Taking Chances

Over the past few months since taking my leave, I have tried to be very open to new possibilities and new challenges--whatever comes our way. Not many people get the opportunity to do something like this and I am so grateful. I have learned and done things that I didn't think would be possible a few months ago {10k!}. This growth period hasn't just been limited to work, creativity and all that stuff though. It has carried over into something bigger and has started impacting several areas of our lives. Funny how that happens...

I won't bore you with all of the details, but I have had some health stuff come up, some issues more recent than others, and it has really jerked me into reality that we are not getting any younger {ya, I know, 25 is sooooo old} and that our bodies {my body} doesn't respond the way it used to. I can work out like crazy, and not see much change. We can eat salad for a week...no change. I get sick more often and don't have as much energy as I used to. Troy has a history of various health issues in his family and we are both more aware that the decisions we make now will affect our lives in the future. Of course, everyone {and I mean everyone} seems to have an opinion and what to do, what to eat/not eat, how much to work out, etc. etc. etc. I started doing some research on my own though and found out some very interesting things about food and what we put into our bodies. So we have made some changes, and are really happy with them.

Then on Tuesday, when we were at the rodeo with Lindsey and Taylor {told ya, the rodeo has taken over!} Lindsey was telling me about someone we know who read a particular book about food and it changed her life. I remember thinking "whoa, changed her life? Some book." She also said that the reader was expecting the book to be just another one of those finger-pointers--you know, those Vegetarian/Vegan-boosting, carnivore-bashing, McDonald's-dissing pieces that catch my attention but usually make me roll my eyes. But, apparently it was TOTALLY different than she expected. It peaked my interest but it wasn't like I was going to go out and buy the book or anything. Or so I thought...

Last night I was watching a recorded episode of Ellen {love her!} and author Jonathan Safran Foer was on talking about his book Eating Animals. That was the book Lindsey was telling me about! Here is a description of the book from eatinganimals.com, which I feel sums the book up best:

Like many others, Jonathan Safran Foer spent his teenage and college years oscillating between omnivore and vegetarian. But on the brink of fatherhood—facing the prospect of having to make dietary choices on a child’s behalf—his casual questioning took on an urgency. This quest ultimately required him to visit factory farms in the middle of the night, dissect the emotional ingredients of meals from his childhood, and probe some of his most primal instincts about right and wrong.

This book is what he found. Brilliantly synthesizing philosophy, literature, science, memoir, and his own detective work, Eating Animals explores the many stories we use to justify our eating habits—folklore and pop culture, family traditions and national myth, apparent facts and inherent fictions—and how such tales can lull us into a brutal forgetting.

Marked by Foer’s moral ferocity and unvarying generosity, as well as the humor and style that made his previous books, Everything Is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, widely loved, Foer’s latest tour de force informs and delights, challenging us to explore what is too often conveniently brushed aside. A celebration and a reckoning, Eating Animals is a story about the stories we’ve told—and the stories we now need to tell.

Ellen also had letters from and discussions with viewers {of ALL ages} whose lives were changed by this book. I like to consider all sides, listen to several opinions before jumping into something like this. I thought that these people had a realistic view of this controversial issue though and it was refreshing. The author himself even said something along the lines of "I am a human and I am not perfect. But I must try do my part." He talked about people preaching about being green, and then getting on an airplane, which is the single most detrimental thing you can do to our planet. But it just proves that WE ARE HUMAN, and sometimes convenience or finances or desire rule our decisions. Jonathan Safran Foer isn't asking us to become vegetarians {though many probably will now}, he is just asking that we look at the facts and make an informed, positive step in the right direction. Will everyone who reads the book cut out meat all together? Probably not. Let's be realistic. Several readers said the same thing, which was encouraging. They found it hard to go 'cold turkey' - no pun intended - but they are starting to make changes.

I am all about signs lately and I just thought this couldn't be a coincidence. And if it was, well, I am going to try to see it as something more. So I have decided {with the unexpected blessing of my hunt-and-kill-BBQ-master-burger-loving husband} to read Eating Animals, and incur whatever guilt, eye-opening, disgust, or irritation that may {or may not} come along with it.

Wish me luck... I'm off to the bookstore.