this ain't livin'

Unfortunate headline, frightening news | 22Aug06

A week ago, I happened upon an article on the BBC about a survey of 16-24 year olds and their sexual habits. It’s quite eye-opening. The unfortunate headline: “It’s not just a case of getting a cream”. The frightening news? A growing number of young people are not using condoms or other barrier methods of protection. The survey base was rather large–30,000 people were queried online in the pursuit of knowledge in the study, which was sponsored by MTV and Durex. If the results can be generalized to the rest of the population, I’m disturbed.

There’s been a growing trend in the last few years among young gay men to disdain protection, and apparently this is spreading to the straights as well. Apparently it’s oh so trendy now to disdain STD prevention. What is the deal here? Are people unaware that STDs still exist, and that there are some that still aren’t curable? Complacency kills: or at least gets you herpes.

According to the article, most of the respondents (34%) were most concerned about pregnancy, which is, granted, a rather devastating STD, and also one of the most easily prevented. A large number of young women utilize hormonal birth control, and almost fifty percent of those surveyed said that they didn’t use condoms because they (or a partner) were on the pill. It’s touching to see such faith in the pill, which doesn’t have a high failure rate–but it has been known to fail. And, of course, the pill only protects you from one hazard of sexuality.

A large number of respondents cited drunkeness as an excuse, which distresses me greatly.

A fair number also used excuses which sound like they’re out of a sex-ed class. They were “too embarassed,” it might “spoil the moment,” the “partner refused,” they “couldn’t get it on,” or they didn’t have any. Perhaps I’m part of the “AIDS generation” the article mentions, but I really can’t imagine taking any of these excuses seriously. Maybe I’ve been too well indoctrinated by the condom lobby. Do any of my readers remember those little click wheels they used to pass out in sex ed, where you could dial an excuse and a response, like “Condoms spoil the mood,” and you’re supposed to say “oh baby, let me show you how good it can be,” or some such? And then you all trooped out to the rec room to practice putting condoms on bananas? I would hope that they still do that, although I suppose the Bush administration is pushing abstinence only pretty hard. According to the article, sources of information about sexual health are indeed narrowing, or being rejected by youth–it’s time to retool or sexual education programs, if people aren’t taking the threat of STDs seriously. To me, condom usage is part of being a responsible adult–I’m doing my part, so to speak, to help prevent the spread of STDs. It’s like smogging your car–it’s for the better good of mankind, man.

I’m a little disturbed that this has to be made clear, but apparently a large number of youth are not aware that hormonal methods of birth control do not protect against STDs. One should be especially conscious about STD protection with new partners, in my opinion, unless you know them very, very well. Perhaps I’m simply distrustful by nature–but I am disinclined to let someone else muck about with my sexual health. Certainly, some STDs are treatable with some embarassment. Others, however, are not curable, or may have long lasting effects on fertility (if you care about that sort of thing) or other aspects of your health. Why put yourself at risk? Sex, unfortunately, is a dangerous thing sometimes. An awesome thing, to be sure, but sadly not wholly innocent.

And if you’re concerned about pregnancy, two methods are better than one. So why not be certain that you are preventing pregnancy while also protecting yourself from a nasty present? Let’s face it–many people are not open about what they may or may not be carrying, and being an unwitting victim is a tragedy. Perhaps this is all a new terrorist scheme to bring us down–with our well publicized abstinence-only sexual education, maybe brave men and women are “taking one for the team” and spreading itchy loins across America.

STDs are on the rise, thanks to more sexual activity, decreased use of STD protection, and lack of information. This is something we should all be concerned about, because it might at some point come back to haunt many of us. Educate and participate to make the sheets a safer place for us all. Ban terrorists from the bedclothes!

[STDs]

Pop | 21Aug06

“Smokey the Bear must have been gay,” I say, rolling her eye around in my palm thoughtfully. She’s asked me to hold onto it, for safekeeping, until we get to the house and she can clean it. Finally, I wedge it into page 119 of The War of Don Emmanuel’s Nether Parts so that I won’t lose my place, or her eye, before we leave.

It’s a beautiful day at the river, the water a perfect green crystal nestled between the sandy banks, our bodies like inclusions trailing temporary vortexes of instability and bubbles when we slide in.

I am eating apricots, halving them with one hand and popping the pits out to dessicate beside me on the sand, holding my book with the other hand while the sweet juice runs down my face. The sun is warm on my back and I kick my legs idly in the air while I muster up the will to move and get back into the water.

