I’d like to make Frankfurt Green Sauce (Grüne Soße), but I cannot find the following fresh herbs for sale in America: salad burnet, sorrel, chervil, cress, and borage. While fresh Wagyu beef can be purchased across Japan, you’ll have to order it frozen online here in the States. Back in 2011, Caroline and I enjoyed a small wheel of Cendré de Lune or Ashes of the Moon cheese (a variety of brie) in Canada, and while it was one of the most magnificent cheeses we’ve ever experienced, it’s not allowed to be sold in the U.S. Visit Hungary and indulge your palate on some Mangalitsa pork, then ask your local grocery store to get some for you. Need some goose fat? You’ll be ordering that from France or the United Kingdom because you won’t find it on these shores. Maybe your recipe calls for some Crème Fraîche or Quark? I hope you have a local German store else you’ll likely be purchasing online from a company like the Vermont Creamery, which is one of the very few companies I can find in America that makes these products.

I used to think that America was the place where everything was possible and readily available, where our future was as big as the country is wide. Now, I look at Groningen, Utrecht, and Amsterdam in the Netherlands and how they are re-engineering their cities to be more accommodating to bicycles while cars are pushed to the edges of town. In Germany, the first bicycle highway is under construction, with ten cities being connected via a 100-kilometer (62-mile) stretch of road far away from cars. It goes without saying that the rail systems in Europe, Japan, and even China all make our aging rail infrastructure look like we haven’t progressed in 50 years. Oh yeah, that’s because we haven’t.

We have some amazing food in America, but it’s largely relegated to a dozen major metropolitan areas where restaurants that are not franchises can still exist if you are willing to pay for quality. I suppose it’s the same for nature where our bigger cities have incredible parks, but we can’t afford much more than a few trees, a small playground, a dog run, and if you are lucky, some lights for an evening stroll.

Last month, I wanted to sample some fountain pens before purchasing a new one. One might think that in the fifth-largest city in America, I’d find one pen shop, nope. While in the Frankfurt airport earlier this year, I stopped in the Montblanc pen shop but realized I wasn’t in the mood to drop $700 to $1500 on a new fountain pen. In the relatively small town of Weimar, Germany, with a population of 65,542, I had two shops to choose from (I considered various pens and ultimately bought one).

Maybe this is the way it’s supposed to be as we crash into the cultural phenomenon of diminished attention spans, accelerated time, and competition with the infinity of digital media that demands everything is done fast. Franco “Bifo” Berardi is likely right in his postulation that we have forsaken our ability to allow our senses to elaborate on what it means to indulge in quality and meaning. Slowing down must surely be a sign of mental illness because who has the time to nourish their soul? The funny thing is, it is the wealthy who still hold fast to the essence of luxury, where to enjoy something means taking one’s time to savor the indulgence.

Caroline and I are well aware of our obsession with the speed of information and the rapidity that which knowledge can flow into our lives, and yet we are also very alert to the fact that our senses are only truly satisfied when we are lingering on a quiet beach on the Oregon coast, rafting through a deep canyon in Croatia, touching the inner silk lining of a bagworm cottage, or tasting something as uncommon as Szechuan duck tongue. Reading a book, exploring a modular Eurorack synthesizer, or spinning yarn with a drop spindle are also ways we slow down. In this sense, we are able to explore the luxury experienced by the fantastically wealthy who can afford to give their time over to their passions.

Photo: Mangalitsa pig ears and tails being used to make pork broth.