The GAIA Health Blog

Some Healthy Food Fun:    The Wanderlust Food Diaries (of a chronic daydreamer)

"In a Big Country"
(Remembering my time in Connecticut
.....with the East Coast Lighthouses)

On the menu  Lobster Rolls
Video How to Make Lobster Rolls
Music  The song "In a Big Country", and more music by the band "Big Country"

“I'm not expecting to grow flowers in the desert, but I can live, and breathe, and see the sun in wintertime.....”
“In a Big Country, dreams stay with you, like a lover's voice, sparks the mountainside.....Stay Alive”
--Stuart Adamson (of the band "Big Country")

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I didn't know until I left Connecticut that there, I was at the crossroads of my life.

How I loved those drives from Hartford down to Yale University in New Haven. Traversing the whole state in less time it take to get through a Chicago rush hour.

To this day I still laugh at my first trip down to New Haven, walking through "The Hood" looking for Yale University, asking some "Gangster Type", but friendly brother how to get to Yale, and on my oath, he had no clue where I was asking about. He thought I was saying "Jail" and tried to direct me to some Juvenile Court.

He was a cool dude though, we actually chatted for a half hour before I went on my way to hang out at Yale.

Funny stuff, but even funnier how I realized how at ease I was talking to the brothers in "the hood" as I was talking to the Ivy League Yale students at a coffee shop on campus later on that day. I suppose that was the day I realized I was free....free to just be me, go wherever, and do whatever, free to be the real Doug no matter who I run across or where I go.

And there's gonna be a lot of places to go, this is a big country.....

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I always had a fascination with lighthouses, and though the general concept probably applies to all boys, most inner city African American boys, like me, always pick two or three arbitrary things out in that vast mysterious world, things that we never got to see [except on TV] growing up in claustrophobic, inner city, low income housing....

......and we become fascinated with them forever, mine were lighthouses, tall sailing ships, and horses.

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Fastforward from boy to man, summer of 2011, fate and destiny has me working in Connecticut after being laid off from my job in my hometown of Chicago, and I had a date with a girl, whose name I actually can't remember, we drove out to Rhode Island, I wanted to take a look at a few cool lighthouses.

I thought it would be cool to have lunch up in the tower of one, or perhaps, if lucky, my other fantasy, make love with a woman inside the tower of some lonely lighthouse during a storm, with lighting and crashing waves and all that. Not sure what that's about, I suppose the manly version of a boyish fascination with lighthouses.

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The girl, whatever her name was, didn't really "move my molecules" enough to make the "Lighthouse Lovemaking" thing happen, but it was still the most fascinating day, me standing what felt like two inches tall staring up at these awesome giants.

My childhood imagination manifest right in front of my eyes. Gazing upon one of the ones we visited, I muttered to myself, standing next to "what's her name", "How the hell do they build that thing 200 feet out in the water?". She said "I'm sorry, what did you say?". I said "Nothing, Nevermind", she was totally killing my moment.

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I also had the best sandwich of my life at a seaside joint on the coast of Rhode Island. Huge chunks of spicy lobster piled high on an oversized hotdog bun. Impossible to eat with one hand. Accompanied [of course] by the perfect cold glass of beer.

Lunch out on warm, breezy, pier, fresh sea air, looking at the quaint scenery and fishing boats. Lightouse standing majestically off on the horizon. Sometimes, the vision you had as a boy is right in front of you in living color, exactly as you pictured it. I forgot the girl's name, but will never forget the first bite of that Sandwich. I felt it in my spine. Out there, they call them "Lobster Rolls". A "Big Sandwich" for a "Big Country"..............

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Lobster Rolls

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Lobster Rolls

** 1 pounds of lobster meat or canned lobster
** juice of 1/2 Organic Lemon
** 1 celery stalk sliced
** "Quality" Bread, a large style roll or bun (everyone is at a different place with bread, so pick your own)

** Optional Grass Fed Butter for Buttering Roll
** Optional Tabasco
** 1/8 cup more or less chopped tarragon spice
** 1/8 cup more or less chopped chives (or diced scallions)
** pinch or two of Pink Himalayan Salt (AVOID TABLE SALT!!!)

...see video for instructions on making Lobster Roll

3 Ingredient HomeMade Mayo 

recipe here

(none of the store bought mayos have acceptable oils, most are canola and or soybean oil BOTH IF WHICH I AVOID!!!!)

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......I know my music selection confuses my "Hip-Hop" family and friends sometimes, but don't try to figure out
why "Big Country" is one of my all time favorite bands. Sometimes I just have to dance to a different tune :) 

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Sometime people don't get me because sometimes I talk "metaphorically", speaking of a material object, but in reality looking at the spiritual principle that the external object represents.

Only two or three close friends ever know where I'm coming from, but I realized there is an obvious metaphor with lighthouses as pertains to my journey. I didn't ask to be journeyman, living in 4 states in the past 4 years, but here I am. Connecticut was a crossroads in that I had no idea why I was destined for this journey, and had no Idea where I was going or why. But looking back in all that has happened all the places I've traveled, I know for sure this "god-thing" as I call it has always been my lighthouse. Me, the ship always sailing dangerously close to the jagged rocks of life, always vulnerable to crashing and destroying my vessel.

But that "heavenly lighthouse" has always been there, its bright beacon always guiding me into a safe port. There is so much "metaphoric sailing" in treacherous waters left to be done I'm sure, but I always know that lighthouse will guide me home....wherever home may be..............

~stay healthy~

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"Sail Forth. Steer for the deep waters only. Reckless O soul, exploring. I with thee and thou with me. For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared go. And we will risk the ship, ourselves, and all." --Walt Whitman

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"The Wanderlust Food Diaries"

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