This weekend my parents came...to visit my life here on the farm...to validify my existence here...and so we spent time on the farm and then left to visit another farm..learning about the shakers...and I thought about how funny my life is...I work 6 days a week on a farm only in my time off to visit another...but was reminded again...that I have wonderful parents...supportive of the strange path i have chosen to embark upon...delighted to enter fully into my existance here... farming along side me...loving up the children who surround me...engaging with the people i have come to really love around me. And so I thank them for life...
And then this week there were the cows...Charlie the calf...managed to get lost for an hour amongst the brush....mother chole obviously not knowing where he is...Chloe is a strange beast...I love her..but her personality is not how i imagined a cow to be...I thought in my ignorance that "all" cows would be strong, solid, peaceful creatures...nurturing their young...chewing on grass...but chole...well she reminds me of drug addicts...she is really loving to her calf...at times...but then...when grain is near...it is as if she totally forgets about the being she brought into the world...she cares for Charlie and yet at times seems neglectful...her spirit is flighty and almost teenage mother like...she is more concerned about her needs then her calfs...I guess I just always assumed the animal world lacked that ...so chole is showinng me a new side...charlie was found and all was well...the next mroning we woke...were walking through the fields and saw that Lena...our smallest beef cow was walking amongst all our lovely vegetables...oh animals...munching away at our red boston lettuce...stepping on seeded beds...it took all five of us to slowly corral her back into the pasture with the other cows...oh sweet cows...what trouble you are causing...soon I will spend a week milking chole which seems to be ending for many in a lot of spilled milk...we shall see how I and our addict of a cow do together...
Lastly i wanted to mention the pig slaughter...it happened last sunday...4 of our pigs are now no longer with us...the largest ones...the ones who continously attmepted to eat my feet and clothing...but who also really loved to get rubbed behind the ears...Don stated that it is interesting that those who were greediest are the first to go...hmm...how interesting if all of our actions had such applicable consequences...thank God they don't...but I will say farming is beauitful at times...and really ugly...the death...the blood...affected me more than i thought...the skinning of our pigs...the turning them into meat...I could handle...always loving disection...but their deaths, though peaceful were hard...the butchers quietly coming into the pen..petting their heads...shooting them ...slitting their throats...bodies convulsing...and then silence...no squeals...just death...and this is our meat...it is good to be reminded...to eat, there is death...real death...even when it is kind...and on home turf and done by good hands...it is still death...killing for our bodies to be nourished...well enough of the slaughter...maybe I have said too much...but it is, what it is...do I still want to farm...yes...do i want to raise animals..yes...do I recognize, that as my little sister says, killing does take a toll on the spirit...and did leave a dark cloud over my day...yes...so know the meat we consume...which is mostly not humanly raised or humanely killed...leaves its mark on someone...am I going to become a vegetarian...I don't think so...as the meat we killed was well loved and cared for...I knew it...interacted with it...it is the best meat to eat...and so i say I want to enter into relationship with the food I eat...it seems more whole to know your food...to mourn its death...to delight in it's taste...then to just consume it...may I come to know all of my food in life and death. To Life.
Warning: Maybe hard for some to see
7 comments:
Katie
I had such a lovely time with you this weekend. It was so wonderful to meet the lovely people in your life both the small and the grown. I have such an appreciation for all you do. love you.
imocm
It's interesting, Kate, the juxtaposition of your June 6th photo with the photo of the slaughtered pig - birth and death right next to each other. Several months ago, while walking through a pasture, I came upon a hawk in the process of killing and eating a crow. The crow was still alive, weakly flapping its wings, crowing painfully, as the hawk dug its beak into the crow, casting its feathers aside as it went for the meat. Being no lover of crows, I still felt remorse as I witnessed this event of death and life. It was the end of one life that brought about the continuance of another, and so death and life march on, hand in hand, one feeding the other until it's the one which has been fed will have to yield so another can survive. It was wonderful being with all of you this weekend - thanks for sharing your reality with us!
I just read this quote in How to Eat Supper, "I'm not a Vegetarian because I love animals, I'm a Vegetarian because I hate plants."
Oh great, now I can never eat bacon again. Ha. I'm joking, of course.
Great update. I've been wanting to talk to you but the weekend have been so busy. Hopefully this weekend... xoxo
What a fun, special photo of you and your parents! You look HAPPY!
Katie,
This is Martin (of Martin + Kim + girls)--Kara directed us to your blog.
I thought this was a sobering reflection and a good reminder of the true price of eating meat--and the ideal of relationship with animals we eat.
From my limited reading about indigenous peoples who lived in a sustainable economy with land and animals, it seems they often had rituals to signify the importance of each animal that "gave" its life for their food.
While it's probably disingenous to invent some sort of ritual (ex., sprinkling blue corn over the nose of a killed deer and intoning a thanksgiving, as in Silko's book Ceremony), it seems like our own culture is bereft of rituals that might help frame the meaning of an event like pig slaughter--even and especially when the event occurs under the most humane conditions.
Or maybe there is a semblence of ritual in the slaughtering process?
I look forward to reading more of your thoughts as you farm!
MC
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