I do the best imitation of myself

Ben Folds always says it in the best way.

Lately I feel like a walking contradiction of myself. There's this dyed haired, tattooed, pierced, skinny jeaned, studded belted, smoking portrayal of me that everyone sees every day.  Don't get me wrong, I don't dislike these physical characteristics of me. I embrace them. I have calmed them, alcohol is no longer my crutch and I'm happy with that.

Where I feel the contradictory part creeping in is that lately there's this hidden depth of mother earth 'hippyness' in me fighting to get out but it's tough getting through these life long habits of mine.

I had a bad case of eczema a few years back and used the creams and oils and crap the doc suggested, which made it ten fold worse. So I looked into things myself, cut out sulfates and parabens from my skin care and hair care regime and lo and behold, reduction in eczema with very few outbreaks. Great! BUT, I still colour my hair with ridiculous chemical crap every 6-8 weeks thereby wrecking all the balance my scalp has achieved in the weeks before. Why? Vanity, simple vanity. If there's anything I can't cope with, it's my hair looking like crapola.

Back to the smoking as well, I cut chemicals from my products yet still I puff on the cancer sticks as if they will somehow lengthen my time in this world. Unfortunately vanity in't the culprit here, or may be it is. Despite knowing how evil and socially unacceptable smoking is, I still like it, I like how it can look, I guess there's the rebel teenager in me that won't quit despite the fact that I'm going to be 32 this year and I swore when I started that I'd quit before I hit 30. :(

Another contradiction I'm struggling with, I stopped eating meat just over two years ago. I feel better for it, health wise and morally too. It's not the eating of animals that I disagree with on this one, it's how they die to feed us. If they were slaughtered humanely then although I don't think I could bring myself to eat meat again, I wouldn't have such a issue with it. Yet, I drink milk.
Now, unless you are into animal rights etc then you may ask what drinking milk has got to do with animals dieing. Well, the majority of calves are slaughtered or left to starve to death as they affect the milk produced. A cow can't give as much milk if there's a little one feeding off of it. Plus, the type of cows that produce milk aren't bred for their meat, so the calves serve no purpose except in the womb and the occassional female calf which will be allowed to live and join the herd. Yet still I have milk in the house and use it every day.

I know I can't live up to every ideal I would like. I don't have the money to buy organic and fair trade foods, clothing etc. I do the best I can with these things but there's a lot of things I could do like go back to drinking soya or rice milk, stop smoking, calm the teen rebel punk inside me and just embrace the fact that I am now a grown up with responsibilities in the word that are larger than me and those in my immediacy, yet there's part of me that's scared of turning into a self righteous sopabox type person. Almost as if my flaws keep me normal.

But is that reason enough?