Velkommen til Oslo

It was a grey and windy afternoon, and a few small raindrops glistened on top of the black suitcase I carried. I stood in front of Oslo Central Station and pulled out my phone. It connected to the nearby restaurant’s WiFi. I located myself on a map, and crossed the construction in the park towards the bus station.

The ticket machine wouldn’t accept my credit card without a pin number – or at least that’s what I gathered from what little Norwegian I understood – so I dug through my pockets and the bottom of my purse for 30 kroner for a one-way pass. Everyone at the bus stop stared as I examined each coin to determine its value. The bus was there ten minutes later, and I hauled my suitcase into a row and sunk into the seat beside it.

I stared out the window as we passed through the city, and into the southern end of Oslo. The cityscape quickly turned into seafront views, dotted by boats tethered to worn wooden docks. The windows were flecked with tiny drops from the cloudy sky, and my hair was slightly frizzy.

I pressed the button as we approached Gladvollveien, and heaved my suitcase back down the steps onto the sidewalk. Above the clay tile roof of a grey house, I could see the gentle ripples of the sea. I lifted my suitcase once again, going down a set of steps, where I knocked on the front door of the house. A middle-aged man opened the door, welcomed me, and let me in.

Truls was his name. He was calm, reserved, and alert. A professor of Norwegian, I learned. He showed me to my room upstairs, a tiny room equipped with a small refrigerator, a kettle, and some cookies. A balcony opened to a sitting area, overlooking the vast sea and Oslo fjord.

Once Truls left me to unpack, I went out to the balcony, oblivious to the raindrops still trying to reach ground, and leaned on the railing. The sea looked even more blue beneath the grey sky. The fjords stood prominently in the distance, guarding the capitol city.

I stood for a couple hours, captivated by the cold sea breeze and gentle wrinkles in the blue water. My focus broke with the clouds, as they made way for a glimpse of blue sky and sun. The Norwegian sun was surprisingly warm, and dried out the sprinkling sky.

I changed my clothes and made the next bus, feeling much lighter without my heavy suitcase. Again, I stared out the window, watching the docks and boats pass by until we reached the city center, where buildings and people sprang up around us. I hopped off at Børsen, unsure of where I was, and crossed a side street to follow the swelling of the buildings. Apartment buildings lined the streets until I reached Karl Johans gate.

I walked up Karl Johans gate until I reached the Royal Palace, where I circled around through the parks and watched couples pass by. An old man sat alone on a bench, not entirely still, but quite content. A middle-aged woman held a small Yorkie on a leash. A young Asian couple held hands quietly as they strolled.

I walked quickly but silently. I don’t remember thinking much in that moment. The sky began to turn pink above me, and the crowds thinned. I walked back towards the bus stop, picking up a ham sandwich at 7-Eleven (I’d worked up an appetite), and pausing along the way outside Burger King to connect to WiFi and check the bus schedule.

I had barely been idle for a moment when a skinny young man approached me. He had dark brown circles under his eyes, and his blonde hair was tousled. His jeans fit him a bit too loosely, and were held up by a worn belt. He held a small brown bag in his hand, gripped around the top.

He spoke to me in slurred Norwegian. I looked the other way and answered, “Sorry, I don’t understand.” Even in his stupor, he understood.

“You have a very pretty face,” he muttered in garbled English. “I’m just out of prison but I’m clean,” he said. “I know my hair is messed up and I’m not dressed nicely, but if that wasn’t the case, would you have sex with me?”

I gathered my things, straightened my coat, and began to leave. He followed me down Karl Johans Gate. “I have a boyfriend,” I lied.

“But if you didn’t?”

I continued to walk.

“Do you want some wine?” he asked, holding up the brown bag.

“No thanks,” I answered, and I lost him.

Twenty minutes later I was on the 83 bus back to Gladvollveien. It was getting cold outside, and I was glad for the warm bus. I found an empty seat towards the back. I had been on the bus for close to ten minutes when I realized we were going a different way than I had been before when I first arrived at Gladvollveien a few hours ago.

The driver went down a side street, where he let two young girls off, and then did a U-turn. He made an announcement in Norwegian, but no one seemed disturbed. I thought nothing of it.

