Waking up with a yawn, I slowly turn to look at the alarm clock and realize I only have 20 minutes until class. Running into the shower, I quickly soap my hair with all natural, vegan shampoo and conditioner and lather my body with all natural vegan body wash. Hopping out of the bath with a steamy blindness, I reach for my environmentally friendly toothbrush, and brush my teeth with all natural vegan toothpaste. I quickly get dressed, and slide on my cruelty-free Birkenstocks and my purse, which displays many animal rights buttons, run to the kitchen, grab a banana and a soymilk and jet to class.
To many of my friends, I'm known as "Starza, The Vegan." I never knew that your diet could define you as a person, until my diet was different from everyone else's. For me, it's simply a lifestyle I chose when I was 13. I don't even have to think about it anymore. Well, that was until I started eating with meat-eaters.
My lunch buddies consist of seven other people whom I love dearly. Unfortunately, this love doesn't get acknowledged at the table. With my plate filled with non-cheese pizza or a stir-fry and other various fruit and veggie dishes, I look awkwardly out of place. Glancing around at my friends' mountains of charred flesh and dead animals reminds me of the massacres of the Holocaust. I stay silent because I'm not one to push my beliefs onto others--if only they felt the same.
Once I sit down, the typical conversation begins. It's as if a timer has been set, and they have 30 mins to ask as many outrageous questions as possible: "Starza, if you were on a deserted island and there was only dirt and a cow, would you eat the cow?" "Starza, if there was a dead deer in the woods and you found it, would you eat it?" "Starza, don't you care about those poor vegetables that were ripped from the land for your enjoyment?" Every day it's the same questions asked in a different manner. Sometimes they want to hear my answers, sometimes they just ask so the other flesh-eaters can giggle at their questions. For the most part, I ignore them because they know how I feel, and they know I only answer serious questions.
After the lunch ordeal, I go to classes where I get the same "you have an anti-leather button, but your shoes are leather" statement over and over. I have to explain the fact that no, I wouldn't wear an anti-leather button and then show up in leather shoes to every single person. Sometimes I wish I could tattoo it on my forehead, but I deal.
Finally comes my peace of mind for the day. Usually, my vegan and veggie friends eat dinner together. It's the best part of the day for me. We laugh over the questions we were asked that day, complain about the stuff we have to put up with, and confirm each other's choice to be cruelty-free.
Every day is a battle just to believe what you believe, but I know that by discussing my views, at the very least I am planting seeds about animal rights in the people that I meet. My lunch buddies may be big meat-eaters who aren't planning on going vegetarian anytime soon, but each and every one of them can tell you what being vegan is and why I'm vegan. It's a start, which is all we can hope for.
--Starza Kolman is an 18-year-old student at James Madison University and President of the school's Animal Rights Coalition. She's been vegetarian since she was 12 and vegan for two years.
