Recipitation

Summer months, redolant with humidity and mosquitoes, occasionally require a bit of indulgence. In my husband’s imagination, this indulgence expresses itself in the sleek lines of a grill. You’ve reached financial bliss when you have a grill, and our grill-less state indicates otherwise.  Of course, the reality of a small NYC apartment dictates that we instead dubiously approach the public grills in local parks, light our briquets, and pray that any nastiness will burn away before we get around to cooking. 

It seems to me that the American dream could be summed up in a grill. We don’t want to share, we want our own. And we want our own to be shiny, beautiful, and very, very powerful. Not the little 4 cylinder toys that get reasonable gas mileage, but an 8 cylinder monstrosity that requires a small herd of animals to die just so that it’s grill racks can be filled with an abundance that will strike envy and fear into the hearts of all our neighbors. (feeling a bit cynical tonight, are we?)  It’s funny how we use money to make statements about ourselves, be it the Stuart Weitzman stiletto platforms I dream about (because they say I am confident, pampered, and don’t actually need to walk anywhere?), or the can of cavier that makes someone’s favorite foods list (which says, at least to me as onlooker, ”I know food, and have enough experience to distinguish exquisite cavier from boring roe”).    Ah, we are shallow occasionally, all of us in our cravings.

To support that imaginary world, where grilled food flows freely, we spent $28 (credit card) to purchase italian sausage, rolls, bbq sauce and charcoal. All so we could enjoy a bit of time outside with a group of aquaintances/friends (which are we?)/ fellow interns, throw about a frisbee and football, and laugh about the horrible effects of excessive inulin intake on the human digestive track.

Undoubtedly, the trollbots who read this blog have noticed a lack of posts about my consumption. Why? A breather of sorts. Lucky grad student that I am, I find myself employed in a summer job that pays almost as much in three months as an entire year of graduate stipendship. The financial pressure of daily measuring where my money goes no longer seems to crush onto my lungs every day, however, I’ve found in the last two months that the habits of the last year are well ingrained.

A new job, after two years outside of corporate America, requires new clothes. Of course I want to spend my days exploring my wanna-be just like the Uniform Project creativity, or slavishly copying the likkle girl who wurves pwetty things, but reality dictates that I just fantasise about such lovely money-requiring amusements (more below).  Both examples draw heavily on an extensive amount of time and effort collecting unique pieces, and an even more extensive amount of creative flair taking unique and not-unique and refashioning them into something new. I’m not certain whether they are just the fore-front of a trend, or recreating snippets of trends left and right. Afterall, the amazing power of marketing to make and remake reality leaves one wondering, upon sighting of something new and refreshing, how long until new shows up in a slightly different shade, or a hint, winking and nodding to something unattainable, as it stares out at you from a big box retailer shelf.

I digress. I find myself, in my attempted reintroductions to the shopping world, absolutely unwilling to pay the prices attached to the clothes in my hands. A $10 shirt at H&M still feels like a pile of gold, especially when I finger the cloth and think of the hands that sewed it for pennies, this throw-away bit of clothing that cannot help but last a season or two.  Even worse, my desire for a comfortable pair of ballet flats, so I can skirt wear with ease intead of tottering about, toes squished into smooshed up sausages of misery, weekly collides full force with the reality that this $20 or $30 will have soles worn through by December. But the additional $50 or $60 (on top of that earlier bit of money) required to step up in quality to a shoe made to last a bit longer still appears an inscaleable mountain in the face of the looming storm that the return to graduate student life entails.

A bit grump-inducing, yes?

To deal with this funk, I carefully plot and plan trips to consignment shops unreachable on foot, and imagine the treasures awaiting within. Perhaps next week my powers of teleportation will kick in.

Today I thought I knew what I would do. But it didn’t work out that way–the needed camera necessary for a trip to the NY Historical Society was hidden somewhere unknown, and with time ticking away, I found my plans unwound into a messy tangle.

Lunch, then, would not arrive with my husband around 1 pm.

So I took a buy one get one free coupon, a friend, and went to 240 Sullivan Street to try Peanut Butter & Co. (hat tip to Peanut Butter Boy for reminding me to go) After all, what magical alchemy inhabited this space where grown adults paid $7ish for a PB&J?

We got the sandwich of the week (creamy peanut butter with strawberry rhubarb jam), and a peanut butter sample platter, all for $7.59. I paid $4.09 (cash), my companion in sticky eating, $3.50.  We spent our sandwich waiting time discussing nostalgia, and the process of using nostalgia to sell childhood lunches to not-so-young adults. Even the decor said nostalgia, with old PB paraphenalia, and a strong whiff of sweetness.

