Don't get me wrong, I love my job, well I think I do. I lOVE cooking. And I like most of the people I work with some of them I really like, Clark, Cory, Jen, Michelle and Norma. But with others there is a big lack of respect for me, at times. I don't know what it is I guess because I'm different than everybody else. I'm the only veg, I am very concious of what and how I eat and prepare things and I'm outspoken about it. I feel I am most myself at work and it opens me up to a lot of teasing, which is fine, for the most part I laugh it off but this girl can only take so much. I have never been good at comebacks and you know what I like that about myself, but it's frustrating not having the last word so I usually land up getting pissed and laughed at. Whatever I can deal. But it's when shit that occured today happens I start to question peoples respect for me. I was standing by the tilt skillet working on English snap peas, preping them for Monday, talking to Nico explaining how mustard greens are good for digestion, we were trying to convince Oscar to eat just a bite since I had eaten two pieces already and Corbin comes up to the side of me. I notice something cold on my arm and think nothing of it for a second I thought someone was just touching me as they passed behind as we usually do until I look at my arm and see he is touching me with what I think is a duck liver. I screamed You Fucking Asshole and threw the snap pea I had in my hand at his head as he walked away laughing. I immediately walk to the hand sink and scrub with soap. Javier starts laughing jovially. I look at him as I'm scrubbing and said seriously stop laughing I'm fucking pissed right now. He laughs again. I had to try so hard to hold back the tears. I would have been fine if he wasn't laughing, I was pissed but I wouldn't have had tears....
The fact that I just cried right now from thinking about how I felt at that moment tells me that something is not right with me right now. I'm a stronger person than this. But I've noticed myself being more affected by people giving me a hard time. Noticeably enough that Cory had a talk with me about it. I was doing just fine until this instant and even after I think I handled it well, without making such a big deal of it.
I just want to know why people can't leave me alone. I need to create a happy space for myself and somethings telling me it may not be there anymore.
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The real question though...
Was the duck meat 'cute' at least?
Wow Chris, I thought u'd understand but you want to make jokes too... Thanks a lot.
Being vegan has to do with a lot more than cutting things out of your diet and reading ingredients, Ashley. It's about consistency, resisting temptation ALL the time, willpower, sacrificing convenience, and shrugging off the fire you get from everyone else for your choice. People for the most part don't difference, and they'll tease you and punish you for it. If getting duck liver put on you is the worst you've faced yet, you have a lot in store for you, cause it will get much worse.
Of course I understand [more than you even know] how it feels to be picked on for it. But if you can't laugh about, if you can't shrug it off, then are you really secure in it? I actually welcome the adversity, now. I love it. Because every time I inconvenience myself, every time I resist food when I'm hungry, every time I do without some nice jewelry cause it's made out of horn or bone, or laugh at someone's biting remark, I reinforce how dedicated to my choice I really am.
And that's all that matters, if that cleared that up for you..
I get shit EVERY damn day about being vegan and now you're trying to question my security in it. I am the biggest advocate of my lifestyle that I know. I'm always cooking things for people and saying try it, it's vegan! You really aren't even understanding what this blog is about. It's about lack of respect, me feeling like shit in my own work environment. It's not okay. I'm tired of getting laughed at, I deserve the same respect I put out. And if me wanting to leave my job for lack thereof, so be it. Who are you to tell me whether I am a good vegan or not. I never asked for this label, it is just the closest way to describe me.
First, I think you should calm down.
Secondly, I understand exactly what this blog is about: you feeling victimized. No one is going to respect you when you cry when they joke around. You're letting them know they can get to you. But when you can take the worst of their shit and laugh it off, that will earn you their respect, and it's the only way you're going to get them to stop. If you expect others to treat you the way you treat them, or respect you because you respect them, you're setting yourself up for a world full of disappointment.
Are you going to leave a situation or environment every time you face adversity, conflict, or disagreement? How can you possibly receive respect if you do? How can anyone understand what you're about or what you stand for if you cannot, with confidence, stand up and express your reasons and experience with it?
Vegans are a self made minority. When you make that choice, you set yourself up for criticism. The more consistent you are in your values and motives, the better equipped you will be to not only survive the fire they give, but earn their respect. If you can't take criticism or be consistent, don't call yourself vegan. Don't have tattoos. Don't do anything out of the norm, and play everything safe. But if those things mean a damn, at all, then be prepared to go to battle for it. Fair or not, it's just how the world is. Anything worth having is worth fighting for, and you most certainly will have to fight for it. If you want to boast 'Perfect Score,' 99.99% won't cut it. You don't get to pick and choose parts of 'the label' that you like.
