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Monthly Archive Of December 2011


Dreams, Schools & The SWEET Truth..Communities changing what children are fed.

December 18, 2011

The other day we (Mee & Those People) were driving through one of the giant mountain canyon passes that connect Malibu to the valley, listening to some of our favorite country jams.  This led the girls and me to talking about our trip home next week to Nashville.  Bella got quiet and then I heard sniffles.  Both her and Lola were sobbing, they wanna go home and so do I.  Bella asked, “Momma why are we here again?” ” ‘Cause I’ve got some work to do and it can only be done here.  Plus we’ve been having an adventure, aren’t you happy?”

This opened the flood gates, tears flowed and for the first time since our arrival both my girls sobbed for Nashville.  I guess the thought of returning to our comfy spot is a message that we can all stop holding on so tight.  It’s been a ton of changes the last 3 months and getting set up is a totally different thing than “getting here”.  We are still somewhere else in side – not knowing for how long we will be here keeps all of us just one step away from the edge of change- or so it feels.

This past lunar eclipse put me through it.  I woke up for two or 3 nights in a row due to my mind twisting with rambling inner trash talk. Each night I’d close my eyes talking to me about me, “Come on girl relax and let us dream up a sign leading to the direction that we need to be taking in our waking life.” Boy did my dream self not let me down – I had some whoppers one in particular took me by my arm.

I was in a car driving towards a large body of fresh water, the road was hilly and I could physically feel the drops in my tummy.  We arrived at an old folks home  where we were greeted (we being me and my friend Gretchen) by a nurse.  She said, “You need a reading girl.  Come this way, they will see you next.” We made our way down a dimly lit hallway stopping at the last room on the right.  A woman, well I think she was a woman she seemed to be both or neither – I guess ’cause it didn’t matter.  Her skin was brown and her eyes round chocolate saucers.  She tapped at a chair for me to sit in and then took my hands and the world disappeared .  I couldn’t take my eyes off of her chocolate saucers and her ever spreading face, she was expanding then she said, “You are growing into a very big person, you are becoming the person you wanted to be and if you want you will grow very much.  Just don’t worry it is only time and time is moving quickly.”  Suddenly I looked into those eyes of her and saw that they were mirrors and it wasn’t her that was spreading out before me but it was really me that I was seeing!  She dropped my hands & I caught my breath, the room returned along with the nurse.  She said, “The Oracle is tired now.” You must leave.  I woke up.

The next night I dreamed again, this time I was with some kind of priestess she was pushing and pushing me to answer her questions.  But her questions were difficult as the answers were locked deep inside of me in a room without a key far away from the Mee that I am, ’cause they were placed by the girl that I was – the one who was afraid to speak her truth.  I looked around and there were Indians hunting in the marsh and the woman priestess said, “Life here in Alaska is very difficult.”  Then she went back to pushing on me with questions.  Finally I opened my mouth and a huge amount of truth came flying, my truth was so very big that it caused a tidal wave that blew the priestess away, as she was pulled back into the sea her eyes danced with joy and I felt free – I heard her say she was proud of Mee.

This morning I woke up choking, in my dream a walnut was lodged in my throat.  I know why I dreamed this.  You see a few days ago one of the momma’s from the school my girls attend sent an email around regarding the student store that is run to raise school funds.  Only problem is that they sell pens, pencils, erasers and crappy JUNK i.e. candy & other unhealthy snacks.  Her point was that the school coach tells the kids to remind their momma’s to give them a few bucks so they can be sure to buy some from the store or from one of the bake sales that frequent the campus (again to raise money). So the little boy comes home asks momma for a dollar she tells him no I don’t want you to eat any of that stuff and then he feels as if he’s letting his beloved coach and school down.  Of course I jumped in on the email writing my opinion, “I too wanted to support the student store and then I saw what my girls were choosing and were eating and thought – OH NO. I work very hard to keep the sugar and processed foods from our house. When we go into the world it’s like walking through land mines. The worst place to have to do food battle is within the school grounds where peer pressure has more power than parental guidance. Unfortunately young children don’t have the ability to completely understand what a “healthy choice” is if they are offered chips a hoy or an apple – they want the chips a hoy. Bake sales can still exists but with healthier guidelines.
Feeding our children real food is the greatest gift we can physically provide and REAL food leads to better focus, balanced hormones (yes young children have hormones which effect the thyroid, adrenal glands effecting emotional reactions), stronger immune systems as sugar weakens the lining of the digestive track. Finally by providing real food we are sending a message to our children that we CARE and to our community that we are a group of parents that take ACTION.
Mee Tracy McCormick”

