We’re in the midst of the nativity fast. The monastic fast means being functionally vegan, minus olive oil, and I don’t think I can get away with that. That’s mostly due to the fact that I don’t do the shopping or the cooking in my house and I’m not willing to make Abby cook vegan for me. So if I’m not giving up meat and animal products what should I do?

There is something beautiful and healing and important about fasting that I would like to partake of, so I’ve given up bread and sweets and alcohol. I’m also planning on not eating at all until supper on Wednesday and Fridays. I think that might be an interesting thing to do for the entirety of the fast but it is not easy and I am not as easy to be around as I’d like while it’s going on. Something I’d do if I didn’t live with Abby and Roby.

I guess if I didn’t live with Abby and Roby I’d be a monk, that’d be if anything happened to them. In an alternate universe without them, well, I don’t much want to think about that. 

I didn’t eat today, I had some black coffee in the morning and the first thing I put in my mouth apart from water was a bite of sausage that I chewed up so that Roby could eat it better. She didn’t end up eating the sausage either, at least not for a while. 

I thought there was a little poetry in that, fasting all day only to challenge yourself with tasting but not eating food so as to give it to your child. It felt in line with things, Good, even. 

I could do a lot more. Smash my phone for one. If I had money I’d buy an apple watch. That way I could see if someone’s trying to bother me for work and deal with it, without the temptation of a proper phone. But that’s just weakness. Excuses.