When she dives in, her eye pops out like a champagne cork and skips twice across the water before slipping below like a sinking ship. I hear a muffled exclamation under the water and she surfaces, water streaming obscenely from the hole in her face.

“Ow,” she says, placidly. “Fuck. Motherfucker.”

“I think it landed over there,” A says, walking wisely along the bank well upstream of where her eye landed and diving beneath to search, hair slicking back across his skull like a seal.

I don’t know why she has a fake eye. For some reason, it never seemed like an appropriate question to ask, although we used it to play pranks at parties sometimes. It’s pretty realistic, for a fake eye, and when she talks to you she casts her face down and slightly to the side so it’s hard to guess. There’s something, still, about the quality of the eye, reflected in the intensity of the other, that makes the truth obvious.

“That’s never happened before,” she says.

I’ve never seen anything like it.

“Do they warn you about that, you know, when they set you up with your glass eye?”

“No,” she says. “I don’t think they went over ‘what happens when my eye pops out while I am swimming’ when they were giving it to me. It doesn’t seem very practical, I mean, to have it popping out like that. Maybe my eye socket is enlarged or something.”

H looks somewhat embarassed to be asking this, but plows on anyway. “Has anyone, uh, you know,” he says, “asked to fuck your socket?”

“Fuck my…oh. No. Not really,” she says, leaving her answer somewhat ambiguous. I glare at H and he has the wits to look shamefaced when A surfaces again.

“Did you find it,” I say.

“No. What color is it,” he asks.

“Green,” she says. “Why?”

“Well I wanted to make sure I had the right one,” A says.

“Are you expecting more than one,” she asks.

“Well no. But I mean it has been in someone’s head. I don’t want to touch something that’s been in someone else’s eye socket.”

“Ew,” H says. “Eye herpes.”

A dives back under while we sun on the bank.

She’s remarkably calm, for someone who has just lost an eye. Maybe once you do it once, you get used to it.

We’re talking about fire prevention when A surfaces again, triumphant, and paddles over to me, perhaps because he knows me best. With the solemnity of a Labrador holding a chew toy, he hands me the eye. It is green, and somehow lifeless outside of her face.

“Will you hold it,” she says, “until we get back to the house? For safekeeping?”

“Sure,” I say, “why not?”

Later on, trudging up the hill on that late summer afternoon, I tuck her eye into my bra so I won’t lose it, and realize I’ve forgotten the page I was on.

morning.treasure.island | 20Aug06

drinking strange dregs of coffee in a bittersweet day of cloudy humidity, i am the only one awake in a household of silence, sleep, thought.

yesterday was stumbling through chinatown to the hang ah, eating dumplings and inventing a new fetish, was changing buses and standing in the transbay looking at the 10 idling on the curb, was sweet discovery and a loss of rational thought.

cake was eaten.

across the bay the city of san francisco is swathed in sleepy fog like the twisted sheets of a long night, sprawled out from the bridge like tentacles. i am almost certain that there is not a precise word to describe the emotion i am feeling right now.

on friday night a man in front of the berkeley bowl wrote a poem for me, about yellow watermelon. i should post it.

he sits on a bench under a tree by the front door with a sign that says “poems about anything” and i say “what about watermelon, yellow watermelon,” and the giant disc of the sun is setting behind me and he pulls out a receipt and slips it into his typewriter and we stand there dripping with fruit juices while he types.

he says it’s a good gig.

there is a strange peace and stillness here which goes beyond sunday morning, a sense of being in the city but not of it and rusting hulks of things skulk in the back ground like zombies.

sometimes i think i should never leave.

Day of the exploding toilet | 19Aug06

When I speak of catastrophic plumbing events, I know that of which I speak.

During our time in Molybos, we lived very close to a German family with a girl around my age, and Elika and I would often walk to school together in the mornings. Indeed, we did most things together, being rather unusual figures in the primarily Greek town. Every day at lunch we would walk back to my house together and my father would put together lunch for us in the cavernous kitchen if it was raining or in the back yard garden if it wasn’t. Then we would amble back down the hill for another few hours of school, unless it was Saturday, in which case we were out for the afternoon.

