83:To taste again

Coming back to Orcas Island in mid January

Tonguing along in life

We have tongues. Talk with them. Taste with them.

And in both eating and talking: we have a hard time staying present.

Oh, well.

This book is about going about life in a whole lot of fun ways that open possibilities of learning and loving life again as we did when we were young.

And when we were young, food was bliss.

The strawberry, bliss.

The banana, bliss.

The celery with peanut butter in it, bliss.

The slice of orange, the carrot, even the spinach if it was real from a garden and the adult who was cooking knew how to steam it lightly and put some nice rich spring butter on it.

Yes, bliss and then more bliss.


And then the rules came along, no elbows on the table, no playing with your food, have to eat everything even the stuff the adults have ruined by overcooking or buying it too old. Or we just don’t like it, have to eat it.

Time comes along, the clock world, hurry and eat, and eat and hurry, and it’s no fun a lot of the time.

And guess what?

We aren’t children any more.

We can take our time, it’s our time, our time is our life.

We can take our time and wrap our tongue around our food, and chew it slowly and savor every bite.


This is today’s job: to return to the soul of the soil’s gift to us, our food. Slow down, chew. Breathe while we eat. Breathe while we taste. Don’t talk or read or watch the tube while we eat. Just eat.

And when not eating today, as much as you “can” sense and enjoy sensing, your tongue.

Thanking Two

the sun
our source
of free energy

the amazing explosion
93 million miles away
and a tiny sliver of this huge
being's energy (a million times the size of
Earth)
comes to us

grows the grass that feeds
the cows
that graze down near Fresno
and are milked in the pastures
and then the milk
raw milk
sent to stores all over California

thankful to
sun
and raw milk
and the magic of bacteria
to make
Keffir
from the last batch of keffir

thanks to sun

for drying towels





for drying dishes



for giving Marlie a warm
morning in which
to plant some spinach seeds


thankful
that the night is dark
and sleep comes

and then the day
the sun,


sometimes bright,
sometimes hidden

but always there
keeping life going
on this beautiful, amazing planet

Earth

Labor Day and the Love of Now

when I was a boy
Labor
Day
meant going back to school
and putting on new jeans, always ill fitting
and uncomfortable and shoes for the first time
in a long while

and school was usually made even
more unbearable by a fall heat spell

and then
there were all those people
and all that sitting around
and all that noise
and all the dead time while the teacher
over and over said something
not very well

and recess,
a breath of fresh
air
and lunch
awful food by how I eat today's standards
but to a child
food
and freedom to move
and playground sports
ah, that was
heaven
for awhile
and

then going back in
and the afternoon takes
forever
and the bus ride
home
and the sweetness
of walking from the bus to my house
or to a friends
house and
changing out of too tight too uncomfortable jeans
and maybe going to the beach to play
or wandering around looking for other kids
to do
we didn't even know what

freedom
and learning
and discovery
vs
sitting
and rules
and conformity
and herding

oh, well:

And now school
is

when I'm awake
or near awake
and realize it

and

School is:
all of life

....

Thoughts toward health and anti-aging

Echinacea

Nice little start on
this over at yoga/health blog,
"Thoughts toward anti-aging, and August"
and why not
ramble
a bit more?

So::::

What is health,
anyway?

Getting outside
when you feel the call.

Feeling the call
when
you have the call.

Eating good food
early in
the day.

Eating food you
grew
near your home
no car between you
and the yum
yum
your backyard
your land
a bike ride away at some other organic
clean
sweet land


Checking out
as much raw food as you can
sweetly
and non-rigidly enjoy,
and what a time of year now
is to enjoy that.

Staying present.

Loving the people
and stuff
you could let bother you
and drive you crazy.

Doing some sweet movement
where learning,
learning,
sensing,
awaring,
nowing,
and discovering
and
funning
are all
part of
the package.

More
stuff, too.

