Such a Gift
I was going to blog about something else today. Then I came home after lunch, checked my email and found these two photographs.
That's my book on the shelf at Foyle's, thanks to my dear friend Seanan. Recently I mentioned how much it will mean to me to see Bones & All for sale in the biggest bookstore in London, but I never thought it could happen now. I feel SO FULL of happiness and gratitude.When I say this is a gift, though, I don't mean seeing my book on the shelf--I mean having a friend who cares enough to get it there. I wish so kind a friend for each and every one of you!
FAQ: Choosing a POV
QUESTION: How do you decide on which point of view to use in a story?Choosing a point of view is as basic a decision as choosing the sex of your protagonist—perhaps even more so! In my experience, there is one right answer, at which you will arrive relatively early on in the process; and in the meantime, you might enjoy writing a single scene from multiple points of view and comparing their effectiveness.Ask yourself, which point of view best serves the shape of this story? If there are several primary characters and we need to get into the minds of each of them, a traditional first-person narrative isn't going to work. If, on the other hand, the voice of your hero or heroine is particularly crucial—if the story simply can't fulfill its potential without it—then first person is pretty much a no brainer.My first published novel, Mary Modern, has two female protagonists along with two male leads and a small host of important minor characters. I suppose I could have let each character have his or her say—as in novels like Hillary Jordan's Mudbound, Tracy Chevalier's Falling Angels, or Daniel Wallace's Mr. Sebastian and the Negro Magician—but given that the family home in Mary Modern became something of a character in and of itself, it felt right to use a third-person omniscient point of view...almost as if the house itself were doing the narrating.Third-person narration can, of course, be limited or omniscient, and a limited third-person perspective might feel a bit like first person even though the narration is technically happening outside the protagonist's head. If you want to offer your readers a more objective view of what's going on, but don't need access to other characters' heads, then third-person limited is certainly an option. Frankly—and this is a matter of personal taste—I find omniscient third-person narration a whole lot more fun, probably because I can "play God" within the fictional universe I'm creating. Then again, the claustrophobic potential within a limited third-person perspective might be just what you're looking to achieve.Petty Magic is the "memoir and confession" of a 150-year-old witch, so it had to be written in the first person. The way Eve looks at the world is so unique and fun that had I not allowed her to tell her own story, much of her verve would have been lost, or at least watered down. It's like listening (over your favorite drink, in a cozy corner booth) to a juicy, almost impossible-to-believe anecdote from the person who experienced it, as opposed to just reading the story secondhand over the internet. (This is why young adult novels are generally written in the first-person present tense; to a teenager, everything often feels like it's happening all at once, and it's completely emotionally overwhelming, and the breathless pacing of the first-person present can capture this feeling most effectively.)Aside from voice, the other consideration of first-person narration is that your character's perspective is incomplete by definition. Every narrator is unreliable to a certain extent! As you write, you must leave space for a more objective truth, and decide to what extent your protagonist becomes aware of his or her "blind spots" and emotional limitations as the story progresses. Between her present-day romantic shenanigans and recounting her dangerous adventures of sixty years before, Eve is having so much fun that when the time comes for her rude awakening, she's completely unprepared for it. (At one point she remarks that the word "epiphany" feels like a shard of glass in her mouth.) Eventually Eve does choose to learn from her mistakes, though, and therein lies the payoff for both reader and protagonist.Another thing to consider is that even if you do decide on first-person narration, your narrator might not be the central character, as in The Great Gatsby. In this case, the narrator might have a more reliable view of the protagonist's motives and identity—or he might not.So far I haven't felt much of a desire to experiment with point of view. Second-person narration would be difficult to execute in a way that felt even remotely organic; and, more to the point, I have not yet come up with a story idea best served by second-person narration. Other writers have experimented with point of view quite effectively, as in Joshua Ferris's And Then We Came to the End. I haven't read it, but the critical consensus is that he absolutely pulled off the narration in the first-person plural.Every so often novelists will play it both ways—Diana Gabaldon employs both the first person and third-person omniscient in the thoroughly awesome Outlander series, for instance—but unless you are writing something similarly epic in scope, you probably won't be able to justify this sort of "cheating."The choice of perspective is just as intuitive as the rest of the decisions you'll make in the telling of your story. Each point of view offers its own potential, and if you keep plumbing those possibilities as you write, you'll be able to create a narrative that is more complex, and therefore more satisfying, for your reader.
Villa de Leyva
Sierra and Diana picked me up at the hostel in San Gil, and together we drove down to Villa de Leyva. This was the last stop on my Colombian tour, and it was utterly splendid from start to finish.(More photos of Villa de Leyva in this post.)
(We stopped for a bit in a little town called Oiba to stretch our legs.)
The Plaza Mayor. Villa de Leyva has a very rich colonial history.A few shots from the farmers' market:
This hood ornament is just about the coolest thing EVER.
In lieu of seeing the "dinosaurs," we opted for some actual fossils at a tiny paleontology museum:
We also spotted a fossil in the courtyard of a local winery.
After my friends went back to Buca, I had a day and a half more to potter around town before heading back to the airport in Bogotà. I amused myself with lugubrious religious art at the Carmelite museum...
...went for a walk in the hills outside of town...
...and reconnected with a friend I'd made back in San Gil. I also met this precocious little home-schooler, with whom I played a few coin toss games. (I can't remember what the game is actually called.)I also chatted with a new friend we'd made whose parents own an adorable cafe in town, and he promised to make me a tinto campesino--a traditional style of coffee flavored with cloves and other spices—but when I went back in the morning, the cafe was closed. Wistful sigh!(Thus concludes my Colombia recap.)
