This picture is about eight years old. Kiley was one of the first friends I made up here and was later a roommate. When we met (at work where we were hostessing and waiting tables), we both had recently endured a breakup with a long-term love, we both knew the words to "The Vagina Song" by Pig Vomit and we both smoked cigarettes. Soul mates. Also, Kiley had just transferred from Hofstra to UNH and I had dropped out of URI to take classes there as a non-matriculating student, so we both felt a little displaced; a cementing agent for any relationship.
Solid from the start (so rare, this genuine platonic girl-on-girl chemistry) our friendship was built on all-nighters for school, sneaking out for cigarettes at work and even attending employee meetings high together.
Which is why it's so funny that, when we met for drinks the other night (on an outside restaurant deck in New Castle, NH---good bye summer), the conversation centered around dietary supplements and yoga.
"What's happened to us?" one (or both) of us asked.
We both had wine. Her white, me red. Two glasses apiece; any more and we wouldn't be able to drive, we agreed. Never mind the dehydration. (A flashback pops into my head now of Kiley telling me to, "Let it out," as I vomit grape crush shots into a pile of snow outside her car.)
We both had a shrimp cocktail and I also added a salad. She's off meat. I'm off gluten.
We still can talk and talk, that hasn't changed. (And the conversation is still fun. She talked about taking a yoga class with "a farter" and I admitted that that is half the reason that I've never taken one. "I'm way too immature to handle that.")
On parting she sent me off with a package of shelled hemp seeds (a dime bag of another ilk) to experiment with in my cooking.
We decided we are going to start a book club.
"We can read health books together and discuss our findings!" one of us said.
The next morning she sent me a text message regarding a conversation we had about fish oil. According to information she got that morning at the Portsmouth Health Food store, of the two omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil, EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid) helps strengthen and protect your heart and DHA (docosahexaenoic acid), your brain.
"...we will be experts soon!!" she wrote.
(According to The Instinct to Heal: Curing Depression, Anxiety and Stress Without Drugs and Without Talk Therapy by David Servan-Screiber, M.D., PH.D., "The best products are probably those that have the highest concentration of EPA with respect to DHA." However, Servan-Schreiber is speaking in this context solely of the effects of fish oil in regard to the treatment of depression, which have been proven beneficial.)
P.S. I'm still doing my homework, so didn't listen to anything I say (and I'm not sure about the brain/heart thing Kiley said either).
Hopefully we will be covering this in our book club. Though, not at our first session. The text we chose for our inaugural book club meeting covers an entirely different aspect of physical health: Chelsea Handler's My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One-Night Stands.
I guess we haven't changed completely.
Mo'mega-3 news:
Also from The Instinct to Heal (amazing book I started a while back but took a break from so I could eat cheese-covered potatoes without guilt):
"One key neurological fact is that two-thirds of the brain is composed of fatty acids. These fats are the basic component of nerve cell membranes, the "envelope" through which all the communications with other nerve cells take place, both within the brain and the rest of the body. The food we eat is directly integrated into these membranes and makes up their substance. If we consume large quantities of saturated fats---such as butter or animal fat, which are solid at room temperature--their rigidity is reflected in the rigidity of the brain cells; if, on the other hand, we take in mostly polyunsaturated fats---those which are liquid at room temperature---the nerve cells' sheaths are more fluid and flexible and communication between them is more stable. Especially when those polyunsaturated fats are omega-3 fatty acids."
Fasci-fucking-nating! The actual structure of your nerve cells, the fluidity of their communication, affected by what we eat---incredible to me.
[I was just going to list all the shizzle that Servan-Schreiber cites for this but it's like a page and a half long...my apologies to all the original researchers of this information.]
Later in the chapter, he says, "Some nutritionists have described our brains today as sophisticated race car engines meant to run on highly refined fuel that are instead asked to putter along on diesel."
What could my brain do if it ran on "refined fuel"? (What about yours?) I want to see what this puppy can do!
Even on diesel, this really gets my brain going. What I'm really thinking about lately is how all of this information---all this stuff that is being documented about the prevention and cures of most Western diseases being managed with diet and exercise (and NOT patentable, PROFITABLE, means)---plays into the current health care reform debate.
Somebody should really write an article about that.
No comments:
Post a Comment