Me and Food

Activities, peoples, and ideas in ones life change over time. They either evolve, disintegrate, are distorted, or may just simple change as one becomes more aware of themselves, there place in the world, and how they effect the environment around them. Like all other things my relationship food has done these exact things. Although it may have not have happened in the order described above my relationship with food was one that began with being distorted, then it disintegrated, moving into the stage where it evolved, ending in final stage of constant change. These changes in my relationship with food are a direct result of my heightening awareness of myself and my body, how I fit into the world and how I want to fit into the world and finally how I impact my surroundings and the environment around me.
My ever-changing relationship with food began before I was even aware that we as humans have a relationship with food, when I was very young. It began in distorted manner of not understanding appropriate eating habits, and often eating not because I was hungry but because I was worried, nervous or simply bored. These habits all led to me becoming extremely unhealthy and obese. My relationship with food did not begin to change until I was junior in high school when the relationship started to disintegrate. When I say disintegrate I mean I gave food little to no thought and only viewed it as something I did once in awhile to fill a biological need. This attitude although maybe the other extreme to how I treated food before led me to look and be healthier with a large amount of weight loss. Then my relationship with food started to evolve; as I became a healthier person my views on food became healthier and less extreme from one spectrum to the other. Meaning I started to learn how to eat good portions of god food and not only fill a biological need but also appreciate and enjoy the different kinds of food that are not good for you but also delicious. This led to my relationship with food being a ever changing one as I see it playing a different role in my life, as my view of the world changes.
An understanding of myself, my impact on my environment, and how I want to fit into this environment has directly fueled my relationship with food and its changes over time. For example when I became aware of my body image I strived to change it through my eating habits. Then when I realized food was more then a tool to fulfill a need and something that should be enjoyed in appropriate amount, because it was a resource from the earth my relationship with food began to evolve. Finally when becoming more educated on the different types of foods and there affect on our environment, from sources like this class my relationship with food is one that constantly changes and forms new aspects.
Over all my relationship with food fits into the food discussion in a interesting way. I say this because I feel like the different stages of my relationship with food represent some commune views of food over all. For example like the first stage of my relationship with food, it takes on the viewpoint of the part of are society that eat in a obsessive unhealthy way. The second stage represents the part of society that still views food in a somewhat unhealthy way just on the opposite end of the spectrum. Finally there is a small portion of people in our society that have a well balanced habits between eating when it’s necessary and truly enjoying food.
Over all I don not believe my relationship with food is one that is done developing. I say this because my outlook of myself, my affects on my surroundings, and my over all view of the world will continue to change. As my relationship with food develops I believe societies relationship will food will continue to develop. Hopefully this will lead us to take on healthier habits as a whole and have a healthier earth and bodies’.

Sustainability

When I gaze into my crystal ball to uncover the future and what it holds for not only myself but my family, my school, and my country, I see a image of sustainability. I see restaurant that in the front serves healthy, nutritional, organic products and in the back has a station where you can fill your car up with there oil waste for cooking, because in are new sustainable future nothing can go to waste. Although this future seems to be pretty ideal and almost utopias to truly see a sustainable future I need to define what sustainability is and how it plays a role in my culture and how my own ideas behind it have changed and how will it continue change.

When defining sustainability I feel it is necessary to examine several things that are not all just environment related. The first thing that needs to be addressed though is environment related, and that is the effect on the earth. To be truly sustainable a product cannot cause damage to our environment and if it does it has to be counter balanced somewhere else in the same process. Another factor that needs to be examined when discussing the topic of sustainability is the use of resources, because if a product or process is abusing resources it cannot be sustainable, but instead it needs to focus on using minimal non-renewable resources and more on the use resources at hand that can keep the process going by itself. Finally when defining sustainability the social aspect needs to be addressed. A product or process is not sustainable innless it is economically able to maintain itself and treats the employees or people involved in the process in a manner that allows them to economically and socially maintain themselves and there families. The definition of sustainability has so many aspects it’s easy to see why it may be hard to notice its role in our own cultures, but nonetheless it is present.

In my own personal culture I see sustainability playing its largest role in my education. I hold this to be true because first of all the initiatives being taken on our own Ohio University to move the entire school in a sustainable direction. This is evident in our composting system that uses food waste and converts it into reusable material, along with things like the baker center and it’s constant advertisement of how all product used in the cafeteria are recyclable. Along with the initiatives being taken by the university to move in a sustainable direction there is also the effect that the topic of sustainability is having on my every day classes. For example in majority of my science classes in the past there has always been a chapter or two on global warming and its affects along with prevention of it. Also this class is a great example of the effect of sustainability on my education, after all it is a class that is teaching writing and rhetoric through the education and discussion of sustainable issues. It is very evident in the areas where sustainability plays a role in my education and I believe it will continue to be evident.