Sunday Brunch
I went home for the weekend, and yesterday my dad cooked a beautiful brunch. What does a vegan eat and drink for breakfast?
Sweet potatoes, onions, red peppers, garlic and fresh rosemary, sautéed in a cast iron skillet. Tomato slices. A simple tofu scramble with turmeric, salt and pepper. (The turmeric adds the yellow coloring.) Coffee with organic soymilk from Trader Joe's. Orange juice. Blueberries and blackberries picked literally just up the road.
I've been thinking a lot about my friend Jen's suggestion to focus on the practical transition-oriented stuff. Showing you what I eat on a regular (perhaps weekly?) basis might be helpful to that end. You, as a non-vegan, already eat a lot of foods that are, and other favorite meals (like Sunday brunch) can be veganized so easily!
It's official!
I will have a new website well before the end of September. And it will be MARVELOUS.
(Playing around with GIMP to give my designer a sense of what I'm envisioning.)
Nobody's Perfect
Please let me emphasize that I'm not trying to make you feel guilty for the way you are living your life right now. As I wrote to my friend Jen the other day, half of my purpose in vegan blogging is to psych myself up to do better, and the other half is to psych you up for a whole new world of possibilities. I feel so vibrantly healthy and happy as a vegan, and I want everyone else to feel this awesome along with me!Regarding the first part--psyching myself up to do better--it's important for me to note that I am NOT holding myself up as some perfect model of ethical living. I generate trash. I don't always buy organic, and sometimes I forget to read labels. Every now and again I just assume a veggie burger is vegan. And sometimes I am a moody, judgmental priss.
I'm still wearing my "pre-gan" woolen sweaters. As I knit vegan replacements, I will be phasing out the old ones. But yes, for right now, I am a vegan still wearing wool. (As fun as it would be, vegan or no, most people can't afford a whole new wardrobe all at once!) Also, I'm sure there are still items in my wardrobe that were made in sweatshops, or at least way-less-than-ideal factory conditions. This is why I want to make what I wear, but I'm a rather slow knitter and seamstress.Here's something else I try to keep in mind (again with the "try"!): I was a meat eater for the first twenty years of my life. I still consumed animal secretions (yucky word, I know, but it is accurate) for ten years after that. Yes, I wish I'd had that "aha" moment back in childhood like some of my vegan friends did, or that my parents ate like hippies instead of just looking like them for a summer or two back in the early '70s. I wish I could have been ready that much sooner.But I wasn't ready, and that's okay. I don't feel irritation or resentment when I look back on who I used to be, so it wouldn't be fair to have those feelings toward somebody else who is still eating meat and dairy. Of all the wise things Jamey said to me at Sadhana Forest, maybe the wisest is this: "We're all doing the best we can at any given moment." Some would argue that's a cop out, and I see where they're coming from; but what Jamey meant is, just because someone is intellectually aware of the better choice doesn't mean they are equipped--emotionally, psychologically, or otherwise--to act in accordance, at least not at that point in time.I don't know that there are any "perfect" choices in this world, only better choices. That goes for humans too. We will never be perfect people, but we can become better versions of ourselves through even the simplest choices we make.A Room with a View
(Mr. Forster, wherever you are...I hope you can forgive me.)I've only ever stayed in New York City hotel rooms for my launch parties, but for the Main Street Vegan Academy mini-reunion last weekend, I booked one thinking two out-of-town friends would be joining me. Alas, their travel plans fell through, but I decided to make the best of the situation by turning it into an all-night writing retreat of sorts. Check out wasn't until noon, after all...(You may have noticed my tweets from one night a couple of weeks ago, when I drank too much coffee at the Starbucks down the street and ended up working 'til 6am.)
Five thirty. Colorless sky. Birds a-chirping. I can hear one of our Muslim students singing his prayers.-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) July 9, 2013
Yup, the hotel is literally at "Ground Zero" (with a Morton's steakhouse downstairs, no less). I was living in an NYU dorm in Chinatown on September 11th, and saw more that day than I care to describe here. I still think about how many people lost their lives, and I bless them, wherever they are, but I've never felt the need to actually visit the memorial. (Now you see why I was in a rather morbid frame of mind.)
After saying goodbye to my MSVA friends, I stopped at the Trader Joe's near Union Square to pick up some "fuel" for the long night ahead. (I would be so deliciously productive! It would be SO WONDERFUL!!!!!)Not long past midnight, though, my energy began to flag. The coffee I'd brewed in my room was really weak (even the decaf I made in the morning had more caffeine in it!), and I suddenly remembered I'd only gotten five hours of sleep the night before. With a couple of iced coffees I was hoping to ease myself into that elusive "sweet spot," the "theta state" or however you like to label it, but it just wasn't happening. I needed some shut-eye. So I promised myself I'd get a good three hours done in the morning, and climbed into the king-size bed.
I used to write until 4 or 5 almost every night when I was in grad school working on Mary Modern. Twenty-four doesn't feel that far from thirty-two, but I gotta face reality here: I'm not that young anymore. I can pull one of those exhilarated all-nighters every now and again—they are still every bit as fun as they were then!—but it's going to take more planning than it used to. At any rate, in the morning I managed to finish a draft of the outline (or "chapter flow") I'd been working toward, which had been my goal for the night anyway.The other take-away from my experience over the weekend is this: you won't be touched by some divine hand of inspiration every time you sit down to write. Much of the time it's just putting one word down after another, and that's perfectly okay. That's how a book gets written.