Well of course my response fueled the momma fire and before I knew it I received two emails from teachers concerned about what to serve the kids for after school classes and holiday parties – a TIZZY was brewing. You see now The Sugar Pushers are fix in’ to rumble with the Healthy Mommas.  

At pick up last night two of the Healthy Momma’s were chatting about how they’d just danced with The Colonel aka The Principal (I call him this because at halloween he dressed up as the KFC man with an uncanny resemblance – lugging a bucket of chicken!).  The two Healthy Momma’s were in full on spinning mode.  Seems their curbing the sugar efforts were not well received from the administration – bake sales and student stores are part of the schools history and ain’t NO BODY down with letting go of the crank – aka sugar! One of the women was even wondering if she should remove her child from the school.

I knew I was fix’n to dance when they told me that they were told this, one of the DUMBEST responses: That if your child is fed healthy foods at home they will make healthy choices – OK I gotta call bull shit when I sniff it – my kids are amazing eaters but if you dangle a cookie covered in crappy pink frosting full of hydrogenated oils and your the person of authority selling it – whom they trust – they are going to buy it!

Later, when I told this to Lee he said, why don’t we put cigarette machines all over and see what the upper kids choose?

After listening to these disappointed Healthy Momma’s tell their tales and I said, “Nah, don’t worry I got this. I know these people are not so stupid. After all California is supposed to be so health conscious and Malibu the upper echelon of our society for sure should know that candy & refined sugars sold doing school hours is a total sabotage to the entire school community – the kids & teachers.  I’m gonna go have me a chat with The Colonel.  

Funny thing happened along the way, I’d picked up on the fear of one of these momma’s and it had me balling my fists and I was reacting from a place of assumption,  as I approached the office God moved through me, shifting my energy – realigning me with my hearts intention : TO PREVENT KIDS & ADULTS FROM GETTING SICK and going through what I myself have gone through.

I walked into his office I saw a man who is worn out by the end of a long day full of dealing with issues, complaints and concerns.  I felt a huge wave of compassion for The Colonel especially ’cause I was fixn’ to take his bucket of chicken.  I said, “Hey there how are you today? I know everyone is in a big old tizzy about the sugar situation but I just wanted to let you know that I’m here to help. I know you don’t know who I am or what I do but helping folks shift their relationships with unhealthy processed foods is my forte.” I gave him not a second to even share his opinion on the subject – I was running on jacked up air. “I’m super busy right now but I’m going to come in and teach your upper classes to bake real baked goods using REAL ingredient with unrefined sugars and even toss in some things  that support the body instead of breaking it down. Then the upper kids can sell their healthy baked goods to the younger kids and inspire the entire community to try new things – shifting out of the old paradigm, ‘Cause I mean it’s just plain crazy that folks would actually want to keep feeding their babies things that harm them.”

He then told me there was going to be a meeting regarding the sugar situation on January 10th and could I be there? I said, “Fo’sho shawty and even better I will come with a tray of yummy healthy goodies.  ’Cause it ain’t the kids who are hard to change but the momma’s and poppas who will not let go of their STUFF on many levels – children always want to improve and school is the most appropriate place to educate.”

That sweet old Colonel stood up and hugged me goodbye, he is a good man who walked into a school that had a rough couple years and he is in charge of the clean up crew and I know something else – the families that are at this school remained through the rough times ’cause they care deeply.  As I walked outside it dawned on me, most folks don’t know what healthy is and are so afraid it’s gonna taste bad, and even more that they will be judged for how they have been eating and feeding “those people” that they remain in an unhealthy rut.