Minutes later, a confused Indian man went to the front of the bus, where he was let off. Still, I thought nothing. Gladvollveien was approaching on the monitor, and I pressed the button. He didn’t stop. Confused, I pressed the button again for the next stop. He still didn’t stop.

I went to the front of the bus just as the driver was attempting to do a U-turn off of a steep hill onto a busy street. The bus didn’t fit. He tried to back up, and the side of the bus screeched against a traffic light. Standing up, I grabbed a handle with both hands to steady myself. The traffic light turned sideways.

“I’ve been trying to get out,” I told the bus driver, completely perplexed. “Could I get off at the next stop?”

Minutes later, he opened the door, and I stepped out. I looked at the schedule at the covered stop, expecting an 83 schedule. It wasn’t an 83 bus stop. It wasn’t even on the 83’s route. I had no idea what had happened on the bus, or why I was at an unknown stop.

It was dark by now, and no one was around. It was dead silent, except for the rippling sea. I was completely lost in a foreign country. Could hardly understand the bus schedule, which was written in Norwegian, with names of bus stops I had never heard before. Running my finger down the list of stops on the 81 bus, I came by Vølund. I recognized that name from the monitor on the 83. If I got there, I could get the 83 to Gladvollveien – assuming the 83 was still running, after what I had just witnessed.

I waited twenty minutes for the bus. Everyone on board stared as I climbed on. My anguish must have shown on my face. I got off at Vølund, and checked the bus schedule. Sure enough, the 83 was due in 23 minutes. I wondered if the bus would even come. It was only 9:30, but the night felt like a timeless vacuum. I could hardly see, except for faint lights from windows of seaside houses spilling into the street. There were no noises except for the wind passing over swaying tree branches and the rippling sea.

I understood then why I was so brave to come to Norway alone. It was cold, I was stranded, and I was defenseless. I thought of how alone I was, how vulnerable I was compared to an hour ago, when I confidently got rid of the strung out pervert on Karl Johans gate. Looking around, I was in the safest neighborhood in the capitol city of one of the safest countries. While I was no less vulnerable, I couldn’t have been less at risk anywhere. Keeping this in mind, I decided it was no use worrying about my predicament. While the time seemed nonexistent, the bus would run for several more hours, and I could do nothing but wait.

I pulled my 7-Eleven ham sandwich out of my purse. I realized in that moment that I was still starving, and my stomach was growling. Biting into the sandwich, the dry bread crumbled in my mouth. I peeled back the wrapper, and realized I had picked up gluten-free. The bread turned chalky as I tried to chew, and stuck to the roof of my mouth.

I started smiling, and quickly that smile turned into a small snicker. The longer I giggled, the less I could control it. Suddenly, I was in tears, rolling my head back against the wall of the bus stop, and laughing out loud, all by myself. Here I was, lost in Norway with no idea if my bus was even coming, trying to eat the most god-awful sandwich I’d ever tasted in my life. If anyone had walked down that deserted street, they would have seen me stomping my feet, laughing uncontrollably, holding a sandwich that was dropping giant pieces of bread on the ground with every move I made.

I got home that night, and it wasn’t even ten o’clock before I was back on the balcony, smiling over the glimmering sea waters under the moonlight, protected by the solemn Oslo fjords. I thought at that point that I had seen the most astounding welcome Oslo could possibly have in store for me.

How very wrong I was…

Stuff

Two weekends ago, I stood in my parents’ basement, mulling over a lifetime of stuff - college notebooks, high school yearbooks, middle school love letters. American Girl dolls, spelling tests, home videos, Beanie Babies. Lots and lots of Beanie Babies. I started out with a pile of “things to keep”, a “pile to give away”, and a “pile to discard”.

The piles grew equally at first, until I’d sifted through so many memories that I had to realize it was time to move away from the things that stood as mere symbols of various stages of my still-budding existence. The dolls, their clothes, their beds, their lunch boxes that matched my own in elementary school. The hours I’d spent playing with them as a child were vivid in my memory, as was the day I stood before my mother, suddenly aware of how many toys I had but no longer had any use for, and confessed that I didn’t know how to play with dolls anymore. I remembered the unanticipated calmness with which she responded, “Okay. Should we move them out of your bedroom?”