Life After Life After Life
(Main Street Vegan Academy, part 4.)I was staying downtown (more on that tomorrow), so on Sunday afternoon I took a wander through the Trinity churchyard.
Every time I see an 18th-century grave marker I'm fascinated, again, by the phrase departed this life. I like to take the words out of their Christian context, and simply consider death as an onward journey. I can almost get excited when you frame it that way--as J.M. Barrie put it, "an awfully big adventure."
One of the doors to Grace Church.On the other hand, don't we "depart this life" and begin another quite frequently throughout our lives? Coming back to New York often feels like peeping in on that version I was living twelve or fourteen years ago. I pass Grace Church on Broadway, and remember how I admired the view over the churchyard from the window of an NYU dorm room when I was visiting as a high school senior. I walk through Washington Square Park, and think back on all the conversations I've had there, all the interesting people who came in and out of my life.
(Some things thread themselves through, joining each chapter together: to the end of my life (the actual end), whenever I see hydrangeas, I will always think of my sister.)
Maybe it's odd that I love graveyards as much as I do. Part of it is the romance and the gothic flavor and all that, but there's a practical reason too. We need every reminder that our lives won't last forever, that we must experience them as fully as we can—the highs and the lows, avoiding none of the messiness. Those colonial New Yorkers have had their turn; now it's ours.
Main Street Vegan Academy, part 4
Sometimes you find good advice where you least expect it (in this case, the ladies' restroom at South Station.)Saturday morning I took the bus down to New York for a Main Street Vegan Academy reunion dinner at the marvelous Peacefood Café (at Union Square). It was so lovely to reconnect with my classmates and meet a few new friends from the earlier sessions (one of whom, J.L., has a brand-new book out called Vegan For Her!)I've gotten to the point that when I'm in a totally vegan-friendly place like New York, a Chipotle burrito isn't going to cut it when I could patronize a cruelty-free business instead. I hadn't looked up a vegan option near the bus stop beforehand, but I decided I would find one without having to try too hard (I think most of you know I don't own a smartphone).And what do you know? A block and a half north of the Megabus stop (7th Avenue at 29th Street), there is a Loving Hut.
The girl behind the counter actually remembered my name, and used it each time she asked if I needed anything and if I was enjoying my food. A seitan sandwich with chipotle mayo and a side salad with carrot ginger dressing were so satisfying after a four-hour bus ride!
Already daydreaming about dinner at @peacefoodnyc with my #mainstreetvegan posse tomorrow. Gingerade & chickpea fries, for sure. #vegan-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) July 20, 2013
More deliciousness at Peacefood that evening: gingerade, chickpea fries, and a Daiya cheeseburger with sprouts and plenty of pickle and mustard on focaccia.
Part of the Main Street Vegan crew. Oh how I adore these people!!!
Afterward we went to Chloe's for some fruity soft serve. Tali always orders the large.
So much fun tonight!!! RT @victoria_moran: With Main Street #Vegan Academy grads @chloesfruit in Mamhattan. pic.twitter.com/KXeJVXnxpG-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) July 21, 2013
For brunch the next day I went to Sacred Chow (on Sullivan between West 3rd and Bleecker), which Tali had recommended. Stellar service--I love it when waitstaff don't try to make me feel weird for eating solo and taking up a whole table--and the fresh market greens salad hit the spot (after two faux meat sandwiches the day before, I was really hankering for some roughage).This was my first experience of jicama (that's the white bits), and I wasn't thrilled with it—it doesn't seem to have a taste at all!—but the raw cashew kefir dressing and "almond and sunflower nutmeats" were really delicious.Much more to say about my night in New York, but I'll save it for later this week.
Vegan is Easy, part 2
(Vegan is Easy, part 1; Time for Some Context.)
There are so many rules!
It's too restrictive.
Too difficult, too drastic, too extreme.
It's nice that it works for you, but I just know it wouldn't work for me.
Like I said, you can tell yourself you aren't capable of something, and prove yourself right (or dismiss an unfamiliar perspective as "too extreme"). That's your prerogative.This is mine:
(You can buy this button here.)People like to think veganism is about following rules and adhering to prohibitions. They focus on all the things you aren't "allowed" to eat. But what sort of hardship is it to deny yourself something you don't want? I certainly don't "abstain" from cigarettes!Friends will sit down to a meal with me and say, "I know you can't eat this." Sometimes I leave it at that, and sometimes I'll say, "I could eat it. I choose not to." Let us make the distinction between a rule and a choice.Fine, you say. I get it. But how do you get to the point where you no longer WANT to eat a fillet steak, or a big gooey helping of mac-and-cheese on a cold wet night? You may only have the vaguest notion as to why you should want to give up these foods in the first place. This is the point at which you begin to educate yourself.It happens for some people quite dramatically, like when you stumble upon undercover slaughterhouse footage; other people will read a book like Diet for a New America, The China Study, or The World Peace Diet, and let the information change them in a way that feels absolutely liberating (can you tell I'm writing from personal experience here?) This is the first choice you will make, before you even get to the "vegan is easy" bit. Do you really want to know where your food came from, how its production affects the planet and other sentient beings, and how what you eat will impact your body, mind, and spirit? Or would you rather just keep on living as you have been?During Main Street Vegan Academy I was talking with Marcia and Zachary about in vitro meat development. "Frankenmeat," I call it, though PETA is actually promoting this research for obvious reasons. "I'd never eat it," Zachary said. "Flesh just isn't food to me now." That's how I feel too. I'm not depriving myself of something I no longer see as edible.Besides, most of us vegans will tell you that we've become way more curious and creative in the kitchen since changing our diets, more open to trying "new" products like chia seeds or amaranth or kohlrabi or what have you. (And I enjoy vegan baking even more than I did the "old" way, admittedly because I like to surprise and delight people with delicious sweet things that are also cruelty free.) I've chosen to look at life as an adventure ever since I went on my first solo trip, but since I've gone vegan it's like I've been handed a much bigger map to guide and inspire me. The choice I've made has given me a whole new kind of freedom.
