Vaguely Automotive

When you're a kid, a car is one of the most grown-up things you can own. It represents freedom and adulthood and responsibility. You take care of it and put money into it and it takes you places you would probably never go on your own. Maybe you traverse the country together, just the two of you. Sometimes it's the only thing, or space, you can call your own in an otherwise chaotic world.

Cars can keep you warm and dry and get you places, but they can also be a lot of trouble. For this reason, some people switch them frequently. Many Americans consider it a given that an adult should not be without a car for any significant length of time. No matter the trouble they've had with past cars, some people hardly consider their own lifestyle or needs before jumping into another one.

But there are people who don't have cars.

It's easy for the drivers to look out of the windows of their own cars and pity the bikers, alone, exposed, and vulnerable, under no power but their own. I know, because I've looked out of my car windows at bikers, with the empathy borne from experience.

Bikers are colder in the winter, it's true. They have to struggle harder against the wind. In many ways, they are more vulnerable and at risk.

But they're also more independent and in many ways have greater freedom because of what they don't have. They are aware of their own strength and ability. They overcome their fears. They engage with the world in a way that drivers ensconced complacently in their cars couldn't imagine.

Some bikers are born to ride. Others find themselves carless after a short or long period of driving and decide to give it a shot temporarily. Some, like me, have always been bikers at heart, and remain bikers even when happily driving a car.

Winter reminds me how nice it is to have a car, and there are definitely things that make me miss my driving days. I'll probably have one again, if the opportunity and circumstances arise. Not because I need one or am looking, but because sometimes the right thing surprises you when you least expect it.

On Dieting and Religion

Okay, people. All I've got for today is a metaphor, and as it only struck me yesterday at the end of my run, and may have been runner's brain induced, it might be a little half-baked.

So apparently all diets--the ones that only let you eat only fruits and veggies; the ones that let you eat as much animal fat as you want, but ne'er a banana; the ones involving only cookies, etc.--work. No matter how crazy a diet might be, if you follow it, you lose weight (at least temporarily). The theory is that being on a diet makes the dieter think about what he or she is eating, and the dieting mindset and adherence to the rules, whatever they may be, actually result in weight loss. (Even if you're ordering your latte with half and half because you're on Atkins.)

It struck me yesterday that the religions of the world have a similar thing going. Following the tenets of any of them would, ideally, make one a better person--kinder, more generous, more thoughtful, less selfish. Instructions on lifestyle, it seems, don't really vary all that much. Some groups prohibit dancing or alcohol; other groups include those things in their rituals. Most of them seem to advise temperance and worship of an entity higher than oneself. None of them has as a fundamental tenet "Go out and kill infidels," or "Deny rights to your neighbors." Right? The focus is on one's relationship with God and others.

But instead of letting others choose which diets they prefer--no matter how crazy they sound--imagine if certain dieters felt compelled to impose their own diets on others, even violently!

Do I think it's completely insane to replace the milk in your latte with half and half because you're trying to lose weight? Yes. I do. That's crazy. I worry for you and your arteries. But scientists tell me you will actually lose weight on the Atkins diet. Given my genes and general level of Crazy, I will never have to try this, but I'm not going to stop you, because, after all, it's your body. I'm a vegetarian, and I'll extol the virtues of that diet to anyone who will listen, but I also won't place myself between you and your cheeseburger.

Funny, though, how when it comes to religion, leaving each to his own is somehow completely unacceptable. "That's what happens when eternal salvation is on the line," a friend responded recently. Thus, adherents to one diet get to mandate, say, the removal of all salads, or the institution of melted cheddar on everything. They may even instigate wars, not just against those who don't diet, but against fellow dieters who are simply on another plan.

And. Well. That's wrong. Right?

Stuffed

Current boniness notwithstanding, I am a good eater. I've been a good eater since I was a baby; family legend has it that I would cry at the end of mealtimes when the food was taken away. I shared my lima beans with my aunt and uncle's cat, not because I didn't like the lima beans, but because they were my favorite and I thought the cat would like them too. (I think she did.)

A parable

Let's say that I started feeding myself when I was three, and that I started inventing my own dishes shortly thereafter, substituting ingredients I could reach for those I couldn't. Let's say I ate when I was happy, sad, bored, and generally whenever I could. I was a really good eater and passable cook, and everyone thought I'd major in Food in college. I didn't, although college is pretty much about eating, whatever you study, and I did a lot of eating and cooking--more and more challenging dishes.

