"Fork over Knife" and the Neoliberal Agenda

I've been taking a break from the blog, frustrated with myself that I seem to be hovering at the 10 lb weight loss mark. Since I told myself I would stick with the WW program for a year, I'm trying not to obsess about the week I spent in Chicago, eating carnitas tacos, ethiopian shiro, Red Mango. But now that I'm back, I've decided to take the time this week to assess some of my food and lifestyle values.

So, on the encouragement of my two C-Bus besties (after the encouragement they received from another mentor), I watched the documentary "Fork over Knife" the other night. The documentary espouses a "whole foods plant-based diet" and the screen time consists of mostly-white able-bodied male athletes, an important move for the film's agenda, which is de-bunking the myth that you will never get enough protein from plant-based foods. Now, I actually mostly agree with the film on this count: I believe that whole foods are both more filling and better for long-term health. In high school I met a peer-turned-good-friend who actually lived on a working family farm (I was a Massachusetts city kid transplanted to Maine in my mid-teens) and her attitudes toward vegetables actually transformed my food-values world. Carolyn taught me how her family, particularly during the growing season, shapes all of their meals around their vegetable dishes, often having two or three at a meal, the animal-based foods functioning as a cursory. I grew up in a world where a tablespoon of soggy, frozen peas served as my vegetable for the day. As someone turned vegetarian at 12, I struggled to get enough food (eating disorder aside) until I met Carolyn. (As you may have noticed by my Chicago exploits above, I am no longer a vegetarian, mostly because I got lazy after discovering a processed-soy food allergy). So I get it.

I think vegetables can be a center-piece--if you can afford them.

The film rarely addressed cost, though. Not on the day-to-day grocery bill cost. There was a health official in Chicago who spent two minutes talking about food deserts and economic inequalities more generally but I guess this wasn't as sexy as watching the vegan doctor's son-turned-fireman climb the fire pole. Besides the fact that the film itself was kind of an editing hack-job (they alternated a bit of nutritional science history with poorly integrated, contemporary lifestyle transformation stories) with ableist masculine rhetoric, I actually had a more serious problem with the film: it's neoliberal agenda.

If you're in the academy, you know that neoliberal is kind of the sexy, critical framework to justify the importance of all sorts of academic critiques for everything from pop culture to the prison industrial complex (or, if your my brilliant partner, you're integrating the two). And despite the fact that we might be a little bit bored by the buzz-word of it, it's actually a useful framework for understanding the increasingly-privatized and individual-based agenda of the U.S. expansionist project. Blahblahblah.

Here's where it showed up in the film. The other main objective of the film, besides debunking the protein-myth, was to discuss how a whole foods, plant-based diet can serve as treatment for a myriad of diseases, from obesity and diabetes (no surprise) to cancer and hepatitis. The mantra was "get off the meds, take control of your health" and "look at how much money we can save the healthcare system if you stop taking your meds". Now, I'm no fan of Big Pharma. I spend months in my Women's Health class asking my students to interrogate Big Pharma and diagnostic models they produce. And while I fully support eating whole foods as much as possible (insert major asterisk here with footnote caveat), I also don't think chronic health problems and diseases can or should be completely in the hands of "individual responsibility". It's not a surprise that everyone in the film is middle class or wealthier, with the kinds of jobs that afford them vacation and flex time, expendable income for massage, acupuncture, and yoga classes, and the comforts of more than just food. Plant based, whole food diets are expensive and until we transform our industrial agriculture system, work day length and unemployment crisis, child care networks, housing and green space development, and address the chronic stress that comes from daily interactions with  sexism, racism, classism, homophobia, and ableism--not mention addressing our actual healthcare model-- we can't expect folks to fix their diseases. My suggestion: a whole foods, plant-based diet, a complete cultural and political revolution, and some compassion.

All of this said, I did re-think last week's carnitas and bought some fresh, spicy arugula and a daikon radish to jazz up my salads this week.

Short Term Body Project, Long Term Body

It's been a little tedious trying to get myself to write lately. I've had a weekend traveling for a journal editing training, followed by a weekend where a year on a planning committee culminated in a successful/exciting/overwhelming/joyful two-day conference, followed by a weekend (now) answering student frantic emails around final paper thesis/outlines. All of this is somewhat usual end of the year academic stuff--a burst of hectic before the doldrums of July and August. But it's also made me worry that I will never get any of my own work done. That the prospectus, since it was passed last week, is as far as I will get. Forever ABD.