Didn’t the value of our things lie in the people we had become in the process of owning them, of touching them, of using them until we couldn’t use them any longer? Wasn’t their value now in the memories we feared we might lose? As the piles of stuff grew with things we hadn’t touched in two years, in five years, in twelve years, I started to think of the space they clouded - space in my parents’ basement, space in my small apartment, space in our emotional bodies. Space that needed to be cleared if we were to progress from here.

I’ve always been sensitive to the energy “stuff” creates; does it lift me up or does it drain me? A couple hours of pouring through stuff, and I’m absolutely ruined. I’ll eagerly walk ten miles through the streets of New York in a day, exploring pathways and people and places, but a couple hours with stuff and I’m destroyed. A couple hours with stuff in my parents’ basement, and my “piles of things to give away” and “things to trash” start to topple over. The things in my “pile to keep” start making their way over to the other two piles. I bring the remaining “pile of stuff to keep” over to my apartment, and two-thirds of it goes.

A couple hours with stuff, and suddenly nothing seems valuable except the memories of what it all once meant to me. A time when those things were important and fit my needs. Now they represent parts of me that have not disappeared, but have changed shape. Now it seems the only stuff I need are clothes for work and travel, and beautiful pottery and picture frames to infuse life into my apartment. And cat supplies. My six pound cat takes up as much space in my apartment as I do. What does a dainty cat do with a seven-foot cat condo? He climbs it though, and I call it his kitty Hilton. All it means is less space for things I don’t need but can’t get rid of.

My mom feels the same way about stuff as I do, but parting with my American Girl dolls was a much more emotional process for her. Everyone always says not to get rid of those things, to hold on to them dearly for the day someone can use them. But it’s been over twelve years since anyone has loved those things, and I’m nowhere near having daughters who would play with them. I can’t commit myself to a relationship at this point in my life, let alone children. I’d rather someone play with them who needs them as I once did. If I ever have daughters, they’ll want to play with the toys and dolls that fit their own needs, anyways. Eventually, my mother demanded that everyone hold their tongues and look away as she offered up the dolls – and all of their dresses, shoes, hairbrushes, nightgowns, sleeping bags, purses, petticoats, polos, parkas – to friends with grandchildren.

I don't mind. My parents, in their sixties, are ready to move into a simpler stage of their lives, finally freed from the constraints of a child not wholly separated from home. All of the stuff that matters to me is now in my small apartment - and I can hardly find the space for a microwave. I've already distanced myself from my childhood, except for the relationships, the lessons, and a lot of photographs gained along the way. The photographs alone, organized neatly by my mother into dozens of albums, could take up an entire wall in my 550 square foot home. My mother assures me with half a smile that these albums will be my wealthiest inheritance.

Tai Chi with Mitch

            Do less to achieve more. 

This is the mantra by which West Chester University’s Professor Mitch Goldfarb lives.  Surprisingly though, he is anything but lazy.  Goldfarb wears many hats, and could be considered a master of many trades. 

He is a music producer and songwriter.  A professor of T’ai Chi Chuan in the Kinesiology department of West Chester University, and some semesters, a professor of music at Immaculata University.  He is a website and e-commerce marketer and designer.  A photographer.  A writer.  A husband, father, and grandfather. 

But it is his Tai Chi practice and teaching that informs the rest of his life and career.  The art of Tai Chi is a soft martial art from China that focuses on meditation, internal strength, and wellness of the mind, body, and spirit. 

Goldfarb practices the Short Yang form, introduced by Chinese scholar and professor, Cheng Man-Ching.  Goldfarb began practicing in 1997, upon reading a book in which a character experienced life-altering results from practicing Tai Chi.

            “In Tai Chi, we celebrate laziness,” says Goldfarb, a small middle-aged man, as his eyes gleam beneath wire-rimmed spectacles.  “It’s about seeing where we can let go, and learning where we’re doing too much.” 

Tai Chi is a spiritual practice not only for its meditative qualities, but for its Taoist philosophy, which promotes the idea that chi, or life force, runs through each of us and can be awakened or depleted.  Tai Chi aims to replenish this chi through slow and deliberate movements, and to bring awareness into the body. 