Then, let's say I did... oh, FOUR... years of graduate study in which eating, and particularly cooking, were even more important. I tried foods I had never even known existed! I created elaborate meals with multiple courses, occasionally in just a few hours and without any sleep while trying to grade my own students' foods.

Now, let's say that in order to continue with my graduate work, I had to pass a test, and the test was this: for my primary, secondary, and outside areas of study, I would prepare lists of the most important dishes in each area--ones I'd already eaten in classes, as well as quite a few I'd never eaten before. I would eat all the new ones, and review the ones I'd already tried.

Then, I would be given two weeks in which to construct three massive, elaborate meals, assigned by three of the chefs whom I respected and admired most, and based on all the dishes on my lists--as well, probably, as anything I'd ever eaten. I would have to be intimately familiar with all of the flavors in the foods on my lists and how they worked with other flavors, and would have to use the chef's constructions of their own dishes to structure my own--breaking down and attempting to understand their own processes of creation so that I could critique and enhance them in my own meals.

Let's say that I had to serve those three massive and elaborate meals to the three chefs, one of whom specializes in each of my three areas. My results would determine whether I would be allowed to... spend the next few years writing my own cookbook. If I messed up, I would get dropped from the program. If the meals themselves were okay, the second part of the exam would be to present a detailed proposal for what the cookbook would look like.

So let's say I have been stuffing my face pretty much non-stop for the past two months and I am both exhausted and so full I can hardly walk. I am sick of food and don't feel like cooking. All the meals I've eaten are beginning to blur a bit in my memory (not to mention give me indigestion). I am starting to wonder whether food is really the game for me and why anyone would ever want to write a cookbook, let alone whether I have what it takes. I'm anxious about what the chefs will assign, and whether what I serve them will make them ill. But at this point, I'm so sick of eating that I'm about ready to start cooking--just to get this over with.

It starts one week from today!

Day fourteen

Breakfast: Puffins and soy milk
Snack: Cantaloupe
Lunch: Vegetable-tofu curry; nectarine; pistachios
Snack: Apples and peanut butter
Dinner: Brown rice pasta salad; cantaloupe

So today ended the second week, and quite honestly, I'm feeling pretty over this whole cleanse. For one thing, although it's not too far from my usual fare, I'm getting a little bored with my meal options. For another, despite all my eating, I'm hungry much of the time. (If I didn't have to do all this reading, I could eat all day long, but as it is, it's rather disruptive. Also, I'm trying to keep weight instead of lose it, and so hungry isn't how I want to feel.)

Then there's the fact that I'm not feeling all that great. Once again, it could be anything from the usual list--reading all day, being inside all day, feeling stressed about my exams and life, the heat, the early morning workouts, the not running--and not a direct effect of the cleanse, but I've been feeling tired, headache-y, and depressed instead of cleansed and energetic. For a while I thought my skin was doing better, but then my face broke out again.

Maybe it's like running, where two miles are hard, but three feel great?

Days 9, 10, & 11

Day 9
Breakfast: Company oatmeal
Snack: Apple
Lunch: Vegetable curry with brown rice; apricots
Snack: Dates and almonds
Dinner: (At the neighbors' house!) Brown rice spaghetti; vegetable sauce; salad; soy lemon pudding and agave-sweetened strawberries and nectarines

Day 10
Breakfast: Wheat-free pancakes with peanut butter and applesauce
Tea: Iced Passion herbal tea
Lunch-ish: Mixed vegetable chips; rice cracker mix; sugar-free, soy Pom-Blueberry smoothie
Snack: Watermelon, cantaloupe, and cherries
Dinner: Crudite and hummus; corn-flax chips; popcorn

Day 11
Breakfast: Oatmeal with strawberries; fruit salad; pistachios
Lunch: (Green Leaves vegan restaurant!) "Chicken" spring rolls; yellow curry with wild rice; broccoli "beef" with wild rice; Rock 'n' Roll Noodles
Tea: Iced Passion herbal tea + a Splenda
Dinner: Puffins with soy milk

I had a fantastic weekend. Saturday, I met up with Deanna and we drove out to L.A. to meet up with Jeni and her new hubby. We went to Cinespia, which is kind of like Omaha's Shakespeare on the Green, but with a movie instead of a play. And in a graveyard. We brought a picnic and throughly enjoyed watching Hitchcock's The Man Who Knew Too Much and the hordes of hipsters. Good times!