One afternoon, we arrived back at the school grounds and I felt the call of nature rather urgently. The school bathrooms, in general, were avoided, since they were done in the style still common in much of Europe which involves crouching precariously in the middle of the floor aiming for a large-ish hole and hoping you don’t get something nasty on your skirt. We preferred the sit down out-houses we had at home, when possible, especially since the school bathrooms had recently been plumbed and we’d heard ominous rumours about them. Also, our home outhouse had much more tasteful reading material–six month old back issues of the Times our friend M would send us by the case.

I went in and did my business while Elika did likewise in the next stall. I noted that several students had availed themselves of the facility before me but not flushed, perhaps out of fear, or a lack of understanding. Confident in the new knowledge gained during my recent trip to Athens, I flushed my toilet with an air of triumph and watched with a sense of deep pleasure while water gurgled under my feet, whisking the product of my labour into the bay.

Elika, next door, wasn’t as confident.

“I’m afraid,” she said, after the sound of gushing water faded.

“Ha,” I replied.

“Will you come flush mine too?”

“No,” I said, “you flush it. Don’t be a baby.”

“Please?”

“Are you really so scared?”

“Yes.”

“Fine,” I said, marching into her stall with the air of an expert. “We’ll flush it together. Then you won’t be afraid next time.”

I showed her the pull-chain and we grasped it together for a moment.

“Drie, zwei, eins!” I said, and we yanked the chain sharply downward.

For a moment, there was no response, and then a volcanic rumbling. Elika glanced at me nervously but I stood my ground–I was the resident toilet authority, and gurgling wasn’t going to phase me. The rumbling grew in volume, as did my concern when the gush of water didn’t appear. The California girl lurking within wondered if this was an earthquake.

There was a moment of silence before the contents of the toilet erupted over us, cascading streams of water and filth all over the bathroom stall, our school uniforms, and us. In my recollection the stream was geyserlike, although the norms of physics make this unlikely. It’s more probable that the toilet simply hiccuped, belching back some of its offensive contents.

Either way, we were covered in waste.

“Sheiße,” Elika said.

[Greece]

Ah, the TSA | 18Aug06

So I’ve been spending a great deal of time at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) website, in the wake of the “fluids on a plane” incident. My philosophy has always been that in order to defeat the enemy, you must know the enemy, and this had led me to read through a wide assortment of TSA guidelines in order to better understand what the hell is going on in the world. It’s a pretty strange world out there, kids, as anyone who has flown recently knows.

Hell, the last time I went on a plane I made the mistake of wearing clogs with steel rivets and I cooled my heels in a high security room for quite some time while three TSA workers dismantled my Danskos. Those were good shoes, too, damnit, and then I had to run through the fucking Cleveland airport at warp speed with the heels flapping like the mouths of gossiping harridans.

The TSA is pretty hip. They must have someone on staff who reads blogs and follows major news stories, because I notice there’s always a rapid response to negative reporting. For example, earlier in the week a number of news sources reported that the technology we use to scan for explosives in things like shoes isn’t actually very effective. The TSA countered with a feature on how they respond to ieds. Most airports now support their x-ray machines with swab detection devices, which have a very high false-positive rate.

I also stumbled across (via BoingBoing), an article on service animals. I’ve taken animals through security before, although never in a post September 11 environment, and I remember wondering how, exactly, animals are screened. Service animals add another layer of difficulty, thanks to the requirements of their owners. It must be an intense thing to be blind, going through security with your dog, even though the TSA claims to train its employees in the proper methods for dealing with service animals. The TSA sounds fairly thorough, although they ignore an obvious point–in a country where animals are viewed as objects, why not make an entire animal an ied, through the use of swallowed or implanted explosives?

Indeed, what about the use of yourself as an ied? I mean I hate to be giving the TSA any ideas here, but a number of people wear implanted medical devices, which carry documentation. “Oh, that’s just my pacemaker,” says the right wing fundamentalist on the way to bomb a plane full of gays. “Great,” says the TSA officer. How do you counter the threat of internally carried ieds seriously?

At dinner the other night, we were talking about the recent changes in airport security, and one of my companions made a good point, one which I firmly agree with: we are letting the terrorists win. They have come to govern our lives on all levels–someone, somewhere, is very happy about the state of terror American keeps its civilians in.