Goldfarb strongly believes that when we are aware of our bodies and minds and we work in harmony with our surroundings, work becomes effortless.  This lends an explanation as to how he maintains his geniality and enthusiasm for life, even in the midst of his busy schedule.  Pursuing his passions, Goldfarb genuinely enjoys his busy work schedule.

“I love everything I’m doing,” he says, and his tone softens.  “That’s really been the blessing of my journey.  I keep doing stuff to feel good, and it makes the phrase ‘without effort’ ring true.  If you are engaged, it’s not effortful.”

“Mitch understands the secret,” Goldfarb’s student Randy Johnson says.  “He’s discovered how to live life, and I wish I could internalize it.”

It is precisely for this reason why so many of Goldfarb’s students keep coming back to his Tai Chi classes, both within and outside of the university.  It’s the classic “I want what he has” syndrome; fortunately, these people can have what he has.  In fact, Goldfarb’s purpose in teaching is to bring his students exactly what he has found, and it may be simpler than one would expect. 

“My goal,” Goldfarb says, “is to empower the gifts that are already in these students.  It’s about helping them connect to the magic that is already within them.  I’m a conduit.  They give themselves the gift.”

And many of his students are receptive to this, seeing how this secret has worked for Goldfarb.

“I try to have a positive attitude,” says another of Goldfarb’s West Chester students, Scott Stuart.  “But Mitch is genuinely vibrant and cheerful all the time.  That’s a person I want to learn from.”

 For some though, many of Mitch’s lessons seem counterintuitive. 

“Some people seem to have a hard time making sense of Mitch’s teachings,” says Stuart.  “Sometimes I think those people just don’t get it, but I realize it’s a very different way of thinking, and it takes careful examination and acceptance of yourself in a way that may not be easy for everyone to do.”

Although the task of slowing down and becoming present may be daunting to some, Goldfarb comes equipped to show students the way.

“It’s my responsibility to interest my students; to make it entertaining, and fun, and creative, so they can have a taste of what it’s all about.”

Indeed, Taoism and Tai Chi are contrary to Western thought; in an action-oriented society, many people may feel guilty about slowing down to focus on breathing and the body.

“While I’m doing Tai Chi, I think of all the other things I should be doing, and I worry that I’m wasting my time,” another frustrated student expressed early on in the semester. 

Perhaps, though, this is exactly why the class should be offered.  When so many of us cannot seem to escape the daily grind, there is something refreshing about setting down the burdens of the day to simply experience the here and now in order to put everything else into perspective.

Goldfarb is the prime example of this.  Morning to night, he is out and about, teaching classes, taking classes, and working on his latest projects.  For many it would easily become overwhelming, but as Randy Johnson stated, Goldfarb seems to know the secret to handling it.

Goldfarb approaches everything with a bright smile, a playful sense of humor, and an eager, “That’s great!”  Wherever he goes, he remains present and alert, absorbing and sharing whatever joy is to be found in his midst.

Listening to Goldfarb spew his schedule from memory, one is amazed by how perky he sounds. (“In the morning I work on my music projects.  Then I teach three university classes during that day, then I go to Philly to take three classes from one of the grandmasters, Maggie Newman, and one of her students.  Then I go home for dinner and I take a three mile walk with my wife.”) 

It seems so contrary to his mantra, “Do less to achieve more,” yet it fits for him, as his passion is evident.  Everything Goldfarb does is play.  Instead of worrying about the next place he has to be, he enjoys every moment he gets to do the things he loves. 

His careers are in line with his passions, and he has human interaction all day long.  Even in the midst of work, he maintains a playful environment and, most importantly, leaves room for everything to take its own course under his guidance.

“We’re so focused on control in our society,” he says.  “I used to be all about control.  Even the door to my music studio said ‘control room.’  When we realize we’re not in control, we’re able to find greater enjoyment in our lives because we can finally let go.”

This is reflected, too, in his Tai Chi practice.  Much of the art focuses on letting go of the muscles, and allowing chi to move you.  As I watch him guide his students, his constant suggestion is, “You’re doing too much!  Let go in the shoulders.  Just take a deep breath and relax.”

