Read food. Not too much. Mostly Michael.

Just moments ago I finished reading a book by one of my favorite authors, Michael Pollan. I first discovered his writing a number of years ago in an article that ran in Harper’s Magazine. An avid gardener, Michael was tending to his poppies when he has this epiphany: if he were to think to himself, after having loving tended a poppy garden for the sheer enjoyment of the flowers for some time,” I will sell these poppies,” he would be committing a crime. For now, he would be growing the poppies with the intent to sell their opiates. But if he did not have that thought, well, he was just a flower gardener.

The next epiphany o f Michael’s I shared in was his theory, so beautifully articulated in his book The Botany of Desire, that plants are not so much tamed by man to do our bidding, rather they make the parts of themselves that are desirable to humans more prevalent in an attempt to prolong their existence. While this theory comports a certain consciousness to plants that we, as humans, have always celebrated as setting us apart from them, the book certainly makes a great case and is a wonderful read. It basically outlines the history of apples, tulips, potatoes and marijuana, each a fascinating story in its own right.

What is so tremendous about his style is that he presents his ideas and findings in such a way that you can almost see him sitting back and audibly emitting a “WoW” every time he finishes a paragraph. He lives totally in our world and is on a mission of discovery. He definitely exposes the downsides to things but he is not preachy and does not try to sell this as much as tell it. He is sharing his experiences with the information he discovers in as nonjudgmental a way as I have ever witnessed. He accomplishes the amazing feat of journalism with himself as the main subject, objectively reporting on how he reacts to the information he collects, slices, dices, sautés and digests. It is a cooking alright, but not in the usual sense.

Today’s interaction with Michael was the book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma. This traces the contents of four meals from the plate back to their genesis, presumably in nature. But as this journalistic endeavor shows, nature is becoming less and less involved in the process. The thing that becomes so crystallized in this book is that every aspect of our lives is impacted by so many things—economics, politics, technology, nature –the synergistic effects of which are totally unpredictable and in retrospect often incomprehensible. This is no less true in the context of the most basic of human needs which in this country appears to be enjoyed in the ultimate state of liberty-eating. Paradoxically, this is simply not true.

Timing, as they say, is everything and the coincidence of reading this book just after joining the Board of Community Food Connections is another example of the tremendous synchronicity that is ever present in my life. Along those lines, as I was reading the section about corn I was thinking to myself that it would be a perfect text for an anthropology class. Sure enough, my daughter Melanie just finished reading that excerpt as an assignment in her college intro to anthropology class.

Now I see that just last month Michael’s latest treat is now in print. Good timing! I am looking for my next book. I can’t wait to pick up a copy of In Defense of Food. I totally love the tag line that comes from this book that should be the new American mantra: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

Check him out at www.michaelpollan.com.