The peanute butter sampler came with the equivalent of an entire jar worth of peanut butter. After trying each, declaring some well-balanced and others strident, we split up the flavors, base-ball style, and took them home.

I decided my spicy PB needed to grace my dinner table, and stopped at Whole Foods for some bread, plus green beans to accompany dinner, and fish and hoisin sauce for tomorrow’s meal. A grand total of $10.87 (credit). I wish there were a grocery store closer to my house. While I’m wishing, I’ll wish for more time so I can go back to making my own bread which doesn’t squish up during slicing.

Tonight’s take home message comes smooshed between two slices of whole wheat: make your own.

Image from stickers and donuts.

My one shopping moment of note, this entire semester (if we don’t count the trip up the Swiss mountain), happened late one Wednesday evening, after a three-day marathon of paper writing. I rewarded myself by indulging in a bit an imaginary reality by purchasing two pairs of boldly colored tights (on sale! $14, debit) at Anthropologie. I’ve never been in the store before, but found myself enchanted at the world of new “vintage” being painted before my eyes. Here, in one boxed up package, was my key to looking like Chuck from Pushing Daisies. Or at least, getting closer to it.  Like many others in the TV-watching world (or in my case, hulu-enabled watching), I am enchanted by the quirky, beautiful, sweet outfits the main female lead in the show wears. These clothes speak of joy, and happiness, and a plucky, perky kind of personality that overcomes great odds. I want my clothes to speak so kindly.

One cannot help but be astounded by the idea of taking vintage, which intrinsically carries with it the elusive “patina” of age, and making it into a commodified, recently manufactured, line of products. Here, one finds a variety of hardware to put on your furniture, making it look older than it is, or a new dress that looks as though your mother might have worn it. Or grandmother.The prices are astoundingly high, with t-shirts selling for $50-$98. But the idea of looking like Chuck . . . one swoons.

April 14th, 2009. The mad, final push to finish filling out my federal and (two) state income tax forms. I finish. Submit. It gets rejected for my husband typing in his ss# incorrectly.  Funny, in that he cannot recall the number assisgned to identify him.

All in all, we “broke even” this year– we owed the federal government $6, Illinois claimed $360ish (I forgot to write it down in my checkbook, and am not willing to look it up at this moment), and New York is giving us back $420ish.  Every year, at tax time, I vow to pay someone to do it next year. And every year, when tax time rolls around again, I do it myself. It’s fun to see what kind of silly loopholes exist for people who buy _____ (insert: windmills, electric cars, medical equipment), and sad to see what kind of huge medical expenses you have to put out before you get any credit.  Medical expenses hold much more interest for me since my husband transitioned from student to unemployed–we pay ~$200/month (hmm–insert direct withdrawal of $800 for medical expenses over the last 4 months) for the assurance that if a bus hits my husband, or he falls off his bike, or some other horrid thing happens, someone will help us pay 80% of our bills. After we dish out a minimum of $1000.  We find ourselves in the statistical category of the chronically underinsured, as paying that 20% would probably wipe out all of our savings in a matter of moments, but we can not afford more. At least we think we can’t. However, we choose to afford what we do buy, for $2400/year, which is peace of mind.  I miss the days when I worked for a NFP with fabulous health insurance, and look forward to returning to such a situation some time. In the meantime, this moment of scarcity has moved my political views left, and made me wonder why my government does not acknowledge our efforts to avoid further burdening the US taxpayer.

We paid the USPS $6.99 (credit) to send in our various state returns via certified mail.

In other news, I paid Penn State $165 for the privelege of coming to partake in the currency of an academic conference. It appears that some small amount of fiscal capital is necessary to participate in the exchange of academic capital, after all, one cannot attend without finding a place to sleep, a way to get there, and a fee to get in.

I left a day earlier than my husband for our spring break family reunion, all the result of spending an 8 hour layover in London. I have a college friend who now lives outside London, and we arranged to meet at Paddington station. So my first expense of the trip was to stop at a change place and get $25 switched into pounds. Silly, as the commission isn’t prorated, but it’s been so long since I changed money that I’d forgotten. It amazes me that having a credit and debit card without a “puce”–that little chip that all the machines in Europe read instead of a magnetic stripe–can literally stop your ability to participate in the money economy unless you have cash on hand. By the end of the excursion, I had spent the entire $25 on a combination of a tube ride into London, a cornish pasty, and a train ride back to Heathrow.

