A Life Without Bacon is Not a Life at All

Given that we are a mere 12 days into 2009, GirlTuesday has made the suggestion that we write about New Year’s Resolutions this week, which I think is a great idea.

I had the opportunity to speak, at length, with a guy I met this morning as were were on the way to a community service project. After going on and on about how the Earthy-Hippie-OverPriced-Organic-Local grocery store didn’t have grits and soysage at 7 this morning, he started to preach the benefits of vegetarianism (and veganism more particularly; one thing for which I can never see benefits. Give up cheese and sour cream? No way!). I know lots of vegetarians who don’t eat meat for health, environmental, religious, and ethical/animal treatment reasons, but he didn’t really seem to have a reason for his initial decision other than he needed to make a New Year’s Resolution. So he decided to give up meat for the year 1991, and here we are 18 years later, and the guy has stuck to it. His endurance is impressive, but I’m just not sure he knew why he did it in the first place.

Never in my life have I ever met someone who kept a New Year’s Resolution for a year, let alone 18 years (and one that eliminates bacon and fried chicken from his diet – I can see giving up something terrible…, but bacon?! Now that’s dedication), so I am quite impressed. And dumbfounded. I have never really understood the point of New Year’s Resolutions, and have never been inclined myself to make one. If there’s something different I want to do in my life, I just do it. I don’t see the point in waiting until January (unless of course one New Year’s eve, while bowing to the porcelain gods you decide to give up drinking….then it might as well start immediately). If there’s something that you want to change about yourself badly enough, you should be inspired to move on it quickly; I think if you have a need to put it off so that you can make an official New Year’s Resolution, then you’re probably not that interested in change anyway. And sorry to say, you’ll probably fail. Take all of the overweight women in my office as an example. They’ve been planning for the diets they all started last week since…oh….October. There were complaints of “I can’t fit into my winter clothes” starting around the first of the month, but nothing was done because “the holidays are coming up, and it’s hard to be good during the holidays.” The holidays? What holidays? Columbus Day? Halloween?

I don’t mean to sound overly cynical or judgmental, I wish everyone well in their resolutions, but I hope that people are doing them for the right reasons and that they can stick with their resolutions.

So this year, I’m making my first ever New Year’s Resolution. I’m giving up cauliflower. I hope I can stick to it.