He then holds the student’s arms up by the wrists as he suggests she stop holding the arms up.  Her arms collapse, her shoulders sink, and her wrists remain raised in Goldfarb’s fingers.  The room goes silent and still.  Goldfarb then flashes an encouraging grin.

“It’s so easy,” he says.  “We’re bringing laziness to an art form.”

Cookie Cutter

Fall and winter months were always a confusing time in my family.  It’s the time of year when extended families are expected to get together, whether they want to or not, to celebrate the holidays; the men sit down to watch sports, and the women gather to prepare food in the kitchen.  At least, that’s how I’ve always figured it’s supposed to go.  I never had the experience to determine whether this was true or not.  My extended family, scattered throughout Seattle, Portland, Cleveland, Tallahassee, Mexico City, and we in Philadelphia, never had an easy time congregating.  Seattle was the base, as my parents’ families of origin both began there.  But frequent holiday visits were not always possible.  My family visited most years in July or August, when Seattle was experiencing its best weather—that is, when Seattle is least like Seattle.  We went out for Christmas when I was four, and again when I was thirteen, but to date that has left twenty-one other Christmases to be spoken for—not to mention twenty-three Thanksgiving Days.

                  We really never had a traditional celebration.  Several times we went to Cleveland to spend Thanksgiving or Christmas with my mom’s brother and his wife and two daughters, and several times they came to us.  This was my favorite way to spend those holidays, but some years they had other plans.  And once their first daughter left the house, there wasn’t any hope of congregating with our Cleveland family.    A fair number of times we got together with some nearby friends who had a similar familial situation.  But eventually, that tradition fell by the wayside, as I looked for other places to go.  Since we didn’t have holiday plans that had solidified by repetition and obligation, my family had room for other traditions. 

The year I was born, my mom discovered a recipe in Parents magazine for cutout butter cookies.  At some point along the lines, before my memory started to record events, Mom began decorating them in colored frosting.  I don’t know when and how Mom discovered that I liked these cookies, but somehow she realized—I liked them.  By the time I was old enough to understand the concept of decorating cookies, she had already collected an assortment of cookie cutters—dogs, cats, Santa’s sleigh, turkeys, pumpkins, bells, acorns—and food coloring in any number of hues—forest green, Kelly green, lime green, rustic red, red-orange….  Come Halloween, Mom would pull out her recipe for the cutout cookies; after a while though, a recipe was unnecessary.  Several times over the next two months, Mom would spend the morning making and baking these cookies.  As I learned in later years, it was not so simple a procedure as it looked.  The end product, though, justified the labor pains.  Not only were they darling to look at, but they were delicious.  I don’t think I’ve tasted anything that so thoroughly satisfied my taste buds.  Every combination of flavors you craved was in these cookies.  They filled your mouth with a not-too-sweet-but-sweet-enough buttery flavor.  The butter, sugar, vanilla, dash of salt, smooth frosting…. All of it congregated ever so pleasingly there in your mouth, the way most families congregated, probably at the moment I was enjoying the cookies, although the cookie I’m sure was far more satisfying.  It left you perfectly happy, as though nothing else could have brought you such fulfillment.

A couple batches for Halloween, a couple for Thanksgiving, a couple for Christmas; sometimes more.  This was typical.  Once a fresh set of cookies had cooled down after baking in the oven, I would help Mom frost them.  I can’t imagine how atrocious mine must have looked in my early years of practice.  I always admired Mom’s ability to make a perfectly rounded edge of frosting, just shy of the edge of the cookie.  And she always had an eye for placing sprinkles, simply and perfectly, atop the cookies.  The way she decorated her cookies fully reflected her being.  They were careful and intentional.

Mom made these cookies frequently for many autumns and winters.  She rarely brought others into the process of baking—the laborious part.  In my young years I often meandered in the kitchen when she made them.  I would play with the flour before she put it into the dough.  I would sift it into a tall mountain, though sifting wasn’t really necessary.  I suppose it gave me something productive to do and kept me out of her way. The baking was the painstaking part, so she most often did that on her own and invited friends and family, when they were around, into the decorating. 

