A few years ago at a bachelorette party, the group of us girls went to a steak house for dinner, and I ordered a salad. The girl sitting next to me looked stunned and said:
A: You got a salad?
Me: Yeah. It's really good!
A: Why did you just get a salad?
Me: I'm a vegetarian.
A: Are you allergic to meat?
(side note...is that even possible? it might be possible, i don't know, but it just sounds really weird)
Me: No, I just think it's kind of gross to eat a dead body.
A: But don't you know that meat is good?
(wow.)
Me: Well, I've actually never been a huge fan of meat anyway so it was easy for me to give it up.
A (sounding confused): But....there's cheese on your salad.
Me (even more confused): ......Well......I'm just a vegetarian, not a vegan.
She paused, gave me a blank stare, turned her back to me and started talking to the girl on her other side. I guess the vegetarian lifestyle isn't understood by everyone.
My off-and-on vegetarianism began in 7th grade. The choice back then was really just following along with my best friend who wanted to stand up for animal rights, which I had much less passion about than she did. So it was only about a month or two later that I was staring at the menu at McDonald's trying to decide between a garden salad, or chicken nuggets. The chicken nuggets won that battle and my animal rights movement went down the drain.
That became a pattern for me every few years...not eating meat for a month or two but ultimately realizing that it was just easier to eat meat, even though it was kind of gross to eat a dead body. So I guess this proves that I'm just lazy and am more strongly influenced by convenience rather than conviction.
This last time around, at the age of 26 I decided once again to stop eating meat. And by this time there had been so many advances in soy over the years that I thought it would be an easy switch for me...and it was...but I also fooled myself into thinking that all this new soy would provide the key I had previously been missing in making the lifestyle actually stick for life.
But now I am once again "off" vegetarianism, much in part to my husband's love of meat, and also due to my accidental meat-eating a couple years ago that made me say, "Screw it. I'll just start eating meat again." It happened at work one Saturday. As a "thank you" to everyone who had come in to work that weekend, the boss bought Jimmy Johns for everyone for lunch. It was a catered platter with a variety of sandwiches. I took one that looked like a veggie...all I saw was cheese and lettuce. But when I bit into it, I discovered that there was tuna fish buried under the lettuce. And it was delicious! So I was torn. I had devoted 3 years to not eating meat, and I still wanted to be a vegetarian, but now there was this blemish on my not-eating-meat record. The damage had been done. I didn't know what to do. And it continued to bother me for a few more days after the tuna fish incident, until I was on my way home from work later that week and had a huge craving for a turkey sandwich. I gave in. So much for conviction.
Sometimes I still think about going back to that lifestyle, but ultimately, I'm not sure why I really would. I know it would just end up the same way that it always has. Not having a passionate reason for choosing vegetables (or in my case lots of pasta) over meat has really been my downfall. I should just accept the fact that even though I don't love meat as much as I feel that a meat-eater should, that doesn't mean that I have to stay away from it all together. It's perfectly fine to still eat vegetarian meals whenever I feel like it and yet not consider myself a vegetarian.
But on days like yesterday, waiting in line for my turkey burger at our office cafeteria, I was horrified as I watched the cook put raw pieces of chicken on the grill; all slimy with spots of blood in them and fat stuck to the edges. It made me want to throw up. And it's in those moments that I think I might prefer to be a vegetarian again...at least for a little while.
Friday, July 29, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
Naive
I've always been very trusting, and expect the best intentions from people. I'm still a bit of a push-over at times, but I'm working on that. And I've learned to pick my battles (which means that I do fight back sometimes). But this is a pretty recent notion for me...within the last year...that I've started standing up for myself and saying what I really feel. My husband calls me "Assertive Lauren" during these moments of expression.
But a few years ago, my naive self got sucked into doing something that I didn't really want to do, and was just too nice to say no. Before I get into the details of this situation, let me give you some background...
I began taking dance lessons at the age of 10 and, unknown to me, had a very neglectful teacher. It wasn't until the age of 14 when a new teacher came along that within the first few minutes of the first class with this instructor, he stopped the class to point out a mistake that I was making...bending my knees pointing them straight forward while my feet were turned out to the side. Proper technique would have been knees over your toes, so knees pointed to the side. The new teacher corrected my error and said that if I kept doing things the wrong way, I might really mess something up. But by then, after 4 years of dancing that way, the damage had already been done. I went to see an orthopedic doctor and was diagnosed with malalignment of both knees. Each of my kneecaps is dislocated in 4 different directions and my legs have grown crooked. There is no way to correct the damage that's already been done (surgery isn't even guaranteed), but by keeping my legs strong, I can prevent my legs from getting worse. So a few years ago, this prompted me to join a gym.
And here is where my naivety comes into play. As a "thank you" for joining the gym, they gave me a free personal training session. I was told that the trainer would show me around the gym and instruct me on how to use the equipment, especially focusing on the machines I was really interested in to meet my goals (leg machines). So I went to my free session and it was awesome! The trainer was really friendly, funny, helpful, and he actually seemed to care about me and getting my legs stronger. I thought I would be walking away with the knowledge that I needed to start working out on my own.
