Eating Habits of the Domesticated Geezer

Aging has placed few limits on an adventurous appetite.

Photo by Alice Pasqual on Unsplash

As the American political climate became more divisive and the national conversation devolved into a national hollering contest, food became the sole subject on which my family members could agree. We are all in favor of it. And then some.

Perhaps this is why I was shocked when a high school teacher, having one of her frequent pedantic moments, declared, “We are supposed to eat to live, you know – not live to eat.”

Not in my house! It was an unspoken but understood principle that eating was for pleasure and “living to eat” was not merely tolerated but encouraged. The joyless, bloodless, latent latter-day Puritanism of “eat to live” had no resonance in our home. Nor could I subscribe to a system that treated gluttony as a cardinal sin rather than the prime directive.

We are all products of our times. Both my parents were children during the Great Depression, when hunger was widespread. They were teens during World War II, when sugar, meat, coffee, butter, and canned goods were strictly rationed. So by the time they started a family in the 1950s, they were still celebrating their freedom from poverty and limitation. Food was abundant and affordable, the economy was in high gear, and they were passionate that their children would not face starvation – even for a few hours.

So like many in my generation, I grew up well-nourished and appreciative of tasty fare. My idea of “exotic” was tasting unfamiliar foods for the first time. To that end I pursued Chinese, Thai, Indian, Korean, Mexican, Venezuelan, Ethiopian, Greek, Afghan, Middle Eastern, and many other cuisines.

Appetite Adjustments

Today I remain epicurious, but my geezerhood status has forced me to make certain adjustments to my lifelong dining habits.

I would not call the adjustments extreme. I do not eat dinner at 4:30 pm., regardless of discount. I do not eat stewed prunes for breakfast. My wife and I do not order one entrée for the two of us. Yes, I still have all my teeth and they work quite well.

I do find, however, that I eat less now and feel satisfied. I suppose my appetite has finally fallen into line with a slower metabolism, and not a moment too soon.

Sacrifices Must Be Made

But there have been sacrifices, some of them made reluctantly. I have learned by painful experience, for example, that my digestive system can no longer tolerate Southern fried chicken or Thai dishes with a hotness factor of 5 or more. I avoid chocolate because it aggravates my acid reflux, as do orange juice, potato chips, carbonated sodas, and excess cheese. I have given up coffee, though I drink one chai latte each morning and try to convince myself it is equally effective. I don’t drink alcohol because it interferes with my medication. (Because of my abstinence from smoking, drinking, dancing, and cards, a few friends suspect me of secretly being a Southern Baptist.)

I still make a biennial pilgrimage to New Orleans to sample all the city’s signature dishes – gumbo, crawfish etouffee, Andouille sausage, jambalaya, oyster po’ boy, muffaletta, pralines, and beignets – but as a concession to my age, I limit myself strictly to three meals daily. The price for this orgy is equivalent to dropping an explosive charge into my intestines, but I endure the short-term distress willingly for the pleasures of the palate.  

Being married to a thoughtful and health-conscious vegetarian, my everyday diet is a healthy balance of whole grains, fresh vegetables, nuts, beans, and fish, prepared in dozens of innovative ways with the assistance of the New York Times Cooking website. Desserts are either fruit or non-existent. When I feel the urge to consume meat, I check in with my son. He is on the Paleo Diet and consumes regular servings of beef, pork, chicken, and mastodon in season. We  pay no attention to “superfoods” or the diet fad du jour.

All my adaptation to age are minor. None has taken the fun out of food. For as long as I am able – and I hope that’s a long time – I plan to continue to savor the tastes and textures of foods from many cultures and many great cooks. I live to eat because food continues to add pleasure and excitement to my life.

How has age impacted your eating habits?

Special thanks to Wayne Christensen at Vintage Morels for inspiring this post.