We have countless home videos with friends and family frosting cookies and dropping sprinkles over them.  We held an entire party one winter day of six-year-old girls decorating cookies.  One year we brought the naked cookies to Cleveland with us, along with the decorating supplies, and the entire family went to town decorating.  Many memorable times were had with this activity, and every time we make them we reflect on creative things people have done with their decorations.  A friend once made a crack in a bell-shaped cookie that looked identical to that in the Liberty Bell.  Another friend once turned an acorn into the face of an Asian man wearing a hat.  There were endless creative possibilities in the decorating of these cookies, and the best were always rewarded by being reflected upon every time we made the cookies.

When Mom started working again, batches of the cookies we decorated each year became scarce.  We’re lucky now if one batch comes out of the oven each year.  Simply missing the delectable flavor, I recently took over the baking process, and understood why we make so few anymore.  But despite how difficult they may be, it is a tradition that simply can no longer be forgotten.  They are most often now an autumn tradition, since that was when the process usually began.  October was the beginning of the cookie decorating season.  Now the “season” has become more like a day long, but if an October goes by without baking and decorating cookies, it will surely happen in November—or December.

Bacon: Delicious, Pernicious, and... Sexy?

            The twenty-first century in America has brought with it much political and social controversy.  On December twenty-third it is irreverent to wish a Merry Christmas to the clerk in the gift shop if you don’t know he’s Christian.  It becomes a personal attack to assume or mistake a person’s nationality.  A hot-button issue of the last Super Bowl was people’s reaction to hearing “America the Beautiful” sung in different languages during a commercial.  And now with this century’s health movement and animal rights movement, even our food has become a target for controversy.

            Eat beef and an innocent cow has been slaughtered in the service of your own gluttony.  Eat pork, and you’ve blown nearly all conventions governing religion and ethics.  Worse yet, fry up some bacon and wait for the outraged cries of your cardiologist, dietitian, rabbi, and local hippies denouncing your name.  Despite having served only several decades prior as the mouth on the breakfast smiley face pancake, bacon has now become one of America’s most taboo foods.  It’s terrible for your health, it’s harmful to animals, it’s against many orthodox religious practices, and for at least one of these reasons, it is scorned by many flag-waving self-proclaiming Americans.  Bacon is just generally bad in America.  Yet, as often happens with taboos, it has simultaneously become cool.  It is not only despised, but it is also revered.  Bacon has become bigger than itself; it’s almost—sexy.

            Like some might find it obnoxiously trendy to wish a Merry Christmas to a Muslim, the carnivores’ bacon craze has counteracted PETA co-founder Alex Pacheco’s cries to treat animals with “the same rights as a retarded human child.”  Such political activists hold power over much of our population, but in this case we’re not listening to them.  Amidst the fad diets which hold high appeal to many—purple foods, raw foods, veganism, cabbage soup, grape juice, South Beach, Atkins, tapeworm diets (yes, purposely ingesting tapeworms to lose weight)—we are standing by our traditional upbringing and eating those juicy, fatty, artery-coating, controversy-provoking bacon strips.  As Sarah Hepola of Salon Magazine points out in her article “Bacon Mania,” we don’t have to worry about whether the bacon is fresh enough or local enough or healthy enough, as we do with our salmon and produce.  “And there is something comfortingly unambiguous about a thick slab of bacon. It's bad for you. It tastes fantastic. Any questions?”

            There is something about this comfort, this confidence, that has become sexy in America; something sexy when you don’t fall into every fad the culture places upon you, but rebel through conceding to your own satisfaction.  You know it’s indulgent, you know it’s risky, yet nothing can hold you back.  The moment of experiencing bacon is a sensuous one.  We’ve all been in that moment of entering the kitchen to a pan of sizzling bacon.  Its smell fills your body with craving, begs to be satisfied, persists and nags until indulged.  The fullness of the flavor is so bold, so prevailing, that it reaches deep within every pocket of your mouth.  It is undeniable that there is something seductive about the fleshy slab of meat.

