because I had to leave the South and move to Tucson in order to write my manuscript... which is mostly about the South-- Southern food and Southern race relations-- and just about every poem has a Southern accent when I hear it in my head. And I'm never so accutely aware that I'm a white girl from the South as when I'm not living there. Just yesterday, a co-worker totally raised my dander with her assumptions about racism and bumpkinism in my little corner of the country--- of course, there's far greater KKK membership in the mostly-white Midwestern states than there could possibly be in the southern states where the population is so much more diverse that it simply cannot support the same sorts of de facto segregation that, you know, Ohio can. I mean, Mississippi has one of the largest Vietnamese populations in the country and Nashville is home to more Kurds than just about any other metropolitan area. And that doesn't even address the fact that, in parts of the South, African Americans are barely a minority anymore. But I'm not saying that there aren't rednecks in Tennessee... of course there are. But there are also rednecks in New York. And Oregon. And certainly also in this co-worker's home state of Maryland. But simply because some white supremicists claim one particular region over another as their "home," they'll never be able make the region subject to any sort of group-think bigotry. That's just nonsense and so painfully offensive I can't even stand it. People are people-- and they will have their biases and blindspots, but those are definitely not predicated on where they're born/raised/reside. Wow.. this paragraph is rather tangential, eh?

Anyway, as I was saying, it seems to me that it's a rather writerly concession to move away from home and then obsessively write about nothing but home. Many of the shots in Swedish Auto are tight and close in; they lovingly probe the nooks and crannies of Charlottesville in such a way that belies the director's familiarity and comfort with this city. Sieg's clearly in love with this place. However, I find it pointed and significant that the resolution of his plot requires that his protagonists leave Charlottesville. When I asked him about his feelings about his subject matter, he became a little more animated and talked a little about exorcising those old demons of youth. Moreover, I think, he was excited to be acknowledged as much for being a writer as he is for being a filmmaker, though. Hence my being charmed: I love me some writerly enthusiasm! Well, and there's no denying that he's quite handsome, as well.

This is not to say, of course, that his filmmaking practice was anything less than thoroughly engaging. He whipped out a couple smart stage tricks-- including a sound effect and some flashing orange lights to denote an off-camera explosion. And because two of his characters where notable voyeurs, he was able to employ a succession of interesting through-the-window shots and cat-n-mouse kinda scenes in such a way that they felt new and untrodden.

I have a feeling that this movie, too, is likely to find distribution much in the same vein as a movie like Junebug. In many ways, it's got such a quintessentially "indie movie" feel-- and Lukas Haas, a frequent indie player, and January Jones (fresh from her knock-out spot in The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada) inhabit these characters in a manner that is sensitive without being sentimental. While the script isn't dialogue heavy, it does occasionally dip into some slightly stock-sounding conversation, but overall, this film embodies the sorts of tensions that are very familiar to me: simultaneous loyalty towards and restlessness within that one place that you'll always consider home, no matter how far away, and for however long, you go. It's this place that imprints itself upon you and your identity in such a way that you'll always feel obligated to answer for it even while it pricks and festers in the back of your brain. And maybe that's just what it's like to have a home.

How strange that I feel this way about Nashville, even though I've never felt more at-home (i.e., happy) than I did when I lived in Tucson. Must I always have such an affinity for the thing I rasp against most?