“The Other Place,” an essay by faculty member Megan Staffel, appears in the Spring 2013 issue of Cerise Press.
When I went to graduate school in the seventies, there was a benign, laissez-faire attitude in the culture. The sixties were over. The Vietnam war had been brought to a close, and by the end of the seventies, a farmer from Georgia who was not only a pacifist, but a forward-looking thinker, occupied the White House. For a progressive, there was not much in the public life of the nation to inspire outrage. Carter instituted energy saving initiatives that made everyone, liberals and conservatives alike, in 1978, acknowledge that fossil fuels were limited and conservation was necessary. The speed limit was set at 55; thermostats were lowered to 68. We liked peanuts because that was what our president grew on his farm, and at least in my circles, we also liked small cars, down-filled vests to wear in our cooler houses, and meals featuring tofu. I was twenty-six and married, and just before I sent in my applications for graduate school, I hesitated: maybe I should dedicate my life to the soybean?
