Eat More Veggies

Daily writing prompt

What’s one small improvement you can make in your life?

Small improvement? I can’t think of one. But one big improvement I could make in my life is to eat more vegetables.

I don’t eat healthy enough. I eat a lot of processed food because we don’t have a lot of time or energy to cook at the end of the day. Between Richard’s job and his share of the housework, and my work and writing, we just don’t have the energy to do more than open a jar of spaghetti sauce or eat some faux lobster dip with crackers. It’s a wonder that my stomach hasn’t reached up and strangled me at some point.

It’s not that I dislike vegetables, even. When I eat vegetables, they’re the best thing on earth if ripened well and not overripe or spoiled. I have very good tastebuds and I can tell if a tomato or cucumber is a bit off. Right now I’m craving an Indian vegetarian dinner of channa masala, saag with turnips, and chutney. Or a Thai cucumber salad and some green chicken curry. Or a stir-fry with peanut sauce.

We’re putting in a vegetable garden this year. I hope that entices me to eat more vegetables. I’m also putting in an herb garden for the same reason.

Revamping one’s diet is not a little change, but a big one. Wish me luck.

In Protest of Trump

Daily writing prompt

What public figure do you disagree with the most?

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As an American with progressive leanings and a desire for globalism, the public figure I agree with the most is Donald Trump. I could throw the rest of his cabinet in for good measure, but I’m going to focus on Trump today.

I’m going to spare you readers the commentary on his personal attributes of vanity, venality, and probably narcissism, because this essay is supposed to be about disagreement.

I disagree with Trump’s overuse of executive orders to reshape the government, bypassing Congress. The legislative branch exists for a reason, and is vital to our democracy.

I disagree with Trump’s viewpoint that the purpose of government is as a despotic tool of revenge. There are plenty of examples of this, from revoking security clearances for past Democratic opponents to firing prosecutors for their roles in prosecuting January 6th rioters.

I disagree with Trump’s denial of due process toward people he deems as undocumented aliens. Due process exists for a reason — it’s in the Constitution.

I disagree with Trump’s dismantling of DEI programs, which sought not to favor women and people of color, but to give them equal access. I disagree with Trump’s efforts to rewrite public history, removing these people’s accomplishments.

I disagree with Trump’s every Cabinet pick, as they seem to be chosen as the least competent people for the jobs.

I disagree with Trump’s destructive purge of government employees and organizations, especially those which protect Americans. Cutting government spending can be done thoughtfully, as was evidenced in the Clinton administration.

I do not just disagree with Trump. I protest his heavy-handed, anti-American actions.

My Career Plan

Daily writing prompt

What is your career plan?

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I’m 62 years old, an associate professor, and five years from retirement. This is the time where people with careers coast until retirement rather than thinking about promotion-type ventures.

What is my career plan? For the most part, doing the best job I can until I retire. This means teaching, a bit of research, revamping classes, and possibly writing up a new class. There’s going to be a little bit of helping with curriculum revision, and always summer interns. Nothing new or surprising on that front.

I don’t want to go up for full professor because of the stressors of paperwork and worthy research — I have tenure; that was what I needed. I need life balance.

As far as the writing goes (I guess that’s a hobby rather than a career, but I’m going to talk about it anyhow) I am going to keep writing. When I retire, I will have more time to write and will have to write to keep my sanity in retirement. I don’t do nothing well. Maybe I will find the secret to promoting my work. Maybe I will write a best-seller. I don’t foresee anything else unless I turn a hobby into a more considerable operation, such as going professional with my moulage. I haven’t gotten to that quality; it would be fun if I had.

That’s my career in a nutshell. At my age, it’s not exciting.

The Last Concert I’ve Been To

Daily writing prompt

What was the last live performance you saw?

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The last concert I’ve been to was the Gesualdo Six, a British a cappella group who performs vocal music from medieval to modern compositions. Mostly older.

The concert was held in McCray Auditorium, which is housed in an older building whose lobby looked like a courtyard. Very English Gothic, I’m told. Not a bad building for the Gesualdo Six.

The Gesualdo Six were fabulous. I have an eclectic taste in music, but one of the things I love is good harmony. I can’t play-by-play the concert like I was a music critic, but the soaring harmonies are what I will remember.

The concert I saw before the Gesualdo Six? The Hu, a Mongolian heavy metal band. Did I mention I have eclectic taste in music?

Working in a Test Kitchen

Daily writing prompt

What’s a job you would like to do for just one day?

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In my undergraduate years, my major was Foods in Business, a major designed to position people into the food industry. This was not what I ultimately did with my life, having discovered Family and Consumption Economics, and my life’s work, my junior year. But as an undergraduate, I wanted to work in a consumer affairs position, or even better, in a test kitchen.

I took a class my senior year called Food Science, where we spent the first half of the semester learning the chemical and physical properties of food, and the second half of the semester testing hypotheses about food. Mine was testing for substitutes for butter in baking poundcakes — margarine, butter flavored shortening, and regular shortening with butter buds flavoring. (Note: people preferred shortening over everything, including butter.) I fell in love with test kitchen work and, if it weren’t for the fact that I loved the thought of graduate school more, I might have gone into test kitchen work.

So, if I had a choice of any job to step into for a day, I would walk into a test kitchen. I think I remember the basics 40 years later — standardized recipes where one weighs all the ingredients on a scale (including a very sensitive one for small amounts like baking soda and seasoning), tasting rooms with good ventilation, white walls, and neutral lighting, testing of texture, crumb, and viscosity using simple and complicated testing. I think I can do it for a day with very little coaching.

