Healthy Eating

My sister’s family eats very healthy food choices.  They eat a well balanced and healthy diet but eat plenty and it’s all delicious.  When I first got back to Oregon a month ago I stayed at their house for almost two weeks and adopted some of their good eating habits.  I’ve surprised myself by only having eaten red meat three times in the past five weeks… and in the past two days I’ve eaten no meat at all.  Not that I’m becoming a vegetarian or vegan.  I’m not morally opposed to eating red meat and have eaten it and enjoyed it often.  It’s just that the major cause of plaque in our arteries is animal fat from our diet.  The less animal fat you eat, generally the less plaque buildup you’ll have in your arteries.  And that equates to better heart function and health.  The amount of animal fat in my diet is an easily modifiable thing.  I have eaten delicious food the past few days that’s been easy for me to cook and been quite filling.  But there has been no meat at all for two days.  To a girl who grew up with a cow and pigs and chickens around that I knew we were going to butcher to eat, this is quite a change.  But a healthy one.  As I’ve turned 40, it’s really hitting me that I’m at that age where the normal changes of aging are going to start happening.  So I have to do what I can to delay them.  That’s not to say I’ll never again enjoy a nice juicy steak.  It just means I won’t be doing it nearly as often.

My new digs

I’ve been back in Oregon a for just over two weeks now.  I’ve been in my new condo that I’m renting for exactly a week now.  I’m incredibly happy to be back home and have not for one minute doubted that I made the right decision in coming home.  The patio of my condo is my very own private, quiet, wooded retreat.  A mama deer and her two babies come eat grass and leaves about fifteen feet from my patio every night.  Sometimes daddy deer with his small rack of horns comes by.  He surprised me this morning and cut through the path about two feet from the edge of my patio.  When I talk to any of the four of them they just perk their ears up and look at me for a minute, decide I’m not a threat, and go back to eating.  None of them are at all scared of people.  I’ve taken some pictures of these very friendly deer and will post them soon.  When I was a little girl and my dad would take us camping, I would sometimes wish I could live in the woods under large green trees in the peace and quiet.  I think I finally got my wish.  This condo complex is so incredibly quiet!  And green… and wooded… and beautiful.  It really does sometimes feel like I’m living in the middle of the woods.  But in reality, the hospital where I work is only a twenty minute drive away and there is a grocery store a five minute drive away.  I’m not in the middle of nowhere at all… it just feels that way.  At the moment I’m sitting outside on my patio with my laptop and watching three turkeys about twenty feet away walk through the grass.  When I first stepped outside this morning, I was greeted by birds singing to me so loudly I almost wanted to ask them to turn the volume down a little.  I couldn’t be happier with where I’m living.  And work is going well, too.  It’s off to a great start, with friendly coworkers and things falling into place like I had hoped they would.  But most of all, my sister and her family are here!  My younger  niece, the four year old, has asked a few times when she can come see my new house.  She actually has even asked about spending the night in the second bedroom.  Of course, my sister informed me if I take her overnight it has to be for a minimum of seven nights, so that might be a while before it happens.  But it’s great to be home!  I don’t believe I’ll be leaving again ever again other than for vacations and trips.  I’m just not moving away again… ever!