Funtimes in San Gil
From Bucaramanga I took a bus down to San Gil, which has a reputation as a mecca for adventure sport enthusiasts. It's a cool little town with a lively backpackers' scene, and although I did spend more time "out" than I had up until that point (as you do, traveling on your own), I still managed to get some good writing done at a shady picnic table on the hostel patio.It's the easiest thing just to book your rafting, kayaking, rappelling, paragliding, or what have you through your hostel or guesthouse. I stayed at Macondo and it's excellent—helpful staff, very clean, comfortable common spaces, and attracts a friendly crowd. I also loved wandering through the indoor produce market in the center of town--picked up fresh fruit to nosh on, and a lot of the stalls offer juices and smoothies.
I rappelled down that waterfall in the background, and someone took this really awesome shot of me as I was doing it, but she never sent it to me. Oh well, you'll just have to take my word for it.
I played tejo with a bunch of guys from the hostel. Really fun.
The other popular thing to do in the area is El Camino Real, a 200-year-old donkey track linking two quaint little colonial towns, Barichara and Guane. Rene and John and I took the bus from San Gil to Barichara, and walked around town for a bit before starting out on El Camino Real.
The postcard-pretty church on the Barichara town square.
We had no trouble finding the cute little vegetarian café mentioned in the guidebook, and sat down for a lovely meal.
These kids were SO OVERJOYED that school was out, it cracked me up. (You can also see how extremely quaint is Barichara!)
El Camino Real was my favorite part of my time in San Gil. Lovely hills and pastoral scenery and camouflaged butterflies.
This hairy hanging stuff is known as "old man's beard." (I wanted to call it "witches' beard." I think that would be way funnier, especially since the effect as you're standing under it is a little eerie.)
On the outskirts of Guane, a four-legged local came over to greet us.
We were taking the local bus back to San Gil, so once we got to Guane it was time for a relaxing drink in a cafe courtyard.Only one more Colombia post left!
Time for Some Context
I was feeling pretty good when I put up yesterday's post (Vegan is Easy, part 1). It's been my aim for quite awhile now to blog regularly about vegan topics (with an eye toward relaunching this site as a veganism + creativity extravaganza of sparkly good fun—more about that soon), and it feels awesome to be taking small but concrete steps toward an important goal.In response to that post, I received a thoughtful email from a dear old friend. He believes that the way I approached this subject was potentially off putting to many casual readers of this blog (himself included), that I'm operating within an isolated context, and of course I honor that perspective. Through our email exchange yesterday, I realized I should probably clarify a few points.Going vegan is more than a matter of semantics, of course, and I admit that on this blog I am writing primarily for people like the person I was a few years ago. When I say "going vegan is as easy as you want to make it," I am speaking to someone who has the means and resources to eliminate animal products but hasn't yet made the connections between food and personal health, food and the planet, food and the thinking, feeling animals it used to be. If you are a little bit open, a little bit curious, and can afford to educate yourself with a book like Main Street Vegan or Eat Vegan on $4 a Day, then yes, I am writing to you--and you are free to take or disregard my advice as you wish. I know not everyone will like what I have to say here, and I'm fine with that. I'll honor your journey and trust you will honor mine.When I say "going vegan is easy," I am not speaking to someone living in low-income urban housing who goes to McDonald's for dinner because it's what he or she was raised on. I do not feel "qualified" to speak to that section of America, or anywhere else, not because I don't believe a vegan diet is viable for everyone, but because I KNOW it is easy for someone like me to say it's easy. I'd love to work with socioeconomically disadvantaged young people someday (in fact, that's a huge part of my master plan), but I'm certainly not going to sit here and say that shifting their eating paradigms will be just as "easy" for them as it was for me. That said, in the near future there will be an increasing number of organizations like Dr. Ostfeld's cardiac wellness program at Montefiore in the Bronx (as I mentioned in this post) that will make veganism an accessible concept to people who have problems I will never have to contend with as a middle-class "white" woman. Whatever race or color, rich or poor, every person on this planet deserves to be happy and healthy, right? So you see, this message IS relevant to everyone. (I'm putting that out there in a spirit of equality, not as in "THE WHOLE WORLD SHOULD GO VEGAN TOMORROW.")My friend believes in social justice. So do I. And I think we can agree that factory food is, to a certain extent, a capitalist tool of socioeconomic oppression, from the unfortunate souls who toil in an atmosphere of relentless horror and trauma in the slaughterhouses to the unfortunate souls who consume the Big Macs, "fruit" punch, and genetically-modified God-only-knows-what, and pay for it with their health--while a select few tell one lie after another as they profit from all this misery. On the other hand, there may very well be a section of the politically progressive community who believe that seeking justice for animals (and even the planet) is "kind of beside the point" when there are so many people suffering all over the globe. Why am I arguing for the animals when I could be down in Florida right now protesting outside a courthouse, or volunteering with an NGO in a third-world country? Because I believe that world peace begins in our own stomachs. We can't eliminate the violence on our streets until we stop and see, truly see, the products of violence on our plates. By all means go out and engage in whatever form of activism makes sense to you, and I'll keep on pursuing the role I feel I'm meant to play in all this; and let's leave room for the possibility that our goals aren't mutually exclusive.I stand by my assertion that going vegan can be fun and easy. It might be more of a challenge than it was for me (I didn't have hostile friends or family to contend with, for example), and it might take you longer to transition than it took me, but that doesn't mean you can't do it. You CAN do it. This is about your planet, all the other creatures we share it with, and your own health and spiritual well being. Even if you don't go vegan today or tomorrow, it's a lifestyle worth your careful consideration, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking the time to read this through.(Vegan is Easy, part 2.)
