Process Writing - Metacognition

I have two typical approaches to writing.  I either word barf and then go back and highlight the useful bits, or I create an intensive harvard outline of what I want to say and then fill in from there.  I know my strength as a writer is intensive details, and my weakness is organization, so these are the formats that help me organize my thoughts.  In this class, I did neither, which may have been part of my struggle.  I often worked in bullet points instead, whether it was for my memoir or my restaurant review, and then relied on workshop to reshape the structure and order of my thoughts.  I used the same bullet point approach to my reading responses, knowing what facts and opinions I wanted to hit, but using a stream of consciousness and connection to string them together.  That was how I wrote commonplace entries for examining text in English in high school, so it was the format I understood for reflective writing.  I'm honestly not sure why I continued this tactic into my formal writing.  After workshops I'd always use the harvard list style on word to create a new outline of what I wanted to say, moving large and small bits of text around until I found a better flow by hacking away excess.  I could never quite figure out how to fix my restaurant review, no matter the effort.
My breakthrough was definitely with my memoir.  I revamped it from it's original hecticness and found a way to create a flow of story that painted a picture that did a lot more showing and telling.  I could have milked it more, but just reading where the saga of chicken breasts started and ended swells my own breast (pun intended) with pride.  Going from the scatter brained approach of "here's everything I might want to possibly tell you about my father and chicken...and belgium pancakes" to the concise "here is a narrative about my father and I shown through chicken" really taught me about using a symbol instead of letting it use you.
My reading responses were the most cathartic for me.  My brain makes so many connections because it's detail happy, so being able to barf it all out into a somewhat tied together theme allowed me to organize my thoughts more before class.  When I got readers responses there were many times they would consider an angle I hadn't seen, or their interest in my passions got me more passionate to share more of my opinions.  Responses lit a fire under me to actually keep mentally digging, which made class discussions all the more diverse.  There was so much to absorb in our texts that I often felt overwhelmed, so having reading responses gave me some personal respite to dig deeper instead of spread further.
My biggest issue before college was not writing about personal experiences.  Since I took Gail Griffin's Telling Secrets, I've tried to be honest with myself in all my classes.  As much as I didn't want to assail the class with my personal struggles and life, the complaints tumbled out anyways.  Having a warm accepting environment where instead of people judging the whining instead offer ways to utilize it is incredibly helpful.  I always have trouble managing emotion in my work, whether it's showing and not telling, or just acknowledging I have emotions in the first place. Food and Travel Writing made me stretch my boundaries and explore subjects from angles I wouldn't normally approach them from, which in the long run is a positive, in my opinion.
This course specifically came at a strange and useful time for me.  I've been fighting with body issues for quite a few years now, and this class coincided with me hitting the mental space of doing the right things for my body and mind instead of the easy things.  Learning about food and social impact also got me to think about what right means, and how to obtain it.  I now have such a visceral reaction to food.  I'm more aware of the choices I'm making, and who and what they impact.  It brings me joy to be more aware, and I plan to continue to learn about my and other's food impact.  Just don't expect any more food reviews from me any time soon.

Final Revision of Restaurant Review: Sushiya

The Sushiya sign features the label “asian fusion” under the black and white title of the restaurant.  The stark contrast of the white “ya” next to the black of “sushi” is reminiscent of the hesitant response one would give when asked, "Sushiya or Sushino?  Should we go?"  

When describing the food and space, the word that comes to mind is "meh".  When entering the multi-business complex a person finds what they'd expect of a standard middle-class asian fusion/sushi restaurant: hues of maroon, mint, and bamboo pattern, black lacquered furniture, silk screen motifs, televisions overlooking a bar, and a bathroom hidden behind a partitioning curtain of the well known woodblock "The great wave at Kanagawa". The assorted fake plants complete the atmosphere.   The Beatles, the Doors, and the Who intermix with the low hum of electronics and patrons.  The sound level is low, not having to compete with the three small families with their children.  The host typically won’t even need to ask “reservation?”, because there will be room.

