That Vegan Thing

Over the past few months, I've been eating more and more like a vegan. I've been eating less dairy and eggs because they cause me digestive problems. I get along fine that way (I'm one of those people who really likes tofu) and I really appreciate the fact that foods without cheese and cream are also lower in calories. Although I consider myself a vegetarian (for about the past 12 years), I do eat fish and seafood occasionally.

My food choices have thus far been primarily about health. I originally stopped eating red meats because of a family history of colitis. As mentioned above, avoiding dairy and eggs keeps me from having health issues, too. Though I do value the fact that I'm not personally contributing to animals living in cramped and unhealthy conditions, I know that vegetarianism isn't for everyone.

A couple of nights ago, though, I had a dream which involved a pool of water being formed (temporarily) on my Aunt's driveway. When the water was drying up, there were three large salmon flopping around in the evaporating pool. My companions and I knew they would die soon, and I was given a knife and told to put them out of their misery. I just couldn't do it, though, and I handed the knife off to someone else, covering my eyes and turning away. The question that ended the dream was "well, should I be eating fish, then?"

Today I went out to lunch with my parents at a local diner, which isn't particularly vegetarian-savvy. This is the type of situation where I might normally have a haddock sandwich or some such thing, but after that dream, I couldn't do it. I'm not sure what my long-term decision on this is, but for the moment at least, I'm feeling that I've made a further step down the vegan path.

[As a footnote, if vegan food interests you, there's a really cute blog about it that I've linked here, called The Vegan Lunchbox.]