I'm vegan. Should I only date vegans?

My short answer is, “Maybe.” 

It’s funny.  Whenever I start dating a guy I particularly like, the first thing my friends ask is, “Is he vegan?” That question usually precedes “Does he want kids?”

“No kids” is my main deal-breaker!  

However, I went on some dates with a vegan guy recently, and I'm seeing the advantages. 

I forgot how big a deal it is to be a vegan.  Food is so central to socializing, to being human.  Pretty much the last thing even Jesus did before he died was have dinner with his buddies! 

Prior to dating Vegan Man, I didn’t think being vegan was crucial.  I did date a vegetarian, Catholic guy for a minute.  Wouldn’t a liberal, Catholic, vegetarian, activist guy would be a good match?

Nope!  Politics, religion and diet didn’t matter. Our personalities weren’t compatible and he wanted kids. 

So I stopped caring about the dude’s diet.  As long as he respected me and was willing to go places where I could have more than a salad, all was good.

But, attention single vegan women!  Maybe you knew this already, as I tend to be delayed in learning things, but dudes will say anything to impress you. 

“Oh yeah, I like vegan food once in a while.”  Translation? Whenever he hangs with you.

“I don’t always eat meat.”  Or, “Sometimes I just get a frozen cheese pizza."

In other words, his lack of meat-eating may not be deliberate, intentional, like it is with you.

But with a vegan guy, wow.  It’s easier.  Any restaurant he suggests will be vegan-friendly.  And it’s not like you are dragging him somewhere he may not want to go. 

It does kinda suck when a non-vegan guy wants to take you to his favorite joint, but you have to politely, graciously decline.  Sadly, his favorite place is BBQ Meat-O-Rama. 

And if you want to try the new veggie-friendly spot in town, vegan guy probably will too.  Then, you can be all cute and try food off each other’s plates! 

Plus, if you ever go past casual dating and perhaps into more serious territory, on holidays, you won’t be the only vegan at the table.  The hosts will already be accommodating for him. 

Vegan Man and I are not serious like that, by the way. He and I have only gone on two dates.  We are in the same vegan group, but he is only in town once a month.

Fortunately, we are facebook friends now, and he is becoming one of my biggest facebook fans at least. Vegan Man is attracted to me, but I doubt how serious his attachment is.  Is it purely lust?

Though I still won’t make “must be vegan” a deal-breaker, I will say that this experience is showing me how important it is. 

I won’t tell you to limit your options.  But vegan girl, pay particular attention to the vegan guys…

Where should I look for my kind of guy?

I've been reading the book, Buddhism: Plain and Simple, lately, and have started thinking about it in relation to my lack-of-dating life.  In this book, the author, Steve Hagen, discusses "seeing" a lot.  He says that Buddhism is partially about really seeing what is in front of you.  Not analyzing it, not creating ideas about it, just "seeing," truly seeing.

I went to a few events last month, one of which was aimed at Catholic, young adult singles. Some things were becoming clear to me, once I opened my eyes and really saw what was in front of me.

As soon as I pulled into the lot of the Catholic singles event, I saw a bumper sticker for Bill Brady on one car and another car with a "crisis pregnancy" center bumper sticker.  Crisis pregnancy centers are basically pro-life centers.  If I wasn't meeting my bestie at this event, I would have left.

Not only were there signs of Republicans, but most of the guys who were there were either too old or way too young for me.  The guy who spoke with me the longest actually had kids. And the conversations were mostly boring small talk, like about jobs.

Again, if it hadn't been for "Amy," I would not have stayed longer than an hour.  Some other friends of mine happened to be there. The world of Catholic singles in my city is small after all.  I talked to them until Amy arrived.

Surprisingly, though, or maybe not so surprisingly, when I went to the community center where I met Jack, I felt very comfortable.  Much more comfortable and welcomed than I did at the Catholic event.  They were screening a progressive, radical movie.  Complete strangers willing to strike up a conversation, usually about social justicey things.  And of course, there was a potluck with plenty of vegan-friendly food.

Jack, of course, was a nice addition too.

If I really open my eyes, I see that Catholic young adult events for singles are probably not the place to meet my Mr. Right.  Yet I keep going to them.  I go to some hippie-liberal-progressive event, that isn't even a "singles" event, and feel much more at home.

Einstein said something like insanity is doing the same thing over and over though you're getting the same result. I'll go to Catholic young adult events for my own spiritual needs.  That's it.

Follow me on twitter @flamencokitty 

Image: Danilo Rizzuti / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

the things guys will do for...

Sometimes I wonder if I'm too hard to match. Firstly, I'm Vegan, and how many men want to date Vegans? Seriously. I mean, where could they take us to eat? Well, actually, I can tell him where we can eat, but anyway. Won't their family be insulted if they bring vegan-girlfriend home for Thanksgiving and she doesn't eat anything?

Also, I don't want kids ever. No, never ever. Will I change my mind? I doubt it. The only reason I would do it, as far as I can see, is because of biological urges, and I'm pretty good at resisting biological urges...But apparently okcupid says the best matches for me are the guys who want 3-4 kids. You expect me to spew at least three humans out my uterus to prove my love for you? No thanks.

But after talking to some guys and reading posts by some guys on forums, it's interesting to see what they are willing to do to get with a girl they like.

Firstly, my cousin Lou (who is the same age as me) married a vegetarian, Layla. She was raised vegetarian while I converted in college. So of course, when we get together, Layla and I exchange recipes and talk endlessly in our Vegetarianese (seitan, nutritional yeast, tempeh...). He joins in at times, because now he's mostly vegetarian. He likes a steak every now and then, though it messes up his digestion for a couple days when he eats it now! He did not grow up vegetarian, though. Like me, his dinners growing up were basically "big-chunk-o-meat and potatoes," "big-chunk-o-meat and steamed veggies" or "big-chunk-o-meat with bread and butter." He seems pretty cool with being veggie, and they are raising their son to be mostly-veggie. I think he's convinced that being vegetarian is good for your health and still delicious.

However, I've read posts by guys in their early-to-mid twenties who said they were dating a girl who was vegetarian and they went vegetarian while with her, but then went back to eating meat after they broke up. It makes me wonder if that was Lou once upon a time, if he converted in college to be more appealing to his then-girlfriend. "Yeah, Layla, I'll try a seitan sandwich. Sounds great..." Had he married another woman, would he be mostly vegetarian now?

Also, just when I was thinking that my childfreedom is limiting my selection of men too much, that I'm putting myself on the road to spinsterhood (not that that's necessarily a bad thing, as long as I'm a cool spinster), D told me about how he broke up with his last girlfriend because she was undecided about kids (but leaning toward yes), while he discovered during the course of the relationship that he really didn't want kids. He said that a lot of guys don't think seriously about having kids. They just want the "cookie" (as Steve Harvey calls it). So they go along with parenthood because their significant other really wants a widdle baby. From the way he said it, it sounded like quite a few guys are actually undecided or ambivalent, but figure, well, babies come with the cookie...

That restored my faith a bit, though I apparently encounter all the men with the "baby rabies!" I shouldn't lament that I'm too hard to match and think that I need to change core beliefs to get a guy. I certainly don't expect a guy to convert to Veganism to be with me, though he needs to understand I ain't cooking meat for him! And if D's assessment is accurate, I shouldn't think that all guys who claim to want kids will be turned off by me. They might just be saying that because they figure all girls want to reproduce, even though they could probably go either way on the parenting thing.

I'm still not messaging guys who say they want 3-4 kids, but maybe I should send a message to the ones who say, "1 or 2." It's just coffee date anyway, not a marriage proposal.