The Asian fusion between Korean and Japanese offered by Sushiya features dishes ranging from complicated and spicy to simple and familiar, but lack the wow factor.  It is beige, much like the wall color.  From Egg Cake Sushi and Korean Kimchi to Oshinko Roll (pickled Japanese radish) and the standard California Roll, the taste is enjoyable but unimpressionable.  The experience is asian fusion, but the emotional impact is the neutrality of Switzerland.  If it were a paper, it would receive something in the lower B range.   The Egg Cake sushi is sweeter than usual, but still pleasant.   The kimchi leaves that tingle of spice in the corners of a smile, but spice-lovers will find themselves wanting. The vegetable udon has familiar white radishes with pink edges and a plethora of other pleasantries like cabbage and fried noodles, but has nothing that surprises or captivates a customer to fight for the last noodle.  The steamed gyoza may come closer to room-temperature than desired, but still has the craved texture of a dumpling.  The seaweed salad has a light dressing with a hint of chili and lime amid vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil and seeds, complete with two lemon slices on the side.   The Kalamazoo Roll combines elements like avocado and eel: a combination that always gives a pleasant reaction purely because the tastes were made for each other.   Everything was as expected, and for the things that weren’t, they still aren’t impressive.

Sushiya’s menu is so heavy with laminated pages and choices it can double as bar-bells, almost to the point of overwhelming.  The best way to navigate it and the over-loaded portions and prices of entrees and specials is to order a surplus of small dishes from the extensive appetizer menu and share with a large group. Order an entree individually and the price will range between $18.95 - $37.95 for just the main dish. Order a series of rolls and they’ll be brought on a wooden boat that is convenient for sharing.  (Order from multiple selections and for multiple people and the portions get cut down and the cost is diverted by splitting the check evenly.)  If a group of five evenly splits the cost it will be closer to $15 per person, whereas in a group of two expect to spend at least $25 per person.

In the menu, there are multiple ice creams offered for dessert.  This is the closest to wow you’re going to find, with flavors ranging from Green Tea, Mango, Sesame, Red Bean and Ginger. The bowl comes with two scoops, which can be mixed and matched if the diner finds they're too indecisive. The joke is if you want a vegan dessert [here], get alcohol; you better like dairy or not be lactose intolerant.   There’s another downside.  Some flavors, like Plum Wine, are in high demand and therefore run out, even as early as six (two hours after they open for dinner) on a Sunday or Monday.  But don’t fret.  Instead, order the Red Bean or Sesame Ice Cream.  The latter is nutty, and almost has a coffee feel to it, whereas the former is a favorite that replaces any craving for the vanilla bean.  For a surprise, go for Ginger.  It is tart but subdued (compared to the generous hunk that comes on the sushi boat), and has a pleasant way of tickling the nasal passages.

Other positives are Sushiya’s waitstaff and tea.  Both bring some warmth to the space.   The tea is the real stuff, complete with the cloud at the bottom indicating the use of a tea acorn instead of a bag.  It comes in a plastic teapot painted with a bamboo stalk, but it is warm and heats both your insides and the standard clay tea cups just-so. The waiters are also as real as they come; genuinely accommodating, friendly, flexible, respectable and prompt, while giving space to a customer’s indecisiveness.  They are fastidious in leaving a water venn diagram on the table to grab free refills of the green tea teapot, but still ask if they should refill it in the first place.  The waitstaff does their best to answer special requests such as how the bill is split, or portions (like the ice cream), and are attentive enough to make good ordering suggestions or noticing a customer leaving their wallet and promptly return it.  

Sushiya isn’t sensational, but it can satisfy a sushi hankering after a four minute drive from Kalamazoo College’s campus through downtown Kalamazoo.  Nothing is atrocious or slimy or outstanding; it doesn’t leave much of an impression other than on your wallet.  The plates are square, the chopsticks are take-out style,  the wait staff is friendly, and the menu has variety.  Its selection is wider than Sakura, a further but similarly priced Japanese Hibachi restaurant in Portage, and can give access to the same type of food with less travel time, for a price.  The quickest way to describe Sushiya’s selection is crisp, convenient, and coin.

