rethinking everything

It is often a scary thing to acquire knowledge. Over the past few months I have frequently thought back to childhood and the beautiful innocence of it. Becoming an adult changes a lot, and although I thought I would have realized that several years ago, some things are just now starting to become overwhelming. Responsibility always sounded like such a great word when I was going through the shaky teenage years, but now, I realize how much responsibility I am faced with daily. Every decision I seem to make is either me taking responsibility or not. Every decision I don't think to make is still me taking responsibility. This is what makes my head hurt. There are too many things to consider and research.

Perhaps I should start where this all did. Mark and I recently started a Netflix membership. We have quite a queue lined up and have already watched many. The past month or so, we have been on a documentary kick. This is mainly because of Mark, but also out of curiosity. As a result of these, we have been talking about a lot of issues neither of us ever seemed to be concerned or aware of. Issues such as the medical industry, cancer, antibiotics, recycling, dentistry, midwives, processed foods, organic food, toxins, chain restaurants, shots... and the list seems to be continually growing. Now, I grew up in a very conservative Christian home where I was taught wonderful, rational, and loving things, but for the most part, never was what I learned to consider an "environmental freak." This also typifies my husband's upbringing as well. Things have changed. Maybe it is the quarter-of-a-century birthdays that we are both facing this year, or the conversations about having a family and decisions we'll need to make. Whatever it is, we've both started to take a really hard look at things around us and our ideas of "normal" living and starting to get concerned and confused.

Now, I realize that documentaries are often very biased and some do not present both sides of the argument or even the whole truth about the favored side. But they have caused us to start thinking. A lot. And research has ensued. This is all great, right? Of course it is. We should be thinking for ourselves and examining what's put before us. But it is really terrifying as well. Neither of us want to become conspiracy theorists, as so many on the web like to call those who discuss a lot of the pitfalls of these issues, but at the same time when you start looking into these issues the "conspiracy" called greed becomes extremely prevalent.

So, the point of this seemingly rambling post, I'm not sure. I am not a verbal processor, contrary to the stereotype about women. I have been really struggling to process all these issues and my inability to verbalize all my thoughts to Mark has been a source of frustration to myself. So, perhaps by writing something down, things will find a way to start sorting in my head. Maybe I'll write a post on each of these issues as I research them and make decisions. Maybe that won't be necessary or desirable. I guess we'll see.

In addition here is a brief list of the movies that have caused this mess:
The Business of Being Born—about the birth industry, mother and baby safety, and the prevalence of midwives everywhere but the U.S.

Super Size Me—about fast-food chains (most specifically McDonald's), obesity, and the effects of processed food on the body

The Beautiful Truth—a not so well-done documentary but it brings up multiple issues about cancer treatment, antibiotics, dentistry and fluoride, and organic foods.

on the queue to come: Sicko, In the Womb, Maxed Out, and hopefully Food Inc.
on the bookshelf: Fast Food Nation, A Cancer Therapy