SAME OLD, SAME OLD
It’s almost noontime and I’m having my second cup of coffee. I have always loved coffee ever since I can remember. We did not have Starbucks or Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf back then, but we had Dunkin Donuts where I used to smoke cigarettes with my college friends and unintentionally irritate the store staff with our pranks and games. I remember this one time when we had a contest to see who could smoke the ‘fastest’ without letting the ashes fall off from the filter; the one with the longest ash remaining wins. There were five of us so the store was immediately full of smoke that the staff had to open the doors and windows and politely ask us to leave. Those were the days…
I’m not particularly proud of some of the things I did when I was young but it was a time for exploring and experimentation. And if one learns through experience and mistakes, then I must be a genius already. LOL
I stopped smoking after trying to stop a dozen times or more. A short bout of pneumonia helped me get the job done because it was madness to inhale smoke when one’s lungs are sick. So that helped end that part of my life.
I did not stop drinking coffee though. It was, is one of the vices I can’t seem to avoid and it’s just one of the pleasures in life that makes friendships stronger. What else would I drink if I was working in a coffee shop? Tea is fine, and I prefer to consume this flowering evergreen from time-to-time, but will always go back to my Americano in a heartbeat.
VEGETUS
I’ve been a part-time vegan for a couple of years now; and a full-time vegetarian for more than a decade. It’s been a wonderful journey into this life that extends towards the exploration of religion, spirituality, philosophy, the body-mind-spirit connection, and many more related topics.
Vegetus is the root word of vegetarian and comes from the Latin word for lively or vigorous because vegetarianism means more than just eating vegetables; it extends to other aspects of our life.
GENESIS
I had a classmate in college who was vegan when nobody knew about it, even if it was already in the dictionary. We did pranks on him back in the day by putting meat in his sandwich or hiding it in his salad when we ate together. He did not really get mad at us; he’s a cool guy, passionate about music and writing. Little did I know that I will be joining his ‘tribe’ many years later after we left the university.
We re-connected on social media while he was working with greenpeace here in the Philippines and I was running a vegetarian / vegan café circa 2011. He was happy to find out that I had been ‘converted’ and promptly asked me to sponsor one of their activities (haha!), which I was happy to oblige by providing meals to the participants and speakers.
I first tried vegetarian food in a seminar sponsored by the TSP (Theosophical Society in the Philippines). And, it was about the Process of Self-Transformation. It offered a glimpse of a life that I had only seen in movies and read about in books, but never quite understood. To me, that seminar lived up to its name and ‘transformed’ me from the inside and out. It opened the door for me to the wonderful world of mediation, yoga, energy healing, vegetarian and vegan food, tai chi, and generally being aware about life and the interconnection of the universe.
Lao Tzu was right:
The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
Lao Tzu
It’s funny how things turned out with me and my friend. During our college days, I never really understood why vegetarians and vegans would give up eating meat and seafood. Life has a funny way, or ironic way in some instances, of unfolding things in our life’s journey. To me, it was being an @$#h0le and mocking my college friend then advocating the thing I was mocking him for later on. I’m glad that he planted the seeds of compassion when we hung out together back then. It paved the way for my worldview to slowly turn – it was the first step in my journey towards a healthier and more compassionate life.
Thank you for dropping by and reading up to here. I hope you are well and in the best of health in every aspect of life. Good day everyone! :-)
Image by Nikos Apelaths from Pixabay