Part Three of Restaurant Review - Reflection on Sushiya

When I first set out to write a restaurant review, I planned on going to Fuel to gain perspective on a vegetarian's eating habits.  I found out Fuel was closed, and had to quickly reroute my plans.  Since I had chosen my original subject based off of veganism, I picked my new location while planning to continue with the same mind frame.
This was the second roadblock I encountered.  It's difficult to review a sushi restaurant when you're not allowed to have fish or eggs.  I couldn't eat the majority of the food with vegan restrains.  I had to go back and eat there a second time, and work a few extra hours in preparation for buying a second meal.  The positive was I went with a larger group the second time, so I gained a better perspective on the food itself, and also how to navigate the cost.  Both times I took excellent notes with quotes and my own impressions of the food, but when writing it up I found I couldn't use a lot of it.
In the actual writing of the review, I also found a lot of difficulty, specifically with not being able to use first person, and avoiding second person.  To write an opinion piece as a background voice drove me nuts.  It didn't help that I'm bad at describing tastes, but good with details in spaces.  In trying to play up my skills, I demeaned the focus of the assignment.  When we first started looking at reviews, the review on Kenmare spoke to me, because it used its focus on space to describe feeling.  I think space defines a lot of my personal feeling about food (hence my ideal meal piece), but that got in my way as a reviewer for a restaurant.  It also didn't help that in my expectation writing I described the exact space I walked into when I first entered Sushiya.  It made me want to focus on writing about the space more because of how cliché it felt, while at the same time reminded me of the Sushi places I grew up with.
It would have been easier for me to write a rave or a pan, but being honestly neutral on a space actually made it more difficult.  The "thesis" and "but" and "so what" I normally pride myself on in papers just weren't being conveyed.  Three official drafts later, shuffled paragraphs, and more perspective, and I'm not sure I ever got the hang of translating my writing style and voice to the format required for review writing.  This was by far the most difficult assignment for me, but I have to hold my head high and move forward.

Perfect Meal Final Draft - A Feeling of Home

A Feeling of Home

A kitchen is a kitchen.  Friends are friends.  A house is a house.  My home can still be my home.  These were the breaths I took entering the yellow house of my friends’ after passing the train tracks that delineate the border of Kalamazoo College’s bubble, and Kalamazoo.  The living room was the cleanest I had ever seen it.  The shoes were stacked neatly in a pyramid by the door, the table cleared except for a few coasters and the series of science test tubes that haven’t been broken in with vodka yet.  All the DVD’s were stacked, the chairs were clear of video game controllers and homework, and the mood was set with draped soft Christmas lights.

This is when I knew: my friends cared.  They were going out of their way to make their home a welcoming space, even though all I needed was a kitchen and some chairs for guests to sit on. Within the past week the house went from being my unofficial home to my ex’s house where most of my friends still lived and hung out.  

Many of these friends partook in my unbirthday party on South Haven’s beach back in May.  I had just finished a show, and decided it was time to unwind and relax with friends and finally acknowledge how wonderful life is; hence an unbirthday.  We piled into vans and sedans like clown cars to car pool to the Meijer by the highway, each car in charge of a food subject to help with our cookout, with a budget of ten dollars per person.   One group had fruit, one had buns and condiments, another had paper goods, another had side dishes.  I then crossed my fingers and we were off, hoping to get safely from point A to B on Memorial Day weekend.  It turned out to be a lovely day of cold water and 90 degree weather in South Haven, complete with laughter and sunscreen and excellent food which I still can taste if I try.  It was the beginning to establishing my permanent friendships. It was also the first day I started dating Keeney.  

Now, almost half a year later, I was again organizing a similar get-together, this time within walking distance of the K College bubble.  Hosting in the dorms was not an option.  I wanted a house.  A home.  I wanted people to feel like they were getting a small and cheap convenient getaway, even if they already lived in that same yellow house.  People were so broke and bogged down with life that a potluck wasn’t an option, so instead I figured a Stir-Fry where everyone brought some kind of a vegetable to throw in a large pot would work.  My peers were having trouble even finding the time for grocery shopping, so I did it instead and split the bill later on.  I went the night before the party with some of the house members on their regular grocery trip to the same Meijer I had been to for the South Haven gathering.  This time I spent a little over twenty dollars on some basic vegetables for the expected fifteen guests.  As I threw broccoli, asparagus, sweet onion, and a multi-colored pack of sweet peppers into the cart, I made a point to thank Rachel Horness for “letting me hitch a ride”, to which she said “Thank you for coming along.”  This was still my family.

