Ah the travails of naming a new blog. Especially when that blog is going to be dealing with food and words and conceptual stuff and concrete issues and—ooh, worst—non-dualistic thinking-doing-feeling. Shit, it’s the stuff of web-era daymares. Plus, as Carla Cevasco has said, no more food puns.
Many moons ago, I had a blog that I kept up for a while. I started it when I went off to Italy, seeking to get under a Tuscan son. No, wait, that’s not it. It was a Parman son. And by “son”, I mean a master degree. Anyway, I went there to study food and communications, and since it was 2005, I figured I needed to be blogging. Just cause. I named the thing And the dichot, which I felt was suitably abstract, multi-layered, and distinctive. I think my mother, who represented 16.67% of the readership, eventually came to understand the linguistic layering, but let us say, my words did not quite go viral.
Back then, I liked the idea of pluralistic thinking (I still do), dealing with food as a mix of matter and meaning (I still do), and mucking with writing as a way to sort out the whirl of voices, peas, and wind that occupy my mind and body (I come and go on this). I thought I was pretty clever with one series of posts, Calling a Little Bullshit, which pointed out giant fakes and flaws in food advertising. I enjoyed speculating on the What Ifs of a future gastronomic utopia, before learning more about utopias. I needed to reflect on the crazy-making process of a 24-hour-a-day master program with 22 other food fools, and how full immersion in making and eating may be partially to blame for the efficient and anchored successes of industrial food.
Now, what? That master degree completed, I came back to Montreal ten years ago, seeking a home (a home!) where I could abide well, eat well, and date well. (What else does home need to provide?) For the past decade, I worked pretty consistently for that same school, and along the way did a couple of other graduate programs (no I have not been a student all my life). I now find my at the end of a remarkable, eighteen-month, round-the-globe research project. Having participated in a very large network of foodish relationships, I am now thinking about those that are close in, near, and intimate.
My sister gave me permission to call this period a sabbatical. I like that, now that I’ve learned a little about the word’s etymology (so many words, so little time!), including some nice connections to agriculture. Like a lot of people who take time off, I’m not exactly planning on sitting idle, but will instead let the experiences of the past years sink in, anchor themselves to my muscles and fascia and neurons and other squishy bits, and see what that produces in terms of future practice and projects. An academic savasana, as it were.
Here, then, in this blog, I will write about those ideas that emerge from such relache. About the possible natures of a sabbatical, for example. About the feeling-doing of fermenting. About trans-ness in food—identity, disciplinarity, species-ism—though probably not #transfood, however (which seems to have a lot of meanings on Twitter and elsewhere, so maybe, Yes, #transfood…) And about close relationships and near networks: parents, self, gardens, kitchens, chopsticks, fingers, yeasts, molds.
So back to the name of this blog. You already know it, cause it’s at the top of this screen. I had to be simple, I decided, since I was already complicated once. Yet as anyone who knows me will attest, ‘simplifying things’ when it comes to food is one of my conceptual nemeses. (Yes, I have many. Get in line, persistent thwarters!) In choosing it, I’m trying to be clever—plain, brief, catalytic, complex. I’m hoping to leave things open, fillable, common, personal, slurpable, and a lot of other cute and metaphoric adjectives. (Ooh, so many bloggy bits suggest themselves now—what would an online chabrot or scarpetta be? Shall I make a Stock page, where I dump the remants and trimmings from other textual preparations? Will my posts freeze well?) We shall see if it’s satisfying. If not, I’ll replate. Or go bento. Or tiffinize things.
For now, welcome to my Bowl.