My dreams were making sense, I was once again gonna expand and last nights dream where I was choking on a walnut was ’cause lord knows what my truth releasing did was put more work on my plate, and do I really want to take on a another community’s poor food addictions? Y’all know where I’ve been with folks that don’t wanna change and it’s a heck of hike up hill – but worth it. I just closed my eyes & made a promise – as long as I’ve got my health I shall be of service – I call this gratitude in action.

Farm 1.5 yrs ago

Well I gotta run ’cause Jane Ellen is texting me pictures from my farm house where a slew of movers are unloading trucks with our furniture into our finally finished farm house which means we made it back from the floods that threatened to take our livelihood a year and a half ago.  Lee and I are here in Malibu directing via phone and my inner control freak is running a mind game on me.  Can’t wait to get home to my sweet Tennessee life….

 

 

Thanksgiving, Hunting Jade, Big Sur, Black Friday & Occupy San Francisco

December 5, 2011

(Click here to watch videos from the road)

We left Malibu Tuesday afternoon and drove non-stop to Big Sur.  This would be my first time driving up the coast.  5 years ago Lee worked on a project in Sausalito which allowed us the opportunity to take an apartment over looking the Bay.  I’d fly up north packing “those people” (my girls) to meet Lee, spending a week or two at a time roaming the city of San Francisco via the ferry boat that crossed the foggy bay. However I now know that to completely understand the state of California one must see it all from the road.

Stop 1 was the red wood forest – I’d first fallen for these magnificent beings on a visit to Muir Woods, if you don’t believe in etherial worlds then visit this forest. We arrived well into the darkness staying at Big Sur Lodge located in the forest.  Our super cute cabin included a wood burning fireplace – no tv and no phone.  The best part about family road trips is that we all become one connected unit, no distractions allowing our roles to be just that momma, daddy, sisters.  After a yummy rest in the cold pacific air we inhaled a great breakfast and hiked into the woods.  All I could think about as we moved through the tribes of red woods – yep, tribe ’cause they stand together in clusters -never alone, always supported by one another – a mirror for our family. I thought about their giant roots connecting them deep into the earth.  I was sure to breath as deeply as possible inhaling the massive amounts of oxygen these gems were giving off.

We drove on to Sonoma County where we spent the most wonderful few days with Nanny & Bubba (Ted & Peggy) my adopted adult parents – I met them in my early 20′s – they’d not had children and I was still in need of a momma and a daddy.  They stepped in and have been the most amazing influence in my life.  My girls know them as their grandparents & the adoration we all share is beautiful.  On Friday Lee and I headed into to San Francisco, leaving the girls with Nanny & Bubba.

Our first stop was Mill Valley, I really like this little town with it’s quaintness, simple style and fresh food restaurants.  Lee and I stumbled into the Mill Valley Hat Box, an old school hat store where I bought my first Stetson Fedora.  We booked a swanky hotel and a reservation at Millennium Restaurant.  What we didn’t take into consideration was that our hotel was located literally on top of Old Navy in the shopping district of San Francisco and our Friday get away was BLACK FRIDAY!  Holy cow was it NUTS!  I’d not planned on shopping at all on Black Friday and to find myself smack dab in the middle of CRAZY TOWN was something else.  As we stepped out of our hotel to walk to Millennium we marched right into a giant protest – OCCUPY folks were going head to head with CONSUMER- AHOLICS. Lee and I found ourselves paralyzed by it all, and we weren’t the only ones watching, there were plenty of people NOT holding shopping bags standing on the outskirts figuring out what it all means – asking themselves are we the 99%? All I know is that there is something happening here y’all and as soon as the message can be delivered in a clear and coherent voice WE are going to participate, ’cause shawty – Humans Are Not Commodities and the only way things will change is when WE all see our value.