Estimated cost of lost time due to security-related airport delays is in the billions. If I was a terrorist, I’d be mighty proud of that kind of impact on the American economy–that’s no small potatoes. Especially when you consider that I am more likely to be hit by lighting tomorrow than I am to die in a terrorist attack. Yet I don’t see the American government investing millions of dollars in anti-lightning efforts. The US government is not good at prioritizing the use of funds–funds raised from the tax dollars of the beleaguered middle classes.

I’ve lived in a lot of places all over the world, some of which were/are heavily victimized by terrorists. And I have never seen anything like the United States.

I’ve been around police forces that carry automatic weapons and ask you for your papers–I’ve snuck my way across borders into places I shouldn’t have been. Hell, I’ve even talked with radical extremists who had committed acts of terror such as kidnapping. I was on a flight that was hijacked, and I’ve been on trains and boats that have been stopped to root out terrorists. And it was scary: I’m not going to deny that. But there was also an air of business as usual about it, a sense of “let’s not let the little fuckers disrupt us any more than we have to.”

Most of the countries I have been which have heavy security precautions utilize highly trained, confident, polite police forces. I’ve never felt fear in approaching or being approached by these men and women, even though they might seem very intimidating in their camouflage and gloves and huge guns. They are there to do a job, and they do it calmly and with respect. In the United States, I’m scared shitless of these kids who are poorly trained, living in a culture of fear, waving around very very dangerous weapons.

Our security methods are not effective or efficient–they are transparent and easy to manipulate, tweak, and learn. It doesn’t take long to figure out how to get through airport security when it’s all on display out in the open-style. If frequent fliers can learn how to subvert the system, don’t you think terrorists can too?

The terrorists are winning if we live in a world where every day is a day of new fears and worries. They are winning when we sit at airports for hours waiting to clear incompetant security checks. I’ve been in high security airports which actually get bombed on a daily basis and I’ve always passed through security with a minimum of fuss, thanks to a high level of efficiency. We all work together, yes, and we all make some sacrifices for the greater good, but more importantly things get done.

It’s reasonable to take precautions–it’s not reasonable to live in a bubble. The systems we use for tracking threats are useless–for example, I, an entirely harmless academic, am listed as a security threat on the FBI red flag list, which means that going through airport security for me is a nightmare. Once I made the mistake of talking in Arabic with a friend while in line for the x-ray: never again, I say. When people are flagged for having the same name as someone else, when figures in power are exempt from screening, when we must arrive three hours early for a domestic flight: the terrorists have won.

And we’re ‘mericans, damn it. Fuck the terrorists! We shouldn’t be such pussies, letting them towelheads win, man. So fight back. Don’t live in fear. Tell the TSA to stuff their travel tips where the sun don’t shine, because you’re taking the train–you’ve got people to see and places to go. We all know that I’m not all rah-rah go America, but I am rah-rah go public freedoms, and I see a severe abridgement being suffered by the citizens of this country because you are allowing the government to manipulate you. Let’s all get on the red flag list. They can’t detain us all, right?

[terrorism]

Sempre Fudge | 17Aug06

As my local readers are no doubt aware, Headlands recently made the drastic and unprecedented decision to drop the Amazon Chocolate Cake, made by Cafe Beaujolais, and carry Sempre Fudge cake from Costeaux French Bakery. Given the sacrosanct nature of the Headlands dessert case, this is headline news.

And it required a new cartoon, which is always a source of pleasure to me. Speaking of which–is there any way I can commission a replica of the 11’s? Or, better yet, if the bastard who stole them is reading this, could they be returned? I’m sure it would be a no questions asked kind of thing–I know I’m not the only person who is wistful about the 11’s. I just…I really miss the 11’s. And I understand that you guys might be retiring numbers, like they do for famous ball players. But still. For me?

The Amazon and I had a tormented relationship. The body of the cake is actually vegan, and I’ve had fully vegan versions which are scrumptious. Especially, ahem, with a layer of raspberry goodness in the middle. But I was never a fan of the frosting–too thick, dense, and rich, it detracted from the cake. Often I would hollow the cake out from the layers of frosting because it was just too much for me. Many patrons felt the same way, which may have been part of the reason for the change. The Amazon was a notorious foe–most people weren’t really up to it, so to speak.

So I was in Headlands recently and decided to try the Sempre Fudge, as part of my mission to say I’ve tried everything in the case. Now that I’ve had the new cake, this is once again true. If you’d like full reviews on everything Headlands serves, we could start “Friday Headlands Blogging” now that Friday Cat Blogging is on infinite hiatus thanks to my camera-less state.