Vegan is Easy, part 1
I love this sign over my friend Amy Lou's kitchen doorway: "Turn soft and lovely any time you have a chance."
There's a reason why certain expressions become platitudes, right? No matter how irritating it may be to hear "you win some, you lose some," or "This too shall pass," the truth these sayings carry is undeniable.The platitude I have in mind right now is attributed to Henry Ford:"Whether you think you can or you can't, you're usually right."But I prefer to say it this way:"Whether you think you can or you can't, you are VIRTUALLY ALWAYS right."You probably know by now (and if not, you might be interested to read this essay) that I believe in the creative power of semantics. That's why I try my best to avoid saying "I want" or "this is really hard for me" or "I'm struggling." (I also try to avoid the word "try," but y'know.)This isn't just a theory for me; I taste the fruit of my words on a daily basis. My words (thinking or speaking) reflect my attitude, and my attitude creates my reality. This can be as basic as thinking "I can DO this" when I'm easing myself into a more advanced yoga pose (and guess what: I prove myself right), or as "important" as writing and selling a novel, or speaking in front of a group (same words, same outcome).Awhile back I stumbled upon the Twitter profile of a woman who described herself in her bio as "struggling to be vegan." I don't remember where she was from (though I'm pretty sure she doesn't live in New York City...or India). It made me sad to know that not only was someone creating and perpetuating a struggle for herself, but that she had actually chosen to frame her own identity in this negative light.Life can be really, really challenging sometimes, and there's no sense denying that. Strangers and loved ones alike will question your decisions, and maybe even make themselves unpleasant about it. But if you can adopt a "free and easy, no matter what happens everything will be just fine" sort of attitude as you move through your day-to-day activities, then why not choose to live your life that way? Why WOULDN'T you make life as easy for yourself as you possibly can?This is how I feel about veganism. Before I left Sadhana Forest, I decided that this new diet and lifestyle and belief system would be joyful and easy, even if it required a little extra planning from time to time (such as packing several packages of nuts, sesame sticks, and dried fruit on our trip to Turkey).You know what I'm going to say next, right? It HAS been joyful and easy.When they find out I'm vegan, people often say, "Wow, no eggs or cheese? That must be hard," and I come back with, "It's easy, actually. Fun and easy." I have traveled extensively in a meat-heavy country like Colombia, and eaten like a (vegan) princess in every single place I visited. I have "broken bread" with meat-loving friends and relatives, and enjoyed the experience even if I didn't like what I found on their plates. I am making and purchasing beautiful new vegan clothing, and not regretting giving up knitting or wearing wool. I decided I could do this, and I would love doing it, and I have absolutely proven myself right.But I'm not special. If I can do it, so can you.(The other piece of this is, of course, educating yourself to the point where you no longer desire animal foods--so that veganism is your choice, and a joyful choice at that!--and I'll be writing about that process next. Time for Some Context; Vegan is Easy, part 2.)
More Juicin'
(Almost every time I say "we're juicing," someone comes back with "that makes you sound like you are on steroids.")
I like to admire the colors before I stir.
Looks like a dark chocolate shake, or a pint of stout, right? Beets + aforementioned dinosaur kale + carrots + a couple of apples = the savoriest juice yet. (I'd have used more apples if we had them.)
An Edible Churchyard
I have a big post coming up soon on veganism and Christianity. In the meantime, here are some shots from Old South Church, which has an organic heirloom kitchen garden to benefit homeless women and children through a charity called the Women's Lunch Place.
If I wanted to belong to a church again, here is still more evidence why I'd consider this one.
(Kate and I went inside while she was visiting last month.)
Stopped by the farmers' market across the street (it's open Tuesdays and Fridays) for some beets and dinosaur kale (so called, I guess, because the leaves are huge. Sweet and juicy too, perfect for juicing). Hooray for local produce!!!
Bucaramanga
After Cartagena I took a bus to Bucaramanga, where Sierra lives, and it was so absurdly late that I didn't get to her house until three o'clock in the morning. She had to get up again in a couple of hours to teach, but that didn't stop her greeting me with a hot meal, cooked on the spot.
(I really do have the awesomest friends in the world.)We spent a very happy week and a half together. Sierra threw a beautiful dinner party with all her friends (from school and elsewhere), I continued to get really good work done on the children's novel, I lounged in the hammock reading Outliers and The Historian, and I even sat in on her classes one day.
Sierra is one of those wonderfully inspired and inspiring teachers. She spends hours decorating her classroom at the beginning of the year.
She took me to the multi-level central market downtown, where fortunately the animal products were located on a separate level from the beautiful fruits, veggies, and herbs:
We picked up ingredients for vegan pesto and roasted garlic and tomato soup.
