It is probably impossible to live a black-and-white life, though certainly addicts like myself will try. The only route to comfortable success is to contemplate the grays and adjust when necessary.

That comes up for me today as I continue a discussion of how our family chooses its protein. To many, that might sound like liberal-sissy stuff, but we are convinced of the essential values of nutrition and responsible consumerism, and wish more people were.

The competing interests at issue are a fairly developed opinion that the more processed a food product is, the less of a food it is, and our increasingly reliance on processed soy to replace animal protein in our diets.

Yet another tint of gray comes from the fact that soy is part of the great monocultural quartet (with rice, wheat, and corn) that by its nature (un-nature?), both supports and threatens human survival. Proponents would tell you that growing a single variety reduces the farmers' variables and fosters mechanized yields. Others say, quite rightly, that with single strains, one new pest could wipe out all production of, say, corn, or wheat, in short order. We need only to regard nature to know that it favors is diversity, not monotony, and need only regard the banana's plight to see the risk.

So, in opposition to animal cruelty and the environmental degradations of factory farming, we eat less animal protein, but our "solution" is to encourage monoculture farming and rely on food processing. Can that be right?

That's what our family discussion is about.

As I said in the previous post, Georgie leans vegetarian foremostly on the cruelty issue, and no amount of grass-fed, earth-loving agriculture is going to get around the fact that in the end, the animals are going to give up their lives in service to extending ours.

I, meanwhile, am very impressed by how almost every environmental deficit imposed by imperious manhandling of animals and the land can be turned into environmental benefits by exchanging marauding for stewardship.

I'm aware of several organic, grass-fed, humanely grown meat CSAs in our area, and these days, the option they represent is looking better.

Will we end up there, or even test it out? Perhaps that will be my next report from the gray.