Final over time and the course of the quarter my ideas behind sustainability have changed greatly. Before this quarter my idea of sustainability would not have involved a societal aspect of it. I actual would not have considered the idea of employees being able to maintain life standards on the wages provided by the sustainable product or process to be a important part of the idea of sustainability. In this sense my ideas behind sustainability have grown. I believe the idea behind sustainability will continue to change as we as society encounter different obstacles with the environment and mankind. For instance as we run out of limited resources such as fossil fuels the idea on how a sustainable product or idea should begin may change or differentiate.

Now lets return to the idea of sustainability in the future with keeping in mind my definition of sustainability being a product or idea that does not harm the environment, uses a limited amount of now reusable resources, creates a cycle that it can maintain itself, and finally is produced in a economically feasible manner that does not take advantage of the people involved in the product or idea. The future still holds a this idea of sustainability, but this time the restaurant is still serving organic food but in a building that is ran off of solar panels and wind turbines with employees that are not only treated fairly, but are given livable wages to support there families. As for the station in the back used to fuel your car with left over oil from the restaurant, that is all manned by humans through a pump system similar to a well. This may not be what the future actually holds, but anymore it may be the only solution if we continue to use and abuse are resources in the now.

Opposition to Green Development

I recently found this article on the New York Times website and thought it was very interesting and deserved a closer observation. I found this to be true because rarely do i find in our media opposition by the general public of the installation of things that move a society in the direction of being more sustainable. Normally we find the opposition in the government and congress when debating taxes and what to pay for and not, but in these cases it has nothing to do with cost but everything to do with location, because the things being used are already paid for and installed.

Because of the different tone this article takes on, it raised some questions in my mind. Should we go green even if it is against the wishes of the people who have been living in the area first? Also it raises the question of who gets to decide what land can be used for? Is there really such a thing as owning land?

Environmental Housing to the Extreme

I recently came across this article on the internet that displayed a house built in whales that was built environmentally consciously. When i began to read the article and stopped because my attention was grabbed not by the words i was reading but the pictures of the actual house. Not until i viewed all the pictures did i begin to read the article again. The pictures are amazing and remind me of a hobbit hole from Tolkiens Lord of The Rings books. It made me really jealous of the house and thoughts of how i could build my own hobbit home!

While my reaction to this home was very positive I am somewhat pessimistic of it's practicality. For example while this house is environmentally friendly in the materials it's built with, but was it built in the most economically conscious way? Also will this home be able to endure mother nature?

Renewable Energy in Ohio

I came across this video while researching renewable energy sources in Ohio. When watching this i felt hopeful and excited. I believe these feeling were produce because that was the motivation behind the video. It wanted to intrigue people and get them interested on the possible solution to our ever growing energy crisis.

The only question raised by the video were does this video do enough by only being on youtube? Also this video raised the question of should there be more companies out there dedicated to the educating of renewable options?

Buying Green

Recently while surfing on the internet i came across this website that gives the viewer a review on a scale of 1 to 10 how environmentally green, healthy and safe a product is, with 10 being the most environmentally healthy and 1 being the least healthy for the environment. The rating system is broken down into three different categories. The first is labeled health and gives you a rating on if the product raises health concerns. The next category is environment and this category gauges the products risk it may cause to our surroundings. The last category of society reviews how the product is made, and if it is made in a manner where there employees are valued and respected.

This website i found to be very interesting and yet raised several questions in my mind. The first being is it our civic duty to our planet and each other to properly inform ourselves on what products are healthy and which are not? The other question this website raised was should we be demanding that all products meet this review system, or is it unrealistic?

Prezi: The Nutritional Benefits of Sustainable Food Production

Prezi!

Wind Farms Coming to Hawaii

Click here to read or listen about the current debate in Hawaii if wind farms are the answer to the state making 70 percent of there energy sources renewable by 2030. While these farms would most certainly aid in the process of Hawaii running on more sustainable resources, they have been the topic of hot debate within the state for multiple reasons. The most obvious being that construction of large windmills has a impact on the surrounding environment. Along with environmental impacts the locals of Hawaii are concerned that the windmill could take away from the naturalistic beauty of the land.

So this is my question, does the impact of the construction of renewable energy sources on the environment out weigh the good it's doing in the long run? If so, how will we address the need for renewable resources?

