High Expectations

I went to a class yesterday entitled “Eating For A More Energized Life.”  I wanted to attend this class last year but it didn’t fit into my schedule.  I was really looking forward to it.  Just waiting for the class was exhausting me. 

The instructor was going to fix my life.

We went to the wrong campus.  We were supposed to be somewhere else, 20 miles away.

When we arrived at the second destination there was no way to know what classroom we were supposed to be in, there were about a dozen different buildings.  They took our money and gave us no information.

I was definitely feeling energized as we traipsed across the grounds, imagining my hands around the throat of some administrative genius.

We arrived an hour late for the three hour class.  But I don’t think we missed anything.

Why do I invariably believe that someone else has the answers?  The instructor launched into a lecture on Ayurvedics, an Indian philosophy based on the seasons.  Then 15 minutes on the blood type diet.  What the F?

From there it was pretty much the usual, things you already know: sugar and white flour are bad, root vegetables good.  Surprisingly, even apples are really high on the glycemic index.  If your bread isn’t chunky with whole grains, toss it out.

Go to sleep at night.  Don’t eat crackers & cheese in bed.

She mentioned dairy, antibiotics, growth hormones and phlegm.  So A. asked her what she might suggest feeding a 4-year old instead of yogurt.  She recommended kale chips.

Recipe for kale chips: put leaves of kale on baking sheet, add sea salt, bake until edges just begin to turn black.

I think we should have asked for our money back right then and there.  But I am a big fat pussy who just sits there steaming and writes really passive-aggressive statements on the class review sheet at the very end, no signature of course.

Our instructor also recommended eating only “happy” food.  Wild salmon are happy salmon, farm grown salmon live in a cage, swim in circles and eat each others poop.  Free range cows & chickens live a life similar to the pig in Charlotte’s Web before being clubbed in the head.

As for the other students: all women, all yuppies.  After all, would a garbageman, a mechanic, a bricklayer attend such a class?  If our husbands sat around talking about how tired they are we would call them pussies.  Women, in general, have got a really great P.R. campaign going.

Some classmates just wanted to hijack the subject matter & talk about anything but food and energy: a relative’s fibromyalgia, white vinegar treatments & the best place to purchase wild salmon.  The teacher needed to put the kabosh on that shit, but of course she did not.

Even worse, what’s with people staring straight ahead at the instructor and mumbling when they speak? 

Perhaps I have a bit of a hearing issue.  Generators were blowing air into the room at a loud & breezy 15 m.p.h.  But if you can’t look around and speak with a little vim & vigor, then you have a self-esteem issue.  You’re barely alive.

Speak up people!  And then listen to yourself. 

The answers lie within.