The organization process was similar:  I used a poll on a Facebook event to figure out available times, and found a happy medium between the friends who could come.  Fifteen was the original count, but I had the aching suspicion that no one was going to show.  With theater auditions and exams and final projects already dwindling numbers in the cafeteria and increasing revenue for Maruchan’s Ramen, I feared the three of us present at the start time of 5:30 would be the only guests.  There was already one person creating intentional space, so my paranoia whispered that more would follow suit.

In South Haven, we had laughed and ran around, the sand almost too hot for our callused feet.  There were tickle fights and stolen hats and borrowed bathing suits and massage trains on bathroom towels acting as makeshift beach towels.  Whether I was clambering onto someone’s back to stay out of the frigid water, or falling off them and squealing with the cold; basking in the sun at the end of a pier while I missed the fact Keeney was trying to flirt and impress me with his experiences in sailing or we all were helping my friend Zac distribute the meat and vegetarian burgers he had grilled; or I was cleaning sand off of a fallen slice of pineapple for my own personal succulent dessert, I was smiling and comfortable.

I was now uncomfortable.  It was thirty minutes to an hour after the original time set for the event.  As my foot tapped, I was afraid that the food I had bought for fifteen wasn’t going to be eaten at all.  But of course, the rest of the crew finally ambled in late, creating a grand total of eleven. Topics ranging from bras and beards to classes and chicano studies comfortably were passed at the same pace as cooking duties.  Knives, pots, and cutting boards were exchanged between scrambling hands, and jokes were interchanged like counter space.  Chicken was cooked in a separate pot for the non-vegetarians, and the rice was slightly burnt in a pleasant smokiness. Garlic brought by a friend was simmered in olive oil and sesame seeds in the wok (also lent), preparing for the items I had already bought at the grocery store. Water chestnuts and pineapple were later contributed and added.  I stole a slice of pineapple from the can, hoping to taste South Haven again, but instead I tasted nothing.

He was everywhere.  When I went to the upstairs kitchen to grab more silverware, he was in the empty space of his room where my toothbrush used to sit on his bookshelf.  He was in the chicken sizzling on the stove that I had thawed that had originally been used to make him Chicken Marsala to celebrate our five months together.   He was in the awkward smiles and "are you okay?"'s I received whenever I was caught looking at the steps to upstairs, even though I knew he had already cleared out before having a chance to bump into me.  It’s hard to plan a perfect meal when the person you ideally want there won’t be.

I loved the melting wok of people who were.  They were from different walks of my life, brought together through cooking.  Some had already overlapped at other points, others were entirely new flavors to each other. I focused on the excitement of introducing circus folk, choir folk, theater folk, and other odds and ends to each other; mixing together like the stir fry: easily and with some saucy conversation.  My original invite list consisted of thirty people, not because I expected them to all come, but because I have at least thirty people on this campus who I consider to be worth celebrating as friends, and in many ways my family. 

I hovered and fluttered between the living room and kitchen.  In between playing hostess and offering up my chopping expertise to the kitchen dwellers, I caught tidbits of conversation about the Chicano Studies debate at K.  As I set down paper plates, mugs, burger king collectable plastic cups, and a hodgepodge of different silver wear pilfered from the cupboards of the house, I listened to my peers in the living room.  Zac was offended by how support of Chicano studies focused more on skin color rather than cultural differences.  As a person who identifies with latino culture but doesn’t have dark skin, he felt excluded by the way the issue is being communicated in the community.  Others lent their advice and their knowledge of other race studies and hurt identities at Kalamazoo, and I was able to return to the kitchen without fear of the conversation over bubbling.  Just like the mixture of foods in the stir fry was tailored to allergies and food preferences, I was thankful to have friends who could come together under simple circumstances and mesh without leaving themselves at the threshold.  I never had to be tense about things getting to heated, not because my friends are all the same by any means, but because they’re the type of people to have openness to explore all things; and in this case, new people.  I can trust my friends to soothe tempers, or readjust the fire.

