Making preparations

It has been quite a summer. With all the preparations for this bike trip such as mapping out a route, looking for sponsorships, researching site visits, and working at a summer camp to earn money for the ride, these three months have flown by. But, the summer always does.

Luckily, it has been a summer full of delicious food. Such meals slow down time for me, as I surrender to the complex tastes and textures that only a fresh salad can provide. As I type this entry, I am also enjoying a pasta and veggie medley. Most of its ingredients came from 24 miles away, grown on a little farm called the Community School Farm in South Tamworth, New Hampshire. Crisp salad greens, fresh yellow squash, sweet tomatoes, spicy onions, and sharp baby turnips all smile up at my fork. Thrown into the mix are more exciting veggies such as the purple green beans, corn, steamed kale, and yellow cucumbers from last week's share. It has been so rewarding to drive or bike home (depending on convenience throughout the summer) with bags full of fresh veggies, still smiling from my walk through rows of tall flowers and fragrant herbs and the exciting conversations had with Geoff, the farm manager, farm workers, and fellow fresh veggie enthusiasts also picking up their shares. I feel like I'm in a secret club.

Of course, some of the food in my salad was not locally produced. The canned garbonzoes are from who knows where, purchased at a Shaw's supermarket. My pasta is organic, made from whole wheat and flax seed for added nutrition to my vegetarian diet, but it is also not local. Even when I make home-made pasta with eggs from my family's chickens, the semolina flower is not from Vermont. Even for someone trying to make a conscious effort to control the distance her food traveled and how it was produced, it can be difficult to filter everything, particularly when working a full-time job. This is why I want to take a friendly, inquisitive approach to talking to people on the bike trip. I am not out to blame anyone, to make them feel guilty. The reason supermarket chains exist is because they fit so perfectly into our lifesytles in the United States. Or so I think. We'll see......