My Dog is Chelsea

Several people have asked me: “How was it?”

The answer: “It was totally awesome.”

But first—just how did I score tickets to Michael Pollan’s totally awesome and totally sold-out Tuesday night appearance? Well, there is a freeze on annual raises at my job, and my boss gave me these tickets in lieu of a raise as part of my annual review. She offered them to me tentatively: “It’s just a small token, so don’t get too excited,” she warned. I opened up the envelope and pulled out two tickets that each carried two magic words: MICHAEL POLLAN.

“Omigod omigod omigod!” I shrieked like an 11-year-old. “OMIGOD!!!”

My boss looked a little surprised. She had been expecting a look of feigned interest, or at best a polite smile—and instead it was as if she’d just handed me two plane tickets to Fiji.

“He’s my favorite—I’ve been obsessed with reading his—he’s one of my—I love his—He’s—He’s—He’s—” I had lost my ability to speak. “He’s my hero!” I blurted.

He is my hero. He is doing with his life what I only wish I could—researching and writing about the food industry. His work is engaging, well-written, funny, inspiring and exhaustively researched. In short, he is awesome.

Which is why it should come as no surprise that his Tuesday night lecture was totally awesome. If you are familiar with his work, you wouldn’t have found his speech particularly new or groundbreaking, but no matter. It was enchanting nonetheless.

Here’s the part that moved me the most:

Someone from the audience asked what his hopes were for change with the incoming Obama administration. Pollan responded by saying that he has seen some encouraging signs—most notably, Obama’s mention of Pollan’s recent New York Times Magazine article—but that he suspects that Obama doesn’t feel like there’s enough popular support for an overhaul of the food and agriculture industries. He told the story of a chef friend of his who had recently cooked a meal for Obama. This friend had asked the President-elect about whether he had plans for tackling the food industry.

Obama had responded: “Show me the movement.”

Really? Is that all it will take? To show him the movement? If we can prove to Obama that there are enough Americans who want a better food system, then he will stand up to the agribusiness and food processing lobbyists and demand that WE’VE HAD QUITE ENOUGH of corporate interests being placed ahead of the health and livelihood of everyone else?

I sure hope that’s all it will take. Because for crying out loud, there’s a movement.

Go ahead: show it to him.