morality of meat

last night, over tea with coconut milk, my sister, her girlfriend, and i talked about our bodies and body image. i have had health problems for over ten years that i can't seem to shake, except of course for the few months when i was totally primal.

"you know being a vegan totally messed you up, right?"  my sis said.

in a flash, i realized that my weight issues, my health issues, and my mental health issues dramatically worsened when i gave up meat.  i was a vegetarian for years.  i felt so very righteous.

i've always been an extremely sensitive person.  so sensitive, that as part of my survival, i know tend to avoid crowds, too much noise, and the news.  i just feel too much.  so, the plight of our fellow creatures on this earth (i lost sleep after imagining chickens in cages too tight to move around) as they are farmed for our sustenance made me sick (in so many ways).

as a little girl, i saw chickens with their heads cut off running around a small enclosed yard.  a couple of hours later, they were quite delicious.  i've eaten the meat of a ram that i used to pet.

and, then, the health issues.  bloating, all sorts of digestive distress, fatigue, joint pain, headaches, scattered memory....but at least i wasn't contributing to an animal's suffering.

hold the phone.  I'M an animal.  and i'm suffering.

part of the rage that i feel towards factory farming are the deplorable conditions in which our meat is raised.  the pens are too small.  the diets are all wrong for the animals.  (cows eat GRASS not GRAINS) the animals aren't given room to play.  they are fed hormones to control their weight.  a cow isn't given place to develop its "cowness".  a chicken can't be a chicken and pigs have no mud in which to be piggy.

wait a second.  people are crowded into cubicles.  our diets are completely wrong for us. (people eat VEGETABLES and MEATS not GRAINS)  people aren't given the incentive to go out and play.  people take pills or are fed hormones in their food that control their weight.

people aren't given place to develop their "peopleness".

the animals that suffer the most with vegetarianism are people.

not eating meat is not a morally righteous move.  we need it to be healthy.

insisting that all creatures have the right to live as they were meant is beyond moral.  it's just correct.

i wonder how long it will take to undo the damage to my body that vegetarianism has caused.

ouch...

has it really been that long since i've posted here?

i've been busy sludging through the sweet underbelly of the stereotypical american lifestyle.  there are several couches with the expanding indentation of my ass.  there are vibram five-fingers laying forlorn in the depths of some bag, somewhere.  there are foodlike package shells littering the landscape of this past month.

and there is the pseudo-food that has become a part of me.  the taste of all that sweetness, all that agricultural pornucopia still coating my digestive lining.  the cloying desserts, the puffy, margarine soaked giant pretzels, the sparkle of msg on hot fries....all that is flowing (okay, not flowing really, more like roiling) through my system.

i feel like hammered shit.  quite frankly, i feel poisoned.  sickened.  and like something unnatural.

this blog was my lifeline, in a way.  the accountability to something.

of course, i have my excuses.  i've been without steady living space for a long time.  my depression pokes it's colossal head up through the floorboards more frequently.  i was robbed so my beloved (beloved????) computer is in the hands of a thief.  i am homesick for something that no longer exists.  and, i feel isolated.

it is a chicken and egg thing.  what happened first?  did i stop living primally so all these factors popped up or did all these things rear up and then i stopped living primally?

either way, it's time to stop the insanity.

i am dancing with different aspects of it all right now.  getting the new cave set up in a VERY minimalist way.  (i got rid of half my stuff and it's still too much...where did all this shite COME FROM?)  i'm slowly organizing my pantry and fridge to have all the foods that my body recognizes readily available.  i am working on a loose routine that allows me to meet all the modern responsibilities while giving me the time to live with as much freedom as my wild self needs.

i am the type of person that wants to wake up in the morning and have the perfect day after living in chaos the day before.  but, creating a life takes work.  scratch that word work....it's a weird connotation.  creating a life takes boldness, imagination, and playfulness.  and of all the things that make me who i am, those three things i have in excess.