I cajoled my daughter into letting me come get her from college and spend the weekend with me, so I made a plan to head down to Massachusetts to get her. Since she is out in western Mass, I knew I would be going along Route 2, and I knew that Walden Pond, where Henry David Thoreau wrote his famous book,
Walden, was just a few hundred meters off of Route 2.
Now you might say, what does Henry David Thoreau have to do with eating in convenience stores? If you have read
Walden, you might guess. But if not, let me share.
Thoreau lived in the woods for more than two years in a one room cabin he built with recycled wood that he hauled to the pond's edge. He mostly lived on beans that he grew himself, and water he drank from the pond. He was engaged in an experiment. To see how simply he could live his life, and what effect that would have on him. He writes about how people challenged everything about his experiment - was he lonely? didn't he need to eat meat? wasn't he bored? what important thing could he possibly learn? wasn't he wasting his time (and his Harvard education)?
Thoreau didn't care. He had a vision of what he wanted to prove. It was one part economic, nine parts spiritual. But I don't think the nine parts would have worked without the one. Economics is the yeast in the bread of
Walden. Without the economic challenge, the rest would have been meaningless.
One of my favorite lines from the book is where he says: "I know of no more encouraging
fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his
life by a conscious endeavor."
I've read
Walden several times. I've quoted the book more times than I can count. But I had never visited the Pond itself. So yesterday I decided to leave early in order to have time to visit the pond.
For breakfast I had cottage cheese (8oz, $1.75; 220 calories) and a couple of cups of coffee as I was getting ready ($0.28; 4 cal).
The drive from Dover to Concord took a little over an hour, and I realized by the time I got there that I was hungry, so I set out in search of a convenience store before I headed into the woods. I found Nine Acre Farm Convenience Store not too far from Walden. It was right next to a Dunkin' Donuts that I really wanted to go to, but I went to the store in stead. I bought a banana ($0.50; 90 cal) and a two bags of peanuts - one honey roasted, the other hot. I ate the banana and the honey roasted peanuts ($1.00; 480 cal) as an early lunch. Oh, and I bought a cup of blueberry coffee ($2.27; 5 cal). I know - who's heard of blueberry coffee? But it was actually not bad. I wouldn't want it everyday, but it was interesting. Anyway, then I headed over to the pond.
I hiked the perimeter of the pond, and visited the site where he had his cabin. I have more about this on my other blog here
http://recalcitrantegg.blogspot.com/2015/02/a-visit-walden-pond.html if you want to read about it. Good exercise walking in the snow. Wicked cold!
After hiking and visiting, I kept on heading down Route 2. I stopped a while later at the Fitchburg Circle K and bought a corned beef sandwich ($5.49; 335 cal), a small bag of Doritos ($0.50; 140 cal), and a sweet tea ($0.79; 140 cal). I wouldn't have bought the latter two items except they were included in the price of the sandwich, which must have really been 7 something, but when I got the receipt, this is how it was broken out. Some sort of sandwich meal deal thing. Anyway, I crashed a little bit on quality for lunch.
This is the thing - no one made me buy the junk. I like junk. I chose to buy the junk. I could have bought something else. I think there might have been a few stray pieces of fruit in the store. Or simply skipped the junk. But I didn't. Honestly, I was kind of grumpy because I had gotten lost (twice) looking for a gas station on two rural, not well marked exits before I stopped in Fitchburg. So I lost a bit of self control and indulged.
I picked up my daughter and headed back up to New Hampshire. We stopped at
Prime Mart on the way back because I needed another coffee. They had a separate coffee/donut counter in there, but clearly "Boston Donuts" was simply a "Dunkin Donuts" counter that had not paid its franchise fees, and thus reverted to a made up, in house brand. I bought coffee there ($2.46; 4 cal) with two cream ($0.00; 40 cal).
For dinner I had the left over chicken stirfry from Day 10 ($3.86; 404 cal).
Before bed I had an orange ($0.99; 63 cal).
It was an expensive, relatively unhealthy day. Carnage:
After 12 days, I think I can say it's possible to make better choices in a convenience store. A convenience store will never be a Whole Foods, but with a spirit of conscious endeavor, you can do better. But we'll see by the end.
These experiments I have engaged in are experiments in conscious endeavor. What are we capable of?
As Thoreau says, "Every man is tasked to make his life, even in its details, worthy of the contemplation of his most elevated and critical hour."
Day totals:
Cost: $19.88
Calories: 1,924
Exercise: 275 calories, mostly from hiking around Walden. I sat in the driver's seat for about six hours.
Weight: 169.9