            Even more enticing than simply bacon is meat on meat.  Bacon on burgers has become the latest craze.  Take the Wendy’s Baconator, for example, the whopping 970 calorie meal, often devoured in a matter of bites, which made 25 million sales in North America in its first four months. Rarely anymore do we think of burgers without the full experience—two patties, lettuce, tomatoes, onion rings, ketchup, barbecue sauce, fries, pickles, and, of course, bacon—smothered in brown sugar and a secret special sauce.  Whenever I go out for dinner, I flip to the burger page, disregarding all other entrees, and my eye goes straight to their bacon burgers.  Each time without fail, the people I am with stare at my burger with amazement and envy when it is placed in front of me, disbelieving its enormous size and wishing they had ordered the same.  

These massive, decked-out burgers signify to many the image of guns, meat, and manliness; something about it appeals to men, and the notion of eating meat on meat is often considered “manly” in America.  When women eat meat on meat, however, it’s plain sexy.  American women are particularly infamous for giving in to all these fad diets (acai berry diet, low fat diet, and grapefruit diet, to name a few more) so when a woman eats bacon on beef, it symbolizes to Americans that she is tough, womanly, and independent.  Not only does she dance to her own beat, but she is a carnivore.  When we see women eating meat, it taps into our Neanderthal instincts.  She appears robustly healthy to our instinctive response, whether she truly is or not.  And as celebrity bombshell Jessica Simpson told the world on a t-shirt she was spotted wearing in 2008, “Real Girls Eat Meat.”

            Ingrid Newkirk, president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), expressed her disgust towards meat eaters to the Washington City Paper in 1985 when she stated, “Eating meat is primitive, barbaric, and arrogant.”  It is this attitude, shared by a growing number of Americans, which makes the act of eating meat risqué. Not only is it seen as provocative, but it is, in a sense, primal.  As some have taken on this view that a carnivorous diet is positively sinful, it seems to have created greater polarization; others, who may have once been neutral toward meat and animal rights, have not only jumped to the defense of meat eaters, but have fallen towards the end of the spectrum that adores meat not only for its taste but also for its vulgarity.  Its lewdness has become erotic.

            Adding to the image of women and meat being sexy, the “bacon bra” surfaced in late 2007 and went viral on the Internet.  On one man’s Flickr page was featured a picture of a woman’s torso covered only by a bra of raw bacon.  It inspired much controversy, as some people were offended by the image of a woman sexualized through strips of raw meat.  Or conversely, as one Serious Eats blog follower expressed, “I am deeply offended by the way this post is objectifying bacon. You are treating bacon as nothing more than a piece of meat.”  Responses to this wave on the Internet represented the many feelings that America holds towards bacon.  Viewers expressed their disgust at viewing bacteria-infested raw meat; feminism came forth through the outraged viewers who saw it as a woman being objectified as a piece of meat; animal rights activists stood forth in their horror at seeing the remains of a pig being used for such a cause; health nuts cringed at the calories and fat contained in this unconventional undergarment; but many, as Heplon observed in her article “Bacon Mania,” responded with a childlike, "Ohmygod, baaaaacon.”

            A couple weeks ago when I was trying to decide what to write my essay about, my friend Brandon called me to check in.  I explained the prompt reluctantly, expecting him to try giving me a list of uninspiring topics.  Sure enough he did, and when he realized my indifference to his ideas he asked, “Okay Liz, what’s your favorite food?”  It didn’t take me long to answer, “Bacon.”  Brandon went quiet for almost too long, and I began to wonder why on earth he could be so upset with me for picking bacon as my favorite food.  After this long pause, he said in a serious voice, “Is it really?  Is bacon really your favorite food?  I have to ask you to marry me now.”  He then explained how dearly and desperately he loves bacon, how important it is in his life, and I wondered if he might become emotional. 

I then told Brandon about a (likely fabricated) newspaper clipping that went viral online a couple years ago regarding a police case which involved a supposed break-in at a couple’s house that resulted in five pounds of stolen bacon.  As it turned out, his wife simply had not wanted to admit to eating all five pounds of bacon for a late night snack. Upon hearing this story, Brandon proceeded to tell me exactly what he would do to a woman who could eat five pounds of bacon in one sitting.  And considering his feelings towards women eating bacon, he would probably only like a bacon bra better. 

