I haven’t eaten red meat for 40 years. I wish I could give up chicken (except free-range) but then I’m down to fish which seem a) tainted, and b) endangered. By the way, I don’t not eat meat mainly for health reasons but also because I had an epiphany walking through Les Halles at the age of 23 that eating meat is disgusting, arrogant, oblivious and unconscionably cruel. Moving on … I try increasingly to eat only organic veggies and fruit. Of course, I don’t, but the thought (and the anxiety) is always lurking. I am not afraid to eat great whole-grain bread. But I also eat the white kind. I wonder about the perils of cloning food but think it may come to billions eating cloned food or no food. I was just in Paris and am now in Berlin and, I have to tell you, I have not stopped eating. It was all delicious, and I never had the slightest frisson of fear. Moving on.

I am having a hard time as I eat out a lot and don’t trust anybody’s hands. Immigration and travel have introduced new bacteria and viruses everywhere. Now I can’t eat tomatoes and my friends in Europe won’t eat buffalo mozzarella so there goes Caprese salad. I eat little meat but now salmon is disappearing and you get signs in restaurants all over saying that it is and don’t eat it yet you see it on the menu. Anyway, mercury has invaded fish so I eat it a little less frequently. I may go back to Bill Blass’s heavenly meatloaf. I was never sure what was in that. I avoid lettuce except at home and we are into rewashing blueberries and soaking them in lemon juice so we aren’t surprised by spiders. It is a bummer. The worst of it is that I am not losing weight.

I do my treadmill on the boat and walk around every port and the only dessert I eat is a tiny — very tiny — scoop of chocolate chip mint that we make. But I am the same weight. Now even rice feels like I am taking food out of poor children’s mouths. And it seems a lot of things could be used for fuel to lower prices. There are so many reasons not to eat.

No. I try to eat healthy but I don’t pay much attention to where the food comes from so my "healthy" eating is probably leading to cancer. But then, so is everything else.

Are you kidding? No more than I ever did; I always only ate strawberries, corn, watermelon in season. These days organic is for rich people. I am not dedicated to food.

 

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