Finally, the soy sauce was added and we grabbed servings.  We split the drinks Abby had gotten at Bottom’s Up between plastic burger king glasses and mugs.  People hummed joyful moans through mouthfuls of food, but the only thing I really tasted was my drink. As I requested, no high fructose corn syrup or alcohol was wanted, so varying flavors of nine bottles of Snapple was shared amongst the elleven people.  It was the only thing that I wasn’t in charge of.  

There was the apple that tasted like cider and tea, and then there was the sweet tea that, in the words of Abby “tastes like raisins covered in sugar”, instead of tea made from black and green tea leaves as the label would suggest.  The Arnold Palmer was grabbed the least as seconds and thirds graced paper plates.  Conversation stayed quiet as words couldn’t find their way past the mixture of rice, vegetables, and chicken, being shoveled into hungry maws.  Once the wok was scraped clean, paper plates were discarded, bottles were added to the returnable pile, and silver wear and cups were hand washed and returned to the drawers and cupboards in either the main or second floor kitchens.   Most people trickled out to return to final projects and exam studying while a few stayed to help me quickly put the food away.  The “smokey rice” went in Tupperware, and we bagged the water chestnuts and remaining yellow pepper together in a ziplock for the house to keep.  The asparagus and carrots went up to the second floor fridge, and silverware and cups were washed, dried, and returned.  It got easier to pass his room every trip to the upstairs kitchen.  I kissed my fingers to my lips and then touched them to the door in respect, and left the house.

When I later asked one of my shyer friends “Did you have fun tonight?” she replied, “I did!  It was like the best social interaction I’ve had in a while. I wish I got out more, but I don’t feel like I know anyone well enough to ask people to hang with me.”   These are the moments that remind me what makes an ideal situation.  Now a friend of mine knows a few more faces, of people I really care about, and has a chance to have more social interactions. The space, once familiar, may have rubbed me the wrong way at first, but there I had given my wonderful friends a chance to unwind, and to get to know each other. To have taken this person and bring her into a created safe-space is even more rewarding then a full belly, and helped the space feel safe for even me, even if just in reflection.

In time, home-base will be home-base again.  In the meantime, my home will be wherever I carry my friends with me, and wherever we can find a wok and a shmorgishborg of everything else we could ever want to throw in our melting pot of experiences and overlapping interests and disinterests. At this dinner, I celebrated people.  My people.  The people who move and inspire and care for me, and the people who define home for me.  The people I love for their faults and their experiences and their intellect and for their ignorance and stubbornness.  Anything labeled with perfection or ideal is probably always going to be missing something, but in the temporary moments of my dinner, I feel like I got close.  This meal was never about the food, or the stress of no one coming, or delegating shopping or cooking tasks, or intelligent conversation, or the struggle with who wasn’t there.  I don’t think my perfect or ideal meals ever will truly be about the food.  It is about reminding myself where home really is.

The Perfect Meal: Melting Wok

When I passed the train tracks declaring the border of Kalamazoo College to enter  the yellow second house to the left, it was the cleanest I had ever seen it.  The shoes were neatly in a pyramid by the door, the table cleared except for a few coasters and the series of science test tubes that haven’t been broken in with vodka yet (21^st birthday present for Rachel Horness, a Chemistry major and Spanish Minor).  All the DVD’s were stacked, the chairs were clear of video game controllers and homework, and the ambiance was set with draped soft christmas lights.  This is when I knew: my friends cared.  I had asked for the kitchen space for a small gaggle, and they had gone out of their way to make this a welcoming space. It didn’t, doesn’t help that within the past week the house went from being my unofficial home to my ex’s-house-where-all-my-friend’s-also-live.  A kitchen a kitchen.  Friends are friends.  A house is a house.  My home can still be my home.  These were the breaths I took entering on November eleventh at 5:20, a tight fit after my choir concert ending at 5.

