A Pipe That’s Not & Hoodwinking with Cheese to Gain Perspective

PROLOGUE: My Business Engineering blog has evolved into something that allows me to explore my cultural background as represented by food and the customs of the family table, my connections to what I am and where I live and sustainability, survival and culture in general. The exercise of concentrating the blog site’s original focus on how to become a better a "Marketing Engineer" has allowed me to focus on my marketing consulting skills. In the course of my postings, I was able to discover and understand what my original Business Engineering concept was really all about.

The hidden benefit of the marketing oriented blogging became a form of self-analysis. And, as such, I’ve discovered that I could pursue my passions of art, food/wine (sustainability) and marketing all in one blog: In Search of a Personal Stability Zone to explore our collective aspirations. Yes, the idea was inspired by Alvin Toffler’s book Future Shock. The blog’s new direction will hopefully allow me to describe directly what I’ve learned so far in life and, the posting topics will indirectly serve me as a launching point for what I’m currently pondering. The latest posting follows…

NEWEST POST: In the movie Kung Fu Panda, the main character, a panda named Po said to his Kung Fu master that the reason he didn’t quit was, “…because every time you threw a brick at my head or said I smelled; it hurt, but it could never hurt more than every day of my life just being me.” Am I suffering a mid-life crisis? No, I don’t think so. So, what’s with the introspection? Maybe it’s that I am older and hopefully a lot wiser. Perhaps Shakespeare said it best in this soliloquy (Macbeth Act 5, scene 5, 19–28)…

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

Why not merge work and play? Why not let our passion(s) be our guide? Why not do what we love? Because there’s usually no money in it! And, we all need an income. But, what if we could make a living doing what we love doing? If we could, would we strutting and fretting our hour upon this stage?

Marketing teaches us the principle of supply and demand. Is there a demand for a blog about someone’s thoughts and experiences in art, food/wine (sustainability) and marketing? As for my art passion, I’ll explore some of the World’s masterpieces and offer my perspectives on it or, what drawing is really all about and what it takes to develop the skills needed to develop as an artist.

Food and wine? I’ve spent a lot of time cooking for a living and for sheer enjoyment. My heritage has given me a solid culinary tradition with the appurtenant rites, rituals and celebrations. And, a tongue-in-cheek exploration of wine, a joke really, turned into something real interesting. Together, food and wine are, to me, the basis on which to delve into a sustainable life; not lifestyle. Of course, marketing is what I do to pay the bills but it is also the thread that connects these pearls.

These passions are what helped shape my life and I hope I have a steady supply of knowledge, experience and information to provide my readers. So, if I may, here’s my first attempt to tie all of these interests and passions into one neat bundle. ART – I’ll begin with Rene Magritte and his painting: Treachery of Images (La Trahison des Images), shown here. It was painted between 1928 and 1929. Magritte (1898-1967) was a Belgian surrealist artist popularly known for his thought-provoking images, which challenged the observers' preconditioned perceptions of reality.

In this painting, an ordinary object teaches us an invaluable lesson. The script under the image of the pipe - ceci n'est pas une pipe – in English it means this is not a pipe. It seems that the visual, a pipe and the text, this is not a pipe are a contradiction. To quote another famous artist, Pablo Picasso: We all know that art is not truth. Art is a lie that makes us realize truth. At least the truth that is given us to understand. This painting then, is not a pipe, it is an image; a painting if you will, of a pipe. I don’t think I could have found a better painting to illustrate my three passions. The Treachery of Images represents all art. It is an illusion. It is one individual’s interpretation of a subject or situation. It is more than it represents.

FOOD - Food and wine are two subjects that can also teach us that, they too are not all that they seem. Take French onion soup for example. It has reached a high status. It’s not considered diner fare. Yet, its origins may be found in abject poverty. Why else then would a culture glorify it? Many of our favorite dishes have their roots in poverty, necessity and sustainability. In this area, which is heavily populated by Portuguese, kale soup is an enigma wrapped in a mystery. It graces the average household and reigns as table d’haute in fine Lusitanian (Portuguese) restaurants. It is a soup that can be placed in a variety of recipe categories. It is the Portuguese equivalent of the Italian minestrone soup. It too is a hodgepodge of whatever is available. It represents an Old World culture of: waste not want not and offers us a valuable lesson is sustainability.

WINE - Wine has taught me much as well and I hope to share what I know and what I’ve learned with you. For example, the old wine merchants had a guideline which went as follows: Buy on apples - Sell on cheese. This adage suggests the true simplicity of wine. After all, according to the ancient Romans - in vino veritas – in wine (there is) truth. Buying on apples is from a marketing perspective, common sense. Apples strip a wine to its basic elements. The wine will either withstand the scrutiny of the (acidic properties) apple or it will not. Only those that pass the test are worth purchasing. As for the flipside of the coin; cheese is fatty. Serving it to enhance a so-so wine and entice a buyer who knows no better is not necessarily considered unethical. It is however, a good lesson in caveat emptor, another gift of the Romans which means – let the buyer beware.

I hope I’m off to a good start with this new blogging perspective as I search for my Personal Stability Zone and I hope inspire and assist you to find yours. In a world in constant flux, a place we can carve out in our heads or in our off-hours with significant value that offers a respite from the everyday is where I want to be. I hope to discover and share how we can all be more conscious of our decisions, reduce the stresses caused by the change and over-stimulation in our lives and occupy our homes and control us at work. We need another place, another environment, a zone of stability that allows us to accept or refuse, embrace or resist or, breakaway or run towards the forgotten ties that bind us. We need a place that offers us enduring relationships regardless of the insanity that assaults us every day, a - Personal Stability Zone. As with Shangri-La, it’s there if you look for it. I think it’s worth a shot to set off in search of it.

