being vegetarian/vegan

sometimes i think a lot about my food choices, and other options as well. sometimes i wonder if i could do more.

i chose to become a vegetarian for environmental, ethical, and health reasons. and i'm very comfortable with that fact. i feel like a much healthier person and i'm not constantly wondering what i'm eating, if it's bad for me, where it came from, and how it was raised. Sometimes though, with the presence of a bunch of vegans around me, i wonder about the rest of my diet.

ok, so granted, i'm not going to give up cheese, i just can't, it's kind of essential for drinking wine. but last summer i was pretty darn close to being vegan while i lived with my sibling and it wasn't difficult. i like soy milk and when you aren't doing any cooking with eggs it's easy to not eat them. the problem here is in baking. and yogurt, well, i like it, but i don't really eat it on a regular basis. so really the issue here is cheese, which i couldn't give up last summer either as i ended up buying expensive farmers market cheese (which was the best gouda i've ever had).

i think about it though, giving up all other animal products. I'm already a pretty strict vegetarian, no fish, i try to avoid butter, i try to not buy leather and i'm just more conscious of what i'm eating. all these people around me are doing it, and for very similar reasons, so what is keeping me from taking that next step. i wonder.