These were a lot of the same friends that back on May twenty seventh had all piled into cars to go out to south haven.  I had arranged a gathering for my unbirthday.  My parents share an anniversary with my actual birthday in October, so celebrating my existance is always an odd thing.  In May, I just had finished a show, and decided it was time to unwind and relax with friends and finally acknowledge how wonderful life is.  I organized a few carpools, gave each car a food related responsibility, and then prayed it would work out.  It turned out to be a lovely day of cold water and 90 degree weather and laughter and sunscreen and cooking out, and also the first day I started dating Keeney.  
It’s hard to plan an perfect meal when the person you ideally want there doesn’t want to be because the wounds are too fresh, so I settled for ideal.  

The process was similar:  I threw out an event on Facebook with a poll for available times, and found a happy medium between those who did want to come.  Fifteen was the original count, but at 5:40 I had the aching suspicion that no one was going to show after a few cancellations due to theater auditions and last minute stress-related cancellations.  With exams and final projects dwindling numbers in the cafeteria and increasing revenue for Maruchan’s Ramen, I expected my 15 to quickly become the three of us preparing food for a Stirfry. Call it paranoia, call it vulnerability but I was afraid of more people creating intentional space.  At 5:45 the only people present were my best friend Rachel and the members of the house, sans my ex.  
Yet, he was everywhere.  He was in the chicken I thawed from the freezer and originally used to make him Chicken Marsala to celebrate five months.   He was in the empty space of his room where my extra toothbrush used to sit as I went to the upstairs kitchen to grab more silverware.  He was in the awkward smiles and "are you okay?"'s I received whenever I was caught looking at the steps to upstairs, even though I knew he had already cleared out before having a chance to bump into me.  Originally, my perfect meal was with everyone I loved at the cheapest and easiest convenience cooking together.  Everyone was a bit too high of an expectation.

What I love about cooking is the people it brings together from different walks of my life.  I focused on the excitement of introducing circus folk, choir folk, theater folk, and other odds and ends to eachother; mixing together like the stir fry I had planned: easily and with some saucy conversation.  My original invite list consisted of thirty people, not because I expected them to all come, but because I have at least thirty people on this campus who I consider to be worth celebrating as friends, and in many ways my family.

As my foot tapped, afraid that the food I had bought for fifteen wasn’t going to be eaten at all, I comforted myself with the process of setting up the event.  The previous night I had been grocery shopping with some of the house members, spending twenty or so dollars for the projected amount of guests.  I made a point to thank Rachel Horness, a senior I met in choir last year.  I said, “Thank you for letting me hitch a ride”, to which she said “Thank you for coming along.”  It had been a week of evaluating the space friendships can have, and such a simple statement let me know I was still wanted, even with all the uncertainty.  Last time I had the gathering of friends in South Haven, it was the beginning to establishing my permanent friendships, and my relationship.  This time, it’s about me reminding myself of their permanence, and of moving on from my ended relationship.  It’s been almost half a year since the unbirthday, and somehow feels like a completed circle and cycle.

Thirty minutes to an hour later the rest of the crew slowly ambled in, and topics ranging from bras and beards to classes and chicano studies comfortably were passed at the same pace as cooking duties.  Knives and cutting boards were exchanged between scrambling hands, and jokes were interchanged like counter space.  Peppers, pineapple, broccoli, asparagus, and sweet onion were tossed into a wok (curtesy of Brie’s Living Learning House) simmering olive oil supplemented with garlic and sesame seeds.  Chicken was cooked by Rachel Horness in a separate pot for the non-vegetarians.  All the Rachels (there were three of them) started to find themselves referred to by their last names to avoid them saying “huh?” in response to their name, receiving the reply “I meant the other Rachel.”

I played hostess, dashing between both the living room and the kitchen like my mamma taught me how to.  At one point, I get a text from Abby letting me know she’s on the way.  Zach Wood (there’s two Zach’s) heard the comforting tone of the TARDIS from the television show of Doctor Who, and proceeds to show me how his phone case is the TARDIS as well.  I promise to send him the text tone later that night, returning the phone to my cleavage without even worrying about cultural decorum because these are my friends (my choir dress has no pockets).  The TARDIS makes a explosive whirring that is uncomfortable to anyone unless they know and love the show.  Like my ideal meal, it’s all about context and interpretation on whether the house could grow to be a comfortable space again.

