MAX et RACHEL

Sustainable eating

So I’m having a lady friend over for dinner tonight, and with the goals of something fresh, delicious, and healthy (I’ll save the burgers for date night with Max), sushi was a natural option. We usually get some sushi-grade salmon from the poisonnerie at Atwater Market. They’re nice and efficient, and it doesn’t break the bank for a delicious piece of fish. I’m pretty sure it isn’t sustainable though, and I have a lot of trouble closing off my brain (to the fact that I’m eating something that is contributing to major harm in the oceans) while opening my mouth. 

I did a quick search for fishmongers with sustainable options and came across this surprisingly comprehensive article from the Montreal Poutine blog. Here’s a quote from the author I just had to share:

Sorry to all lovers of SushiShop or your neighbourhood all-you-can-eat, but that stuff is killing the oceans. An all-you-can-eat sushi dinner shouldn’t be taken as a personal challenge to stuff as much unsustainable fish into yourself before it disappears forever.

Which some may say is harsh, but perhaps that’s the reality of my shopping choices. It brought a completely new gravity to the verse when Paul says, “Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things” (Philippians 3:19). Do I let my stomach direct my conscience, even though I know it’s destructive? Do I make excuses saying it’s way too pricey to buy organic when I spend the same amount on disposable clothing?

I think we have such a genius Creator, who made innumerable species to coexist in complex ecosystems. When I eat, I want to celebrate that, not indirectly destroy it. I’m glad this admonition is coming right before we head to Toronto and France. Here’s to hoping I’ll be able to stick to my guns!

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That infographic is from the beautiful book, Oceana from Ted Danson. It is a wonderful read, no guilt trips, only inspiration.

Good morning

Some sources of inspiration for this sunny April morning:

“We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. May your unfailing love be with us, Lord, even as we put our hope in you.”

- PSALM 33:20-22

And Yo La Tengo’s album, Fade.

Happy almost-spring, all.

The Big Sky

Summers didn’t answer, but it went through his mind again that he didn’t want to go back with anybody. He wanted to be by himself, to go along alone with the emptiness that was in him, to look and listen and see and smell, to say goodbye a thousand times and, saying it, maybe to find that the hurt was gone… Goodbye, Dick Summers. …We mind the time you came to us, young and green and full of sap. We watched you grow into a proper mountain man. We saw you learning, trapping and fighting and finding trails, and going around then proud-breasted like a young rooster, ready for a frolic or a fracas, your arm strong and your wind sound and the squaws proud do have you under a robe. But new times are a-coming now, and new people, a heap of them, and wheels rolling over the passes, carrying greenhorns and women and maybe children, too, and plows. The old days are gone and the beaver’s through. We’ll see a sight of change, but not you, Dick Summers. The years have fixed you. Time to go now. Time to give up. Time to sit back and remember. Time for a chair and a bed. Time to wait to die. Goodbye, Dick. Goodbye, Old Man Summers.

From AB Guthrie Jr’s The Big Sky. 

I picked up this book back at the end of December and 200-pages in, this is the first passage I can mildly understand on a deeper heart level. I wonder if all old hearts feel the same way, if only for a moment.

I suppose it’s kind of a sad passage, but I also suppose it’s book about a sad time in a big, beautiful land.