This morning the three of us girls headed into the Fashion District. I've never seen anything quite like it. It was something like what you might get if you mixed Florence's open markets with southern California strip malls, Mexico City street vendors, and industrial urban alleyways. I found this website after the fact, which sort of hints at the experience. I saw a few things there that I liked, but was vividly reminded that I really just don't do fashion. I lack the money and energy for it, which is okay since it only really occurs to me to think about it when I'm in southern California. I don't know what might happen to me if I lived here long-term. Baudrillard described fashion as contagion; I don't know if I'd catch it or not.

Stateside

I write from the Seattle Central Library, where rain is running down the fancy diamond-paned high-tech glass above and around me here on the 10th floor. I've read about this library, watched the excellent Ted presentation by one of its designers, looked at lots and lots of photos, and even written a short paper on it (as metaphor), but it's very exciting to actually be here in person--precipitation and all. Our brother picked my sister and me up last night after our flight back from Honolulu, and I crashed on his floor. We rode the bus into downtown together this morning, and in an hour I'll meet my aunt for lunch before catching another bus to the airport (where I was able to leave my suitcases last night).

In the meantime, I've been frantically reading blogs in an effort to avoid thinking about the reading lists for my exams. My advisor needs them, and I know I'll feel much better once I've actually submitted them, but in the meantime the task feels so daunting that I can't really face it. I'll face it soon, though, and it will be okay.

I have lots to say, though I'll have to save it for procrastination posts later. Remind me to write about...

• Hawaii! (Diamond Head, Hanauma Bay, Dole Plantation, Polynesian Cultural Center, Hilton Hawaiian Village, Kailua Beach, and more...)
• Indiana Jones and Sex and the City
  
• Television and pop culture
• Barack Obama!
• Anxiety dreams and the causes thereof

I also have lots of pictures to post, so get ready!

Salons and churches

Last night I went to a salon I've been to twice and blogged about once. When I came to the desert last Christmas I hadn't found Jim, so I'd had Nick cut it for me again, and when I got here this year, I found that Hi-Lites had sent me a "We Miss You!" coupon for a free wash, cut, and style. Although I wasn't really due for a cut yet, it having been just five weeks since I was fairly thoroughly shorn, I decided to take advantage of the coupon before it expired on the 31st and made an appointment for yesterday afternoon.

I couldn't have Nick again, since my coupon was for Stylist or Master Stylist and he'd been promoted to Designer since my last appointment with him, but a quiet girl named Nivianna gave me my cut and the best shampoo I think I've ever had, complete with aromatherapy massage. The cut and shampoo were fine; sitting in the chair under unforgiving florescent lights, surrounded by a gaggle of the highest-maintenance women I could remember seeing in one location, was rather disturbing. They were tanned, had colorful accessories and/or tatoos, and all bore chunky blonde highlights in their shiny hair; I was pale, sweatered, be-frizzed in the midst of my cut, and not at all improved by the overhead lights. I was definitely out of my element, and felt like a bit of a clod--a sensation all too familiar from my teens, but one I thought I'd mostly grown out of.

As I was revisiting the event as I shampooed myself this morning, I realized that my experience in the salon mirrored a lot of the problems people have with church. I had lucked into finding The Chair and Jim, through a friend's recommendation, and found it cozy and welcoming (with flattering lighting). Jim didn't chide or mock me for styling with "cheap mousse," not having had a professional haircut for nearly a year, or taking matters into my own scissors, as other stylists have done. Yet Nivianna questioned the evidence she found of his use of a razor on my hair, as well as my own decision to have my hair cut instead of letting it grow ("Yep, it grows in pretty spirals, like a princess! I'm over it," I've taken to responding).

Hi-Lites isn't unfriendly; a girl welcomed me from the reception desk, and after I'd been waiting for about 10 minutes past my appointment time, the make up artist who earlier had been chatting with another employee came over, sat on the bench next to me, and spoke with me while I waited for another 10 before Nivianna came out to shake my hand and take me back to a chair.

Most churches have managed to figure out the "friendly greeting" thing, and a few have even worked their way up to the point where regular members will actually engage visitors in conversation. Often, it does seem to be the obligatory, slightly awkward conversation of the type I had with the make up artist, but it's better than nothing--even if the one with her did make me feel a bit self-conscious about my own maquillage.

A more pressing concern, however, and one far more difficult to solve, is that very sense of self-consciousness. Just as I couldn't help but compare myself to the women around me in the salon, visitors to a church feel the same pressure. The regulars in both cases know the rules, the look, and seem to have it all together; the visitors feel like clods--especially if they're not frequent visitors to that type of establishment.

So, a great shampoo feels good and a decent cut is nice, but it doesn't outweigh feeling clod-like and out of place. If churches could solve that mystery, they'd probably retain more clients.