Thoughts at the Supermarket

Why is grocery shopping so stressful? As a kid, I just eat what I was told, in college I'd eat three cheeseburgers at 2:00 a.m. and not think twice, but once I became an "adult" I started seeing shopping as a responsibility both to my health and to the planet. 

I was pushing a cart down the aisles at Kroger the other night, picking things up, reading the ingredients, and putting them back on the shelf. Everything seems to have either too many preservatives or too much sodium or too many calories or something that makes me feel like I'm poisoning myself or the environment. Because I scrutinize everything I put in the basket, shopping becomes stressful. A few weeks ago Kyle and I were standing in the refrigerated section, vacillating between a commercial chicken for $1.99/lb. or a free-range organic chicken for more than twice that. After a difficult debate between our conscience and our wallet, we put them both down and bought dried beans for the week's protein. 

And take coffee creamer. I luuuuuuuv that stuff. But now when I see it in the refrigerated section of the grocery store, I think, "Oh God, those artificial flavors and colors are going to give me cancer and ruin my health for good." So I have to content myself with boring old milk. 

The main culprit for this freak-out is the novel "Sweetness #9" by Stephan Eirik Clark, which I first heard about on NPR in August 2014 but didn't get from the library until October a year later. That book traces the rise of artificial flavors in U.S. food products from the '70s to the present -- and it's depressing, even if it is fiction. 

I guess I could shop at Whole Foods or Fresh Market, but it's so expensive. 

In my head, I have long debates between the virtues of there being a million choices of things to eat, and the virtues of only having healthy choices. They've both got their pros and cons.

But dang it, it's about to be Thanksgiving! It's the time of the year to eat marshmallows on a sweet potato casserole, and gravy on everything. So I'm going to throw all of my sensibilities to the wind and enjoy my stepdad's famous mac and cheese, fried turkey, and pecan pie and all the other goodies of the season. 


I can worry about the negative aspects of mass-produced food later on. 

Fun & Games

In all this week's news about protests, fights, un-friending, and all the rest, I've found two fun things to do that tell me humanity is still good: Triangle Game Night and RDU Blues.

Thursday night I went to the lobby of a downtown Durham hotel without knowing a soul except Kyle, and left having met a group of diverse new friends. An Arabic-speaking doctor at UNC, a Spanish-speaking paralegal, an IT guy who was probably a bro back in college, a black IT analyst, his hip girlfriend who works in corrections, a blue-haired not-sure-what-he-does and me all sat down at a table and played Anomia for an hour while Kyle and another group of folk played another game whose rules took too long to explain.

Friday night we went to a blues/fusion dancing event in Durham, where white people, black people, Latino people, college people, working people, and retired people all boogied down to an eclectic mix of blues music, throwing in some salsa and swing to their blues moves.

At neither event did anyone say anything political, either kind or unkind. We were just there having a good time. I was a stranger at both events but felt welcomed, and I hope everyone else who attended felt as good as I did. Durham is a good place to be.