And I think these feelings are what leads to the advice I recently received from a colleague, passed on to her from a fellow PhD: "The difference between those who finish and those who don't are about those who just keep going."

And I know for me, it's the smaller projects (planning a conference, working on a journal issue, publishing an article, planning a course syllabus) that make the larger projects seem relevant.

It's this realization that led me to make a decision about Project 28 and the new Weight Watchers Chapter. Combine the short term with the long term. Entertain self with somewhat narcissistic projects--growing my nails out (I am a life long biter), growing my hair long (I made a decision not to cut my hair short again until I have passed the dissertation), complete Jackie Warner's 40 minute power workout without dying. Enroll in yoga class, ten sessions.

I've lost my first 12 pounds on Weight Watchers. But here's the problem that I've noticed with myself: I keep thinking of how I can do this faster, how I can reach my "goal" by my 29th birthday. And I've realized that if I don't just make a long-term time commitment, a full year, I will continue to think in terms of the numbers in the program and not the habits. I will continue to think that it's the week to week that matters. And I'm pretty sure that thinking is a piece of what ended me in the clinic ten years ago.

"The difference between those who finish and those who don't are those who just keep going."

What to do when Mental Illness Kicks your Ass

Well, apparently, the answer to this is to get teary in an unsuspecting feminist professor's office.

I'm not sure if its the moodiness of weight-loss, the ebbs and flows of my ssri's (the "prozac poopout") or the stress of the past year where, encountering several PhD benchmarks (exams, prospectus, IRB approval), I'm left with news that my advisor is leaving--my second one to leave in a 15 month period. Likely, it's a combination of all of this.

And I have to say, this isn't a blog so much as just a note. To let you know I'm out here and struggling to stay optimistic about this process of finding balance. Trying to focus on little successes (delicious mint pea soup made, weekly groceries bought within budget, students' thoughtful writing assignment on connections between racism and homophobia half-graded) and trying to remember that support can come in the simplest of phrases.

"I, for one, am glad you're here."

Ode to the Egg: Part II

As it was coming down in sheets-- one of those early May showers (bring June flowers??? I guess global warming will have us revising that particular rhyme) that thunders lightly in the distance, soaking you in your quick dash home from your evening workout-- I wanted eggs.  The comfort food that has always been around in my house, in the form scrambled at the tail-end of a flu, fried in between white bread with ketchup on days my mom had off from work. But to call this blog an "ode to the egg" would be incomplete, because it is also an ode to steamed spring-fresh green beans, boiled red potatoes, olives, capers, and tuna, between bites of crisp cool lettuce. I'm writing now about the tuna nicoise.

As an aside, this is actually the only dish I like boiled potatoes in. I recoiled from potato as a child, which is pretty much betrayal to my french canadian and irish genetics (though I proselytize with poutine and can drink my weight in guinness to make up for it).

I actually just had to google that to make sure I spelled nicoise right (and as my partner would complain, I evidently need to check my spelling on here a lot more often). I don't know how to pronounce it either. I started ordering it in restaurants in my early days of coming out as a meat-eater. My partner, in her quest to eat all things fancy-brunch, brought me to classic americana-goes-locavore restaurants and I tried various pronunciations. Vish-ee-wah. Vish-wah. No one ever corrected me. I'm relieved I never tried to pronounce the S.

What's fun about ordering tuna nicoise in restaurants is that it always looks different. Because there are so many components, the plating is hard to predict: delicate bites of tuna and capers cupped in lettuce leaves or a pile of potato and green bean mixed with flaked tuna and boiled egg yolk. I think it depends on the politics of the restaurant. Are you with the  99 percent? More union = bigger pile.

And it's just as fun to eat. Boiled potato, caper, tuna. Tuna, lettuce, olive. Lettuce, potato, green bean. You get the picture.

So earlier this week, when I found that this dish could be made a. cheaply and b. with relatively few ww points, I planned for it. The weather made me gravitate to egg. I put on a pot to boil water as I showered. I thought that this dish would be relatively easy and simple. But in a kitchen with only 12 by 6 inches of counter space, it was a  bit of a juggle.

Out of shower. Water boiling over. Frantic rummage in fridge for potatoes and eggs.

Pull out directions. Forgot the part about making the dressing.

Dressing calls for chicken broth.