As I continued to hover and flutter, I caught tidbits of the conversation.  The subject of Chicano studies dominated.  As I went back and forth between the kitchen and setting down paper plates, burger king collectable plastic cups, and a hodgepodge of different silver wear pilfered from the cupboards of the house lent by my friends, I overheard opinions, such as how some of the arguments focused on skin color rather than cultural differences, and how people who identified with latino/latina culture but don’t have dark skin felt really upset by how people are communicating the issue.  As the mixture of foods tailored to allergies and food preferences, I was thankful to have friends who could come together under simple circumstances and mesh without leaving themselves at the threshold.

We grabbed servings, and split the drinks Abby had gotten at Bottom’s Up between plastic burger king glasses and mugs.  As requested, no high fructose corn syrup or alcohol was wanted, so varying flavors of nine bottles of Snapple was shared amongst the 11 people.  There was the apple that tasted like cider and tea, and then there was the sweet tea that, in the words of Abby “tastes like raisons covered in sugar”, instead of tea made from black and green tea leaves as the label would suggest.  The arnold palmer was grabbed the least as seconds and thirds graced paper plates.  Bottled were added to the returnable pile and paper plates were discarded, and silver wear was hand washed.

When I asked Rachael LaBarbara (another Rachael), “Did you have fun tonight?” she replied, “I did!  It was like the best social interaction I’ve had in a while.  I wish I got out more, but I don’t feel like I know anyone well enough to ask people to hang with me.”  These are the moments that remind me the point of ideal.  Maybe the space I was being given rubbed me the wrong way, but here I had given my wonderful friends a chance to unwind, and to network between eachother. To have taken this person and bring her into a created safe-space is more rewarding then a full belly.  

I love people.  I love them for their faults and their experiences and their intellect and for their ignorance and stubbornness.  What I love about my friends, is their openness to explore all these things, and in this case, eachother.  I never have to worry about two people not meshing, because I can rely on the rest of them to help sooth tempers, if necessary.  When the topic turns to something politically, or Kalamazoo Collegially, charged (chicano studies), I don’t feel the need to tense like I would in other circles.  At this dinner, I celebrated people.  My people.  The people who move and inspire and care for me, and the people who define home for me. As Rachael and Tammer (who hid studying sciency things for most of the evening but came out at the end for a quick study break) helped me cleared up, I felt safe and welcome, just for a little bit.  We put the “smokey rice” (which a seperate Rachel had burned, but we actually liked the taste of) in tupperwear, and bagged the water chestnuts and remaining yellow pepper together for the house to keep.  The asparagus and carrots went up to the second floor fridge, silverware and cups were washed, dried, and returned, and I continued on to leave the house.

In time, home-base will be home-base again.  In the meantime, my safe-space will be wherever I carry my friends with me, and wherever we can find a wok and a shmorgishborg of everything else we could ever want to throw in our melting pot of experiences and overlapping interests and disinterests.  Ideal is probably always going to be missing something, but in the temporary moments, I feel like I got close.

RR: Alaina McConnell

In "Superfoods That Everyone Went Bonkers Over", I heard the reflected voice of my own mother. These are all fads that she and her holistic doctor follows and weighs into, no matter the cost. I myself also have fed into these ideas, like coconut water and goji berries. I love how McConnell's writing made me question these superfoods, while making the reading entertaining. She weaved things together so well, such as "This pointy spear may look aggressive, but studies say that asparagus is a nutritional powerhouse." It's playful, while still getting strait to the point.
In "Decadent Alternatives To Wedding Cakes" I noticed the same style of writing. "Their manageable size and vast array of flavors easily let wedding-goers have their (cup)cake and eat it too." includes wit to get the point across. I found myself smiling a lot during reading her articles, even though they were mostly informative.  The short and sweet (pun intended) descriptions made my mouth water, but also got my mind thinking about how I could apply this information to my own parties or gatherings.  The tidbit on crepes really stuck out to me, mostly because I'm a poor college student who once in a while wants to eat fancy.  Now I can think of a simple dessert (milk, flour, eggs) where I can customize based off of a budget and sweet tooth with syrups and fruit.