Perhaps as long as sex has existed, so have jokes at its expense.   Looking back even upon Shakespeare’s sonnets and plays, and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, we find crude innuendos.  Similarly, jokes regarding bacon began surfacing in the later part of the ‘00s.  With the controversy over ethics and health not hidden far behind them, several humorous bacon-related memes emerged.  In 2006, a man posted pictures (along with dialogue from the event) of a strip of bacon taped to his cat.  And in 2007, some mixologists made a tongue-in-cheek attempt at creating bacon flavored vodka.  Later in 2007, chef Michael Ruhlman made a similar attempt at bacon flavored ice cream.  Then in 2008, Carin Huber of The AntiCraft, a blog for sinister artists who wish to make creation from chaos, created the Baconhenge—a Stonehenge on a breakfast plate created out of bacon.  2008 also saw the publication of a book by author Sarah Katherine Lewis entitled Sex and Bacon: Why I Love Things That Are Very, Very Bad for Me.  In this book, bacon was introduced as not only a guilty pleasure, but as sexy.  "Pour me a drink, light me a smoke, fry me up a pan of bacon, and let's get it on.”

In its controversy, bacon has emerged at its peak.  Through the opposition of some, it has been glorified by others.  In its admonition, it has also become quirky and savored—and at its best, downright sexy.  What else could be compared to waking up in the morning to a hot plate of bacon?  In the midst of the debates surrounding it, bacon has surfaced as strong, sultry, and insuperable.  I mean, it’s bacon.

Chilled

            Chen came from Taiwan to study piano at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia when she was fifteen.  A small, quiet girl with dimples, she spoke hardly any English when I first met her.  Conversations were basic and slow, consisting mostly of, “How are you?” and “What do you like to eat?”  But over the next six years that I knew her, she became fluent, and we developed a unique bond.  Both only children, we declared ourselves sisters before her studies eventually took her to Yale, then all around the world, sharing the delicate poetry of her piano chords.  During her years in Philadelphia, though, we were family.  I was three years younger, and admired her talent and passion, and feared the bravery that brought her to a foreign country to nurture her gift.  When she played the piano, she swayed gently and comfortably as the muscles in her small arms tremored over the keys.  She evoked something soft and formidable.

When she pulled away from the piano, she was a shy, earnest girl with a smile and an ear for a story.  We were both in school, and would talk for hours about Taiwan, America, and our schoolwork.  While her English improved, from time to time she would twist a phrase.

            “Did you know Arthur Rubinstein tried to kill his life?” she asked my father solemnly one afternoon.

            One February evening after dinner, we were walking down Germantown Avenue in the Chestnut Hill neighborhood of Philadelphia.  I was twenty, and Chen was twenty-three.  It was dark and icy cold that night.  Wet heavy snow fell around us as we hurried to the car, our hats and scarves bundled tightly around our ears and cheeks, mittened hands securing our down coats.  We climbed into the backseat of my dad’s sedan, where we huddled to warm up.

            “Have you ever been chilled to the bone,” Chen asked me, “and not because of the cold?”

            I’m not sure my answer was entirely coherent.  Certainly the day I watched the life drain from my small dog’s eyes was a day I felt chilled, my own blood cooling as hers slowly froze.  The morning I awoke in a dense fog, heartbroken and abandoned, I felt my bones tingle as I realized there was no escaping—I had to bear the deep lashes of loneliness on my raw stripped skin.  I felt chilled to the bone the day I learned of the death of my elementary school teacher, a Catholic nun I both feared and revered.  I felt it the day a mentally ill old man approached me alone at the train station, as he wavered between slinging curses and telling me how beautiful I was, leaving me utterly exposed and defenseless.

Those moments that quiver through the pockets of your marrow are, perhaps, the reminders of how human we are.  That something can resonate so deeply as to chill our blood, to quell its flow momentarily as we struggle to grasp the perplexity of a given moment, another pearl on a string, profound and sacred, yet no different from the rest.  It’s the moment where truth unveils itself in its stark, blank nakedness, unashamed at the stir it causes in its suddenness.  Chen uncovered many of those truths in her music.  They were palpable as chords echoed and her spine heaved, as her long black hair flipped behind her neck.  I only wonder if those are the moments she thought of when she asked that question—those moments of the divine bearing down in uncomfortable ways, ready to grasp you by the shoulders and steer you head on into the cool face of truth.