Food for Thought “Where’s the horns?” “Not horns, Caitie. Antlers. Deer have antlers. This one is a girl, a Doe, so she doesn’t need antlers.” “A doe.” “Ain’t she a big, pretty one?” My eyes locked on the animal hanging upside down behind my grandfather’s barn. Was she pretty? She was pulled up by her hind feet, the tip of her nose just brushing the grass below as her head fell limply. Her once-­‐furry, white belly was split down the middle. I could see inside of her. Emptiness. I had seen deer before, dashing roadside next to my car. My mom always took care to go slow and ‘keep her eyes out for them’. She didn’t want to hurt them. Those deer were pretty, yes. With their long legs, turning ears, flared noses. I looked down at the grass below the animal and noticed the stained ground below her. That is blood, and the deer is dead. The connections were being made, thoughts processed. Was she pretty? I shrugged and my grandfather took my small hand in his, seemingly satisfied with my nonchalant response. He led me back around to the front of the house, my pigtails swaying as I walked a step ahead of him. I silently swore to myself that I wouldn’t tell anyone what he had done to her. It was a dirty secret that I wanted to take to my grave. I let the deer leave my mind, the way that six year-­‐old troubles tend to pass, and I didn’t think of her again until days had gone by. I sat at the dinner table with my grandma, and beamed wildly. She had spent all morning baking an apple pie, and the whole house smelled of cinnamon. I knew that first came dinner, and then came dessert, and I was ready. Grandpa came into the room, balancing bowls on his arms like a waiter. I picked up my spoon eagerly and dug into the meal as soon as he set it down in front of me. “Did you cook it in gravy this time, Bill?” My grandmother spoke through a mouthful of food. I glanced up happily, chewing a big bite with a smile. My grandfather could cook an old shoe and make it taste good. Or at least that’s what Grandma said. “Yeah, good, huh? I hope you like it. We’ll be eating it for a while. Gosh, she was a big, pretty one.” His words struck me, body rigid, and eyes wide. I looked down at the bowl full of gravy, rice and meat. Not meat, flesh. My mind went to the deer hanging lifeless from the beam, and the deer running in the grass beside the road. It felt almost cannibalistic; animals were my friends. I shoved my bowl away. “ I don’t want to eat her.” My voice came out soft and pleading. “Not ‘her’ honey,” my grandmother scolded, while leaning down affectionately to let the cat lick gravy off her fingertips. “You call a deer an ‘it’. Deer don’t have feelings. Now go ahead. Food is food.” I shook my head sternly, pouting out my bottom lip. My grandfather spoke, and his eyes locked on me. I had never seen him upset before. “What’s wrong with you? I waited outside for hours for that doe. Now you eat that.” He pushed my bowl back in front of me, heaping my spoon full and waiting. I didn’t want to get in trouble. And that pie was sitting on the counter, taunting me. I closed my eyes and opened my mouth. In went the spoon. I pretended that it was beef, because beef didn’t come from an animal, it came from the grocery store. After the meal, we ate the pie, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would. That night I laid in bed, thinking about the eyes of the doe as she hung on my grandfather’s stand. They were wide, not peacefully closed like I expected from death. She looked afraid. She must have been afraid of my grandfather before he shot her. I couldn’t help but be a little afraid of him too. That frightened feeling followed me, and with it came frustration and guilt and an overwhelming sense of commitment. Any time I ate a meal that included meat, I associated it with the animal. The animals that I would visit and stroke when I went to the farm down the road, I realized, were the same ones who would later be dinner. Those pigs and cows that acted like pets, wanting to be scratched behind the ear, were the creatures that I was chewing. I couldn’t handle it. The guilt consumed me completely. Then I stumbled upon a documentary called Earthlings and my life was changed. Seeing the real footage of the abuse, neglect, and slaughter of animals in the factory farming system was enough to make my mind up. I would never eat meat again. I ran out of my room to tell my mom about this choice, tears and makeup streaking my face, barely able to choke out the words. She simply responded, “Oh, Caitie, I’m sorry you had to see that….Just give it time babe, and soon you’ll forget all about it. Don’t tell the family about this, you’ll change your mind.” My mind was set though, and although I had stopped eating meat completely, I didn’t tell another soul about my choice because I didn’t want to stir the pot and cause a scene. But no one seemed to notice anyway. Maybe they were all too caught up in their own mental turmoil to notice the physical changes that mine were creating. But then it was Thanksgiving at my dad’s house, and the focus was shifted to family. And suddenly they noticed. “What’s in this?” I pointed to a bowl of stuffing, and then the one next to it. “And this? What’s this?” My aunt, standing above me, suspiciously raised her eyebrow. “What do we need? A menu?” she snapped, obviously