My impressions: too sweet. Too damn sweet. Chocolate should be slightly bitter, tangy, almost a little bit sour, to allow the full flavour to come through and mature. My molars actually started to hurt as I chewed the first bite. God, I hope I don’t have a cavity. The cake was alright, dense, cakey, not too dry, but the frosting was cloyingly sweet. So sweet. Just thinking about it makes my lip curl.

What is this with chocolate desserts and the sweet? Chocolate is such a perfect, splendid, powerful flavour, and bakers seem determined to mask it. I would love to see Headlands carrying a chocolate cake that meant business, that didn’t hide behind sugar’s apron strings, the kind of cake that causes me to emit little noises of pain and glee all at the same time.

Until then, I’ll stick with the frangipane. Or the lemon tarts. Mmm lemon tarts. Now there’s a dessert.

[cake]

Strangers | 16Aug06

There’s a wonderful photography set up at nerve.com called Strangers. I’d recommend checking it out. The photographs are intriguing and haunting, as is the story that goes along with them.

Get some culture in your day. Go! Go!

“I don’t want the knife” | 16Aug06

The Christian Science Monitor is finally doing a feature on Jill Carroll, told in her own words. Yeah, remember Jill Carroll? Kidnapped? Her translator was shot right in front of her? Really long time, like 82 days, being held by extemists? Finally released and just dropped off the radar? The special section for her also has a series of articles dating back to the beginning of the saga, so you can follow the story in full if you’ve forgotten bits.

It’s an awesome series of articles and I am really looking forward to reading them all the way through, even if they are being mean and putting up teasers, movie theatre style, instead of releasing the whole story all at once. Serial journalism at its best. The Chronicle is also carrying the articles, although I think the CSM special is better because of the multi-media offerings.

The accompanying photos are also quite good, as are the video clip snippets for those of you with lots of bandwidth to burn.

Jill Carroll is an excellent writer. The story is well written, gripping, and moving. I really think you should all go read it. I’ll even confess that I cried a little bit reading parts of it, and we know I’m busy most of the time looking stoic. It’s interesting to read this first hand account by someone who had a lot of experience in Iraq, and still was kidnapped–it’s not just new arrivals on the ground, but anyone, who is at risk. She started reporting in Iraq in 2003, and most people asked about her speak well of her ability to communicate information passionately, but with minimal judgment. She knew the scene, and the score, in the area very well. She also knew the dangers of reporting in the Middle East–she was on the staff of the Wall Street Journal when Daniel Pearl was kidnapped. She’s good–she conveys the fear that she felt, and also tells an objective clear story of the series of events she encountered. It must have been an intense experience to write about, after all.

The kidnappings (and beheadings) of journalists bother me very much. I sort of feel that the press and the medical corps are entitled to certain exceptions during wartime, such as not being kidnapped and killed. Both are doing a vital service to both sides–telling stories, and healing. The use of innocent men and women to pull power plays is deeply distasteful to me. I believe that insurgents should at least be kidnapping questionable private defense contractors, not reporters, even if the press corps are there by choice.

Reporters Sans Frontieres has more information on the current state of freedom of the press, including a list of reporters currently in captivity all over the world. According to their statistics, 103 newspeople have died in Iraq since the start of the war. This is something you should care about.

Are there some reporters with questionable motives, some of whom may even be assisting their governments? Well…yes. And that’s irritating, because it softens the divide between non-combatents and the rest. There are far more, however, who are actually making positive changes in the places they work, who are risking their lives to bring out information, who deserve better than beheading and being shot point blank in the head. I still feel that the press deserves protections, that they should not be targeted for military actions and fear tactics, and I am proud of the Christian Science Monitor and the international community for fighting for Jill, putting out appeals, and demanding her return. The effort was successful–she made it back to American soil to tell her story to us.

I hope that this experience doesn’t prevent her from continuing her career as a journalist–it would be a sad loss.

[Jill Carroll]

Night of the living toilet | 15Aug06

So I was cleaning the bathroom the other day and it reminded me of an incident from my youth on Lesbos.

When we lived in Molybos, every day when I got home from school my father and I would walk down to the harbour to see what there was to be had for dinner. The fortress loomed over us in the narrow streets until the view opened to the sea, that rare shade of blue that only the Aegean has, and we would hurry past the butcher’s down the hill to the boats. Sometimes the green-grocer would seduce us with something sweetly scented and summery, and on Saturdays my father would often buy me a piece of Turkish honeycomb to much on while we wound our way through the town.