"The Secret Garden" or Better Known as Wolfe Garden

When first paired up with fellow classmates and handed the assignment of University Class scavenger hunt, I thought it was like other assignments in my UC190 class: busy work and a waste of my time. My opinion did not change until I came across a question I did not know. Where is and what is the name of the garden in the shape of the state of Ohio? I came to find out that the garden the scavenger hunt was talking about was Wolfe Garden located directly behind Alden Library on college green. Upon personally visiting the garden, something about it drawled me in and I felt an instant connection with the art, quotes, and naturalistic setting that provided a seeming escape from the academic world of Ohio University. So when prompted to pick a place for this project I could not think of a better area that I would like to learn more about then Wolfe Garden. After all it was one of the first places I felt a personal relationship with my surroundings on this campus. Although I felt an instant connection it was not an easy task to represent the garden in a promotional piece and make decisions that not only drawled my audience in, but also represented the garden in the light I wanted, with the history I wanted. I feel I did this adequately by producing a series of flyers.

When deciding what kind of promotional piece that would adequately represent the history of Wolfe garden, but at the same time bring across a message of tranquility and escape, I could not think of anything else but a series of flyers. I choose to do flyers because it aloud me to organize my thoughts and ideas into two separate entities. The first flyer I used to get across the history about the garden. For instance the name and significance behind the things in the garden itself. The second flyer I used to get across the history Wolfe Garden has within Ohio University and why it was named a meaningful place in the 2009 book Ohio University: A Campus of Meaningful Places. Overall I believe the flyers represent Wolfe Garden in two separate lights but together it helps my audience understand its significance as a whole.

When making decisions on who and how I wanted to appeal to my audience I started thinking about myself and why I’m so attracted to Wolfe Garden. Like I stated before it provides a naturalistic escape from the academic world and the day in and day out routine of school. So I aimed my second promotional piece titled the “The Secret Garden” at students who are like myself. The first flyer or promotional piece titled “Wolfe Garden” I aimed more at people that have either already been to the garden or just have a curiosity about the history of certain places on Ohio University’s campus. These people include prospective students, current students, past students and of course teachers and faculty advisers.

The purpose of my series of flyers was to represent the history of Wolfe Garden and why it is a significant place on campus. To carry out this purpose I deployed multiple design techniques. The first one I used was the attraction of pictures ranging from the time it was first open to modern day. This solidified the fact that Wolfe Garden does, in fact, through a visual sense, hold a history behind it. Along with pictures I used large font titles with green color. I used the large abnormal fonts to obviously catch the audience’s attention and inform them on what they are reading about. As for the color, along with green being the dominant color that represents Ohio University, it is also a color often associated with nature, fertility, and life. These things are also associated with gardens. Finally I used short writings to fill the audience in on the history of Wolfe Garden. I felt it was very important to be brief and direct with what ever was written on the flyers as to not drag down the audience member with words. After all when one receives a flyer they expect it to be brief and strait forward. If I failed to do this I risk the possibility off the flyer ending up in the trash.

My piece falls short of this purpose somewhat in the artistic aspect. If I were more artistic or even capable with using design programs on the computer I would have been able to incorporate the details and purpose of my flyers in more visually pleasing and artistic manner. For example, since I used Microsoft Word to make the flyer I wasn’t able to place some of the text next to the picture I wanted. I eventually found that I could wrap the text and move it around, but it distorted the color and print so some of the text has different shades then the other text. Also I was unable to add a creative border of flowers or something visually pleasing to make the flyers look more like a finished product.

My main goal of the information and history I chose to share in my piece was to give the audience a brief history behind the garden and why this history makes this place a significant one at Ohio University. I did this by providing in my first flyer the basic history of the people and things that the garden is really centered around. This information included a short description of Thomas M. Wolfe and that he was valedictorian of the graduating class of 1919 from OU, along with how he returned as a Professor of Economics. Other information I choose to be part of the first flyer was things on the different significance of the things in the garden from pieces of artwork, quotes, and even the shape itself. The information in the first flyer helped me lay a foundation for the information being presented in the second flyer titled “The Secret Garden.” It did this by helping the audience understand why in 2009 Wolfe Garden was named a significant place on campus, and how the various history and the history of the things in the garden help shape it and make it what it is today. That being said I intentionally left out some history, for example some information on Thomas M. Wolfe because it didn’t hold direct significance to the garden or at least the features I was choosing to highlight in the garden. I also left out tedious details about the plants and quotes located across the garden because while it makes the garden visually pleasing it would have been to wordy to try incorporate all that information on series of two flyers, plus like I stated before if I became to lengthy with the amount of words used in the flyer I risked loosing my audiences attention.

