I try really hard not to eat meat. Most of the time I manage to steer clear of the stuff.  This is in part due to the fact that most of the time I eat at my house and I have banished meat from my own cooking regime. It’s difficult not to eat meat though. Not just because of the eye-rolls I get from various carnivorous friends and family but also because meat is everywhere: at dinner parties, at office potlucks and particularly at restaurants. I like to eat out but I get sick of having the choice of a veggie burger (which is fine if the place makes it from scratch, but a Boca burger dressed up is not the same), a black bean burger (same stipulations as the veggie) or some meat dish minus the meat (which removes all the protein from the meal and typically leaves me bloated with carbs and unsatisfied).

Primarily, it’s hard for me to not eat meat because my decision is an ethical one and has nothing to do with food preference. I still think meat is delicious. There’s no reward for not eating it other than the sense of personal achievement at having gone yet another day without succumbing. Clean living is its own reward I suppose. But it’s not the same as committing to a jogging regime wherein you see the muscles on your legs get bigger and the number on the scale get smaller. The reward is fairly intangible and seems non-existent when you watch everyone else chow on juicy bratwursts while you’re stuck with a tofu dog that you’ve slathered with too much mustard just so you can choke it down.

I won’t waste time here on a rant about meat production because I figure, at this point, most people know there’s quite a bit of unpleasantness attached to mass produced meat. It’s like smoking. People know it’s bad for them and if they don’t choose to quit, well, that’s their business. It doesn’t take much digging to unearth all of the unsavory details about that sickly, antibiotic-laden mad cow meat or the steroidal, bland chicken breasts from the beakless bird. Even that lovely, sashimi style tuna from the fancy-pants restaurant comes with its own over-fished, non-sustainable baggage.

Despite the disturbing details I know about meat, I still crave it almost daily because it’s my perception that’s changed and not the meat. It’s still prevalent and enticing. However, each bite I take fills me with guilt. I know it shouldn’t be worth compromising my principles for a tasty slice of salty pepperoni pizza. But then I smell the heavy aroma of crackling bacon, see the succulent spiraled ham or the chicken wings sing to me with their siren buffalo sauce and my resolve melts into the sausage gravy that I ladle on my biscuits.

So, like most addicts, I set up a framework of exceptions that allows me to still enjoy meat guilt-free. Or at least that was the idea.

Exception one: always eat whatever a host is serving. It’s rude to turn down food that someone else invested time and care preparing. What I soon learned is that no one is typically offended when you turn down meat, quite the contrary, people usually feel bad for not offering meat-free alternative entrees. So I end up feeling guilty whenever I partake in this exception.

Exception two: if I didn’t buy it, then I’m not ethically responsible for aiding and abetting the evil meat machine. I can eat meat in social situations in which I have not contributed financially. I can just slip my bottle of wine in next to the spread and enjoy the bacon wrapped scallops and finger-licking ribs to my heart’s content. Except that I can’t, not quite. I feel the same guilt as I do when I justify meat eating as a social grace. I can’t seem to turn off my brain as I munch on meat that I suspect is the product of industrial torture, greed and general degradation.

Exception three: holidays are a free-for-all. Holidays are not only food-centric but very specifically meat-centric. You’ve got your Thanksgiving turkey, the Christmas and Easter hams, the Fourth of July bar-be-ques. The only safe holiday seems to be Valentine’s Day in which the whole concept revolves around sweets instead of meats. The most recent Thanksgiving was the first in which this exception lost its guilt-easing effectiveness. I could not help berating myself for indulging in the deep fried turkey. I only had a few bites and it was juicy and delicious and totally unnecessary. There were so many other tantalizing sides that I could (and did) fill myself to capacity without ever eating a bit of meat.

Exception four: organic meats are ok anytime. Except for that they’re not, not really. After yet more research I realized that organic meat companies employ a good many marketing ploys and buzz words to trick consumers into a state of pliant delusion.  About the only term you can trust is “antibiotic free” but my qualms go far beyond the chemical mistreatment of the food source. “Free range” doesn’t mean the chickens skipped around in fields of green nor does “natural beef” mean the cows meandered open pastures eating a diet of grass.

Even the beef I bought off some guy at a farmer’s market turned out to be “grass finished.” After some googling I figured out this meant the cows ate grass for the last few weeks of their lives. The rest of the time they were fed an unnatural diet of grain. That probably gave the poor animals some uncomfortable digestive issues that would put most irritable bowel sufferers to shame. And, in the end, I can’t really afford to buy organic meat that often so—even when it’s legitimate pasture frolicking meat— the “anytime” still ends up being “not very often.”

Exception five: hangovers. Since my first hangover in college I have always craved greasy, calorific foods, typically of the fast food variety. Fast food restaurants are not great for vegetarian options or their vegetarian options are salads which are completely unsatisfying, even nauseating, when I’m rocking a bad, bottle-and-a-half-of-wine-myself hangover. As if the hangover depression isn’t enough, indulging in fast food fare just makes me feel bad about myself and hungover. Besides some places are catching up. There is a barbeque spot just around the corner from me that now serves bbq tofu. Just make the tofu as unhealthy as possible, deep fried and covered in sauce, and I might just be in meat-free hangover heaven.

Exception six: Chick-fil-a. Either you get this one or you don’t. I know some people hate it and I know some people are not tempted by fast food. I do not fall into either of those categories and so can be found periodically stuffing my face with grow-in-the-dark chicken meat covered in that mysteriously addictive, slightly sweet crumbly crust. Luckily I don’t live near a Chick-fil-a, so most of the time I’m safe. Most of the time.

Despite the fact that my many exceptions were designed to keep me with one foot firmly planted in the carnivore camp, their associated problems have pushed me into being more of a meat abstainer than I planned. Sometimes it bugs me. I don’t like that I have to limit myself to a once or twice a month consumption rate because so many others demand dirt cheap meat three times a day. The meat industry has degraded its standards and disposed of its humanity for the express purpose of cutting costs so that a lot of people can eat a lot of cheap meat.

Then, in my more forgiving moments, I think that, even if the animals were properly revered for their sacrifice and meat cost what it should, I would probably eat about the same amount. I would like to treat it as a feast like my hunter-gatherer ancestors who enjoyed meat on a catch-as-catch-can basis. Recently I went to a restaurant with a menu of organic, natural meats from a farm nearby. I paid almost nine bucks for a hamburger and it was the most delicious thing I’ve eaten in a month. It was worth every penny and I savored every bite because I knew I wouldn’t get another one for probably another month. I shouldn’t have too much of a good thing. Which is easier said than done with the holidays just around the corner and a Chick-fil-a a block from my work.