After crossing through the Occupy /Consumer mayhem we found our way to Millennium Restaurant – FANTASTIC FOOD!  Lee my cowboy husband LOVED his dinner too – a vegan restaurant that has nothing hippy, crunchy or health food esque feeling to it.  A 5 star experience that could totally run with all the big dog restaurants everywhere.  A FLASH OF LIGHT- all I could think about was my “Plan B”.  You see when I first moved to LA 15 years ago a young gal, I made a promise to myself,”If this place doesn’t work out I am moving to Key West to be a waitress, hang out on a beach and live my life.” There I was sitting in Millennium and a new Plan B  filling my mind.  I sat watching the guys in the kitchen knock out that amazing food while I dreamed up how I could get a job washing dishes, chopping veggies for a year. Living close to Ted and Peggy and sucking in this eclectic city, while I train in this fine kitchen – learning what I don’t know. The second half of Plan B is to return to Nashville and rock a little cafe and cooking school…

All this “kitchen work” is partly because I’ve  just wrapped up a session of technical chef skills with Chef Rectum in Los Angeles. I’d enrolled the moment we arrived in LA this past September.  I’d decided that I wanted to learn the basics of “regular cooking” meaning animal & dairy.  After all I do cook grass fed beef on occassion and once in a very blue moon organic chicken. ‘Cause I don’t ever want to be so rigid that I miss out on learning something new. The class was small only 6 of us with an occasional visitor. I jumped in like a kid happy to start kindergarten.  I didn’t tell ANYONE who I was, what I do or what I KNOW.   Instead I just said, “Hi I’m Meme, from Nashville and I want to learn as much as you can teach me.”  Truth be told, I didn’t want  PRINCESS KNOW IT ALL to come out, ’cause she is the cock blocker of my growth.  So, I kept it under wraps and by the way I cut the veggies the first time around NO ONE would know I’d ever cooked before let alone on TV!

Reflecting back I see what  I learned and that was how to cut an onion, tomato, make chicken stock and that an asshole always shows his or her rectum.  In particular Chef Rectum revealed her stinky bottom to me when she referred to Tennessee as a place of white trash – how it all went down was one afternoon we were making mussels.  I commented that I’d thought that muscles were fancy and difficult to prepare.  Judith the Jew (I only call her this because she must have mentioned in every sentence that she is Jewish, which is great as I am a Hebrew speaking half kosher woman myself) so she says in her New York/ Beverly Hills accent, “Honey Fancy? Everybody knows mussels are the white trash of the sea.” I busted out laughing, ’cause the thing about Judith the Jew is she’s super funny without knowing it.  Chef Rectum says in her tough I don’t take any shit ’cause I’m a woman who has worked around men for a long time kinda voice, “What’s so funny over there?” I started to tell her, then  Judith The Jew hits me in the ribs, “Don’t say anything she has no sense of humor.” Of course I’d already shared what Judith said, not sure if it was hard for Chef Rectum to hear since her ears obviously are covered by her pants, but she looks at me and says, “I’ll tell you what’s white trash, anybody from Tennessee.  Everybody knows that’s where white trash lives.”

I busted out laughing, seriously was she telling me about white trash – after all isn’t being a BIGOT the worst form of white trash? Then she says, “Besides mussels are very Italian, the Italians love them.” I responded very calmly in front of the class and in my best Tennessee accent, “Well I was trying to tell you before you insulted me that my grandmother who came from Italy used to make them but that of course was before  we threw all of our shoes away and ran over the hills of Tennessee to “f&%!” our brothers.”

Then I looked over at Michael The Curmudgeon  (his nose is always so far up Chef Rectums behind) struggling to remove a “tuff” of seaweed from a mussels shell also known as the “beard” I said, “Be sure to get all of it as I’d hate to pluck a muscle’s white trash pubic hair from my teeth at the dinner table.” He almost choked!  Then I sat down to enjoy my meal, NO one knew what to do with me as I complimented the food, cleaned up my area, removed my apron and said good night for the last time.  So you see now I’m thinking real good and hard about where I want to do my next round of schooling.

Saturday we hoofed it all around China Town in search of magical Jade (check out my style page to see what I’m talking about) and then I screwed up and ate in a tiny little Chinese restaurant – I ordered veggies, white rice and a cup of tea – but the oil was bad and no good for my tummy and I hit the floor Saturday night.  Yep, I still am very careful with my food and will be for the rest of my life.  The good news is that I get back up quicker and Nanny and Bubba took great care of me and the girls.

Now I’m home and writing to you from my new office in Malibu…I’m plugging away but loving that I’ve got a plan B  - if need be.

 

 

 

 

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