Love
laugh
land
learn

all
good

you
2

staying awake

when i eat too
much
late in the evening

i can forget to stay
awake

and then i remember
and when i'm really awake
it's so lovely
that i don't have the usual
energy

to beat myself
up for the "mistake"
of "eating too much
too late."

besides:
raw food,
brendan enjoying his,
marlie thrilled with ideas
for homemaking miso
(she smart,
not eating,
looking beautiful)
and that's nice

as Katie
( and the work)
suggests:
take the idea

"I made a mistake"

and run it through:
judge your neighbor (sometimes yourself)
write it down
ask four questions
turn it around

fun:
loving what is:
fun

experiencing
this life
now
which is all
i can really touch
and experience:
nice

sweet nice
life

i hope
yours is
so easy

and all
it takes
is a turning
turning
the Sufi's turning
re-turning

back
back
to the Self
the quiet
experiencing
without describing

this
now

yes

Solstice of sorts

Amazing William, plus Beth, plus Marlie


the party
of people over
friends
lessons
food
being present
to each other
and food
and what is going to

happen
next

a small child
is always a fun
way
to allow
life
to jump
and swerve
from one present
to the next

william
is an expert
at having life
as an
ongoing
curiosity
delight
and dis
covery

party

the present
is
always
the
best party

and even
better
when
others
are in
on
the fun

Ramadan

One theory
of the angry Muslims

is favored by a professor
of something of other,
named,
I believe
Bernard Lewis:

his theory:
arabs at forefront of world
knowledge
back in 800's and
so on,
even up to 1300's

then they are in backwater
of discovery
and science
and industrialization
and stuff

and so
they resent
the European / North American
world for getting ahead
of them

and so,
they need to act
out
lash out
and so on

fine
fine
theories
can explain anything

but,
i'd say
to Bernard,
try Ramadan,
for a month,
don't eat until after sundown

or
do the modified
Ramadan i'm trying:
just eat for a few hours
in mid day

and see:
what it feels like
to have a different
connection to food
and hunger
and self control
and waiting
and inner purpose
than most of the rest
of the world

or different
than ourselves at other times

maybe inferiority
is part of it

maybe superiority
to fast most of the day
is to do something
many cannot

to focus on something
higher than the belly
is to make religion
not just words,
but a daily
deep inposition

a deep stance
as it were

and to say nothing
of the irritability
hunger can bring
at first
and then
a learning
that we can change
and that these habits
don't need to rule us

what has this got
to do with Bernard Lewis:
well,
try a week of eating essential one meal a
day
and see
if you feel different
that the rest of
the world

and different
than how you usually feel

my recommendation:
eat earlier in the day
rather than later

interesting note:
two of the five obligations
to all Muslims:
fasting in the month of Ramadan
and hospitality to anyone in need

you can see how they'd go together,

Rain, Sun, new Thursday

Oregon summer,
looking a little like California fall

Well
yesterday
it looked like rain
and i bet
it wouldn't

and it did
a
little

so i lost
the wish full thinking
bet

not the first time

anyway,
that put me in gear
literally
this morning
and i rode
out to the garden
and retrieved
some drying fruit
that we'd rescued
from the windfall
that usually just
gets heaved
in the compost

rescued
the drying apples, and pear apples
and peaches
and brought them
home

and almost got them
sorted out
in time
to watch
the beautiful
warm
clear
sun
come on
back out

oh, well

life is good

things shift

soon to go to talk
part education
part slow food

if you want to experience
slow
and learning
and haven't tried
the the Feldenkrais Method®
yet

check out the link
to desk trainer
over on the side

or,
just start moving
really slowly
and imagine
a movement
you have never
done
before

that accentuates,
of complicates,
or expands
the movement you started with

how
do you
do
that?

find
out,
i guess.

or come to one of my
Mat Discovery classes,
Saturday, 10:45 AM
Monday, 12:15 PM
Monday 6:30 PM

see more via current classes link at side
or, heck,
push this Fall Classes

Empty Stomach, Curious Mind

Ramadan
starts today

i'm not Muslim
and i'm curious
about this partial
fast that hundreds
of millions of people
do a month a year

no eating
until after sundown

i'm on a modified version:
eating only
once a day

yesterday
and today,
around 2 in the afternoon

since
eating at night
is harder
on the liver
and whatnot

anyway
it's almost two today
no eating since
around 3 yesterday
afternoon

hungry

curious:
is this "hard"
and
if so
how
much of "being hard"
is my story

and how much
my incredible luxury
of being one of the humans
on earth
with food
around
almost all the time

of course,
anyone
with a garden
and orchard
and some nearby
blackberry patches
has
lots of food
around all the time
this time
of year

curious
interested

what will a month
of this be like

hmmm.