But at the end of that free session, he said, "So, how would you like to sign a contract with me to have regular training sessions?" What? I was stunned. Stunned by the question and stunned by the fact that I hadn't seen this coming. The question honestly hit me like a punch in the face...totally unexpected. So this left me feeling very uncomfortable, not knowing what to say, not wanting to spend the money on personal training sessions, but not wanting to say no because I would have felt bad for wasting this guy's time. So I decided the easiest thing to do was to just say "yes." I signed up for 4 sessions and thought to myself that at the end of that month, I just wouldn't renew the contract. But what would make me think that a month would have been enough time for me to grow a pair, stand up for myself (and my budget) and say no? So of course after those 4 sessions when he asked me to sign up for 4 more, I once again said "yes." And so it went for months, and months, and months.
But after that first 2 or 3 months, I really started to notice a change in my strength. My trainer kept pointing out to me how much more weight and reps I was able to handle. And the best thing about working with a trainer was that, if I had been doing it on my own, if I started to get worn out, I would have just quit. But working out with him, he was able to help me lift some of the weight when it got harder for me, and he kept pushing me to keep going. Giving up was not an option.
It became something that I looked forward to going to. And in addition to being a great trainer, he became a great friend too. Only a year or two older than me, we had a lot in common, had similar personalities and senses of humor. And it didn't take him long to realize that I had a lot of crazy, funny, interesting stories to tell. Our sessions would always start off with a warm-up on the stationary bike which I would start on my own when I got there, and he would meet up with me when he was done with his previous session. So he would walk up to me on the bike and ask the same question every time..."Stories?" And that was the beginning of the most fun hour of my week.
So here are my stories for you to enjoy...
But a few years ago, my naive self got sucked into doing something that I didn't really want to do, and was just too nice to say no. Before I get into the details of this situation, let me give you some background...
I began taking dance lessons at the age of 10 and, unknown to me, had a very neglectful teacher. It wasn't until the age of 14 when a new teacher came along that within the first few minutes of the first class with this instructor, he stopped the class to point out a mistake that I was making...bending my knees pointing them straight forward while my feet were turned out to the side. Proper technique would have been knees over your toes, so knees pointed to the side. The new teacher corrected my error and said that if I kept doing things the wrong way, I might really mess something up. But by then, after 4 years of dancing that way, the damage had already been done. I went to see an orthopedic doctor and was diagnosed with malalignment of both knees. Each of my kneecaps is dislocated in 4 different directions and my legs have grown crooked. There is no way to correct the damage that's already been done (surgery isn't even guaranteed), but by keeping my legs strong, I can prevent my legs from getting worse. So a few years ago, this prompted me to join a gym.
And here is where my naivety comes into play. As a "thank you" for joining the gym, they gave me a free personal training session. I was told that the trainer would show me around the gym and instruct me on how to use the equipment, especially focusing on the machines I was really interested in to meet my goals (leg machines). So I went to my free session and it was awesome! The trainer was really friendly, funny, helpful, and he actually seemed to care about me and getting my legs stronger. I thought I would be walking away with the knowledge that I needed to start working out on my own.
But at the end of that free session, he said, "So, how would you like to sign a contract with me to have regular training sessions?" What? I was stunned. Stunned by the question and stunned by the fact that I hadn't seen this coming. The question honestly hit me like a punch in the face...totally unexpected. So this left me feeling very uncomfortable, not knowing what to say, not wanting to spend the money on personal training sessions, but not wanting to say no because I would have felt bad for wasting this guy's time. So I decided the easiest thing to do was to just say "yes." I signed up for 4 sessions and thought to myself that at the end of that month, I just wouldn't renew the contract. But what would make me think that a month would have been enough time for me to grow a pair, stand up for myself (and my budget) and say no? So of course after those 4 sessions when he asked me to sign up for 4 more, I once again said "yes." And so it went for months, and months, and months.
But after that first 2 or 3 months, I really started to notice a change in my strength. My trainer kept pointing out to me how much more weight and reps I was able to handle. And the best thing about working with a trainer was that, if I had been doing it on my own, if I started to get worn out, I would have just quit. But working out with him, he was able to help me lift some of the weight when it got harder for me, and he kept pushing me to keep going. Giving up was not an option.
It became something that I looked forward to going to. And in addition to being a great trainer, he became a great friend too. Only a year or two older than me, we had a lot in common, had similar personalities and senses of humor. And it didn't take him long to realize that I had a lot of crazy, funny, interesting stories to tell. Our sessions would always start off with a warm-up on the stationary bike which I would start on my own when I got there, and he would meet up with me when he was done with his previous session. So he would walk up to me on the bike and ask the same question every time..."Stories?" And that was the beginning of the most fun hour of my week.
So here are my stories for you to enjoy...
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