Delicious hot drinks at Café Con-Verso.
You can tell how much she loves her life. Spending time with people like this makes you even happier than you already are!
FAQ: Switching Sexes
...It remains obvious, even in the writing of Proust, that a man is terribly hampered and partial in his knowledge of women, as a woman in her knowledge of men.
Here's a question posed by one of the boys at St. Lawrence: I noticed that the protagonists of both your novels are female. Are you ever going to write a story from a male perspective?One of the best writing compliments I ever received arrived by text message. I still have it saved on my phone nearly six years later.
Hi camille! I'm about 150 pages in & i really like your book! The attention to detail often leads to moments of sublimity in the prose, & your treatment of & insight into the male psyche is surprisingly accurate!! I'm reading every chance i get...
The friend who sent it is, of course, a man—and to be perfectly honest with you, I'm not sure how I pulled it off.Then again, if we define convincing literary "sex switching" in terms of the reader being so engrossed in the story as to forget the sex of the person who wrote it, then maybe I wasn't as successful as my friend would have me think. There's no denying that men and women differ in fundamental ways—physically, biochemically, et cetera.
I thought it would be fun to offer a couple examples of sex switching in literary fiction—one I find successful, one not—and see if anyone else can think of authors who can get inside the minds of the opposite sex particularly well.The first example is a passage chosen at random from Hillary Jordan's Mudbound:
The war broke my brother—in his head, where no one could see it. Never mind all his clever banter, his flirting with Laura and the girls. I could tell he wasn't right the second I saw him. He was thin and jittery, and his eyes had a haunted look I recognized from my own time in the Army. I knew too well what kind of sights they were seeing when he shut them at night.
Jamie was thin-skinned to begin with, had been all his life. He was always looking for praise, then getting his feelings hurt when he didn't get it, or enough of it. And he never knew his own worth, not in his guts where a man needs to know it. Our father was to blame for that. He was always whittling away at Jamie, trying to make him smaller...
It was only after I'd finished Mudbound that I thought, wow, Hillary Jordan knows how to get into the mind of a man. I suppose I should get a man's opinion on this, but I was convinced anyway!Now here's an example of sex switching I found distracting:
Changing the subject abruptly, Ines remarked: There are some really good-looking men. Yes, there are some I find very attractive. There are some I find extremely attractive. Well, me too, if we're going to extremes. But, you know, they can turn out to be bastards. Yeah, of course; that's always happening on TV. But that's fake. Didn't you just say...? No, what I'm saying is they can be bastards. Like they can be anything, Ines added. Oh, OK, all right. But the really important thing, in love, is to find a real man. Not the real men again! exclaimed Patri. That's what mom's always telling me. Well she knows what she's talking about, I promise you. How does she know? Ines shrugged her shoulders...
That's from César Aira's Ghosts. Maybe it's just the company I run in, but I don't know any women who talk about men this way; perhaps I'm discounting cultural differences, but I'm not convinced. At any rate, the whole time I was reading this passage I was acutely conscious of the author's sex. As I said, if he'd actually nailed the tenor of this conversation between a teenage girl and her "hip" young aunt, I wouldn't be thinking of the fact that a woman did not write it. (The novel's complete lack of paragraphs and quotation marks drives me batty too, but that's for a different blog post.)In A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf recants her earlier assertion (see epigraph) that writers of both sexes are hindered by the utter inaccessibility of one half of the human experience.
...I went on amateurishly to sketch a plan of the soul so that in each of us two powers preside, one male, one female; and in the man's brain, the man predominates over the woman, and in the woman's brain, the woman predominates over the man. The normal and comfortable state of being is that when the two live in harmony together, spiritually co-operating. If one is a man, still the woman part of the brain must have effect; and a woman also must have intercourse with the man in her. Coleridge perhaps meant this when he said that a great mind is androgynous...
I like the concept of an "androgynous mind." Maybe this matter of writing men (or women) convincingly isn't simply a question of having a big enough imagination—if we can actually tap into a sort of Jungian reservoir of human experience, and funnel that knowledge into an act of creative empathy.And if that sounds like new-age nonsense, is writing a man as a woman all that different from writing about a woman as a woman? You're already seeing through someone else's eyes—someone whose experience differs from yours, even though you made the person up yourself.But to answer the student's question: yes, I am very interested in writing a novel from a male perspective, and excited for the challenge. In 2007 I started what I hoped would be a novel narrated by a man, but I wound up shelving it when Seanan remarked that the first chapter had the pacing of a shorter story. I haven't given up on that one, but in the meantime my second novel for St. Martin's, Immaculate Heart, is narrated by a male journalist. Working on this story is a whole new kind of fun.This was an excellent question, and I'd love to get some input from other readers and writers (especially since I didn't offer a positive example from a male author). Writers, how comfortable do you feel writing from a male point of view as a woman, or vice versa? Readers, what are some of your favorite examples of male writers who've nailed the inner workings of a female character, and vice versa?
@sarahpmiller Thanks for all the great examples/recs! Interesting to me that you're also coming up with more female than male writers...-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) July 10, 2013
@comet_party I really don't know. I'd be interested to hear what men think about that.-- Sarah P. Miller (@SarahPMiller) July 11, 2013
Main Street Vegan Academy, part 3
(All Main Street Vegan Academy entries.)Friday morning Victoria offered several very useful lectures on public speaking and the nuts-and-bolts aspects of working with clients. She's so knowledgeable practical and wise. If you ever get the chance to hear her speak (or better yet, attend the vegan academy yourself), you should JUMP on it. And read Main Street Vegan, of course! She presents everything you need to know in such an easy and loving way; I admit that some of us vegans get REALLY impassioned to the point where we might alienate the "veg curious," but in her books and on her podcast, Victoria's approach is always gentle and friendly.
