Meat and the Supermarket
Well today I went to the supermarket and my husband asked me to pick up some food for him. This inevitably means meat. Having grown up near cattle in Nebraska, he is still a carnivore despite my attempts at persuasion. I know, I know. You’re asking, why is Josie buying meat? It’s a very difficult thing for me to come to terms with. I love my husband. And any of you out there that love your husband know we would do anything to help keep them healthy and happy. I don’t buy food (aka meat) at the supermarket, then he eats out at every meal and that is unhealthy. Not that he can’t cook, he’s just busy like ever one else.
So our agreement is that I take care of many chores around the house including grocery shopping and he takes care of all our joint monthly finances. Those of you that know me know how terrible I am at math so while we tried switching these jobs a while back, I failed my expectations miserably because anything with numbers makes me want to go hide under the covers. So alas … this is the way it is. On the rare occasion that my husband asks me to pick up some food for him at the supermarket, I do.
Today it was lunch meat and stuff for spaghetti (translation … sauce, noodles, and ground beef). I think I have officially been vegan long enough that I can not look at meat and not see a face on it. I stand next to all these other people in the supermarket gobbling up samples of turkey and picking out their choice cuts of meat and I think … how can you not see the face on that cow or turkey or chicken? The package is bleeding for gawd’s sake! But then again, maybe they are just buying meat for their husbands. Then I imagine them taking this meat home to feed to their kids! Their kids! Why would anybody feed a bloody piece of flesh to their kids?
If that piece of meat was set in any context other than on the kitchen table, people would be horrified. What if you were walking your dog around the neighborhood and all of the sudden you saw a rack of ribs bleeding on someone’s front lawn. Wouldn’t you freak out? So why is it that if we put that same piece of bleeding flesh on the table, it’s ok? I could go on here about lobbying and the meat production industry but I think I’ll call it a day 🙂
For those of you reading this who think I’m a half-arsed vegan now that you know I occasionally buy meat for my husband, I think you’re wrong. I don’t eat meat. My husband does. That is what it is. Lawd help us if we ever have kids!