For the next ten days  of travel, I took 200 euros out, and attempted to do most of my purchasing in cash. Almost all of those 200 euros went to food: for example, three crottins de chavignol from a farmers market for 4 euros, a bunch of leeks for 1.5 euros, a collection of Nestle’s fabulous La Latiere petits pots de creme (amazing product–well made, great flavor, reasonably priced ranging from 2.2 euros to 2.4 euros), 9 liters of Vittel for my husband who thinks, after two years of living in France and being advised to drink bottled instead of tap water by his mission doctor, that Vittel is the best tasting water on the market. I’m not convinced, especially since I refilled one of his bottles with Lyon’s tap water, and he never noticed.

The reality of my vacation expenses remains fairly similar to my home expenses: food (although more indulgence purchasing, after all, some of these foods are not available at home. That is changing, as an increasing number of food companies gain global share, leading to cereals like Golden Grahams crossing borders more easily than humans), transportation, reimbursing family members who paid for dinner or housing, more food . . . and then . . . $122.95 (credit) to Europe Car for a bucket-load of add-on charges that weren’t on my agenda when I booked my car and the ultimate indulgence: $122.48 to ride the gondola all the way up to the top of Schilthorn. There is no need involved in such a financial endevour, excpet to see my father’s face light up like it’s Christmas morning, and the gut-wrenching moment of watching skiers drop off the face of the mountain. These skiers don’t do bunny hills.  I have google earth to thank for this–a year ago, had you told my dad that he would be travelling to Europe he would have scoffed and refused considering the idea. But combine the amazing force of two granddaughters with the fact that two of your three sons are living in France, and visiting seemed more likely. Then someone (my husband?) showed Dad how to “fly” around the world on his computer, allowing him to explore places he never new existed before we went. A bit like the proverbial “you don’t know you want it until you see it” moment, Dad found sights he wanted to visit, and we did our best to make sure he saw them.  A consumer economy of sights, you could say. The end result: He commented, recently, that this was the best vacation he’s ever taken.

One of the most fascinating moments about travel is that point when you discover yourself against the immovable wall of cultural differences. My parents encountered very few of these, as a group of french-speaking family followed them everywhere. That moment came when we wandered into a restaurant in German-speaking Switzerland.  Here we were, at the end of a meal, wondering whether tip was included or not. I should have known, but I couldn’t remember. My husband’s German is limited to old discourses on the Bible, dictionary in hand. So we attempted to find out, and the entire exchange ended in an awkward moment with my father handing our waitress a 10 euoro bill for our 80 euro dinner, hoping to not offend, unsure of how to thank her.

It is good to find ourselves in the shoes of the “other,” as this allows us to better understand and accomodate the “others” we meet in our realm of self.  Here I find myself disagreeing with bell hooks in her essay “eating the other.”  Our interactions with the “other” are not always moments of dominance, they can also be moments of true learning and exchange. Must the world be diminished to a commodified state? Can not humans of different ethnicities, races, or socio-economic classes interact with and learn from each other without it becoming a moment of power struggle?

I’ve spent a lot of mental money this week. My closet? 90% donated to clothing recycling, 10% retained, and off on a second-hand store spree. Thanks to graduate student finances, and a pile of papers all due on the same day, I have exhibited great restraint. That restraint is why we’re still debt-free, despite the fact that two of us are living in NYC on a graduate student stipend. Huzzah for us. I hate it. However, I remind myself that there are worse things in life than living a life of frugality, and think about other things such as what to bake, and whether I’ll ever see rabbits in Prospect Park.  And, to be honest, the reality is that we’re just fine. I just have constructed a story of poverty in my  head that affects the daily choices I make regarding food, yet we still have enough to occasionally go out with friends, to pay our rent, eat well, pay for insurance, buy transit cards and even head to Europe to visit family. That doesn’t look like a deprived life.  Yet by constructing such a story of “deprivation” I’ve effectively changed the way I interact with the world, making it possible to pay for what is needed. Interesting.  I think it’s time to start telling stories of abundance in my head, and see how I feel after a week of that.

I’ve spent very little in the way of actual cash. Today, $19.04 (credit) on groceries at Key Foods, including a pack of cupcake liners just in case I miraculously finish my paper tonight. It’s not going to happen, as I no longer understand my own reasoning, but it was a nice thought.

Tuesday: $3.69 (cash) at Whole Foods for a loaf of bread, and $81 (debit) to MTA for my month-long transit pass.

