Hello ladies of homesteading:
In the interest of spicing things up, and community connection, particularly of the CSA sort, but others as well, I've invited Meryl and Emily to join the blog. Meryl has graciously accepted, and I want her to know that there is no pressure with posting--it's a leisurely space--and part of the impetus for current invitation is, of course, that conversation we've been having about meat-eating and being a "compassionate OMNIvore" and how one of us may have just returned to the fold of vegetarianism.
I want to add that I do not judge anyone for eating meat, do not disrespect that choice in the least. But I also believe I would be more comfortable with eating meat if I could be assured that each meat-filled meal were like
our Thanksgiving meal, the one with the free-range organically-fed turkey, but I can't, and it's more exhausting to do that than to simply divert myself to the vegetarian option. That, and it forces me to choose a much healthier option when eating out. No more greasy cheeseburgers for me.
And I tell you, those images from
Food Inc have really been haunting me--the chickens that cannot stand up because their breasts are too large and the cows who cannot walk but are cruelly forced to the slaughterhouse on hocks--I believe
No Impact Man mentioned something about bulldozers and other frightful methods of getting the cows into the slaughterhouse, as a cow who cannot move on its own volition to the slaughter cannot be used for its meat, for fear of mad cow disease.
I mean zero disrespect to people like the farmers at our first CSA, who also had a meat CSA, focusing on chicken and turkey. Those turkeys were truly free-range; I had to drive up that dirt road with serious caution.
But I just can't anymore. I can't trap mice in the winter and I can't eat meat. I'm happily surprised at how the shift has occurred--I wanted it for some time, but, like relationships, it seems it happens when I'm looking away. I fell in love with the man who became my husband nearly eleven years ago when I desperately did
not want to be in a relationship, and I've stopped eating meat when I threw in the towel and decided I wasn't ready yet. It's only been--what--something like three days--but like I keep saying, it feels permanent. As permanent as eight years can be, anyway. Maybe as permanent as more. Maybe as permanent as, well,
permanent.