Epiphany in a Terry Cloth Robe

Saturday night we had some friends over for dinner. Mark and Carla have a little girl just a couple months younger than our oldest son (who's four and a half), and they're finally at an age where we can let them have the run of the backyard and we can have a martini and finish sentences. It's nice.

Carla, who is very involved in organic, slow, local food, suggested we have a slow food meal -- she and I would both take a look at what was being offered at local farmer's markets and make a great meal. She had just bought some local meat, so offered to bring some huge t-bones that Phil would grill.

It was really fun going through the farmer's market Saturday morning, thinking through what would work. Here's what we ended up with:

* Cheese from two local dairies/cheese artisans
* Crostini made from a baguette from a local bakery
* T-bone steaks Phil grilled to perfection
* Bacon from the same local butcher; it was amazing and my four-year-old ate about 3 pounds of it
* Cherry tomatoes mixed with salt and pepper and olive oil, then broiled for about 20 minutes
* Stir-fried pattypan squash, zucchini squash, summer squash, and okra
* A greens salad made with some special dark greens I'd never even heard of -- with a light balsamic vinagrette
* An apple crisp made with four varieties of apples from a local orchard

We ate well.

Sunday morning I made my coffee and stumbled to our pantry to get the boys their morning PopTarts and, staring at the shelves of processed, micro-packaged food, had an epiphany: We can do better. I can take better care of my family. I can slowly make a difference in what goes into our bodies and the impact it has on our environment.

So I'm adding to the millions of blogs with my own. I hope this will help me be honest. Help me not feel guilty because I can't do it all at once. Help me remember that with a teensy bit of planning I can:

* Make more homemade meals
* Stop supporting McDonald's (added bonus: all those plastic crappy toys that end up between the couch cushions will eventually disappear)
* Eat local, organic, and fair
* Maybe steer ourselves toward having a simpler life

I'm a VP at a major publisher. I regularly carry a cell phone, iPod, and Blackberry in my Coach purse. I subscribe to Netflix and drink premium gin. I'm not a 60s hippie throwback. But I'm one person who knows that my actions can change things for my family and myself and can help to break the cycle of bad, homogenous, tasteless, over-packaged, unhealthy, bad-for-the-environment food.

Party on, little blog.