I only have veggie bouillon and not another pot to boil the water to make it.

I use just water.

I don't have red vinegar.

I remember a woman on my last bus trip to chicago talking about the chinese medicine philosophy of joint health and apple cider vinegar. I use that instead.

My partner's horse radish mayonnaise (how old is that???) falls out of the fridge as I reach for the dijon. Cats run as if that was a beckoning fog horn.

I whisk.

Cats on table. I have learned the art of the one-handed cat-toss.

Cats re-emerge with tuna can.

Shit. How long have the eggs been on?

Shit. I have to cut the stems off the green beans.

Shit. The cheap produce I bought last weekend gave me have-rotted green beans. Cut the rot off too.

Toss in dressing.

Rinse lettuce.

Capers. Olives.

Peel egg.

I'm too exhausted to find a fancy way to plate.

But this plate of textures is exactly perfect.

The Pistachio Girl

I'm that kid that car sick every single time I boarded the back seat of my parents' mini van to drive the 45 minutes to my grandparents' apartment on the south shore of Boston. Every.single.time. When I was real young, I remember my father pulling over three lanes of traffic on the southeast expressway, masshole drivers with heavy elbows on their horns, so that I could open the door and puke amidst shredded tire pieces and cigarette butts. My grandfather was always ready for my with chalky pink canadian mints, my face flushed and sweaty as my sisters walked ahead, complaining of another trip made longer by a nausea no amount of drama bean (what I called "granma bean" until I was 11 because I really thought it was made for traveling to grandma's house and misheard my mother's pronunciation) could quell.

Because of this, it's amazing I ever even had an impetus to travel. I sort of accidentally began studying German in high school (a long story that has to do with a cross-state move and school transfers) and just as circumstantially ended up in a German club (I later found out that our young and eager teacher recruited for lunchtime meetings all of us who seemed friendless and wayward). And so I was bit by the travel bug at 16.

So armed with gum, mints, gingerale, and a healthy supply of Nirvana and Alanis CD's for my walkman (remember those, kids?) I boarded my first transnational flight. While my friends around me read and napped, I could do neither, the pulse of nausea beating like a drum in the back of my throat. So I took to people-watching--limited in possibility from the strapping of my airplane seat. And maybe because I watched her, on and off for seven hours, she is sticky in my memory.

And by she, I mean not her physical body. I actually don't remember much about what she looked like. But I remember her movements. She had what looked like an exam book balanced on her right knee (the knee farthest from me), and her left hand poised as if she were a statue holding a small globe. In her left hand were pistachio, something I had never seen anyone eat before. With her palm full of nuts, I watched as she moved with the single stroke of her thumb a nut. Upwards to the tips of her middle and pointer fingers. There, she would press the nut between her two fingers and her thumb, spreading her two fingers apart gently in the breaking of the shell. Then, meat loosened, she would bring her hand to her mouth, fingers and thumb in delivery. She would then use her fingers to push the shell back into her palm, simultaneously sweeping her thumb in search of a fresh pistachio.

And this was done absent-mindedly as she turned pages with her other hand.

And I thought, "That's what I want to look like when I eat."

On Thursday morning, I boarded a megabus, one of a dozen this year, and took my seven hour trip to Chicago. I remembered this woman, and her one-handed tricks, and bought a bag of dry-roasted pistachios at the gas station stop. I briefly thought, "How many Weight Watchers points are these?" but the points left me as a doled out quarters from the bottom of my purse and payed the cashier. Something tells me the salty memories are worth the over-draft.

Shedding a Bit of Bitch

I am kind of a bitch. And I try as hard as I can to do self-reflection but we live in a culture where women judging other women is a regular pass time. Here's the most recent example of this in my life:

I was shooting the shit with the program coordinator at a local nonprofit where I regularly volunteer. Because I'm in once a week, I've found myself pretty friendly with several of the staff and opened up recently about my weight watchers stint. When I was in last week, the program coordinator mentioned this to another staff member because she, too, is doing the online program. I'll call this staff member Ellen.

