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LIFE OUTSIDE THE BIG BOWL

In the blurry hither-thitherness of our everyconvenience modern lives, with food made for us, thoughts thought for us and opinions spun for us, as we plunge our heads into the Big Media Toilet Bowl we can lose sight of the things that count, the real things out there beyond the Big Bowl that give meaning to our own actual everyminute lives, and that definitely includes ginger.

A couple of afternoons ago I was out in the blue cool, my mind still digesting the news wherein Captain Justice had captured the unparalleled ogre Saddam like a rat in a trap, the rest of me tenting the winter greens in anticipation of the weatherman-predicted heavy snow that would be falling that evening-- which snow it turns out (surprise) was not all that forthcoming (having more reputable plans than mere conformity to human forecasting), though we did get a bit of a bully north wind and very brief sleet-- as I was positioning the bamboo framework, at the edge of what remained of my consciousness I kept having to avoid the Oshoga (big ginger) roots bulging up out of the ground like tuberous elbows, nudging me for some reason that didn't register until at last, thank ginger, I pulled my head completely out of the Big Media Toilet: the ginger doesn't want to spend the winter in the ground under the snow and in the damp cold, it wants to be pickled in warm rice vinegar right now! Of course! It will turn pink with delight!

What a relief. I'd been feeling like the world was going to the dogs of war and the Big Media Toilet Bowl was where things really mattered, but as the ginger has since so fragrantly proven, the truly important things are going on all over everywhere, well outside the Big Bowl.

Here's a good recipe for Japanese pickled ginger.