Overall after my discovery of Wolfe Garden in early fall quarter I found myself not only visiting the area on a weekly base, but also sharing it with fellow students that I thought might enjoy and appreciate the naturalistic tranquility it provides. Even though I found it difficult to represent the garden in the light I wanted to, I feel I did acceptable job and I attracted not only the audience I wanted, but was able to share the history I wanted. I feel that while my connection with this garden is strong it will continue to grow as I discover and strive to learn more about it,, and what truly makes it a significant place on campus.

2010 Average Tempature

With the beginning of another year comes New Years resolution, bigger and better plans for the new year, and yes even old information from the past year. This information normally includes statistics from the past year on averages. This article posted on NPR discusses the recently released statistics that proclaimed on average the earth was the warmest it has been on record since 188o. When reading this i had no initial emotions. The lack of emotion produced by this article i do not believe was do to the fact that the information was not important, instead not surprising. Not surprising because we have grown accustom to reading reports that constantly tell us the earth is warming. Upon further review of not really the article, but my own emotional response to the article i couldn't help but think that if an environmentally conscience person like myself feels uneffected by this how do others feel and treat this information? And if we as a society are becoming emotionally dull to statistics that very much effect us and our planet do we no longer care about what happens from a environmental stand point or our we just tired of hearing about it? The last question raised by my emotional response is have we just accepted the idea that our world is warming and there is nothing we can do to prolong the process?

Oil Drilling Reform

Click here to listen or read about new oil drilling standards that are being implicated by the federal oil spill commission to ensure safer drilling in light of the BP disaster in the Gulf last year. The article raised interesting points in my mind on environmental safety when it comes to oil drilling. Although i acknowledge that oil is a valuable resource to the world and it may be hard to reduce the risk to zero i believe we must try to reduce the risk to zero before we continue to drill for oil in new places. For example the article discusses possible regulations that could be put into effect once oil companies start drilling in the Arctic, but my personal opinion is we must reduce all risk of harm to wild life to zero before we can make a moral and conscience decision to carry out with these actions. Finally although this article does not directly discuss BP and there actions it further fueled my hatred for them post the gulf disaster and led me to think about should we put restriction on companies who can drill and sell oil in our country who have made such harmful and disaster's mistakes like BP did?

Relationship and Having a Sense of "Place"

As humans our relationship with place can be analyzed and viewed in multiple ways. First through how our surroundings meaning from the people we’re surrounded by to the environment and ecosystem in which we live in effects us. Through analyzes people often use common quotes to describe the places there in. For instance “home is where the heart is.” A simple yet meaningful quote that sums up that our hearts will always belong to place we considered home. While some may view place as a physical entity other see it as a more metaphoric none physical thing. For example people often sum there life existence up in the idea that they are finding there place in the world, whether it may be through a profession, how they treat others, or even taking care of there family. Although people hold different meanings for their place and surroundings one thing is for sure we all have a relationship with place and weather we like it or not it is always important to hold a sense of place if not a physical place a metaphoric and spiritual place within the world.

My personal relationship to place is very similar to what I believe my classmates relationships our, and when I say place I mean both physical and metaphoric place. Right now my physical place being Athens, Ohio I view as a location to flourish and grow. First of all I do this through the education I’m receiving at Ohio University. Secondly I do this through meeting new people and experiencing new things, and while at school I do both of these things on a daily bases. As for my sense of place in a metaphoric manner, I believe this is directly linked to my physical place. I hold this to be true because as many young adults I am working on defining my place in the world and trying to understand where I want my place to be. This links ups with my physical location because like many others I hold to be true that college is one of the key moments in life where we decide what we hold to be truly important and how will we find our place in that. For example after my first quarter I still find myself feeling that I will only find my place in service to others, hence I continue to pursue a major in Social Work.

Knowing your relationship with place is just as critical as knowing it is important to have a sense of place. Having a sense of physical place allows you to understand why you are somewhere and what maintenance needs to be done to ensure that your location can still carry out it’s purpose. For example by understanding I am here in Athens to flourish and grow I can assume others are here to do the same. By making this assumption I can respect Athens and help maintain an environment that is conducive to do this. As for why it’s important to have a sense of place in a metaphoric manner, is because it allows us to build goals and yes even define our own success in life. Having a sense of place allows us to maintain and add purpose to our lives.

As long as humans exist there relationship with place and having a sense of place will always be important. We see place as a physical entity meaning our environment and surroundings, along with being a metaphoric entity meaning purpose in life. My relationship with place in both a physical and metaphoric manner is a developing one, similar to how I am developing as a human. The importance of having a sense of place is to provide us with goals and guidelines on how to proceed in our everyday lives to shape the image we eventual want to represent ourselves. Over all without place both physical and metaphoric we as humans lose a sense of purpose.