Fencing Bear at Prayer

As a vegetarian, it always seemed to me that Cain got a bum rap (Genesis 4:2-16).  There he was, a "tiller of the ground," bringing to the Lord an offering of the "fruit of the ground," while Abel, a "keeper of sheep," brought "of the firstlings of his flock and of his fat portions."  "And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had no regard." Which, understandably, pissed Cain off ("So Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell"), at which the Lord said to Cain: "Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen?  If you do well, will you not be accepted?  And if you do not do well, sin is couching at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it."  And so, still incensed, Cain invited his brother Abel to go out into the field with him, where he killed him.  At which the Lord set this punishment upon Cain, that when he tilled the ground, it should no longer ...

By now every woman in America will have seen Valerie Bertinelli's photo on the cover of this month's People magazine; I've seen it and I'm always the last one to pick up on such media events. What was your reaction to seeing a 48-year-old woman looking--let's face it--pretty amazing, even if she is wearing nothing but a bright green string bikini? Okay, so that was the point: here's an almost 49-year-old woman (her birthday is April 23) who, doubtless with the usual help of a bit of airbrushing (and hair dye), looks as good as a 20-year-old without her clothes on. But Bertinelli is not just your usual aging starlet: two years ago, she would never have been photographed in such a revealing costume because at that point she weighed some fifty pounds more than she did when the bikini photos were taken. In a little under two years, Bertinelli went from 172 lbs. to her original goal of 132 lbs. and then, with the help of a trainer and a 1,200 calorie a day diet,...

I'm finding it hard not to start this post with yet another apology, but there you go. Yesterday while I was making my breakfast--organic bananas, organic strawberries, all-natural (no corn syrup!) granola, organic milk from pasture-fed cows, organic herbal stress-relieving tea--I was suddenly struck by how white it all was. Unsurprising, you say? I am, after all, exactly the type of White Person Christian Lander's blog -turned- book is aimed at, both descriptively and in marketing terms: college-educated, upper-middle-class, wannabe artist-intellectual, urban dwelling. And, indeed, although I somehow missed the whole blog phenomenon last winter (too busy teaching the History of European Civilization, I suppose), I read the book as soon as I got back from Europe and could order a copy from my local, independently-owned bookstore . I even took the quiz at the back: "How White Are You?" Organic food (check), tea (check), yoga (check), gifted children (check-...

Ever since I can remember, I have had an unhappy relationship with food. No, I have never suffered from anorexia or bulimia, thank goodness. But food has always been my enemy, and wanting food has always been (to my mind, at least) my greatest failing. In an ideal world, or so I have sometimes imagined, I would not even need to eat food. If only I were strong enough, I would never be hungry, never want another helping, never “lose control” or “give into temptation” by eating chocolate or dessert. Food, or so I have long believed, is something I do not deserve to have. Other people are allowed to have food, particularly those who are thin, but I, being ever at odds with my weight, am (or have believed I should be) embarrassed to eat. A number of books that I have read this past year have helped me start to adjust this misconception, above all, Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto (2008) and Vikki Hansen and Shawn Goodman’s The Seven Secrets of Slim People ...