Got public speaking advice from @victoria_moran so awesome I had to bring my notebook into the bathroom so I could keep taking notes. #vegan-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) June 22, 2013
After Victoria's talks, our classmate Ilana gave us an introduction to Ayurveda, which is an ancient Indian tradition of natural healing. (Ayurvedic practitioners generally use milk and ghee, but some vegans are modifying the tradition--see Talya Lutzker's new book The Vegan Ayurvedic Kitchen. Talya was a guest on Victoria's podcast last month.) I'll write more about Ayurveda in a future post. Then we took the subway downtown to Pure Food and Wine for a languid lunch, and by that I mean three courses over three hours, or close enough to it! (I'd been there earlier in the week with Kate and Sara, remember, and while the company was excellent my burger was a little disappointing. This meal more than made up for it!) 
The Mediterranean salad: arugula, kale, kalamata olives, tomatoes, pumpkin seed macadamia parmesan, balsamic vinaigrette. Awesome.
Brazil nut sea vegetable croquettes with a tartare sauce. If I had to pick my very favorite dish out of all the meals at NYC vegan restaurants I've had, this would be it. It's the sort of thing you really want to recreate at home, but you know you won't be able to! Exquisite. (I also ordered a "swan greens" juice--cucumber, spinach, dandelion, pear, grapefruit, tarragon, spearmint, and yuzu...which I now know to be an East Asian citrus fruit, thanks to Dr. Google.)
I was a bit skeptical when this lemon bar showed up—it looked kind of plasticy—but appearances can be deceiving and all that. Really flavorful—a PUNCH of lemon—and a perfect almond coconut crust.
After lunch we walked to an Indian grocery, where I picked up a bunch of interesting powders and oils Ilana recommended on the fly. (This photo with Ilse, Zachary, and Stephanie.) I haven't had a chance to try any of them yet, but when I do I'll let you know how I find them.
Just posted a photo @ MooShoes http://t.co/mcHfr2KGTU -- Zachary Koval (@Zachary_Koval) June 21, 2013
Then it was on to Moo Shoes, which I somehow hadn't visited since 2004. I'm happy to say that vegan footwear has come a LONG way in that time! (By the way, my other favorite place to buy fashionable, quality, breathable shoes is Vegetarian Shoes in the UK.)
Margo gave some love to the Moo Shoes resident kitty.I spent so much time trying on shoes that I missed out on Babycakes (everyone had left by the time I got there, and I didn't feel like eating cupcakes by myself), but I did manage to meet up with my pal Kathy (for whom I used to work back at HarperCollins) for cocktails and some delicious gourmet pizza with Daiya cheese (made of arrowroot and tapioca as opposed to soy, by the by--melts just like dairy cheese) at Pala, which offers a vegan menu. (Sometimes I do wish I still lived in New York...!)
I don't go gaga over shoes, but I'm in love with these dove-gray oxfords I just bought from @mooshoes_nyc. http://t.co/Zqhbvg0I91 #vegan-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) June 22, 2013
Saturday morning we reconvened at the grocery store around the corner from Victoria's apartment to meet her daughter Adair, who was playing our hypothetical client. I picked up several new pieces of knowledge in the course of the "tour," the most scary of which is that tin cans contain BPA unless otherwise noted on the label. You know how water bottles will say "BPA free"? That's because studies have indicated that BPA is a carcinogen. So you have to look for cans of soup or beans or sauce that specifically say "no BPA." Here's a list of seven brands you can trust on Treehugger.com. (If you do a quick Google search on BPA, you'll find that it's the organizations profiting from it who say it's perfectly safe, and it's not like you can actually trust the FDA, due to the influence of said corporate interests.) Afterward we went back to Victoria's for Fran Costigan's talks on food demos and comparing all the different kinds of vegan sweeteners for use in pastries and desserts (coconut sugar, date sugar, rice syrup, Sucanat...) Her new book, Vegan Chocolate, comes out in November, and the confection on the cover looks every bit as decadent as an ordinary chocolate cake. (But like I said, you enjoy your treats way more when you know they're fair trade and cruelty free...)
After lunch we had a panel discussion with Gary Gibson, Dianne Wenz, and Jaime Karpovich, all MSVA graduates, who offered more practical info on starting a vegan coaching business. Michael Parrish DuDell gave the next lecture--half was marketing and business-y and the other half presented the case for veganism from an environmental standpoint. Did you know that raising animals for food contributes more to global warming than every mode of transportation in the world combined? It sounds unbelievable, but this is a statistic generated by the U.N. in 2006. No one is making this up; no one would ever want to. You can see why Michael says he initially went vegan for the sake of the environment. That night we went to Blossom for dinner. I've had pretty good meals there in the past, but nothing truly inspired until Friday night: 
Seitan Frites Au Poivre with creamy mushroom peppercorn sauce, shoestring fries, and grilled asparagus with horseradish cream. The chocolate mousse pie was awesome too, and I almost collapsed with ecstasy as I sipped the organic mint chip shake Lindsay ordered.
