Eat closer to the sun . . .
Dec. 19th, 2005 08:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
doodlemaier Because Manassas Skate N' Fun Zone was a thinly disguised Chuck E. Cheese on ice, and because I couldn't stomach 'pizza or dogs' I allowed the wee-one to talk me into taking her to her fave buffet; the big treat there being variety. Where else are the junkiest junk foods spread on the same table as some of the most wholesome(ish) dishes? Usually she's a pretty decent eater but being a kid she quickly plowed through all the fatty, meaty, grease-fried treats so that she could hurry on to the deserts. I made her eat 'something green' first and so brought back a plate filled with salad, spinach, 'Faerie cabbages', and steamed broccolli and let her choose. You can dress up brussell sprouts as faerie cabbages all day long but every kid knows nasty when they taste it. After spitting the first of those out into her napkin she opted for the smallest little sliver of steamed broccolli and I raised her for the biggest piece (you gan get kids to do the damnedest things if you give them options and let them think they're somehow choosing - and marketing firms know this about our children, and are certainly not above exploiting the fact . . . )
She made the best of it, pretending it was a tree and she an herbivorous dinosaur, and complaining very little. I commented to her that was the best food on earth because the energy it provided us was the closest to the light of the sun that we can actually eat, and reminded her that when that same stalk of brocolli grew in a field out in California somewhere that it looked pretty much exactly the same as it looked there on her plate; that is, it was a whole food (quizzical look from the kid . . . ), that it required very little in the way of processing. (another look, the same really but disguised this time by broccolli-stuffed cheeks)
I reminded her of the spectacle of my Pop's neighbors who had bagged a couple of deer one the morning after Thanksgiving when she and I were last up there, and we watched as they hung them from the deck by their hind legs and gutted them, then peeled the hides off. She actually sat and watched until such point as they removed the first head. "That", I said, "is the process by which people make raw materials into food. That is the process of making 'a cute, furry deer' in to barbecue. That, Kid, is processed food". So I asked Pluckmeier to think about things like that when she's eating, think about where all the different dishes on her plate came from in Nature before they were made into food. I pointed to a butter drenched roll, "Where do y'suppose that came from? Plant, animal, or mineral?" She had no idea where bread came from . . . I was either lucky as a kid or it was a result of some cleaver marketing on behalf of my folks that, growing up, I just happened to prefer foods that closely resembled the plant or animal from which they were derived.
Okay, so she still prefers a handful of gummy bears and an entire plate of whipped creme for them to 'ski' on.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
dontshoottcat tells me that those concepts are probably a litte too advanced for her age, but I couldn't think of a better example, and I can't imagine that anyone's ever too young to learn about the choices they have in their diet. The sooner she can make informed choices and start eating more consciously the fewer bad habits there are to overcome later in life. Not to mention it starts de-bunking some of that fuckin' marketing she's inevitably going to be bombarded with. This is the kind of shit the Soul signed on for when it decided to represent as my kid
I used to believe that if people would only wear the right shoes then we wouldn't experience nearly the problems we invite into our lives. Now, and especially with the research I've been doing lately I'm becoming increasingly aware of how the choices we make concerning what we eat not only affect the quality of our lives profoundly but also ripple out into the world, collectively impacting the quality out there, also.
She made the best of it, pretending it was a tree and she an herbivorous dinosaur, and complaining very little. I commented to her that was the best food on earth because the energy it provided us was the closest to the light of the sun that we can actually eat, and reminded her that when that same stalk of brocolli grew in a field out in California somewhere that it looked pretty much exactly the same as it looked there on her plate; that is, it was a whole food (quizzical look from the kid . . . ), that it required very little in the way of processing. (another look, the same really but disguised this time by broccolli-stuffed cheeks)
I reminded her of the spectacle of my Pop's neighbors who had bagged a couple of deer one the morning after Thanksgiving when she and I were last up there, and we watched as they hung them from the deck by their hind legs and gutted them, then peeled the hides off. She actually sat and watched until such point as they removed the first head. "That", I said, "is the process by which people make raw materials into food. That is the process of making 'a cute, furry deer' in to barbecue. That, Kid, is processed food". So I asked Pluckmeier to think about things like that when she's eating, think about where all the different dishes on her plate came from in Nature before they were made into food. I pointed to a butter drenched roll, "Where do y'suppose that came from? Plant, animal, or mineral?" She had no idea where bread came from . . . I was either lucky as a kid or it was a result of some cleaver marketing on behalf of my folks that, growing up, I just happened to prefer foods that closely resembled the plant or animal from which they were derived.
Okay, so she still prefers a handful of gummy bears and an entire plate of whipped creme for them to 'ski' on.
dontshoottcat tells me that those concepts are probably a litte too advanced for her age, but I couldn't think of a better example, and I can't imagine that anyone's ever too young to learn about the choices they have in their diet. The sooner she can make informed choices and start eating more consciously the fewer bad habits there are to overcome later in life. Not to mention it starts de-bunking some of that fuckin' marketing she's inevitably going to be bombarded with. This is the kind of shit the Soul signed on for when it decided to represent as my kidI used to believe that if people would only wear the right shoes then we wouldn't experience nearly the problems we invite into our lives. Now, and especially with the research I've been doing lately I'm becoming increasingly aware of how the choices we make concerning what we eat not only affect the quality of our lives profoundly but also ripple out into the world, collectively impacting the quality out there, also.
