I have been organizing my bookmarks on my laptop, which means I have been procrastinating: avoiding school work I need to get ready and blog writers I need to search out for the fall issue of Rapport.

I checked out a bunch of vegan blogs thinking they’d give me lots of ideas. They have, of course. I’m not culinarily creative so I rely on other people to catalyze my thought process. However, I find very few vegan recipes I can use “as is”. That’s because I have a list of things I can’t or won’t eat (in addition to the basic things vegans don’t eat). My poor mother!

• chocolate or cocoa
• nuts and seeds (except for peanuts and peanut butter)
• beans and lentils in large amounts
• tempeh
• nutritional yeast
• pre-made vegan mayo or butter
• fake cheese/vegan cheese
• pickles
• deep fried food
• fake bacon and veggie dogs
• any kind of “milk” (with the exception of vegan ice cream)
• most desserts (with the above-mentioned exception of vegan ice cream and sorbets/gelatoes)

I hope you can see my problem. Yes, it is self-imposed due to stomach problems and personal dislikes (or super likes, as in the case of chocolate). But it’s my reality. Again, my poor mother!

I wondered what my title would be if I were to start a vegan blog. That’s how I came up with “The Vegan Who Can’t”. Sounds bad. Sounds bathroom-related.

Maybe this fixation on a vegan blog is just summer boredom. Or maybe it’s just to keep my mind occupied so I don’t think about all the bad things that have happened lately (the barn burning down, Danforth shootings, Bailey’s death).

Sometimes my fixations turn into real things; I did learn to play guitar in this obsessive way. And anyone who does macro photography knows it only works (not to say mine does) if you’re obsessive. Yesterday, I went out around the golden hour and took macro photos down by the shore of the lake. Only a few worked out despite the time it took to set up the tripod and get down on the ground to be at eye-level with the “greens”.

Other times, fixations don’t work out for me. After going to one of those group painting sessions, I bought a small set of acrylic paints and some starter canvases. I tooled around for a few weeks and even created a little kit that would make it easy for me to set up and clean up. But nothing came of it, mostly owing to my very uncreative mind. I love colours but I don’t know what to do with them.

I have even been practicing taking food photos. Val definitely sees this as a fixation. I told him it won’t last once school starts; who wants to see photos of a frozen meal fresh out of the microwave?

Maybe I’m just temporarily challenged by the “if they can do it, I can do it” of looking at so many blogs. I already have a blog – why not do it? Maybe the fear is that it would just become one more project started and not finished. Probably the fear is that my life is just not that interesting. I’m not complaining: I have a great life for me.

At any rate, if I do decide to blog about my version of veganism, I’ll wait until I’m finished with Rapport. My history blog – as I call it – is taking up too much of my time during the school year so I am sadly but smartly (I think) quitting as editor as of mid-November.

For now, I will just go along with whatever happens. It is summer, after all.