Another awesome day at #vegan academy, culminating in chocolate mousse cake and impromptu tarot readings at @cafeblossom. (I love my life.) -- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) June 23, 2013
Sunday was our last day. We had lectures from Sharon Nazarian on social media and Rynn Berry on the history of veganism. Professor Berry's talk was absolutely fascinating, and I'll be blogging about his books (Food for the Gods, etc.) in the months ahead. (He even gave me an extremely useful tidbit for my Edinburgh novel! Like I said--collecting the jigsaw pieces...)
A refreshing glass of gingerade and a Mediterranean panini at Peacefood Café on the UWS, where we celebrated our graduation. The chickpea fries (in the background) were INCREDIBLE.
Photo: Grad lunch @peacefoodnyc w/ @Victoria_Moran, @jamsmom, @PettyMagic et al. #MSVA #vegan #NYC #travel... http://t.co/zp2ESxoSGc-- Stephanie Gorchynski (@StephGorchynski) June 26, 2013
After lunch and a round of goodbye hugs, I went to a wine bar with Ilse and Stephanie to continue our conversation, but I didn't order a glass myself since I was heading out to Park Slope for yoga with our classmate Jean. That was another full circle experience for me, since I used to go to that studio when I lived in Brooklyn nine and ten years ago. (More about this when I blog about my pretty-much-daily practice at Back Bay Yoga.)Thus concludes my MSVA recap, although I do feel I ought to take another post for reflection as opposed to "we did this and this and this." It would be impossible to overstate how much I loved and learned from this program—I'm truly only scratching the surface here!
Snapshots from Cartagena
(Scribbling Away in Cartagena; all Colombia entries.)
The café at our hotel.
Colombians make the best graffiti.
We wandered into a random art gallery. Old furniture, a video projection of a woman licking the floor, machetes hanging from the ceiling (as political commentary)...
...And the building itself was part of the installation.
A torture implement (horquilla del hereja, 'heretic's pitchfork') at the Palace of the Inquisition. (It seemed like pretty much everything in that museum is a reproduction though.)
Ventana de la Denuncia outside the Palace of the Inquisition.
Full Circle
With Tali and Margo on Washington Square East, en route to the PETA talk at the Kimmel Center. Photo by Rain.
As you may know, at NYU I was an opinion columnist for the Washington Square News. (If you're interested, here's the best thing I ever wrote for that paper.)One time the animal rights group on campus circulated a pamphlet stating that NYU researchers, funded by our tax dollars, were practicing vivisection on rhesus monkeys, supposedly to discover a cure for lazy eye. I was going to link to the definition of "vivisection," but I think I'd better define it for you here:
viv·i·sec·tion [viv-uh-sek-shuhn]noun1. the action of cutting into or dissecting a living body.2. the practice of subjecting living animals to cutting operations, especially in order to advance physiological and pathological knowledge.
I was so shocked and disgusted that I hastily typed up an opinion piece decrying what was going on in our university research labs. It was an absolutely lazy piece of so-called journalism--I did virtually no outside research--and the next day we published a letter from the NYU spokesman (part of whose job it was to take us pesky kids down a peg on a regular basis) that began, "Camille DeAngelis parroted the contents of a nasty pamphlet..."Funny that he should use the word "parrot," right? Because parrots repeat what's actually been said; they don't obfuscate, as humans are wont to do. The NYU spokesman didn't deny anything about the vivisection itself--he only attempted to rationalize it by saying people would be helped by the "work" they were doing, and that the animal rights activists were just getting in the way of medical progress. As if making use of our first-amendment right was "nasty," and drilling holes into monkeys' heads WASN'T.Yeah, I think the monkeys would have a thing or two to say about that. But we don't speak their language.
"A few polite words, properly placed, can change a life forever." --@IngridNewkirk at @PETA #vegan #govegan-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) June 21, 2013
Does "progress" necessitate the torture of innocent, sentient beings? Scientists like T. Colin Campbell believe this to a certain extent--for without his lab rats we wouldn't have as much scientific evidence that a plant-based diet is THE way to fend off cancer, diabetes, and heart disease, and there's no denying that animal testing has saved many human lives through vaccines and other critical medicines. Our technology, however, has advanced to the point where animal testing (for pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and so forth) is actually the least effective way of doing things. And yet many companies are still dropping chemicals in rabbits' eyes before sticking them back in their cages.I don't know about you, but I don't want to be a party to unnecessary suffering in any form. I wish I had actually joined People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals back at NYU, and gotten involved. I thought I was doing enough by being a vegetarian, but I know better now.
.@ingridnewkirk on speciesism: "We think we're sophisticated because we invented Cheetos and the dishwasher." @peta #vegan-- Camille DeAngelis (@comet_party) July 5, 2013
Ingrid Newkirk's lecture included photographs and video footage of animals doing extraordinary things...and animals being treated with extraordinary cruelty.As our vegan academy group walked down to Washington Square for the PETA lecture that Thursday night, I thought back on that ill-executed yet thoroughly righteous editorial I'd once written. I also remembered a brief conversation outside the NYU Main Building I'd had with a really nice girl named Lauren, who was active in the PETA group on campus and was thrilled that I'd written about the vivisection issue. I was sipping a hot chocolate, and I offered her some. She asked if there was milk in it, I said yes, and she politely declined.Why didn't I get it?I wasn't ready, I guess. But I really wish I could have been.
THIS is your milk, your cheese, your butter. Still think dairy doesn't hurt cows? http://t.co/sn0wG2g4px #Dehorning #Reasons2GoVegan-- PETA (@peta) June 21, 2013
(All Main Street Vegan Academy posts here.)