What is the very best diet?
Food is such a polemic terrain.
I remember being wide-eyed and open to new ideas.
Was in my junior year at the University of Michigan taking psychoneurobiology and communication with a minor in everything Italian.
I heard that a lot of cool stuff was happening in Haight Asbury and norther California.
For a summer break I headed out to San Francisco when it was still shining and extraordinary. We wore flowers in our hair and passed flowers and hugs forward to strangers we met along the road. For real.
“Make Love, Not War” was an intoxicating slogan. So much hope back then.
I joined the Committee workshop. We learned Viola Spolin theater games, and techniques of trust, listening, and the nuances of comedic delivery.
A lot of early comedians like Dan Aykroyd and Elaine Mays would stop in and give us pointers.
Most in the group, aspiring comedians and actors, were eating a style of food called “organic”. I had no idea what it was.
But at a local coffee house after listening to Richie Havens sing his heart out all night at a dark jazz club, I saw a sign about a lecture on, “You Are What You Eat” by Scott Nearing. At something called a Theosophical Society. In Redding California, way up north from the city.
I had no car.
It was the days of hitch-hiking or “catching” a ride in the back of a bus with a lot of other souls headed somewhat in your direction.
When I think of all the things that could have gone bad, but didn’t, it takes my breath away.
I have no idea how my father slept at night. Not a day goes by that I don’t apologize to him at wherever part of heaven I’m sure his soul now resides.
Scott Nearing was a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania. He was passionate about health. And human rights.
He began to write out against the abuse of child labor, being one of the first people to call for child labor laws and reform.
As we all know, first in line with facts and truth, are typically vilified.
He was black balled from academia.
Instead of turning to booze or anger he moved first to Vermont, and then Maine, these are all long stories. To build “Forrest Farms” and start to raise food without chemicals. With soil from composts that he toiled, tended and labeled with old license plates. And harvested fresh maple syrup from the many northern trees.
Scott is credited with starting organic gardening.
Then Elliot Coleman moved in and we all farmed together.
Elliot wrote books. He is still tilling that soil.
And now Elliot is often credited with initiating the concept of eating food that is well nourished from a well nourished soil that is chemical free.
At this first Theosophical Society Meeting Scott (and his world famous violinist wife Helen)… Scott stood like an oak. Strong. Lucid. Inspiring.
I think I first met him when he was about 88 years old. Still so solid. Not like many 88 year olds you meet today. Not even like many 55 year olds you meet today.
Way older than I am now. I ponder this often.
Our own lives give us such curriculum without needing schools. If we live in this manner. Of constant inquiry. Of “the habit of noticing”.