Monday: $12.00 (credit) to Metro North for a ticket up to Yonkers as a chaperone for a group of undergrads headed to visit the science barge. Fabulously interesting: it turns out that all I need to get my solar house dreams going is a barge and a lot of really big grants. I tucked that information away in a mental pocket book. The instructor reimbursed me the next day.

It’s official. My record keeping is a mess.

While cleaning today, instead of paper writing (the ultimate avoidance technique as the house always needs cleaning), I came across a receipt that I don’t want to lose. It’s not for much, a total of $8.33 (cash) spent on a pound of strawberries, a package of over-priced semi-sweet chocolate chips, an almost impossible to locate bag of popcorn (not microwave) and one banana. All of this, to feed a sweet tooth. Or many sweet teeth.

I occasionally (read: one to two times/week) make the treats for my husband’s institute of religion classes. It all started when I observed the forlorn faces of a group of students one evening, peering hopefully into the large common room with a hopeful “give us a reason to sit around and mingle” look. Such a sad thing, life without food greasing the wheels so conversations can start up and friendships develop. Unfortunately for them, the twin terrors of school and a subway ride make my favored kind of outrageous productions untenable. Instead, I make things like curry-chocolate drizzled popcorn. And it’s fabulously good.

This idea, like so many of the ideas in the world around us, is a borrowed and paraphrased version of various things I see. Vosges Naga bars, chocolate covered popcorn at a birthday party . . . A true case of high meets low. People seem to be willing to pay all sorts of money for a good chocolate bar, so why not play around and make my own fascinating flavors? In other words, I spend my free time coolhunting for my culinary mind. Unfortunately, it’s about time that coolhunting got codified and filed, because like my receipts, I find my ideas scattered. Read the rest of this entry »

Expenditures: $20 (cash) on food at Momofuku with a group of fellow food studies grads, one prof and a visitor whose name I do not recall, but has recently published a book on Bengli food. My mental discussion of this expenditure eerily resembles a previous post (What happens if you never accept invitations to socialize with your collegues?  How do you handle wanting to not spend a lot of money in group eating situations?  What does it mean when a restaurant is so hip that they give you crappy service and dried out buns?  Not to mention clearing your plates and threatening to make you eat foie gras in bowls? Or my favorite, taking away your water glass before they return the check?)

$28 (credit) on a big bag of soil and a variety of seeds: radishes, carrots, basil, dill, ’survivor’ parsley, calendula, summer squash, larkspur and snapdragons. All to fulfill a vision of my own little green rebellion, which I plan on sharing with as many NFSPH students who come to the activity I’m planning for April 16th.  Last summer I boldly decided that I was a gardener, and after leaving that surprisingly productive plot of sun-drenched Illinois behind, decided that every summer needed to be blessed by green things growing. Urban gardening, however, threatens to require significantly more effort, and a bit of law-bending. For example, where to put my now-budding radish plants when I transplant them? Here are my options:
* My fire-escape (technically something that should be clear and accessible)
* The rooftop (warm, sunny, and technically not somewhere my landlord wants me to be)
*The backyard (see rooftop)
*Some abandoned lot somewhere (someone else’s landlord doesn’t want me there, either)
Read the rest of this entry »

$2.75 (cash) on a slice of pizza from the campus eatery, because I failed to pack lunch, and knew that if I did not eat something, I would find myself a raging mess of emotion and headache in a matter of hours.

$11.81 (cash) at Atlantic Fruit and Vegetable on dinner supplies, plus a splurge on rhubarb (so pricey!) and mangoes.

$12.07 (debit) at Key Food to get the rest of my dinner supplies and strawberries to go with that rhubarb.

Earlier in the week: $25.90 on groceries at Key Food, just the staples to eat for the week. Indulged in chicken, because it was on sale for $1.69/lb for boneless skinless breasts, even though I know they are factory farmed etc. etc. I know. I care. I just don’t care enough to spend $4-$7/lb for my meat when I have an unemployed spouse and am living in NYC on a student stipend without loans.   This of course raises the question of why I still eat meat, as it is out of my financial grasp to do so in what I consider an ecologically friendly and humane manner.  Does “because I like it?” count? Or is it really because I have not yet made the mental transition to vegitarian, and in still considering myself an omnivore, refuse to accept a life entirely meat-free?  I sit here, hearing the voices of Alice Waters, Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser bouncing around in my head, and even though I agree, I ignore. It’s no wonder it seems impossible to change how America eats, when even those who know and understand the issues can’t bring themselves to make the necesary changes.  Does “I eat much less meat than ever before, partly because of financial reasons, but partly out of an understanding of the consequences” count, even if it’s not a complete transition? Or is that still a “sin” in the new moral language of food?