à la carte spirit by ilona fried
Food
A Recipe for Life: Zero Expectations + Zero Judgments + Endless Curiosity
I am in Florence, Massachusetts, a small town once home to a silk mill, named after the Italian city. As an experiment in rural living, I’m renting the lower part of a secluded home surrounded by woods, with no other residence in sight. The mailbox is a five minute walk down a narrow, winding driveway. … Continue reading
An Apology to Oatmeal
For much of my life I didn’t want to go near oatmeal, the Birkenstocks of food: good for you but an aesthetic disaster. Dull of hue and bland of taste, what was there to love? Oatmeal conjured thoughts of gruel, served to Oliver and his fellow orphans in Dickensian England, or porridge, something thick that … Continue reading
When an Introvert Walks into a Bar…Learning How to Act Like a Local in Spain
Travel can reveal some painful paradoxes. While I visit other countries to experience different cultures and see how other people live and eat, I have less curiosity about my own country. I often feel estranged from Americans who are proud to be locals and have inherited or developed a pride of place. I never derived … Continue reading
How a Fungus Helped Me “Functionally Integrate” Myself
When I began walking on the same trails in the same woods, I wanted to see if I could transform my addiction to novelty-seeking by cultivating pleasure in one place. To return to a familiar patch of ground felt like a constraint in a Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement lesson, where the strategic use of limitations … Continue reading
When a Transit Annoyance Morphs Into Adventure
When I think about Boston’s MBTA, my soul shrivels. Having enjoyed far more efficient and pleasant transit in other countries, its squeaky trains, delayed buses and cumbersome kiosks grate on me. Yet, in avoiding it I’ve constrained myself. Driving into the city and finding parking is stressful and costly. Using Uber adds up. Since I … Continue reading
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