Wednesday Walk: Nick Offerman and My Wife
Nick Offerman dishes honest comedy and my wife dishes good food
Welcome to Willoughby Hills!
As is typical every Wednesday, today I’m bring you a smattering of topics that I hope will make you a bit more curious about the world around you and give you something to think about later.
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Two of My Favorite Folks
This week’s Wednesday Walk includes some ideas from two people that I greatly respect, admire, and frankly adore. Over the weekend, I was lucky enough to spend some time with both of them at once.
The people in question are my wife Seema and actor, comedian, author, woodworker, etc Nick Offerman. Both of them did some cool things for which I greatly admire them, and I wanted to chat about both of them today.
An Evening of Mirth
This story begins on the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation in Southeast Connecticut, home to Foxwoods Casino. I am not a gambler, but Seema and I made the trip to Foxwoods on a rainy Saturday night because Nick was slated to perform his comedy show at the casino.
We had seen Nick’s “All Rise” tour when he was in the Boston area in 2019, but haven’t been out to any comedy show since the pandemic started, so this was a bit of a special night on many counts.
I first met Nick about seven years ago while producing Ask This Old House. He made a guest appearance at our studio in the Boston area, then I made some subsequent trips to his wood shop in Los Angeles to film a tour of the space and to interview him for This Old House’s 40th anniversary special.
At the start of the pandemic in 2020, Nick agreed to be interviewed on my podcast. The conversation started by discussing filming during COVID, but soon turned to our shared interest in sustainable agriculture. Last year, he started reading this newsletter and then even recommended it through his Donkey Thoughts newsletter. (Many of you may be reading this right now because of that recommendation!)
Nick’s comedy stage show is unique and a bit hard to classify. He appears alone on the stage, mostly speaking, but sometimes playing guitar. It’s part stand-up comedy, part acoustic guitar concert, and part honest storytelling.
The main thrust of Nick’s latest show is calling out hypocrisy of all stripes. He talked about audience reactions to his character on HBO’s The Last of Us being gay and used it as a chance to denounce homophobia and online trolling.
He also discussed the lawsuit between Dominion Voting Systems and Fox News, pointing out the hypocrisy of conservative commentators who publicly supported violence in 2020 while privately discussing how crazy voter fraud theories were and how they don’t believe a word of it.
Some of this may seem partisan, and Offerman definitely leans liberal, but he doesn't come across as tribal either. He’s willing to see both sides of the issue and call things out for what they are.
There’s a moment in the show where he’s discussing people that identify as Christian but seem to follow the opposite of Christ’s example. Offerman mentions that he is an atheist and knows many atheists that live more kindly and generously than a lot of religious zealots. This line was met with thunderous applause from the crowd.
Offerman then follows up by saying that his parents are devout Catholics who still attend the same church where he was raised and that they also set an example for how to live a kind life. There was some applause for that line, but also some palpable confusion from the crowd. The notion of “good Christians” didn’t fit many in the crowd’s preconceived narrative and required seeing gray in a world of black and white.
But Nick doesn't preach or wag his finger. Instead, he attempts to reach people where they are, acknowledge our shared humanity, and our shared buffoonery. I much prefer this approach rather than people who try to undercut others or approach debates with an air of pretension.
I think part of the overall message in Nick’s show was that none of us really know what’s right in this world, so the best that we can do is care for those around us and resist the urge to stereotype, exclude, or “other.” It’s a simple message, but an important one, and one that is so absent from our current discourse.
After the show, we were invited to say hello to Nick backstage. We were with a group of maybe 10 people gathered in the green room for a reception.
I have to admit that I was taken aback when Nick introduced me to his other friends and described this newsletter as “Wendell Berry-esque.” I would take as high praise from any reader, but it was especially meaningful coming from Nick, as I have always admired (and at times emulated) both Offerman’s and Berry’s writing.
Nick also cited some of my recent posts that he enjoyed, including “Walk, Don’t Walk” about the sidewalks in Nashua, NH and the video tour of Downtown Crossing that I posted for paid subscribers last week. For me, a person who voraciously reads Nick and is inspired by him, it was humbling to hear that he also reads my work and seems to be getting something out of this newsletter.
I suppose part of the reason that I mention this is to encourage others out there to keep following your passion. Sometimes it can feel lonely to keep listening to that inner voice, especially when it’s unclear if anybody is even paying attention, but when you push through that doubt and stay true to what you believe, there are good things on the other side. That little exchange with Nick feels like proof of that.
Perhaps more importantly, the bigger lesson that I learned is the importance of staying true to what you think matters. There aren’t a lot of standup shows that invite you to contemplate your views on homophobia, racism, or destructive farming techniques. Nick could have just talked about airplane food or some other mundane aspect of life, but he followed his truth instead and I hope the audience left motivated to question some of their own assumptions and attitudes, perhaps spreading a little more kindness along the way.
Oh, and a random bit of serendipity from the evening. Foxwoods had ordered pizza for Nick and his guests in the green room. Strangely enough, it was from Regina Pizzeria, which I published an entire piece about earlier this month.