Iceplant ran wild along the streets and sometimes we would pick the fleshy, spiky flowers and bring them home to put on the dinner table, a splash of colour to go with our fried fish and lemon.

On this particular evening, we were walking back up the hill with the fish in a paper parcel when we noticed that a toilet had entered from a side street and was proceeding briskly uphill. We must have been running later than usual that day because there was no sign of anyone else in the street, just us and the toilet. My father and I looked at each, hoping one would reassure the other that the image we were seeing wasn’t actually real. It was a bit over the top, even for Greece.

“Kalispera,” my father called to the toilet, which paused in its tracks for a moment and turned to ascertain the direction from which the sound came.

“Kalispera,” the toilet replied, gravely.

We all stood awkwardly in the street for a moment.

Finally, my father worked up the nerve to say something else.

“Lovely evening, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” the toilet said, settling all the way onto the ground. While we watched with fascination, the lid crept up a bit and a pair of somber eyes appeared. “It is a beautiful evening. The fireflies will be out soon.”

Toilets were still a little unusual in Molybos–we made do with a perfectly good outhouse, and while I was aware of the plumbed toilet as an abstract concept, I wasn’t sure that the street was the best place for one. I also wasn’t sure what the ettiquete involved in addressing a toilet might be. “What’s a fixture like you doing in a place like this?” “Nice day for a shit?” Luckily, my father was up to the task.

“What brings you to Molybos,” he said.

“The Stephanopoulos family ordered a toilet,” the man inside said, finally extricating himself and perching on the lid. He was one of the more peculiar people I’ve ever seen, being very small indeed yet entirely covered in wrinkles. He fished a pouch of tobacco and a pipe out of his pocket and sorted that out before continuing. “I came over from Athens to install it.”

The town was plumbed, naturally, although some of us still relied on public pumps for water. But most people stuck with outdoor toilets, and with good reason–plumbing backups were quite common and could have catastrophic results (which I shall have to detail in another post). Most of us sorted out our own plumbing issues, but I could imagine the appeal of a specialist from Athens along with his glistening porcelain products.

“Do you know where the house is?”

“Well no, actually, I don’t,” the man said, puffing vigorously on his pipe. “I assume I’ll find it eventually.”

“Well,” my father said, “it’s sort of on the way home, so we can take you there.”

“Excellent,” the little man said. “If you wouldn’t mind waiting a moment, I’d like to finish my pipe.”

“Certainly,” my father replied.

We sat in companionable silence, my father and I on the low sea-wall and the toilet man on the toilet, and watched the sun begin to set. As predicted, the fireflies came out in force. When the man had finished with his pipe, he tapped the ash out over the wall and slipped back into the toilet, and we continued our path up the street.

We realized that with his visibility limited, the man was tracking our voices, and we began to talk to him about his career as a toilet installer, Athens, and fishing. It turned out that when the order for the toilet had been placed, the man had been directed to Mytilene, and he had arrived earlier that day in plenty of time to install the toilet and leave the island by dusk. He informed us that he usually carried his wares in the unorthodox fashion in which we first discovered him, because it was the most convenient. Once the destination had been straightened out, he caught a ride to Molybos with a group of gregarious fishermen and there encountered us.

He traveled around the Greek islands bringing the wonder of indoor shitting to the populace, and said he greatly enjoyed his job, for the people he met and places he was able to see. He had a wife and an assortment of children at home in Athens, one of whom he hoped would follow him into the plumbing trade, which was catching on in a big way on the more rural islands.

Eventually, we reached the house of the Stephanopoulos family and after making sure he had reached the right house we continued on our way home, there to fry fish and sit out in the summer night eating it with lemon. If my father felt inspired, he might pick up the saxophone and play for a bit, or compose a new song: “Ballad of the Walking Toilet,” perhaps.

[Greece]

On vegans | 14Aug06

I made vegan spice cake* yesterday, because I was attending a dinner party where vegans would be present and I wanted to bring a dessert-like item which would be friendly to all. As I was mixing, I thought about my vegan years, and the way people interact with “unusual” foods.

My conversion to veganism came at the end of summer, on a warm afternoon while I was questing in a friend’s fridge for food. I had been musing over it for some time, and had been vegetarian for several years. But something changed in me as I rooted around in the fridge seeking something to turn into food.

