The Search Should End Here, But it Won't

I found the perfect pair of shoes for work. They are flat, comfortable, look great with my pants and ON SALE. I was psyched. I was searching for the perfect shoe for months now. I know, I know, you are asking yourself, "Where is this going?" Here is the deal. The girl at the shoe store went to get me the other shoe in the back only to discover that the style was discontinued and the other shoe was sent back, while the display shoe sat out on the shelf. In other words, I could have bought the shoe, but I would have only been able to buy one. So, I am thinking, bummer but not a big deal. I come home and search the web only to discover that this shoe is only for sale at Journeys.com, they do not have my size, plus it is backordered. What a total bummer. Oh, well... the search continues. Regardless of what happens next, I will always be thinking of this shoe. This is where I plug the public announcement.... spread this message. If anyone out there sees this shoe, BC- Double Dare You, any color in size 5, 5.5 or 6, please call me, or just buy them for me and I will pay you back. Thanks.

Confessions of a Lacto-Ovo Aquatarian- Part TWO

It was June 2002 and I was in China when I first started to fancy the idea of living a meat free life. I was 20 and dating this guy who was devoted to an organic/natural lifestyle and was educating me about hormones, antibiotics, artificial colors, flavors and preservatives. It was all so fascinating that I became quickly intrigued with him and what he had to teach me.

While in China that summer I started abstaining from meat. I was curious as to how the livestock was being treated, the feed it was eating and the amount of fecal matter that may or may not make it's way into the animal's feed lots. I became obsessed with being grossed out by meat, but not all meat at this point. I was still eating organically raised animals. In September 2002 I started working at Whole Foods Market and my curiosity about the benefits of being a vegetarian were confirmed and supported by not only my co-workers, but the company as a whole. It was easy to abstain from meat when there was so much freshly prepared vegetarian dishes all around me.

October 8, 2002 was when I officially declared myself a pescatarian. My plan was that I was going to use pescatarianism as stepping stone to full out vegetarianism. Years later I was still in the same place I had started... my problem was that every time I tried to go that extra step I would feel hungry and deprived. Going out to a restaurant would leave me with the option of a salad or pasta. The salad would leave me hungry and the pasta would leave me feeling starchy and fat. I was able to cut out milk and survive on a steady stream of soy milk and cheese was an occasional treat. One thing was clear to me in the very beginning--if I wanted to be a full blown vegetarian I would have to actively seek out store and restaurants that would serve me something other than salad and tofu. As long as I was working at Whole Foods I knew I would be okay, there was an abundance of choices there that I never seemed, in my 3 years of being an employee, to get sick of. It was what happened post-WFM that made me start to think that eating was not fun anymore . . .

So tacky that it isn't even sticky

Walking down my street yesterday, it was a cold almost spring day and some flowers, like daffodils, hyacinths and tulips were starting to break the surface of the soil. That is when I saw the most unusual flowers and in full bloom. I stepped up onto the sidewalk and that was when I was close enough to see that they weren't unusually early blooming flowers at all. They were fake flowers that were planted in front of the house. Faded and tattered I thought to myself, Why would anyone do that? PLANT fake plants OUTSIDE. And while I am on the subject... why would anyone have fake plants at all? I was left baffled and a little satisfied because I felt in that moment that I had just witnessed something tackier than pink plastic lawn flamingos... and on MY street... Now, that's something to be proud of.

Confessions of a Lacto-Ovo Aquatarian- Part ONE

It's 12:18 p.m. on a rainy Wednesday afternoon in Hackensack New Jeresey and I am sitting at my desk eating a ham sandwich that I just made. The bread feels soft, yet lightly crisp on the outside while the ham squeezed between is cold and slightly damp. I bite into the bread, into the meat and then pull back and chew, quickly swallowing, hoping that I don't change my mind and throw the sandwich away. I thought all morning about the decision to change my diet of 5 years and 6 months. At 7:40 a.m. in Englewood New Jersey, while cutting ham to go into a salad for my fiance's lunch, I heard myself say aloud, "I think I will eat meat today". How did 5 and a half years of abstaining from meat come to this? Was I an unhappy vegetarian or just waiting for a moment when no one was judging to snatch a piece of meat?

The strange thing about being a vegetarian is that people who are not vegetarians feel a need to judge your eating habits. "So do you eat eggs?" they would ask.. "Yes, I am a lacto-ovo vegetarian, so I eat eggs and milk", "But isn't that from an animal?" they would reply, "Yes, but I am not a vegan", and deep inside I would be screaming, "Who are you to judge me just because I choose to not eat certain things and eat others, I don't need to explain myself to you, are you the vegetarian police now? You stupid fuck." But instead I would explain the different types of vegetarianism and explain that vegetarianism is an umbrella and underneath that umbrella there are vegans, who do not consume any animals directly or indirecly, which means that they do not eat animal byproducts. And then there are lacto-ovo vegetarians who eat milk and eggs, but usually these individuals choose to eat organic or natural milk and eggs and there are also aquatarians which is a term for vegetarians who also eat seafood. But the conversation would never be over just then. They would ask me to justify my reasons for eating seafood, but not land animals, which would get us into the tiresome conversation about the hole in the ozone, the amount of water and grain used to produce one pound of protein from beef, the inhumaine treatment of livestock, the hormones, antibiotics and additives that go in so many meats and then of course the conversation would end, if it ends, with heart disease. But none of this explains how I came to abstain from meat in the first place . . .

No need to rush--- Hey, where's the fire?

August 17, 2008 is 5 months away and Jeremy and I are imagining a wedding day full of happiness, complete with our closest family and friends. However, on the flip side, the day is looming over our heads as the cause of great stress and anxiety as we try to tie all the strings together while juggling our ever changing lives.

Jeremy is enjoying his new job at MLB.com, while ConnWebMedia is in new and rapid bloom. I am in the process of attaining my teaching certification through an alternate route program, while searching for a full-time teaching position for September, and trying to complete my conversion in time for the wedding. We want to be able to look back on our young lives as a time of joy and appreciation for where we are and where we are going. However, right now looking back on the past year and a half all we can see is moving, job changing and rushing, rushing, rushing.

It took a lot of time and deep discussion to come to the conclusion that there is no reason that we need to rush our wedding day. As a result, we will be postponing our wedding to make time to achieve the immediate goals we have set for ourselves.