Family secrets

We had a lovely dinner with friends last night.  By the time I got home from a 16 hour day, though, I crashed before I could post.

Something that struck me over the past week was how many secrets are kept within a family.  My concept of family is pretty inclusive.  My best friend since middle school and her family are pretty much my family.  Our close friends have all kind of formed our own family.  At any rate, I was caught off guard several times as we hung out with all our friends and family and learned many things we didn't know before.

Parents that had to live under marshal law, job losses, pregnancies, a rape.  I'm still trying to process it all. The strength and resilience that it took for them to survive some of these experiences is stunning enough.  Then the realization that they coped in secret.  Amazing.  My heart still hurts for them, though.

Growing up, I'd heard that families always kept secrets.  I never realized it was of this magnitude though.  I've been very blessed and never felt like I had more tragedy than I could handle.  I assumed that the secrets that were kept within families were small and insignificant in the grand scheme of life.  Like sneaking out to a party as a teenager or letting your boyfriend come over when your parents were out of town.

I know this post doesn't exactly have anything to do with food, but it just seemed too important not to share.  Here's the tie-in, though.  I previously felt like there were parallels between coming out and announcing a change to veganism.  It's a lifestyle difference, people are often critical, people may not necessarily feel like they know how to act around you.  I still feel like that in some ways, but I have a little better perspective on the enormity of both.  What you eat holds less significance to others than many other secrets that many people keep. Any thoughts on this from anybody else?  Ok, enough heaviness!

Happy New Year bambinos!  Much love for the new year!