mainsqueeze's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Makin' Soup A bit of history: Up until August of 2001, I was a vegetarian. I didn't stop eating meat for health reasons, or because I didn't like the taste; I stopped because I couldn't deal with the guilt. I've always respected all animals, and I've loved quite a few, too, so it felt incredibly wrong to be eating something that had been a living, breathing creature at one point. I remember the exact moment I made the decision to stop eating meat- I was fourteen years old, and as I was standing in line at the grocery store, I noticed the blood glistening on the cut of beef the man in front of me had unloaded onto the conveyor belt. It hit me, at that moment, that he was going to go home and ingest a rotting piece of a cow's body, that that cow had been killed to become a meal. I was sickened, needless to say, and for the next four years, I did not consume a single piece of meat. I stopped buying leather shoes. I started checking labels on all of the food my Mother bought (and you'd be surprised at what some seemingly innocent products contain. Know what StarBursts are made out of? I do.) I ate bagels for breakfast, rice and beans for lunch, and vegetables or pasta for dinner, and I was just fine. I took nutritional supplements to make up for what my diet was lacking, for those four years, and I was healthy and strong and guilt-free. Of course, the meat-eaters around me took it upon themselves to try to convince me that what I was doing (or not doing) was wrong somehow. They'd tell me that I was destroying my health, and that meat was vital to the human body for it's protein and iron. I'd explain to them that eating meat was something that I simply couldn't do with a clean conscience. They didn't get it. I'd ask, What did you have for dinner last night? A chicken breast? A hamburger? Did it look like an animal? Was it recognizable as part of a formerly living creature? And they would say, Well, no, it wasn't. It's always easier, I think, to ease the guilt you may feel over eating meat- eating animals- when they don't look like animals. A chicken nugget DOES NOT look like a chicken, and so you don't actually make the connection between the deep fried, tasty morsel in front of you, and the rotting piece of flesh that it actually is. I had had, that day at the supermarket in 1998, a moment where my mind MADE THAT CONNECTION, and I couldn't bring myself to continue eating dead animals any longer. I remember, also, the first time I ate meat again after all that time- Zach and I were on the second leg of our mega-roadtrip in 2001. We had been eating in truck-stops and fast-food stands for several days, and vegetarian fare was hard to find. After a steady diet of french-fries and onion rings for nearly a week, I broke down and ordered a hamburger. Any former vegetarian can tell you this: When you eat meat after abstaining for a long period of time, it makes you sick. Sick like stomach cramps and maybe even vomiting. I ate it, anyway, and after that, I ate meat more and more frequently until eventually, it was a part of my regular diet again. About a week ago, my Mother and I went grocery shopping together. My Mom, being the major bargain hunter that she is, demanded that I take advantage of the $.40/lb special on whole chickens. She tossed two five lb, frozen birds into my cart, and that was that. I stuck them in my freezer when I got home, and I doubted that I would ever actually cook them. Last night, though, I decided to thaw one out and make myself a huge pot of chicken soup. After a few hours under running water, the flesh was thawed, and I began to cook. I made a vegetable broth, I seasoned the water, and I pulled the chicken out of the bag. I have never, ever cooked an entire chicken before. I don't even think I've seen a chicken that wasn't chopped into neat little pieces, let alone done the chopping myself. I took my sharpest knife out of the block, and I stared at the tiny, naked body sitting on my counter. I removed the skin (which took about an hour, due to all of the shuddering), and I stared some more. Okay, I thought, I'll just remove the wings and legs, and I'll cut the breasts for the soup. I grabbed a wing, and I grabbed a leg, and I pulled. And I pulled. And I pulled, and then there was a horrible, wet noise, and I actually apologized. After several more hours, of pulling and wincing and disgusting noises, the soup was done. I ladled a large bowlful for myself, and I sat down to eat. I couldn't do it. Like I said, it's a lot easier to trick yourself into ignoring the fact that you're eating a dead creature when your meal doesn't actually look like anything that has ever been alive. I don't think I'll be eating meat again anytime soon, and I'm pretty sure that I won't even be tempted. 5:52 a.m. - 2003-05-10 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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