It happened when I opened the cheese drawer, because in a fit of inspiration I decided I could make quesdillas with the slightly curling tortillas on the middle shelf, the questionable tomato in the crisper, the onion on the counter, and the withering jalepeno I saw behind the mustard. I spied a packet of cheese and I went for it. As I picked it up, it squelched faintly in my hand and emitted a sigh, along with a puff of mold.

I dropped the cheese on the floor and slammed the door of the fridge shut.

“I’m vegan,” I announced.

“Oh, cool,” a voice from the living room said.

“No, really,” I said. “I’m vegan. Right now. This is it. Let’s go eat some carrots.”

I started out a self righteous vegan, preaching my dietary ways to the world around me. Luckily I got over it.

I was a good vegan. I love cooking and I love food and I made some amazing vegan food with great friends–I still make a lot of the same dishes today. I learned all sorts of vegan tricks, traveled successfully, and generally had a good time. Being vegan taught me innovation with food–I really can make food out of nothing because my vegan trained eyes will find treasures in a cupboard that appears to look bare. I’ve been known to whip up food for four out of an apparently empty kitchen. I keep a formidable spice library–it helps.

I was vegan for all sorts of reasons. Ease, because most of my friends were and cooking for everyone was a bitch. Ethically, I didn’t feel that eating animals was inherently wrong but I didn’t like the way in which animal products were raised, harvested, and processed. It was cheap. And it tasted good. Vegan food can be good. Delicious, even. Some of the finest meals I’ve ever had, actually, were pure vegan.

My conversion back to omnivorism happened just as suddenly. I always promised myself as a vegetarian and later as a vegan that if I wanted something, I would eat it. I believe that if my body is desiring something that it’s probably lacking in some nutrition, flavour, or experience, and I’m not going to deny it. Instant gratification is rare in life–I figure I should grab it while I can.

It was a cold and rainy spring and I had been invited out to dinner with old friends. As we came through the door, our nostrils filled with the smells of amazing food roasting slowly, and we had much conversation and toured the garden and went riding and then settled down for our meal. I had been vegan for a good five years at this point, but apparently these friends missed the memo.

Dinner, it turned out, was roast boar, the fruits of a recent hunting expedition, served with potatoes and vegetables and wild mushrooms and salad and other fantastic things. The aromas filled my nose. The host began to carve and serve. The one friend who knew looked at me, eyebrow akimbo. My eyes watered from the scents.

I accepted my plate, said grace, and dove in. I take my duties as a guest very seriously.

It was one of the most heavenly meals I had ever eaten. My body was tired from being outdoors, and the flesh melted in my mouth, seasoned with viciously hot German mustard. The potatoes were crumbly and filled with meaty juices, the mushrooms a dainty counterpoint. It was like God had descended into my mouth for a visit.

For dinner there were pies and ice cream, and I demanded seconds.

I went home and was violently, fantastically ill.

But it was worth every bite.

I’ve never met a plate I didn’t like, and I’m glad I had my experience with veganism. It allows me to be a more successful and flexible cook, in my opinion. Who knows–maybe some day I’ll go back. I live a fairly meat free existance as it is, because affordable humane meat is a difficult thing to find, and likewise with dairy.

Being adaptable as a diner and a cook never hurt someone, and I’m always game to try something at least once. So the next time someone offers you vegan food, or gluten free cake, or a catered raw meal–why not give it a shot? You don’t have to convert or anything…you can just sit back, relax, and enjoy the food.

*Dairy-Free Spice Cake (adapted from the New Joy of Cooking)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Sift together into a large bowl:
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 Tablespoon powdered ginger
1 Tablespoon cinnamon
2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cloves
(adjust spicing to taste–I freehanded and these are estimates)
1 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt

Combine and add:
1 cup Oregon Chai Cider (or some other form of spiced cider, or water, if you can’t find cider)
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 Tablespoon white (or rice) vinegar
2 tsp vanilla

Stir until smooth. Scrape batter into a pan (8×8″) or into cupcake molds (I like cupcakes). Bake until a toothpick (or dagger) inserted into the center comes out clean (25-30 minutes). Let cool in the pan on a rack for 10 minutes before inverting onto a cooling rack.

Serve plain, dusted with powdered sugar, or an icing of your choice. I did powdered sugar.

[vegan]
[spice cake]