A (not so) simple question

When the server came to my table this morning, I already knew what I wanted for my post-hike meal: two eggs, hash browns, wheat toast, and strawberries. But two questions nagged at me that I lost the nerve to ask: Where did the eggs come from? Where did the strawberries come from?

These simple questions are loaded with implications and could potentially be received as negative or critical of the business. The diner was packed, my server was rushed, and it just didn't seem appropriate to ask, but I do want to start asking these types of questions because I do care about where my food comes from. What country, what state, what the conditions are for the animals before they are slaughtered. In fact, what has got me thinking more about food as a safety and humane issue are several related things.

Gene Bauer, author of Farm Sanctuary , detailing his work on the nonprofit place that he started in Watkins Glen, NY (http://www.farmsanctuary.org/), is coming to my campus to speak on Sept. 15. The moment I saw that announcement, I knew I wanted to incorporate his talk and an excerpt from his text into my Advanced Composition class. Our theme this semester is "pressing social and cultural issues," so I figured this would be a good one for us to start with before students go off and pick a topic that interests them. So I bought his book and read it in order to know which excerpts to give my students.

Honestly, I have several friends who are vegetarian or vegan, and am an animal lover and nature hound myself, and I also consider myself fairly well-read on a wide variety of topics. But the systemic abuse of both people and animals and the extraordinary levels of cruelty and malice built into the corporate farming industry makes me sick. Baby chickens being ground up ALIVE in wood chipper-type machinery? Feeding corn, dead chicken parts, and feces to cows messes with their digestive systems (I'm stunned), thus causing a ripe in-body environment for rabid strains of e-coli to grow? Starving male calves and holding them in pens so tiny they can't turn around so their flesh is soft and white (veal)? Boiling chickens alive? These are just some of the real-life horrors revealed in books like Bauer's and movies like Food, Inc. and I definitely think it is high time that we all start educating ourselves on where our food comes from and how these animals are treated or we cannot call ourselves a humane country. Period.

Bauer's book inspired me to do something I've been postponing for months because I knew how horrifying it was before even watching a minute: I watched the documentary Food, Inc. And yes, it is as hideous as you might expect - but also necessary. Books like Bauer's and documentaries like Food, Inc. expose a human-built system that completely disregards other species' rights wholesale. Even the idea that cows, chickens, and pigs feel pain. How can ANYONE think that these creatures don't feel pain? My god, I stopped fishing because I knew I was hurting the fish when I stunned it and then killed it. They squeak. Did you know that? Fish squeak when you kill them. (Aside: I do still eat fish, but only store-bought and only wild-caught, not farm-raised, and only occasionally.)

These texts also unveil many facts that the average consumer wouldn't know such as the reason junk food is so cheap is because those are the crops/products that are the most heavily subsidized because they are actually VERY EXPENSIVE to produce! This, to me, was a revelation. Perhaps it is something I should have known, being as highly educated as I am. But this is just one of the facts that I've since started looking into. Another is this lovely tidbit - according to the data in Food, Inc. 90% of the hamburger meat that is processed in this country goes through an AMMONIA BATH to kill e-coli.

AMMONIA. (Don't believe me? Go ahead. Read up: http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2010/01/nyt-discloses-pink-slime-they-call-hamburger/

I'm done ordering burgers. And no more grocery story meat. Not that I eat a lot of meat in the first place, but that lovely gem has solidified my resolve to purchase meat from local farmers who actually raise the animals, kill them and cut them up without any chemicals. These farmers live with these animals, care for them, and are as intimately involved in the killing process as anyone would wish to be. They do it by hand. Perhaps that makes me a hypocrite (maybe we're all hypocrites) because I'm willing to let someone else kill that animal for me. But that's a dilemma for another day...

The best way to guarantee our meat comes from local farmers is to shop at farmers markets where at least most of the produce, meats, and dairy are local or regional. Also, for a foodie like myself, I relish exquisite food, but haven't eaten veal since I was 23 because there is no reason to eat a baby cow. None. I suppose I will eventually become a vegetarian the way this is all affecting me, but in the meantime, I will try to seek out restaurants and stores that sell locally-produced meat, dairy, and produce. I have found two restaurants and several farmer's markets - that's a good start.

While thinking on these horrifying facts, I picked up a copy of today's Allentown Morning Call, my local paper. And look what the lead story is on the front page of the Sunday paper:

PA egg safety rules a model for coming federal regulations

At first blush, this article is very positive. PA is breaking new ground in voluntarily protecting consumers from salmonella in eggs. We're leading the charge, the feds are following, and my goodness, the FDA may again have the power to inspect places that process the food! Egads, what a concept.

