...the farmer and the cowman

Oh what a beautiful morning. Well kinda. The smog and poisonous gases that usually waft over this area sent on environmental mistrals straight from the Big Apple are noticeably absent today, perhaps because there is an acid laden snow falling on our infested cedars. Teenage pregnancy, smoking, and oxy-contin thefts are down a few points this week and bizarre murders up. It's nice that we maintain some sort of natural balance. Welcome to the new millennium. This ain't about that though. this is about the age old battle that is being waged now as I compose my thoughts. The battle between wheat and beef. The war of the diets. This is about the lies and counter-aquisationals that are being tossed loosely around so helter-skelter in the media. I so want to talk to some of my friends about this, but I don't know who I will be offending or whose on which side. These people take solid stands on this delicate issued and are very serious about their feelings.. Some are tossing down steak fat for breakfast and some are ignoring the low carb admonitions by whoever it is that puts out these dire warnings and eating...oh ma gawd, bread! Ahhhhhhhhhhh! Where do I stand on this issue? Well, I'll tell ya...I wouldn't mind a nice juicy steak fat sandwich on toasted sourdough and drizzled with all the cooking liquidodiums. The only problem with me is that I am on a diet myself. I couldn't eat that much on this diet, it would be too many calories for me. It t'were the calories what made me a little overweight to begin with, so it is they I will try to do without in order to lose a few pounds. I guess in my heart of hearts, it weren't the calories neither...it was me putting in too much fuel to run my machine and having the excess slosh over, so to speak. I didn't do this on purpose, I'm a helpless victim of society. I see fries cooking in animal fat on the tele and I desire them. I could probably get some sort of frivolous law suit going before they change the laws dealing with such mundane trivialities. I sure wanna stay up with what's popular. A second truth. It ain't the weight that is the problem I'm really talking about. All this diet talk, the whole fat-carbo issue is not the real problem, it is only a symptom and a small one at that, of a much larger issue that is staring us right in the face. A ruse to keep us from seeing the bigger picture. Too bad we have our eyes closed in some dazed sort of mesmerizing fantasy and we can't see the forest for the trees. If most of your population is overweight, it's not only because of what is being put into its system...it's why. We eat because we can. This not only applies to fat and carbs ...this applies to technology as well. Technology makes more food available for us, and it hones our commercials to properly inundate us to such a point that we are subliminally taught we need to get this product into our stomachs, NOW! This kind of advanced technology also creates the new bells and whistles for items such as computers, and then makes them so desirable and necessary that we absolutely must go out and get one today and chuck the old one into a landfill somewhere. How about that snazzy, two-story 500 horse pick-up truck as a second vehicle. That would look nice in the driveway. It would also give us a nice place to throw the plastic bags full of stuff we got from the department store. We can charge all this new stuff as we can certainly afford to over-extend our credit line...we have at least that much money. So that is how it is that we are getting overweight in more ways than one. I swear, every time I think about this stuff I feel like growing a long white beard and strapping on a few hand-painted sandwich boards and walking up and down the streets of some teeming metropolis disseminating my chicken little warning that portends the end of humanity. I wouldn't be the first. I'm hoping for the miracle that will slow our burgeoning population down enough to give the planet a small breather, I'm hoping that the waters that are slowly being poisoned by what we are pouring into them will have a chance to rinse themselves clean and the sky that is darkening with our industrial and automotive effluents will mystically become clear. World peace...anyone? Hahahahaha. On the issue of the Earth, by the time it gets to a point that it becomes mandated for us to curb our appetites, it will be, sadly, too late. So it is that we look carefully at what it is that is making us overweight and continue to pursue the sensationalized diets that are the fodder of the weekly tabloids. Loosing a few pounds will cure everything and make the world right. I swear, we are becoming more manipulated than the behind the scenes ministrations of a bad reality series. Oops. I heard the toaster in the other room. My sourdough is ready. Think about what I've said, will ya...but not for too long.

J. Jules Vitali is a sculptor, columnist, inadvertent moral philosopher and poet who resides in Freeport, Maine. He is the creator of the art form Styrogami(tm)which can be seen on the web at www.styrogami.com. He is also an Artist in Cellophane (www.artomat.org). He tries to have fun in life.