i eat whale! and i still call myself a vegetarian

i've been a vegetarian, more on than off, since high school, sometimes vegan by accident, and spent three weeks as a raw foodist an experiment- not anorexia, i swear-
the longest stint of strict vegetarianism was when i was in spain, and ended up eating what i realized must have been an entire rabbit in red red wine stew over the course of the day when it was left oh so appealing in the pot covered by a dish towel in the late summer heat.

i was hungry. i was bony. i had been eating meat again for maybe six months, in teaspoon sized doses, which is normally what i do when social pressures, raw liver, family holidays, abject self starvation, etc. force me to eat meat. and then i ate the rabbit. now, years later, i can look back with the infinite wisdom of my friend jenny, and see that that was the problem: i had eaten the rabbit.

all of the bites, maybe not even enough to form a rabbit, had coincided in my stomach to form a complete, pristine rabbit. with fur. which gave me gout (heatstroke? but i thought it was gout the same way i occasionally convince myself that i am pregnant through an immaculate act of god) the next day.

actually, the original thought works better with almonds. you eat lots of almonds. the almonds meet in your stomach. they form a giant perfect almond egg. one almond. even better, say you eat several marzipan almonds. they solidify into two regular sized almonds, one runty little almond and a teaspoon of sugar. imagine the icons on the food pyramid and you get the idea.

so, following this logic, so long as the quantity of meat i consume is small enough, pure enough, abstract enough to not solidify into a hatchling or microscopic cow, i am free to sample while travelling, visiting family, etc. sometimes. not now though, because

i ate the whale. a small bite. then the whale ate me. whale tastes smart. leathery. anxious sour as daddy. back in the fold now, i guess