Ellen is approaching 60 and has been doing nonprofit work for 30+ years. She's born and raised in the midwest and identifies as a lesbian with a working class lifestyle/budget. She was thrilled to find out she and I could "talk points" and strategize, particularly in relationship to budget-friendly options. She's only six weeks in. As she's talking about all of the "switches" she has made in the past six weeks (which is weight watcher's lingo for not actually changing much about how you eat, just compensating with synthetic, processed low-cal alternatives) she mentioned how floored she was to find out the point values in her current eating habits. A McDonald's double cheeseburger is 2/3 of our daily points. A McDonald's cinnamon thingy is half. She says, "So I'm not doing that any more! I lost 4 pounds a week when I started for the first two weeks." She assured me that the weight loss has evened out to more like a pound and a half/week but she was glowing with this revelation. I notice her khaki pants gaping where her belt was cinched a hole tighter.

I have not had this kind of success. I'm not even sure I'm losing weight just yet. So I'm immediately jealous. Then jealousy turns to anger and anger to bitchiness (which I kept internal). I thought to myself, as Ellen is suggesting this brand of bread that is only "1 point a slice", "I'm not going to do that. I don't even eat bread that much. And I don't go to McDonald's. And I don't drink soda or coffee drinks with calories. Why does she get to lose all the weight? And why is she surprised about McDonald's food?" I think, somehow, that I am more deserving than Ellen.

When she asked me if I had anything I was working on in particular, something I was trying to swap or avoid, I said, honestly, "alcohol." She raised her eyebrows. I felt like jumping to my own defense but thought better of it. I just shrugged my shoulders.

Then yesterday, I made one of my go-to meals that I've been making since late college. Peanut tempeh stir-fry with rice noodles and lots of frozen veggies. I plugged my recipe (and I actually measured my ingredients as I put them into the peanut sauce, since usually I just eyeball and taste test) into the online point calculator. The recipe, in the bowlful amount that I ate (and I often eat two helpings) was almost half my points. And I thought, well, it's not a McDonald's hamburger.....

All this to say, if the weight loss doesn't work, perhaps I'll shed a bit of bitch and remember the complicated (class) politics of women's consumption. And be a bit more mindful of a mouthful.

Is Weight-Loss Self-Absorbed? Wait...Is this blog self-absorbed?

The answer the latter question could very well be yes. The answer to the former I am still wrestling with, as a feminist, as a scholar, as a buddhist-christian-queer-antiracist-socialist.

One of the things that I'm very concerned about is Arizona's ban on Ethnic Studies and their corresponding immigration battles. I teach about this stuff, particularly in my class on American women writers, where we begin with slave narratives and end with Chicana feminist thought, wrestling with ideas of citizenship and belonging and their relationship to a feminist social justice project. My students surprise me with their insights and their varying relationships to activism and history.

Last week I had students read an interview with a black feminist scholar, Evelyn Hammonds, about growing up in the Jim Crow South and pursuing a science degree at MIT in the late 1970's. In a critical writing response, I asked students to make connections to Harriet Jacobs' Life of a Slave Girl and the idea that withholding education is a tool of oppression.

I was surprised to find that many of my students did not know what the Jim Crow Laws were.

That afternoon, intimidators with gun holsters disrupted a peaceful vigil held to recognize the death Trayvon Martin.

The next morning, racist graffiti was scrawled on the side of our campus Black Cultural Center, a building that arose out of student activism and a push of Black Studies (now called African and African American Studies) in the 1970's.

Meetings were held. Undergraduate student orgs representing students of color created a response and faculty and instructors like myself stood in support.

The next morning, we marched from the Hale Center to the Alumnae House to interrupt a meeting of the Board of Trustees. Afterward there was a sit-in, followed by news of more racist graffiti.

As I was marching with students and faculty, I felt the pinching in my groin and the tightness in my tail bone gradually release. There was a dull pain in my walk but it was overshadowed by the energy of the group's movement--the anger, the frustration, the sadness. And I thought, does it matter that my body is here?

I don't have a thoughtful way to end this blog except to say that I think it did, that it does. I'm reminded of the political philosophy of Stokely Carmichael, who understood that white bodies carried privilege that bodies of color did not. So when he became a founding member of SNCC, he encouraged white student leaders to travel to the Jim Crow South because their presence would garner media representation that the local black organizing was not receiving. These white bodies were meant not to be leaders but to listen and engage. To be present.

And I understand today that there are limitations to the work that SNCC was able to do. And I also understand that we live in a different media culture than Stokely Carmichael but I also know that white privilege still exists. And if I can use it for anti-racist organizing, I will.

But I can't do it unless my brain is working. My body is moving. And I am able to stand/sit/write/speak in solidarity.

Please sign this petition--no need to be a student at my University.