So. Blog-Fans! Being a vegan is totally fucking easy – it’s easy-peasy lemon-squeezy, as long as you’re at home. That is, at home, in your own flat, in your own kitchen, making yummy hummus and tomato sandwiches or lentil burgers or kidney beans on toast and ignoring all those horrific rumours about wine possibly having gelatine or pureed fish bladders in it. Once you leave home, it gets slightly harder, obviously. But still. It’s okay. And the good thing about TRYING to be vegan – TRYING at least – is it makes being a vegetarian seriously, seriously, seriously doable. In comparison.
“I do not know why,” says my friend Andy, “you are trying to do this. I don’t know what you’re trying to prove at all.”
Andy is my most right-wing friend. In fact, he is the most right-wing person I know who isn’t actually a Nazi. One of the things I really like about him is the fact that I think he knows deep-down that capitalism is rubbish but he just doesn’t want to admit it to anyone.
“Well,” I say placidly, “it’s because the people who work at the killing animal places are so traumatized from having done all this horrible stuff to the animals that they carve out their eyes and their noses before they kill them and then they put salt up their bums and stuff. That’s why.”
“Well,” says Andy, “I hope you stop all this nonsense soon, that’s all I can say.”
I hand Andy a plate of spaghetti and “meat”balls. I’ve made “meat” balls out of whizzed up sweet potatoes and cannelloni beans and have drenched vegan Bio-Laden pesto all over it.
“This is surprisingly edible,” he says, and I grin, genuinely delighted.
“Guess what?” I say.
“What?” He says.
“I’m not in love with Peter anymore! I haven’t cried about him since November. Okay, I cried about him one time in December but that was a strategic cry because someone I wanted to have sex with didn’t want to have sex with me back so I kind of wanted to distract them from not wanting to have sex with me by emphasizing the fact that I was in love with my ex, plus slightly emotionally blackmail them into having sex with me. Plus I was drunk. But I literally haven’t thought about Peter in ages. And even when I do think about him, it’s kind of… indifferently.”
Andy shrugs.
“I’m not surprised,” he says.
“You’re not?”
“Not really,” he says. “I read once that no matter how long a relationship lasts – two years, ten years, twenty years, whatever – it takes approximately six months to get over it.”
I look at Andy and chew thoughtfully on my really rather delicious pasta dish. Perhaps I should become a vegan Nigella Lawson-type food blogger-type person? I’ve also suffered a lot in life and we’ve both been victims of domestic violence. This could be my new career path. I could be the vegan Nigella, with slightly worse tits.
“That’s true for everyone?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says. “Except for people who actually commit suicide, that is. Everyone-else just needs approximately six months.”
I stare at Andy. I put my fork down and stare at him. He’s an incredibly good-looking boy, when I think about it. And I know this is totally fucking German of me, but seriously, if he were less right-wing I would totally try and have sex with him. But still. I can’t believe I am so unoriginal. I can’t believe it. There I was, thinking I was an actual human being, telling Andy a Real Thing from my life, a True Emotion from my heart, and actually I’m just a bunch of cells and organs and bones and stuff and everyone – everyone, everyone – everyone – all the people – tout le monde – everybody – just needs six fucking months to get over a break-up, more or less – apart from the people who actually commit suicide, that is. I feel a stab of disappointment at being so boring and unoriginal. I feel a tiny moment of grief as I realize that me and Peter were nothing special – that the connection between us was totally meaningless – that we were just two people, two kids, really, who got on quite well and happened to live together for four years. But I know it’s true. I know Andy is right. Because I’m sitting here at my kitchen table, staring and staring and staring at his really quite lovely face, trying to remember who Peter was or why I liked him so much and it’s like my mind is totally blank and fairly peaceful. It’s like meditation. It’s like Peter never even really existed in the first place. It’s like I made him up.