Seema Bites
A few days after the show, my wife launched a new and exciting project which I wanted to share with all of you!
If you’ve been following this newsletter for a while, you probably know that she and I began following a lectin free diet more than a year and a half ago. It started by hearing an interview with Dr. Steven Gundry who caught our attention with the belief that new methods of raising foods (herbicides like glyphosate in crops and high antibiotics in meat) combined with the loss of traditional preparation methods like fermenting have caused our gut health to get out of whack. This has led to major increases in chronic inflammation in our bodies, which has been linked to every disease you can think of including diabetes, autoimmune disease, cognitive decline, and even cancer.
Seema unexpectedly had cancer in 2019, despite living a “healthy” lifestyle and eating the “right foods,” so Dr. Gundry’s message resonated.
We began to follow his diet to see if it made a difference, which eliminated gluten, sugar, soy, corn, and required high quality meats and eggs from pastured and grass fed sources.
The truth is, it wasn’t very easy at first. As parents with two young kids, we were suddenly without breads, crackers, potato chips, or most other processed convenience foods.
Seema rose to the challenge and began learning new methods for making old favorites, swapping out all purpose flour for tapioca or cassava flour, using kohlrabi or turnips in place of potatoes, and using pasta made from millet instead of semolina. She seemed to have a knack for creating and adapting recipes that were compliant with Dr. Gundry’s program but were also really tasty and nutritious, often tasting better than the conventional equivalent!
About a year ago, she decided to launch an Instagram account and YouTube channel called Seema Bites to share her recipes. Many of our friends and family had noticed the positive changes in our weight and energy level and took an interest in our diet, but they also struggled with making delicious recipes that fit within the guidelines.
Through social media, Seema immediately began building a small community. We have been conscious about sourcing ingredients from local organic farmers and food producers as much as possible, and she has formed strong relationships with farmers in our area. But she has also connected with people around the world that wanted to try our way of living but needed some guidance or a push.
About two months ago, Seema decided that the time was right to turn Seema Bites into a fully fledged website, where she could organize her recipes and have them searchable. She’s spent nearly every evening for the last six weeks meticulously designing and planning her website until it was ready to share with all of you!
SeemaBites.com officially launched this week and she will be adding more recipes to it over the coming months.
I’m sharing this because I am proud of the work she has done to build a website from scratch with no design or programming experience. It really looks fantastic given that it was all done by her in her free time!
But more importantly, I really appreciate the spirit with which she’s approached this work from the beginning. She felt like she had a talent to share with the world and she decided to put it out there for free with the sole intention of helping other people. Even when she’s felt like throwing in the towel, she persisted because she thinks this work is making a difference.
In this way, there’s a parallel between what Seema is doing and what Nick is doing- they are putting their truths out into the world because they think it matters.
I hope you’ll take a moment to check out SeemaBites.com, or better yet, bookmark it and come back often as new recipes are added over the coming weeks.
And if you’re interested in learning more about our diet, I interviewed Dr. Gundry on the podcast last year and wrote a newsletter issue which explains more about how we eat now.
#NoNewClothes- Week 24
If you’ve been following the newsletter, you may know that I’m about midway through an experiment of not buying any new clothes this year. This began with a newsletter interview with Amory Sivertson, who undertook a similar journey last year.
A few weeks ago in this space, I wrote about “shopping” in my own closet and the joy that comes from rediscovering something that I’ve owned for a while but haven’t worn lately.
When I had initially planned to go see Nick Offerman’s stage show, I expected to be a face in the crowd who could wear a comfy flannel and not think much about it. But when I learned that Nick would have some time after the show to visit with me and my wife, I felt I needed to dress a little nicer.
Going for a full suit felt like too much, but just wearing a flannel felt too informal, and I was faced with the dilemma of having “nothing to wear.” I was tempted to break my own challenge and go shopping.
But I thought better, realizing I should try to live up to my own standard and “shop” in my own wardrobe rather than buy something new. Here’s the look I came up with:
The centerpiece of the outfit is a green wool sweater from Buffalo David Bitton. I bought it maybe 12 years ago. I always liked how it looked on me, but being made out of wool made it difficult to care for, so it was relegated to the back of the closet. Reading Patric Richardson’s book Laundry Love gave me more confidence to launder it correctly, so I decided to bring this sweater back into rotation.
I’m not a big sport coat person, but I felt like a sport coat could help tie my look together and make it just a tad dressier. The sport coat I ended up wearing was bought when I was a teenager and was somehow still in my closet. I literally don’t think I’ve worn it in 20 years, but it seems like it worked.
Rounding it out, I wore my standard Levi’s bootcut jeans and my Justin boots, which were made in El Paso, Texas. Both of these are the equivalent of an everyday carry, but for clothing. They’re the lower half of my daily uniform.
Making do with what’s on hand can sometimes feel like deprivation, but with a mentality shift, it can be empowering to realize just how much you already have and how little needs to be purchased.
Thank you for reading! Did you get something out of today’s issue? I always love hearing your thoughts, so please drop a line in the comments.
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Other Wednesday Walks
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Stay Safe!
Heath