In which, a mere 36 hours in, I become the not-so-jolly green giant. For it seems everything I eat and drink is green, from this mint tea with a touch of chicory (my liver says thanks, but it talks with a much more muted voice than my tastebuds, the Gilbert Gottfrieds of my body) to the kale and seaweed salad and green beans and Brussels sprouts and aovcados and leeks. True, the quinoa last night was black, with white curlies that sort of steamed off it, making it look like tiny wormlings amidst dirt. Luckily it didn't taste like that--it mostly tasted of nothing as it needed some acid, some cheese, something I'm not allowed to have.
So, yes, I'm in the whining phase of this process fully aware it's nothing like being truly hungry and that I'm doing it to myself. It's the old idea--disconnect from desire (that evidently is nothing but a School of Seven Bells album now, according to the internet). But that assumes that being human isn't all about desire; it's not some outside force, it's not a devil spinning our heads in the direction of want as Mike Oldfield eerily plays. Desire is us, our want elevated into something grand. Sure, we could just eat, but think of the show culture has turned dinner into, so many signifiers, from knowing which possibly gilded fork is for what purpose to the codes of home found deep in different sauces that explain where we come from, who we are, the meals we ate to get from there to here.
Of course, this denial is the ultimate sign of privilege--I've got enough money (mere fractions of a Mitt, but still) to play at eating as strange as I'd like, as long as I like. And the not liking is part of the like--I'm suffering for my own good, and whether it actually does me any physical good is almost besides the point. Perhaps I'm just out to prove Nancy Reagan right, and elevate Just Say No from a bumper sticker to a bumper crop of brilliance. No doubt, a bumper crop of lots of green green veggies.
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