birthdays are fun, getting older? hmm...

About this time every year, I really start thinking about my age and about my mortality. Not so much in gruesome terms, more like a startling afterthought, as in oh! forgot that for a moment. As much as I think, talk, and write about health and diet issues, I often forget that we are all transients on earth.

Obviously from my morose verbiage, I'm guessing one can tell my birthday is coming up, February 20th to be precise. I love birthdays---I think. It could be more like how I love giving parties and celebrating holidays. It's mostly the idea I like. The actuality, not so much. I love looking forward to birthdays, for sure. I love giving myself permission for little indulgences that I might forgo other times of the year. Yesterday for instance, I spent half the day at a spa after having breakfast with my daughter, Kristen, and followed all that with pampering from my hairdresser, Michelle. This whole day thing was a first for me.

Yes, the little indulgences part of birthdays is not the rub. The getting older part? It can't be all bad. It has it's good points. Compared to the alternatives, older is better. As I mulled this post over in my mind, I thought of talking about my age, my specific age in years, as part of a whole picture, full disclosure sort of thing. A this is who I am kind of thing. Then I remembered something my sister, Beverly, shared with us recently. She said a spiritual leader and teacher who we both respect said one should never tell her (or his) age. Not to be secretive or deceptive, not to pretend to be younger or older, but because we limit ourselves and others enough as it is. We label and define even without meaning to do so much of the time. He said not to add yet another meaningless bit of data to that limiting mess. So I am not talking specific numbers.  I may stop that entirely. For much of my life I have felt the need to reveal more than was needed, probably more than was wanted. For now I'll refrain and rethink those habits.

I will say, for me this is a significant birthday in many ways, my age being only one of them. In recognition of this, my daughter is planning a small celebration with my family. We met yesterday to talk about what we might do and what we would serve. As she started with a list of favorite party foods that we've loved and served over the years, I realized I could no longer eat any of those dishes. Wow! Times have changed. I now control everything that comes into my kitchen and as a result, everything that comes out of it. I focus on good foods I can eat and enjoy and all but forget about the rest. I tend to forget that not everyone cooks or shops the way I do. Not even those very close to me. Of course, if this were a party for someone else, I'd just eat first and no one would notice. Since the birthday celebration is for me, it feels a little different. We have worked it out, I think. Works well for me, anyway.

I love grilling or broiling shrimp even for cocktails. These are from US Wellness Meats.

So far we're planning lemon chicken sate with Sunshine Sauce via Well Fed, lots of beautiful fresh veggies like asparagus, cucumber, sugar snap peas, red peppers, grape tomatoes with a dairy-less dip as yet to be determined. We'll also have rare, grilled steak strips or chunks, shrimp in some form, baba ghanoush, mixed olives, our marinated mushrooms, fresh fruit, and a couple of versions of almond flour crackers. Did I mention this is a very small party? Well, my family is not all that small, but if we didn't overdo the food, we wouldn't recognize ourselves.

On what I find an interesting note, Kristen often says she's afraid to cook for me, even before I knew I had major dietary issues. She is especially hesitant to cook in my kitchen. I don't think I'm that picky, but we never know those things about ourselves, do we?

yes, we celebrate valentine's day

food is the best part

I know many people are put off by the silliness and commercial exploitation, not to mention overt sexism, that are the public face of Valentine's Day. On some levels, I am one of them. That said, I'm almost embarrassed to admit that we have a few Valentine's Day rituals that have lasted over the years, traditions I cling to tenaciously. Some change a bit, sadly no dark chocolate decadence with whipped cream anymore, others go from one year to the next untouched.

We don't do gifts or flowers. No poetry, no love songs. For us, it's all about enjoying together some of our favorite things: the food and the Champagne. As good Californians, we very much support our great state wineries most of the year, but on Valentine's Day, Champagne---the real stuff---wins out. We've had this year's bottle for a few weeks now. After some back and forth argument discussion over which to choose, he we settled on a Piper Heidsieck. I was pressing for one of my favorites, Moet et Chandon Brut Imperial, but the Piper's great, too. I really cannot complain. As usual, too, this year we'll use the beautiful Waterford toasting flutes Bev and Gary gave us many years ago. There's something incredibly romantic to me in all of this. I think where celebrations are concerned, I love ritual above all else, not including the people, of course. I do believe if we'd somehow developed the ritual of paper cups and cream soda, I'd try to hold onto that health risks and all.

And the food is my department. No arguments, no debates, no discussions. I get to chose it and I get to cook it. We became painfully aware many years ago, long before I had begun to identify my dietary limitations, that, for us anyway, the combination of restaurants and special occasions were risky business. Valentine's Day, like Mother's Day, restaurants are packed, kitchens are harried, wait staff is rushed and often inattentive. Nah, I'll take my kitchen and my sweetly set table. Maybe even a fire in the fireplace.

This year we'll start with a salad much like that pictured above. My current menu includes skewers of Alaskan halibut and salmon from Vital Choice Seafood (my favorite) served on cauliflower rice. This is the only part of the meal I've finalized. I will be forever in awe of those who can plan meals for the week. I often change the menu of a meal as I'm cooking it. I have not yet found the perfect-looking asparagus I had in mind, but the plan is a a tender green vegetable. If not asparagus, possibly snow peas. Mushrooms have to be in the mix somewhere, so I'll either stuff a few with an herb blend to serve as an appetizer or lightly saute them to serve with the fish.