Hunger

it's interesting
life is

when i'm hungry
i'm so much
more prone
to being irritable

this either means:
eat

or be
patient
come into the now
stop
see what happiness
is waiting
inside the irritability

it's always a delight
to notice
and the more i can notice
myself in my "not together states,"
like
the

feeling
that "something has to be
fixed"
before i can be happy

the more i can notice
the me
inside the "trouble"
and the "story"
and the habitual responses,
then
the more i can be
free

free
ah,

sure,
eating when hungry
is fine

and eating
the way we do it in the west
is like an endless shovelling

what's wrong
with fasting
a little
a meal here
a meal there

letting the irritability rise
and exploring:

where is the happiness
the peace
at the center

at my core

does food fill me
or does the glory of
life ?

Not eating dinner

Not eating dinner seemed like a great idea
at six thirty

but now
at nine thirty
i'm way hungry

is that true?
apparently.

can i absolutely know that's true?
hmmm.

when i attach to the belief:
this is too hard,
i'm going to starve
or hurt myself,
or deprive myself
or miss out on something

without the story:
amused that the stomach
can be such a big shot
in my life
amused at these sensations

in love with myself
and life

Slow Sonoma, Slow Food, Slow Glow

SLOW FOOD
Sometimes people ask me if I'm in the Slow Food movement because the main blog site I put on my business cards is slowsonoma.com.

Well, yes and no, that's the answer.

Yes, in the sense that slow Sonoma started as my campaign slogan when I ran for City Council 2 years ago. This town, this small and wonderful and very asleep to the inner life town of Sonoma, is full of people who imagine they are living a life that is high quality. A big campaign issue is always Quality of Life. With caps.

And then, people rush around through their lives as if they have to get so much done that there is no time to stop and smell the roses, no time to stop and look at the sky, no time to walk down the block and see who's home and how their neighbor's gardens are doing, no time even to cultivate their own gardens, instead leaving the job to some mow and blow and go guys ( the lawn janitors, I call them.)

So my campaign was: slow down. Build less houses. Drive slower, slow down the speed limit. Walk and bicycle more, slow down the rushing around. Turn off the televisions and talk to each other and your family.

Slow down and know this great wonderful truth: this is our life, right now, and only right now.

All else is a dream.

And so food, slow down when you are preparing a meal, slow down while you are eating a meal, talk to the others, look at them, look at the food, be quiet and taste more deeply, take a breath between bites, stretch out the meal and the companionship.

And how do I differ? Eating raw food, the cooking isn't slow, because it isn't. A salad can be easily and sweetly made, a dressing smoothie can be easily made, food can be fresh and natural. Fruit as fruit is heaven, no need to ruin it in a pie. Go for the real thing.

Slow down and touch and taste the food. If you want to cook, cook as little as possible and slowly and with love. If you don't want to cook, savor the richness and the flavors and all those enzymes and the sun kissed water in your food.

Life is good. Food is good. Now is good.

Yes.

Food

Food comes from the soil. Dirt treated well is soil. Dirt treated like dirt is what you pay for when you buy food that is not organic. Yes, yes, I know, sometimes it's just too expensive, but usually not.

Farmers' Markets are the sweet way to support organic and local produce. Ask the Farmer, because some, like Bob Cannard's stand, manned by his sons Ross and Marius, doesn't proclaim organic, since Bob, an iconoclast like me, doesn't want to do the paperwork.

In spring and summer and fall, but not now, on Saturday mornings you can buy organic produce out at the Sonoma Garden Park, which I hope to have them rename the Pauline Bond Garden Park. Anyway, this park, garden, little bit of paradise is my contribution to Sonoma so far.

I was intent on feeding the soil there, lots of organic matter. Green mulching the plots. Wood chipping the paths. Aw, we made the soil sweet. Soil and soul, and two way street.

There's another nice essay in here on gardening.

May your day be sweet and your life be a rich, full and beautiful garden.

Ciao,
Chris