Who am I to say? That's not exactly easy to answer. But I was in your spot, before. I got defensive when people questioned me, and I didn't have all the answers. I nitpicked and tried to 'help' people and show them my way was the right way. I alienated a lot of people doing this. And I was unhappy. And I realized eventually, the hard way, that it's about making those sacrifices for the better. NOTHING ELSE MATTERS. I can't complain about any of it. This is what I signed up for, and it's still worth all of the strife that I go through for it.
Martyrdom is perhaps, even more so than convenience, the most painful sacrifice a vegan must make.
I'm not sorry that I don't fit in your cookie cutter version of the word. We are talking about a belt I bought months ago, yes it was leather and it was not recycled clothing. It is the only non vegan clothing I have bought in over 2 years, so that one decision throws all my validity out the window, my daily choices no longer matter. It was a concious decision and it wasn't easy but It is my life and I can make my own choices. I do not criticize anyone for there choices, it is our flaws that make us unique.
I'm not going to laugh when someone attacks me, I am going to stand my ground. It's the passion in me that makes me get emotional, and I'm not going to hide it.
So what if it alienates me, even if I was not vegan Corbin is not the type of company I want to keep. I work with the guy, he is my supervisor and I show him respect whenever food is in discussion but if he disrespects me I have no problem telling him how I feel.
My job as a vegan chef is to love and be proud of my food. I am going to boast when I am proud of what I've done. I've never claimed to be the perfect vegan and would never want to be. All I can do is live my life and make the choices that I feel are right for me.
It is not my 'version' of the word, it is the definition that I am talking about. Your daily choices still matter, just as anyone who would recycle or drives a hybrid. My roommate does both, and he's not even a vegetarian. His choices still matter. He's not vegan. They're not always hand in hand. Sure, it was the only belt in 2 years. But by that same logic I can eat regular pizza on my birthday. That may be good enough for you, but it's not good enough for me. Or anyone else who actually takes veganism seriously.
You are talking about a belt. I'm talking about you taking a way of life whose sole purpose is to stop using animals as a resource, selecting those elements "that you feel are right for you" [e.g. diet], and disregarding the other innate factors of that way of life that don't affect you and might get in the way of your wardrobe. Don't mistake our points for the same. It goes much deeper than the belt. While eating animals 'to live' is a shakey excuse at best, there is absolutely no justification for fur or leather. It's not about being 'the perfect vegan,' it's about shades of red.
There is a difference between "I'm vegan" and simply "I don't eat animal products." Sure it's a whole 3 letters longer, but at least it's the label that 'best describes' you. And most honestly.
WORDS longer.
Point taken and exhausted Chris. See how easy it is to respect someone else's opinion even if you don't agree?! I wonder what makes you bring this up at a time when it's obvious I am down ? You knew about me buying the belt the day it happened yet waited til now. It seems highly inappropriate to me and thats what makes me angry more than anything. You've done this to me before too, notice a time when I am not okay and continued to make things more difficult for me. I do not understand your logic in this. But it's not what friends do to each other.
We human beings have many ways of knowing what we need to know in order to get through our lives. One way of knowing things is to engage in a course of study in an academic environment. Another way of knowing things is simply to go through the experiences that come our way, making a conscious effort to learn from them. A third way in which people gain knowledge is through the vehicle of intuition, a gift some have more than others, but which can be developed in anyone. No one way of knowing things is better than another way, and they can all be useful at different points in our lives.
Most of us naturally gravitate toward one way of knowing over others, and this tends to be clear early in our lives. For the most part, we live in a culture that values a logical, mental approach to knowing things, so those with intuitive gifts may have been shamed, undervalued, or misunderstood in our ways. Many of us are working our way out of this incorrect value judgment, recognizing that our intuition, far from being wrong or untrustworthy, is a great gift. For those of us who conduct our learning in the thick of our life experiences, we may also have to make an extra effort to remind ourselves that our particular intelligence—often called common sense--while not always officially rewarded, has its own special genius.
Even though, in a given time or place, certain types of intelligence tend to be valued more than others, no way of knowing is inherently better than another. Once we understand this, we can value our own intelligence, as well as the different intelligences of the people we encounter. Sometimes, just understanding that we are coming at the same issue in different ways helps us to avoid an unnecessary conflict. When we value all ways of knowing equally, we benefit not only from what we have learned, and how we have learned it, but from all the other forms of intelligence we are open to honoring.
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