As someone who typically doesn't eat at Burger Chains, her "8 'Better Burger' Chains Poised to Conquer America" article made me crave burgers. Again, I blame her ability to not only weave in creativity, but also inform.  After my disappointing second attempt at writing a review for Sushiya, I recognize these two things as my weakest points in my review writing.  I didn't understand how to create flow while informing with fact and enticing with intellect and inovation. When describing Smashburger, she tells the reader, "It was originally named IconBurger, but the management team eventually changed the name to more appropriately describe how they actually create their burgers — smashing them into a grill with a metal plate." This isn't information about the taste itself, but an interesting fact about the process. It pulls the reader in more without boring them away, while phrasing it in such a way that it's pleasant for the mind.  

In reading McConnell's work (besides being excited to meet her) I was better able to understand the weaknesses in my review writing.  Yes, it was helpful to read food reviews beforehand, but I think it was also helpful to me to read more reviews after struggling with my own.  In hindsight I understand what I want to work on in my writing of reviews.

RR (Omnivore's Dilemma Part III): Digging into Roots

My Aunt married into Chippewa traditions when she married my Uncle.  Therefore, I am related to two Chippewa, my Uncle and Grandma Sue, by marriage not blood.  I've always been jealous of the stories of harvesting birch bark and collecting sap to make maple syrup.  My grandma Sue (who is now considering moving into a nursing home) was still harvesting wild rice and creating bead jewelry using a needle and sewing thread and glass beads as of last year.  I have gotten peeks of this culture whenever I have visited my Aunt in Minnesota.  This concept of learning what the land can provide you mystifies me, especially as one who connects with the earth around her.  Like Pollan I too would like to make a meal at some point out of materials I had gathered myself, so I could properly thank their sources.

  The other day after class I was discussing with Katherine about crickets, and it got me to thinking along the same lines of part III of The Omnivore's Dilemma.   Human's adaptability and curiosity at one point not only found that crickets were edible, but how to make it enjoyable.  An experience.  I also love the interconnectedness between science and food.  The passage about how food was more of a drive then sex (take that Freud!) in the chapter titled "The Omnivore's Dilemma", and how brain sizes seem to correlate with it.

As a Wiccan  my only religious creed is "harm none."  Some ask me then how can I justify eating meat?  I believe in the cycle and purpose of things.  If I come back as a steer, then my purpose is to be eaten.  And then there is something my soul has to learn from that process.  After reading this book, I'm starting to wonder if I need to adjust the source of my food, so that I know it's as humane as possible, such as the Grassfeilds farm Rachel talked about in her Moo-se Your Own Adventure.  The biggest problem is budget.  I can't afford to eat with a global consciousness.  I'm a student living off caf-food.  At this point it's hard to know what to do that is morally and physically right for me.  Vegan or Vegetarianism isn't an option, although I have been cutting out meat more lately.  I can try to get involved in gathering more information or supporting individuals in crusades, such as Temple Grandin's work or watching more TED talks, but in reality it feels like an impossible task to tackle.  In a movie based off of Grandin's story, her character says, "Of course they're gonna get slaughtered. You think we'd have cattle if people didn't eat 'em everyday? They'd just be funny-lookin' animals in zoos. But we raise them for us. That means we owe them some respect. Nature is cruel, but we don't have to be. I wouldn't want to have my guts ripped out by a lion, I'd much rather die in a slaughterhouse if it was done right. In Omnivore's Dilemma in Pollan's exploration of Singer's Animal Liberation, Pollan references the argument "Why should we treat animals any more ethically then they treat one another?"  From my understanding, Grandin discovered that making cows feel comfortable and secure actually saved time and cow's lives (less drowning in the dip that protects their coats).  Even as a poor college student, if presented with the option of more cost with kindness I would take it.  The problem is this isn't an easily accessed option.

It's the little things I suppose.   Whether it's connecting to a smaller culture who gives and takes from the earth healthily, or being a part of a larger culture which I desire to do the same, the only solution I can currently think of is to take it one step at a time, much like the woman at Grassfields suggested when starting the process to get organic.