We're All Here Because We're Not All There

Port Townsend residents, like those in many small, liberal towns, like to advertise their feelings on their bumpers, fenders, trunks, and elsewhere on the vehicles they drive. John and I are no exception. The mainstay of the Port Townsend local is the popular, "We're All Here Because We're Not All There" bumpersticker. It's the first bumpersticker I bought when I got my new car. I was able to move my "You may say I'm a dreamer but I'm not the only one" bumpersticker from my other car because I had it taped in the back window. My other stickers include "Obama 2008", "Another Mother for Peace", "PT" (signifying a Port Townsend resident, I noted in Friday Harbor they have SJI), and the simple "Peace" sticker I picked up at Duck Soup Inn on our trip to the San Juans earlier his month. On my old car I had a sticker that said, "He's not MY president" I got a lot of comments on that one (all positive) ranging from simple thumbs up, to several people saying, "He's not my president either." It's all a way of expressing my freedom of speech -- on the highway, in a parking lot, or in my driveway.

Eating Locally

I know we can't do it too often. But we're going to try to do it every once in awhile. That is eat locally. The first time I was a made of this aware of was with Barbara Kingsolver's latest book, Animal Vegetable Miracle http://www.animalvegetablemiracle.com/ and then I saw something on the news about the 100 Mile Diet http://100milediet.org/ where in essence one only eats what is grown 100 miles from where they live. Some people do it for a year, some for a month and in our instance we did it for a meal. OK, most of a meal. The olive oil and Grana Padano cheese for the pesto (recipe from my favorite cookbook - The Silver Palate Cookbook) wasn't local - and neither was was the penne pasta. But the spot prawns were from Puget Sound (purchased at New Day Fisheries in Port Townsend), the basil for the pesto was home grown, the salad (buttercrunch and romaine lettuce, zucchini, onion, peppers) were all from our garden, our grilled zucchini - from our garden, the wine - Johannesburg Reisling from Chateau Ste. Michelle across the sound in Woodinville, Washington. It was a wonderful dinner and we're are going to try to do this more often. Everyone has their reasons for participating. They want to reduce the use of fossil fuels by buying foods that aren't shipped cross-country or internationally. They're supporting and getting to know local farmers and businesses. The food is fresher, healthier and better tasting - the latter I can attest to. I couldn't believe how wonderful this all tasted. And it was quite an accomplishment. As my husband remarked, "Did you ever believe you'd be eating this much food from your own garden?" I shook my head no. As we came inside from eating our dinner al fresco (shockingly the weather warmed up just enough for us to be able to do so) I told my husband that I didn't think our garden was big enough. Now that is a real shock coming from someone who couldn't even keep a houseplant alive.