It's Not A Fad (This Is How We Eat Now)--Part I

And on top of the quirkiness already mentioned in Clash of the Cultures (Parts I, II and III), you should know that the blending of generational behaviors is not the only place worlds became enmeshed in my home growing up.  We listened to music from every land. It was not unusual to drive by our house on West Broad in Dallastown and hear Hawaiian drumbeats, Rat Pack tunes, Gregorian Chants, Irish drinking songs, Elvis hymns, Pete Seeger folk melodies, Christmas carols, or Pavarotti emanating from our open windows.  We ate crazy foods, had nude oil paintings hanging all over our house, and practiced some manner of alternative medicine before it became popular.  One of my mom's best pals cured her daughter's cancer with green drink.  That's what she called it; we always figured she shoved all kinds of plants in a blender and turned it on for a few minutes.  (I know now they were specific plants.)  I recently found out that my grandmother's regular doctor visits in Lancaster were for colonics!  These eclectic practices extended to our kitchen, as well.

We were the first people on our block to have a microwave and use a pressure cooker.  We ate granola, yogurt, steamed vegetables, brown rice, tuna noodle casserole (My stomach still lurches.), carob, sugar substitutes, any drink with a fruit name, ice milk, and some type of terrible white stuff that masqueraded as salt.  We ate dutifully because my mother convinced us these new introductions to our diet were necessary.  But when we complained, or used the phrase food fad in her presence, she'd bellow:  "It's not a fad!  This is how we eat now!"  And that was how we ate...for a week or two.  Then, we'd be on to sweet potatoes, three-bean salad and zucchini.

Oh, my poor, dear children!  My mother and I now have an information system going, a healthy eating alliance.  Plus, it sometimes includes input from my Aunt Cora (now almost 91), the one who cured her daughter of cancer with green drink.  I interact with earthy-crunchy people who eat healthy stuff.  My mom watches The Doctors and Doctor Oz.  Together, we discuss the sorrows of the SAD diet (Standard American Diet) and the evils of prepackaged foods.  On Sunday mornings before church, Mom calls Aunt Cora and she chimes in.  We swap information we have received from other sources and form our own belief system about how all people should eat.  This belief system, however, is kind of fluid in nature.  But, that's all right because it is well-intentioned.

Stay tuned for It's Not a Fad (This is How We Eat Now)--Part II, in which I discuss the many types of eaters we have been and the ultimate reality as it presents itself in our household.