But these chicken houses (in the photos) in Lancaster have 100,000 birds crammed into them on tilted metal grates on top of each other. According to Bauer's firsthand evidence, the grates cause broken feet and bones, the tilt causes the hens to never really be able to settle in so they are always moving, and the moment these hens stop producing at a high rate, they are sent to a slaughterhouse to be ground up into chicken nuggets or cow feed. This is humane? No. Would any one of us want to live this way? No. Then why have we rationalized away our basic sense of decency and humane treatment? We coddle our cats and dogs, feeding them organic specialized diets (or at least that's what my Lucy eats), exercising them, playing with them, buying them toys and fluffy beds...while the animals who are responsible for producing or becoming our steak dinner/chicken fingers/milkshake are treated as inanimate, unfeeling objects incapable of thinking or feeling pain.

Seriously?!


Seriously.


So my resolve was hindered this morning, but no more. I love diners, but I want the diners that I frequent to know that at least one of their customers cares where her eggs and strawberries came from. And the next time I visit that diner, which will probably the next time I hike the nearby nature preserve, I will make it a point to ask. And if they say "we don't know" or "from the store" or name a large manufacturing company - basically, any answer other than "X farm right down the road," I will very politely ask why not the farm down the road? And make a suggestion that they consider doing so.

Other changes I'm now committed to making include buying almost exclusively from farmer's markets and I am fortunate to live in a place with several permanent markets to choose from. And this includes animals for food - I've found an Amish farm that raises bison and chickens. I'm sure there are more if I just start looking. Might I suggest you do the same?

Life off the grid (and back on)

Almost the moment I landed this sweet new professor position, I canceled my cable and internet service because I know what a time suck they both are and I had to dedicate myself in monk-like fashion to completing the most daunting of tasks: my dissertation. Oh, I could still get online by tethering my phone to my laptop, but at dinosaur speeds compared to zippy cable internet. So my time spent online reduced drastically. In addition, I had no Top Chef or Real Housewives of Orange County or Law & Order: SVU marathons to sap away my valuable time. I heartily contend that because of my disconnection from the grid, I had ample time to complete my dissertation, move to PA, graduate, and do a myriad amount of other tasks usually relegated to the "but I don't have time" whine-bank.

Today marks my return to the grid, lightning-fast internet, and digital cable with 180 channels. I still don't have my new TV, mind you, but the cable is hooked up and ready to go once said beautiful new HD flat screen beauty arrives. And this as I embark on a new adventure as a junior faculty member teaching five composition classes my first semester - one introductory comp, three college comp, and one advanced comp. Also, my research agenda for this fall includes writing a book review (which I have taken baby steps toward beginning) and finishing the necessary revisions for a journal that has requested a "revise and resubmit" for one of my articles based on a dissertation chapter. This is the scholar-teacher's life and I am loving it. Sounds like a helluva lot of work, but I'm not worried. Fifteen weeks goes by so fast, as I've come to learn. And I'm also much more capable now of voluntarily moving off the grid in selective spurts when my need to be ultra-productive or ultra-outdoorsy intervenes.

Life off the grid has its uses and can retrain your brain to focus and concentrate more singularly on necessary tasks such as completing work on deadline, or fun tasks such as taking a solo hike or meeting friends for lunch. Focus and concentration of this kind is a dying skill and one that is worth regaining. Being off the grid means having more time to spend with people and most importantly, yourself. When is the last time you sat on your porch or balcony with a glass of wine or cup of coffee, without your phone, without your laptop, without even a book...and just sat and watched the trees or neighborhood, listened to the birds and bugs, while you (gasp) thought. Just thought. About anything that came to mind.

Here's a nifty experiment that I challenge you to try. Disconnect from the grid for 24 hours. Just 24 hours. Keep your phone on (in case of emergencies), but don't call anyone and no texting! Keep your TV off. And don't go online to email, check your favorite news site or blog, or to watch a streaming Netflix movie. (And if you're in school, that's no excuse - do this experiment starting Friday at 6pm and ending Sat. at 6pm...if you do, you might find you don't want to return to the grid until Sun. at 6...it's addicting!)

Disconnect from the grid for 24 hours and spend time with yourself - go walk in the woods Thoreau-style and think about where you are, what your life is like and where you'd like your life to go. Write old-school in a journal; muses about someone you have a crush on or maybe a place you'd love to visit, or how much you miss your mom. Listen to the radio...and not just your favorite tried and true stations - explore the channels and see what's out there. Finish an assignment or project that you've been putting off. Try something new - a restaurant, a new dish at your favorite restaurant, a hobby you've always wanted to try. Spend time with people - call up a friend you haven't physically seen in awhile (before the 24 hrs begins obviously) and plan a car ride to nowhere - just jump in the car with a map and no plan and just drive - turn after turn until you find a cool old antique store to wander around in, or a funky diner in a neighborhood you've never heard of...

My challenge to you my friends is to go off the grid for just 24 little hours. And see what happens. You might like it. ;)