annoyed with my questions. If we had had a menu on display, it would have read as follows: Family Thanksgiving Dinner Dinner Rolls Homemade Stuffing Oven Roasted Turkey Creamy Beef-­‐Stock Gravy Pineapple Glazed Ham Corn with Butter Twice-­‐baked Potatoes with Bacon and Cheese Brussel Sprouts with Dried Cranberries and Bacon Beer Which essentially meant that my dinner menu would have read: Caitie’s Thanksgiving Dinner Delicious Carbs Stuffing Dead Bird Dead Cow Juice Dead Pig One Delicious Vegetable Potatoes Tainted with Dead Pig Another Tainted Side Dish Beer “It’s stuffing, it’s bread. What? You don’t eat carbs?” “No, carbs are fine.” I smiled, trying not to take offense to her comments, and spooned some onto my plate. I avoided the turkey, gravy, and the vegetables that were cooked in bacon grease. My family used bacon the way that most use table salt. I made sure that my plate looked nice and full so that no one would question me, and sat down amongst my family members. I took one bite of the mashed potatoes and my eyes widened. There it was: bacon. I grabbed my napkin, raising it to my mouth, and spit the wad of salty food out. I quickly wrapped up the napkin and hid it down in my lap, glancing around to make sure that no one noticed. My aunt was looking at me with pure disgust from across the table. “That was rude,” she nearly growled. “You’re honestly going to spit out food at the table?” The rest of my family stopped their conversations and looked at the pair of us. I tucked my napkin-­‐clutching hands further under the table. My dad, who was sitting at my right, tilted his head slightly and spoke to me in a quiet voice. “Hon, you don’t like them? You don’t have to eat them.” I shook my head. “No, I just…I don’t eat bacon anymore. I don’t eat meat.” The entire table fell silent. All of them, that is, except my aunt, who never missed the opportunity to make her opinion known. “Spitting it out at the table is a little dramatic though, don’t you think? It’s just bacon, Caitie, not freaking poison. It won’t kill you.” But it did kill. And the cow that was cooked down into gravy had been killed. And the turkey, the shining star of this family meal, had gone through so much cruelty in its life and no one at the table seemed to care. I could picture them, cramped into a lightless building. Birds unable to walk because they are so crowded together. And the ham that was glazed so delicately with sauce had once been a living creature that struggled to survive a short life of suffering. I wasn’t worried about the food killing me. I was afraid of my food having been tortured and murdered. Everyone went back to their conversations, went back to pretending that I wasn’t the black sheep of the family, went back to pretending that I hadn’t just confessed some unthinkable crime. But not my grandfather, his eyes stayed on me. I finished my dinner promptly, and then hurried back home as soon as I could, but I couldn’t get my grandfather’s stare out of my mind. So, a week later, when I received a letter from him, I was expecting the worst. I had an idea in my mind of what the letter would say, and my eyes brimmed with tears as I flipped the envelope over and over in my hands. I could picture his sloppy handwriting sprawled angrily across the page. I opened the letter with trembling hands and braced myself. This was the moment of truth. The man that I had admired since I was in pigtails was about to write me out of his life, or yell at me, or something else terrible and unknown. I read the letter from top to bottom, and then I read it again. And a third time just to be sure that I was reading it correctly. There was my grandfather’s scrawling script, smudged in places because he was left-­‐handed. It was his handwriting, there was no denying it, but the words on the page still seemed so foreign. Caitie-bug,
Seeing your aunt talk to you like that, it broke my heart. I
don’t understand why you feel that you can’t eat meat. But I don’t
have to understand you to love you honey. You don’t have to eat
it if you don’t want to. Just don’t go all crazy and stop eating
chocolate or something, okay? I don’t think your grandma could
handle that. I’ll see you soon. Love you.
-Grandpa
In a few sentences, he had given me all of the validation that I needed in order to stay strong. Because if a seventy-­‐year-­‐old man, who’s been hunting since he was thirteen, can respect my decision to not eat meat, then everyone else can too. It’s been years since I’ve crunched into a crisp slice of bacon. Years since I last took a bite of a big juicy burger. Years since I’ve been able to put grilled chicken on my salad. But in the years that I’ve been without meat, I’ve felt less guilt. I can live comfortably knowing that my body is not a tomb for other sentient beings. I see the deer on the side of the road, and I can smile knowing that I will never contribute to their downfall. I look at the cows on the farms with sadness but compassion, and my heart is glad that I made the choice to never feast on their bodies. People ask their questions, and they probably always will, but the choice I made will never be undone by their questioning looks or harsh comments. I still live with the mindset of that little girl with the pigtails behind my grandfather’s barn; Animals are my friends, and I don’t eat my friends.