Coming Out

The other major thing I have to get off my chest right away is that I am vegan.
Yes.
A lot of people would think that this means my food options are limited.
Not so.
In fact, when I first went the vegetarian/vegan route three years ago, I discovered an entire universe of food I never knew about. I discovered Japanese cuisine, a dairy-free haven of delicacies. Purple broccoli, daikon radish shredded and salted, pickled plums, arame seaweed rinsed and boiled with plum vinegar, tiny white eggplants that fit in the palm of your hand.
The world is ripe with edibles, but that's not the impression you'd get from an average grocery run.
If a Martian landed in a small town in Nebraska, they'd get the idea that us Americans subsist on beef, corn and potatoes. All nutritiously lowly. And not all that delectable. The American cuisine, rife with pork tenderloin, rump roast, spaghetti and meatballs, and fried spam sandwhiches, has got to be one of the most boring dietary palettes on the planet. High fat, high sugar, high salt, but low on complex flavors.
I've gotten many a perplexed commentary on my diet. Some think it's "radical" it's "too strict" it's almost ascetic. But I sit in my corner with a big bowl of udon noodles and I laugh and laugh. Because most people eat the same thing day in and day out.
Spaghetti,
Meatloaf,
FastFood,
Pizza,
Pork Chops,
Mashed Potatoes.
Hamburgers.
That's it. Over and Over and Over. The endless cycle of boring foodstuffs.
My palette is broad and varied.
One night: lime curry, with sauteed onions, tofu and garbanzos.
The next night: purple cabbage and snow peas over teriyaki rice.

My father calls it "Vay-gun." He thinks I only eat lettuce. When I was a child my impoverished diet consisted mostly of spam, velveeta cheese, bologna and ramen noodles. "Salad" was an awful affair, something to keep you"regular." In no way was salad a delicacy in my childhood home. Usually, it was iceberg lettuce, strips of bologna and velveeta smothered in ranch dressing.
My salads are rife with dark green leaves, spinach, arugula, blanched Kale, dandelion. They consist of such goodies as golden raisins, pumpkin seeds, sundried tomatoes preserved in oil, fresh basil leaves, baked beets, sunflower seeds, baby corn, radish sprouts. They explode with earthy flavors, textures from the smooth soft beet to the crunch of seeds. My salads are extravagant, but humble. Relatively cheap to produce, and yet so packed full of vitamins and minerals I need never worry about taking supplements.
My father looks into the deep salad bowl, brimming with the aroma of orange poppy dressing. He eyes the roasted red peppers, the purple slices of onion, the flecks of almond slivers. He doesn't know what to think. This is alien to him. He's afraid he'll take a bite and actually enjoy it, enjoy it so much he'll give up his precious beef shortribs, never to return. He passes the bowl, not willing to compromise and instead laments the missing steak. I smile after the first forkful. I know what he's missing.