Longer Tables

I have lived a vegan lifestyle for more than forty years. Before that I was a vegetarian. So I have eschewed meat for most of my life; all animal products for the last forty-three years.

I started on this life journey because of my father, who made his living as a butcher. He had the chance to work in a slaughterhouse and just could not murder the animals. That was all it took for me to become a vegetarian.

But as with most things I do, I dove into with no understanding. I did not know how to nourish myself. Oreos are vegan! So is Diet Dr Pepper. With an occasional salad thrown in, I was set.

A health crisis at 26 years old told a different story. I had to change my food to recover my wellnes and save my life. With macrobiotics and Chinese medicine (and the support of my lovely husband), I did just that and developed an understanding of the power of true vegan eating on our health.

I began to teach cooking and put the focus on human health and veganism. I wanted people to feel welcome into this gorgeous lifestyle, whether they came for the animals or for their own health…or the health of the planet. Big picture thinking or small, I wanted people to come to my table; enjoy the food and feel comfortable and nourished.

I thought all vegans felt like this. No matter why you joined us, we would be happy to have you.

And then I spoke at a vegan confernce.

After I spoke, a longtime vegan/peace activist/poet/musician stopped me and asked why I only spoke about health and human wellness. He said that veganism wasn’t about that, but about the plight of animals. I countered with my thinking that I did not care why people joined this lifestyle, as long as they joined. No matter what the motivation, it means less animal products consumed, fewer animals killed and lighter tread on our overworked and underpaid Mother Earth.

With his fingert pointed aggressively in my face (so much for peace-loving poet), he said that I had no right to call myself a vegan if this is how I felt.

Wow, right?

Fast forward a few years and I am invited to present on a cruise where vegan food is served. For many of the guests arriving for the trip, this would be their first experience with the vegan lifestyle. After the first dinner, I noticed something very disturbing happening in the dining room. Several tables sported hand written signs reading “Vegans only at this table.”

What a warm welcome, I thought, sarcastically, for new people.

For me, all these years later, that is the crux of why more people do not move to this lovely, compassionate lifestyle. They are not welcomed with kindness; they are made to feel less than because they didn’t pop out of their mother’s womb as an animal activist.

How can we claim to be compassionate and not show compassion to our fellow humans?

And look, I get it. I have lived this way for so long; I have heard every bad and cruel joke; I have been called every name; I have had people turn their noses up at the food I prepared because it was plant-based. I have heard it all and had my feelings brusied more than I like to admit.

For me, living the way I do and teaching as I do means that I have committed to welcoming anyone showing a glimmer of interest…to my classes; to the information I know and most important, to my table.

In our current world, it is all too easy to turn our backs on each other. We find any and all excuses to remove or cancel someone from our lives. When will we learn that the way back from the abyss of hatred and division our politics have created is to look each other in the eye and see each other…not eating habits, religion, sexual orientation or any other false boundary we use to divide?

Only by setting longer tables and not building walls (as my hero Chef Jose Andres says) can we come together and see that we are one family; one people.

Can what we eat save the world? Maybe; just maybe if our tables have a seat for everyone.