In Resetting America’s Table, I found that I am living proof that the point the author was making was slightly wrong. Technically, I live in poverty. I have for years, since I am in full-time school, part-time work and single mother. Last year, I went on food stamps. I still, eat fresh organic vegetables, shop at the co-op and Whole Foods, and the like, and I do it very wisely. I think the point the author is missing, is being mindful. I shop every day, planning for my meals each visit. I resist the urge to grab whatever looks appealing, like some buffet. I only buy what I need. In regards to public schools and relying on them for their meals, I say, “Why?” Why rely on a stranger to feed your child, when you can use your leftovers, make brilliant choices based on their diet (and at times emotions), and know every single day what they are and are not eating? Go back to Little House on the Prairie days when…well, I don’t remember there being a kitchen at their school. What is needed is more community gardens and really, as Slow Food, suggests, we need more time (and less people). Indeed, it starts and ends in the home and extends to the community.
I love the Action Plan, but, if I remember/heard correctly, it was Mayor Marty Chavez himself who threw out the Landscape Architecture Student’s design and implementation of the medians all along Nob Hill, by ripping the original landscape out and putting in plants that require twice as much water and work, merely because it didn’t look pretty and they were going to shoot a film down that street (replacing drought tolerant plants for geraniums if my eyes served me right… geraniums, one of the thirstiest flowers, in the middle of the desert).
It is indeed, a very thorough, educated and well-thought plan with altruistic and wise intentions that I believe many would support. However, it seems to me that there are unspoken contracts between government and large corporations, that these authors and many like them, try to expose, that prevent a greener, more productive, efficient living potential that could bud into our reality. The question is how can we collectively come together to make it happen?
The true question is how can we free ourselves from this claustrophobic monetary system?
Response to reading and my classmate's comments and to life...
ReplyDeletePlease pardon me for stringing this below another comment. For some reason, I am having issues posting.
I tend to agree with Jenessmay about the Action Plan. It seems a bit ridiculous to expect that our school systems take sole responsibility for feeding our children. I think back to when I was a kid. My mom was by no means wealthy. We ate well. We ate a bit weird (like peanut butter and sprouts sandwiches), but we received the nutrients we needed. My father's house was a different case altogether. He was not poor. We ate out a great deal. He had the means but not the know-how to get us to eat healthfully. Back and forth between the two situations, my brother and I bounced. In each case food was love. The lunches in the cafeteria were made of what I, even as a child, deemed overprocessed and virtually inedible. Every now and then, they were a delightful treat.
But enough waxing anecdotal, I return to the action plan. I think that what should happen, instead of placing the brunt of responsibility of taking care of our children on the government, we should educate people on how to manage their food budgets and how to live well. It is not cheap to eat fast food anymore. This was one of its great appeals in times past. It costs a lot, tastes mediocre at best, and it is not made with love.
I agree with you a lot. My family eat out every once and a while but not often. Dinner time was always family time so we eat at home a lot. We always had/have a garden.
ReplyDeleteWith that in mind I understand how things have changed into what they are. Its easier to just give children money to buy food at school, regardless to healthy or not, then to make a lunch that's healthier. Lets look at the our last two classes. La Po has has change everything and yo the cost to make meals that are more healthy and tasty. Most places don't want to put that much time and money into it.
Most people need to be tough to cook and budget. You can by fresh food and cook it to death and its not any healthier. The action plan may work for ABQ but most people would prefer to go to the store and by food that's not much better then fast food. Anyhow, I think all of what people are saying is interesting.