Cheddar Man – Local Hero

In 1903 in a place called Gough's Cave in Cheddar Gorge, Somerset, England, the skeletal remains of a man dating back to approximately 7150 BC were found. Yes, Cheddar, England is where Cheddar Cheese originated and has been made for about one thousand years. The remains are Britain’s oldest complete human skeleton and have been called, what else but, Cheddar Man.

In the 1990’s, the dawn of DNA testing, Cheddar Man and at least 20 residents of Cheddar had their DNA tested. Cheddar Man’s DNA was extracted from one of his molars. Cheddar Man was proven to be related to the living residents of Cheddar village, which brings us to the point of this posting. Cheddar Man was a local guy! His descendents didn’t wander too far from their ancestral home either.

What does it matter? A locality that is sustainable is a locality that sustains. If your location provides everything you need to survive such as food, shelter and clothing, why wander? Well, okay, what about the need to be self-actualized? A location’s culture must also be sustainable and sustained. I’ve written before that in this area, the south coast of Massachusetts, that our greatest export is educated youth. Even with a school system that others would envy, if there is no industry, commerce or enterprises for our young people to join, they will move on in search of employment.

Our economic system is such that a job or some form of livelihood is needed to fulfill our daily physical needs. We’ve got to work to buy food to eat to live. This area once subsisted on toil focused on the bounty of land and sea. The Industrial Revolution brought us the textile mills. Our standard of living increased with the nation’s. The automobile gave us mobile freedom and the suburbs (where the farms used to be). Are there Cheddar men amongst us? Are you one? I am not. One side came to New Bedford via Canada and Normandy. The other side came to New Bedford via the mountainous region of the Portuguese mainland. My roots in this area are only one hundred and thirty years old.

Yet, my ancestors brought what was local to them here. So, is local a place, a state of mind or something else completely? In the real estate profession the key factor in selecting the right property is location, or, as they like to say: location, location, location. Location requires locality. Locality is both a physical and an emotional sense of place. Where are you located? Where are you situated? Where do you live, work and play? How much and in what way does your current location sustain you?

Is self-reliance a benefit, an advantage or feature of your location? Is self-reliance a form of independence? Does change force us to change? Is change the result of external uncontrollable forces? Are we left to decide whether to change or be changed. Someone once said that what we are never changes. But, who we are never stops changing. Ben Franklin said we could only depend on death and taxes. In a letter he wrote in 1789 after the turmoil and triumph of the American Revolution he stated, “Our new Constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.”

Permanency, like that of the Cheddar Man and his modern cousins on his mother’s side is not certain. Alvin Toffler described that: The rate of turnover in our lives, for example, can be influenced by conscious decisions. We can, for example, cut down on change and stimulation by consciously maintaining longer term relationships with the various elements of our physical environment. Now, remember that Toffler wrote this in the Seventies, another period of turmoil and uncertainty in America.

He went on to say that: Thus, we can refuse to purchase throw-away products. We can hang onto the old jacket for another season; we can stoutly refuse to follow the latest fashion trend; we can resist when the salesman tells us it's time to trade in our automobile. In this way, we reduce the need to make and break ties with the physical objects around us.

We can use the same tactic with respect to people and the other dimensions of experience. There are times when even the most gregarious person feels anti-social and refuses invitations to parties or other events that call for social interaction.

He was talking about the creation of a “personal stability zone” in which: We consciously disconnect. In the same way, we can minimize travel. We can resist pointless reorganizations in our company, church, fraternal or community groups. In making important decisions, we can consciously weigh the hidden costs of change against the benefits. Perhaps stability is sanity?

Why else is it that when we find ourselves outside of our stability zone, home and hearth if I may, we either bring some of it with us or look for it, or something similar to it where we find ourselves? Why else is it that Hoo Mee Chow Mein Mix brings such joy to the expatriated south coast Massachusetts resident along with Portuguese sausage products and coffee syrup just to name a few stabilizers within our personal stability zones?

Perhaps it’s because we all need something we can identify with and with that thought in mind, I present for your sampling, the concept of food, location and sustainability. The more I post, the more (hopefully, I think) evolve. The more I evolve, the more I am convinced that in order to be truly happy, as I learned in Psyche 101, we need a sense of control, belonging and verifiable affection. So, for all of the other Cheddar “men” out there, please consider this: sustainability is anchored to locality. And, a sense of place is represented by what we share at the table. It is with this thought, or revelation, that I am contemplating shifting my thoughts on my vocation – marketing, to something that has always intrigued me – food!

To me, food defines my personal stability zone in many ways. It represents my cultural background, it is engaged in at my family’s table and it connects me to what I am and where I live. It is about sustainability, survival and culture. It allows me to describe directly what I’ve learned and supports me indirectly as a metaphor for what I’m thinking. And, it may redirect me to rename this blog to: In Search of a Personal Stability Zone to explore our collective:

• Conscious decisions
• Environmental relationship
• Ties to physical objects
• Social interactions
• Pointless reorganizations

As well as, perhaps assisting in the investigation in to the strengths and weaknesses of current or popular short-term and long-term investments that are supposed to benefit us rather than destroy us. So yes, what I am has not changed but who I am is changing – again.

They say, go with your passion and food and everything about it is a passion of mine but not, in a gourmet sense. Or, in any matter connected to traditional food writing but, more so, it is about the one personal stability zone we can control – the table. Here is where we are identified, how we identify with where we are right now and perhaps where we’re going. It is also a way for me to tie food, art and marketing into one package in one place just to sustain myself and my sanity.