Staying Healthy in Farm Country

Doesn't sound so difficult, does it? I've just returned from a visit with my father in South Dakota. His small town boasts one restaurant (which is actually just food served in one of the two bars), a senior center, a post office and a bank, with a population of around 200.

Now, many may think that going to farm country would be good for my newly developed whole foods diet. With nothing but farms as far as the eye can see, they must be up to their necks in fresh fruits and veggies. But not so, not by a looooong shot. The restaurant/bar has a mini grocery store attached. But most food there is boxed and canned and packaged.

 Borrowed from ecosalon.com 'cause it's hilarious (and spot-on)

 
They may have a few heads of old lettuce, but nothing straight off the farms. You see, this is beef and corn country. My father, and the other 200 inhabitants have to drive 20 miles to the next town over where there is a larger supermarket, but even here, the fruit and veggies are not that fresh or organic. They've been shipped in from long distances and most likely grown with processes that help keep them looking "fresh" longer. I ate a strawberry from my dad's fridge and it had practically no taste. It was not a strawberry, it was a zomberry. No wonder I grew up hating fruits and veggies! They were so far from the real thing!

My heart is moved for the people who live in these areas, who've become so accustomed to eating packaged and processed foods because they just don't have whole foods available to them, unless they grow them in their back yards. And it seemed the nutritional value of fresh foods has been forgotten as I tried to find something whole to order from the countless restaurants my father and I ate at when visiting a bigger "city".  My saving grace was restaurants with salad bars. If not for them, I would have been eating a lot of iceberg lettuce salads with tomato and no dressing.

 Blech!

In one such place, the only menu option for me was whole wheat toast. All the fruit was in a sugary glaze, all the vegetables were smothered in butter. When I ordered toast and told the waitress I'd wait the 20 minutes for the salad bar to open, I got the "you're not from around here" look. 

It's very eye-opening, the way people react. Especially because I completely know where they are coming from. Two weeks ago, I rolled my eyes at raw food diets and thought the people on them were snobby rich astrologists and pet yoga instructors.  Holistic was a term I ran from. I thought, "that's fine for them, whatever, but it's weird, they're weird." But now it all makes sense. Now I get it and I wish I could make the rest of the world get it too. But I find it very hard to share what I now understand without sounding crazy. Because I don't think I would have listened to me two weeks ago. I guess I feel like it's something people have to come to on their own.

I don't know how to spread this knowledge and make it stick, but that is my goal. I go to these small towns, the kinds of places where I grew up, where my mother fell ill and passed away, where so many are affected by cancer, and I feel obligated to share what I've learned. In one convenience store we went in to, I could not find a single thing that I could consume. Not a fresh banana, apple, not even a Naked or Odwalla juice.  People are living on garbage. I was living on garbage. It is a struggle to live on healthy foods out there, because they are not readily available.

But not just in small towns, everywhere. Our bodies are not getting what they need.

 I hope we can change that.