Cows, pecans and oil: that’s what put food on the table when I was a child. That’s what placed basketball shoes on my feet as a youth, and that’s also what helped purchase my first car.
My dad is a pecan harvester and rancher. My mom works in the oil industry. They divorced when I was 19, but my adolescence was pretty reflective of small-town life in middle-America.
I grew up in Lindsay, Oklahoma, a town with a population of around 3,000 and where the only sign of diversity to be found was on church marquees: Methodist, Free Will, Church of Christ, Episcopal, First Christian.
I was raised in the Southern Baptist sect. We talked about God, sports, who was dating who. We talked a lot about praying for those who might be backsliding or going through a life-altering experience.
In my family, meals consisted mostly of meat, bread, potatoes, and if we did eat salad, you can bet it was swimming in Ranch dressing. The only way you could get me to swallow a vegetable was if it was golden and fried. And can I get another side of Ranch, please?
Today I’m 33, and I live in Sonoma County. A lot of things have changed in my life since graduating from high school and leaving the town of Lindsay in the rear view.
I hardly talk about sports anymore, unless it’s about the OKC Thunder. I don’t go to a First Baptist Church or a second one for that matter, and no meat can be found on my dinner table. You won’t find eggs or dairy there either.
This change of diet came shortly after I accepted a job offer, and moved to California to further my career as a news reporter. It wasn’t a sudden change, although it might have seemed that way from an outside perspective.
I had slowly been integrating healthier foods into my life, beginning in my late twenties. It was at that point I discovered the joy of eating organic foods and sought the company of people who shared a similar mentality.
I really felt comfortable with the strangers in the aisles at Whole Foods. (At that point we only had three Whole Foods in the entire state of Oklahoma.) Quickly the strangers became friends, and eventually I would work there myself.
In late May of 2018, less than five months after moving here, I made the decision to stop eating meat, dairy and eggs. It’s also important to point out I had a huge support system conveniently placed at my fingertips.
Anika, my then fiancé and now wife, is a private chef trained at a vegan culinary school. Another big advantage is the bounty of vegan-friendly businesses in the area.
When I moved to California, chicken-fried steak was my favorite dish, hands down. In fact, chicken-fried steak is the state meal of Oklahoma (no joke). Not surprisingly, Oklahoma also has some of the nation’s highest rates of diabetes and obesity, but that’s another issue for another time.
When Anika willingly made my favorite meal for dinner in my first month as a Californian, I basically asked her to marry me at the table.
However, I quickly learned she liked to eat vegetables. I mean, she ate vegetables a lot. Under her crafty cooking regime, I probably ate more greens in the month of January than I had in my entire life.
Something began to change with my taste buds, as I began to open myself to eating more plant-based meals. It was like my body began to send messages. “Yes, I like when you eat this vegetable medley,” it said. “No, I don’t like this greasy chili burger. Please, please, don’t do that to me ever again.”
It wasn’t pleasant. I will be honest: it was a rough couple of months. But what I realized was the more I incorporated plant-based meals into my diet, the more my stomach would be irritated after eating meat, dairy and highly processed foods.
A wise person once told me that your body is your best friend. If you ask it to start telling you the truth, it will. Just listen.
I wasn’t convinced that eating meat was bad for the earth or me if it was done ethically. As time passed, I began to do more research on eating habits and health. With every article and podcast, it grew more difficult for me to deny that a plant-based life is a win-win for everyone: animals, farmers, the earth, our ecosystem, our bodies, even our economy.
At first the end goal for changing my eating habits was just to prolong my good health and my lifespan, but along the way I began to feel another intimate change happening.
I grew up looking after cattle, and I’ve always found loyal companions in cats and dogs, but I began to see animals differently. When I look into the eyes of a dog passing on the street or see a dairy cow grazing on the hillside, I feel connected to them in a way I never felt before. There is a mutual respect.
It’s pure and simple, but most of all, it just feels right in my heart. There is a peace that comes with knowing I didn’t take another’s life in order to have a meal.
Today I am happy to say I’ve been eating plant-based for three months. I know that isn’t long compared to the length of my standard American diet, but I am so very proud to be contributing to the world in a positive way.
My dad still doesn’t know I stopped eating meat. He’s still mad at Oprah for the whole mad cow disease business, and that was in 1996. It’s not that my father would stop loving me; it’s just that I haven’t found a gentle way to tell him I now believe everything that I was taught as a child about food was basically cow manure.
And I thought coming out as gay to him would be the last time I felt scared to share something significant in my life … who knew? Nonetheless, I feel more united to the earth, to my community and to animals than ever before.
The rewards I have felt and seen in my life have me convinced, without a doubt, this is the life for me. I don’t believe harassing people about eating meat or calling them animal killers is a good way to have an open conversation about plant-based life. Everyone has his or her own journey. This one’s mine.