And for dessert, a real rarity for us, I'm torn between large long-stemmed strawberries dipped in a blend of coconut oil and raw cocoa powder with a hint of pure stevia and pistachio nuts stirred into the same chocolate mix. Maybe we should have both.

yet another struggle: sleeplessness

My diet is darned near perfect, as far as I can tell. I do not claim that it is perfect, but it's close.

I completed my first Whole30 in early November. Since then, I've eaten foods containing sugar on a total of three occasions, each was a special occasion, and each time I had a couple of bites. I have a couple of cups of black coffee early in the morning. The ratios of my foods aren't perfect. Sometimes I eat more protein or fat than I'd like, simply because it's easy. Fresh vegetables are part of every day but not always in the abundance I'd prefer. I've had a little potato with a meal a couple of times in three months. Still, primarily, I eat high quality meats, fish, poultry and eggs, fresh organic vegetables, a bit of organically grown fruit, and healthy fats.

My one more pronounced deviation from healthful consumption is wine, not tons and tons, just some wine.

Exercise is another story, and I'm working on that one. Well, I'm seriously thinking about it at this point. I'm also using the bar that GK installed for me for pull-ups. My pull-ups are pitiful, but I'm finally off the floor at least.

I'll do another Whole30 soon and see if I can banish the wine thing, though it's the ritual, not the alcohol that I find appealing. I've got to find some good replacements. We tried tea, but most hurt my stomach. (Interesting that wine doesn't.)

Still, I don't drink so much that it worries me. I know it adds nothing to my health, that's about it. My real concern these days, and for a long time now, is that I don't sleep. I certainly don't sleep enough.

We are notorious at our house for going to bed early and getting up early. Four or five AM is not unusual, but it's getting worse. Some nights I'm in bed before seven and wide awake by nine or even earlier. On a good night I may get four to five hours of sleep, though never in succession. I am sometimes awake, looking at the clock every 20 minutes throughout the night. Seriously. I read continually about the need for sleep, plenty of sleep. I just don't know how people do it. I would love to. On those nights when I get five hours, I celebrate. Those are the good nights. On the rare occasion when three of those hours are joined, I am ecstatic. I cannot even imagine nine hours, and I know I need that.

This is a less-than-veiled call for help. What's your trick for sleeping? Any special preparation?

maybe i'm a food snob

Okay, I suppose it's not a maybe, it's a resounding yes. Yes, yes, yes! I'm a food snob. I tried to deny it; tried to sugar-coat it; tried to justify it; tried to tie it up in a pretty package.

No more. I admit unequivocally that I believe without question and with definite prejudice that food should be---well, food.

At home I demand it. At work I am about ready to give up.

I teach at a small school, so our staff lounge accommodates about a dozen people, a few more if we squeeze them in. Our refrigerator is usually full to over-flowing with fast-food leftovers, pseudo-food condiments, bread, margarine, large plastic soda bottles, cheese spreads, and other similar items. The freezer is packed with low-cal or diet meals. People toast bread and bagels pretty much every morning, so I avoid the area if at all possible. If someone has a birthday, the obligatory box of semi-edible doughnuts makes an appearance. Pot lucks mean nachos or potatoes covered with edible food-like gook. Sometimes it's casseroles and fruit mixed with jello and cool whip. I used to try to attend without eating before I realized just breathing in that closed-in environment would necessitate leaving work early and in pain almost every time.

Today was in a class of its own. A well-liked and well-respected teacher is leaving. He will still be working with our program, though not with us. He's happy and excited and a bit sad, I'm sure. Today, the staff, a dozen or fewer people total, put together a breakfast for him in the staff lounge before work. I tried to get myself to go, but fear and a heavy workload convinced me to pass on breakfast. I did venture into the lounge at lunch. It had been a crazy-busy morning, and I'd simply forgotten about the breakfast earlier in the day. The large, very large in fact, table was covered completely with the remains of that breakfast. I will not, cannot, call it food. Several dozen doughnuts, a box of Mexican pastries, and a few low-end sweetroll type pasties covered with sticky white icing remained. An empty 3 quart baking dish held what had not been scraped off the sides of something akin to country potatoes, though  with cheese and milk and "butter." A half dozen pancakes made with Betty Crocker's complete mix (add water only) along with maple flavored syrup and margarine sat next to dishes of scrambled eggs (possibly) and a variety of fried patties of some sort (possibly a vegetarian offering.) Several large containers of different types of salsa, the closest thing I saw to food, were scattered around the table. Piles of flour tortillas were uneaten, and extra bottles of sugar-sweetened "juice" were waiting for snackers to venture in. Coffee here always has a variety of "creamer" options and artificially flavored syrups and other additions.

Did I mention that our school has at most 8 teachers, a principal, one secretary, one campus supervisor (security) and a few instructional aides? There was enough fake food in that room to force feed everyone many times over, and those were the leftovers.

Yes, I'm a food snob. Yes, I should be ashamed of myself. These are nice people. But these nice people deserve more than artificial food-like substances and a distribution system that makes all this seem desirable. As for me, as always, I don't know what to say, so I say little. I don't know what to do, so I do little. All I know to do is continue with my program, continue to eat as clean as I can, and answer questions when asked. It may be all there is to do; I just never feel like it's enough.