Full Day, Full Log, Full Plant-Based Living: Song Day (Avett Brothers and Ben Folds) & Rest

5.17.2020

Ian once put this passion to the best wordage/hope, “I wish I could just time-leap people forward several months to show them how their body would feel, how much better everything is: they’d change immediately, but getting them to understand that is so difficult.”

I keep this up because plant-based diets are a planetary imperative, and a Plant-Based Whole-Food diet is scientifically/biologically/mechanistically proven to be the absolute best for our bodies and minds.

I move forward through exhaustion and keep howling, because I used to be addicted to processed foods (just like many of us are/were) and I reveled in the animal products that were filling me with disease; and I look at the kids who will be in the same painful place I was in (or adults suffering the same), and it shreds my heart to slivers.

I could sit back and watch humanity eat themselves (and the rest of us, and every species in our wake) to doom, but I don’t have the personal capacity for such apathy.

Working forward, Sundays will still have a lead-by-example illumination, but instead of dense data sections (which take me hours of culling) there’ll be rest and reflections on songs rattling through this brain-space.

Continue on for: a life of leading by healthful/environmentally-kind example, two cathartic songs, and a full day of Plant-Based Family Feasting.

Q’s morning chalkboard

View of South O on the way back from the Farmer’s Market.

Music is an integral part of my brain and every day of this whirlwind life. If music (or a podcast) isn’t playing, there is most assuredly some manner of song in that head of mine, even when there are thoughts/writing-work/research, there is a perpetual underlay of music that cannot be silenced.

I’ve mentioned before that “No Hard Feelings” by the Avett Brothers is a family mantra and oft-listened to song. It aligns with our mental state of wanting to breathe in appreciation, and not waste time holding anger toward other souls.

When I’m feeling vexed and working toward the peace of “No Hard Feelings”, Ben Folds’ “Time” is the sort of song I’ll belt out on repeat. Despite the nasally high-pitch of my voice, I am actually most comfortable singing tenor, and I have long loved singing along with Ben Folds who has a similar range.

This song is a mental and physical catharsis, especially in these frustrating times of “WHY WON’T PEOPLE CHANGE?! The world is on the brink of environmental collapse, people keep shoveling disease down their gullets, our children have clogged arteries from the same foods killing this earth, and there is a simple/healthy answer to all of this; but folks either ignore, laugh, or mock me despite all the science and truth I amplify!”

After years of practice, I can redirect that wailing to forward movement through various mental exercises, and sometimes the good old-fashioned diaphragm working-wonder of loud singing:

Think of me
Anyway you want
I can be
The problem if that's easier

In your head
Move the pieces around
Things I've said
Turn the memory upside down

And it makes it better I know
But sometimes it's hard to swallow

In time I will fade away
In time I won't hear what you say
In time, but time takes time you know

Forgot to photograph the bowls, but breakfast was: cacao oatmeal and strawberries.

Plant-Based Leftovers Lunch.

j - rice noodles, mushrooms, brussels, peas, braised carrots, apples, and peanut sauce.

Q - stone ground polenta, homemade marinara, peas, mushrooms.

My afternoon view (including planter with groundhog-shorn leafy greens)

I spent the latter half of the morning cooking (quinoa, Ethiopian red lentils, and a fresh kale-and-quinoa salad) then spent the whole afternoon in the yard.

A rainbow of peppers from Wyllie Fox Farm.

Zero-waste tip: have containers with missing/broken lids? There’s always something that can be done with them. This old container has been a very handy scooping tool.

And this bear filled the air with tales of his imagination, drew tentacular creatures (including this Sarlacc) all over the walk, and got good and muddy.

Ian worked on shoring up the past-pond wall to prep it for cucumbers and (eventually) melons.

When you have a groundhog that is eating all your veggies, and you want to keep your new seedlings safe (until cages can be built around them), so you heft all of them indoors for the night.

Grandma sighting <3

Q did this avocado all himself! <3

The zoomed-out view of dinner prep and zero-waste living: the ever-helpful assist of pre-made options and sink full of air-drying dishes, and perpetually re-used plastic bags.

Plant-Based Whole-Food Family Feasting: Ethiopian style lentils, kale & quinoa salad, easy avocado, and balsamic tomatoes.

Homemade, plant-based, zero-waste popcorn. (Not “Whole Food” because we drizzle a tsp of sunflower oil on this so the seasonings stick better. Cappello fave seasonings for popcorn: salt, paprika, garlic, nutritional yeast.)