DUTY, HUMANITY, AND A HEALTHY YEAR

New Year's resolutions are inevitable failures.  Therefore, I usually try not to make any.  But after an encounter with cancer in 2016, I'm trying to make some positive changes -- NOT resolutions, just lifestyle alterations when applicable.

One of the things I'm trying to do is eat less processed foods and eat more fresh vegetables and fruits.  In the last few months, Whole Foods and I have forged an excellent working relationship.  I may have taken it too far this week, though.

It starts out innocently enough: Make salad.

Perusing the produce section of the market, I see a package of baby spinach and toss it into my handheld basket.  Lettuce comes next -- a three-pack of small heads of romaine.  Can't forget celery, carrots, cucumber, tomato, yellow pepper.  Oh, yeah, and feta and croutons and walnuts and dressing.  Some blueberries, too, just because.

By the time I check out, the basket is unreasonably heavy, which I suppose is good exercise since I'm walking home with everything I'm buying.

Once home, I realize that I will have to individually pack my lunches for the week because I have way too much food to make and store a giant salad.  I start chopping stuff and dividing it all as I go, carefully readying several lunches, and I'm damn proud of myself as I do this; smug, I might even say.

Until I remember that it's a short week.  Monday is a holiday, and Wednesday is a day out of work for an appointment that cannot be rescheduled.  I make five lunches, but I only need three.

Later in the week, my youngest brings home his own groceries of healthy food (hummus and bananas and whole grain pasta).  Turns out he is making some positive changes, too.  This is fabulous news.  "I have extra salad," I tell him, "and it's all individually portioned out already."

Huzzah!  We may actually eat through the veggies before everything starts wilting and turning brown.  I won't have to give up my Whole Foods obsession just yet.  I mean, I'm not making that a resolution or anything like that.  Hmmmm, maybe I am, just a little bit.  After all, it's for duty and humanity!  (And for a healthy 2017.)