My meatless life

I’ve been a vegetarian since I was 13 years old.

One summer, I went to a vocal music camp, and the meat was so incredibly foul that I couldn’t even stand the smell of a hamburger on the grill (formerly my favorite food) for weeks. As a chubby and very awkward middle schooler, I suddenly happened upon what seemed like my salvation. Vegetarianism would not only make me skinnier and prettier, but it would also make me cool and mysterious, in an eighth-grade kind of way.

Fast-forward about seven years, and it seems to have stuck.

However, where I once treated my meat abstinence as a sort of trendiness-increasing factor, I now have a very different attitude.

To start, I’m not the stereotypical paint-slinging, murder-yelling PETA person.

Sure, I love all the cute mammals people regularly slaughter. Fish and birds and crustaceans are also endearing in their own slightly more gross way. But my vegetarianism isn’t solely motivated by the fact that I’d like a perfect world in which all animals lived fluffy, happy little lives in their natural habitats.

That would be great, but I agree with my critics that it’s a little unrealistic.

Things are gonna get eaten. It happens.

I’m also not a health nut. Being a vegetarian has certainly forced me to eat pretty healthy, and I’m fairly sure that I’d be about 10 pounds heavier if I ate meat. By default, a lot of vegetarian food forces you to get lots of vitamins and minerals and fiber and vegetables and things of that sort, but I’m not religious about it.

I’m not going to cut all animal products out of my diet and call myself a vegan. I’m not going to go macrobiotic and survive on fruit and seeds. I just don’t eat any type of meat. It’s really pretty simple.

I also don’t do it for the environment. I’ve realized that for every steak I’m not eating, someone else is probably eating two. I cannot single-handedly save the world from corporate farming and weird chemicals in our water by avoiding beef, or save the ocean from destruction by not eating shrimp.

I don’t mean to ridicule those who think this way. There’s something kind of honorable and elegant about the vegetarians I’ve met who are motivated by the idea that they’re creating a better world or that they’re going to live to be 120 or that they’re saving the chickens.

Because, in a way, they are.

For many vegetarians, it doesn’t only represent a way of eating; it represents a whole outlook they have on life and their interaction with the world around them. I respect that, in the same way I respect religious and political beliefs as individual life choices that define a person.

I’ve never been the type of person who wants to convert you to the meat-free lifestyle, and I never will be. My choice to go meatless is my own.

I do it because it feels good, because I really, really like vegetables and because I feel healthier this way.

I do it because, frankly, raw meat grosses me out. Every time I look at a raw chicken breast, all I can think is “DEAD MUSCLE DEAD MUSCLE DEAD MUSCLE DEAD THINGS.” It’s a bit of a problem.

In a nutshell, I do it because I want to.

So, before you comment or send me a million emails telling me how tasty meat is, I just want to tell you I don’t really care.

Not in a blowing-you-off kind of way. Just in an eat-what-you-want kind of way. It’s your life, and you don’t see me telling you to eat tofu and seitan and textured soy protein. I find it delicious. You’ll probably think it’s gross.

So, you eat what you want, and I’ll do the same.

If you stop trying to give me bites of your burger at dinner (surprising as it might be, you’re not the first to think that’s hilarious), I’ll stop talking about the sublime flavor of wheat protein when prepared correctly.

Live and let live, at least where humans are concerned.

When it comes to your plate, it’s your call.

­— kelfritz@indiana.edu