What we talk about when we talk about Soylent

Who doesn’t love being in control of their destiny? Who doesn’t love food from a sealed tube?

Many years ago, I was talking to a friend on the phone while they were visiting Silicon Valley. They woke up after the friend they were staying with left for work, and they didn’t have a key to the apartment, so they couldn’t leave, go buy coffee or food and come back inside.

As we talked on the phone I could hear them shuffling around, opening cabinets and drawers.

“Ugh,” they said finally. “I’m trying to find something to eat, but all they have in all of these cabinets is Soylent.”

I don’t remember what they ended up doing: I think they had an instant oatmeal package in their luggage or something?

Or they might’ve just said fuck it and gone and gotten a banana or a bagel or something, resigned to having to spend the rest of the outside while their friend was at work.

The only thing I remember for sure is they definitely didn’t drink any Soylent.

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Last year at the peak of my “not great mental health summer,” in the middle of a move, I found myself at Walgreens with no plan for groceries. I bought five bottles of Soylent, one of the items in the “health food” refrigerator section, next to the mini cheeses. It comes in a bottle, not a tube, but the plastic itself is reminiscent of gogurt, not in…