My Friend Les

Daily writing prompt

List the people you admire and look to for advice…

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The person I most admired has been dead for a number of years. He was my friend, surrogate father, and confessor. He got me through some of the most difficult years of my life. He was also the most interesting person I’ve ever met.

Les had a series of experiences that I could only dream of, and he would let them slip in conversation. “When I was in the Navy,” or “When I was in graduate school in Scotland,” or “When I was a pilot” … there were quite a few of these over the years. He was a combustion expert, and one of his sidelines was building controlled explosions in coal mines to burn off dangerous gases. He also studied religion on the side, and held a concert of his original compositions at age 80.

Les gave me a lot of advice over the years. Everything from grad school advice to life advice. I was going through considerable trauma and bad breakups in the time I knew him, so I know I did a certain amount of crying over the phone. Never did Les judge me.

He always held that, if I found the right person to have a relationship with, I would heal. It was scary, but he was correct. He knew I would marry Richard when I had barely met him, and he was (as always) right. I never got him that bottle of Talisker (Scotch) I owed him for that bet.

He died at 95, which is fitting for someone whose life was that full. His memorial service was filled with all the people whose lives he’d touched over the years. We had lost touch with each other, but we reunited for him. It was a fitting send-off.

Direction

Daily writing prompt

What gives you direction in life?

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What gives me direction in life? This is a harder question than it seems, because there isn’t one succinct answer.

On work issues, what gives me direction is what needs to be done. There is a cycle of grading, classes to be taught, topics to cover, research to be done, etc. That determines the direction of my work.

With leisure time, several things influence the sense of direction. One big thing is goals. I have small goals and Big Audacious Goals. I have not had a Big Audacious Goal in a while, which is part of why writing has been so hard. Another is my energy level — if I have little energy, my sense of direction points toward rest above anything. Finally, there’s a tug between established routine and emergent wants — do I go to Starbucks to write or start working in the garden?

I wish I could say some divine force gives me direction. I don’t know if I believe in God, although lately I have been praying. I pray that I get done the things I need to get done. But it still doesn’t help me get to the garden tasks.

Living by The Four Agreements

Daily writing prompt

Do you have a quote you live your life by or think of often?

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Be Impeccable With Your Word.
Don’t Take Anything Personally.
Don’t Make Assumptions.
Always Do Your Best.

These are the Four Agreements, from the book written by dom Miguel Ruiz, and I live my life by these.

Being impeccable with one’s word, to me, means not to speak unless one can speak truth. When we lie, we do not speak truth. When we say ‘yes’ when we mean ‘no’, we are not speaking truth. When we say negative things about ourselves or others, we are not speaking the whole truth.

Not taking things personally is exactly that — realizing that when someone says something, whether negative or positive, about you, they are speaking about their view of the world. They are speaking about themselves.

Don’t make assumptions — this, to me, is the easiest one to understand. I teach it in my case management class when we talk about clients, especially cultural diversity. Ask for clarification. Observe the other. Be careful to distinguish between facts and assumptions.

Always do your best. I make it a point to do this, understanding that my best during times of stress and distress is not the same as my best during good times. I can rest knowing that I did my best.

I know that The Four Agreements are considered New Age wisdom, and I reject a lot of that. But these four rules make so much sense in life and have made me a much calmer, more empathetic being.

My First Time Camping

Daily writing prompt

Have you ever been camping?

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My first time camping was in college. I had gone with a friend of mine to Illinois Yearly Meeting (an annual meeting of Friends, or Quakers). Lodging at the Meetinghouse was primitive, rustic two-person dorm rooms. My friend Joan and I decided we would camp in the camping space across the road from the Meetinghouse.

Joan and I put up the tent (not a fancy one like we have nowadays) and we spent the day in activities. The tent was still standing by bedtime, which was a good sign. When we settled in, with our belongings tucked around us, it was a crowded time in the tent and we were tired. Not too tired to notice that my head lay on a tree root.

It stormed all night. Illinois thunderstorms are particularly resonant, so I couldn’t sleep very well. I finally fell asleep after the storm quit. Scant hours later, I woke at dawn, and noticed my air mattress was … floating.

“Joan?”

“Mrrph.” Joan was not a morning person.

“Joan? I think the tent flooded.”

Joan jumped up, and we assessed the state of the tent. Yes, it had flooded at one end, as had the entire campground. We were surrounded by dismayed people noticing that they, too, had taken water in their tents.

Joan and I did the only thing we could — we busted up laughing. We sorted out our clothing (mostly dry) and hung our tent and sleeping bags in the tree to dry. Needless to say, we slept in the dorms that night.

That was my first time camping. The fact that I’ve camped more than once is a testimony to my perseverence. Or my short memory. One of those two.

A Morning Person

Daily writing prompt

When do you feel most productive?

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I feel most productive in the mornings. I wake up at 5 in the morning, sit in bed reading for 20 minutes, then get up for the day. Then I eat breakfast, write this blog during coffee, and by seven-thirty am ready for the workday.

My mind is at its sharpest from seven till about 2 PM. By then, I’m not what I’d call productive. I get most of my work done in the morning, and teach classes in the early afternoon. By three PM I’m ready to take a nap, although I’m not done until 5. My productivity is just not very productive in the late afternoon.

In the evening, I rest. I go to bed by eight, because I’m a morning person.