My Blog
I'm loopy.
Wed, July 18, 2007 - 6:38 PMLast week, I had a work party of 9 come out to do their weeding. I feel obligated to be out with them; in part because they might end up pulling a row of something useful, but also because it's my business. That was Fri night til 9 pm. On Sat morning, we had 5 am rondezvous with our friends to butcher our chicks, and a work party of 4 at 9 am to weed. Then on Sun another 5 am rondezvous to butcher chickens at the friends' house. It's been stinkin' hot, so we wanted to get the butchering done before the heat set in. I'm glad, too. We got 25 chickens/day done by 10:30 am.
That darling daughter of mine is a bit loopy herself. She LOVES butchering. We found that if one puts a bit of dawn in the dunking water, it destinkifies them a bit, so that eliminated the only thing she didn't like. She feels she's particularily good at getting the lungs out whole. I have to admit, there was a bit of pride in me when I saw her sneaking up to the squeemish girl with a chicken foot and placing it on her shoulder. She's got a bit of her mother in her. For some reason, the other girl didn't talk to her much for the rest of the day.
Today, the day after delivery day, is sort of my day off. I took some cold cuts. olive cheese bread, and tomatoes w/basil, garlic, olive oil and balsamic vinegar to my family, who're staying at the lake. left them all there after a nice chat with my Dad. Didn't sleep well, as it was hot and a 2 am thunderstorm and glorious rain (it's been dry) announced itself quite loudly til about 4:30. I found myself propped on the couch at about 6 this morning, water glass in hand. I guess I fell asleep watching the lightning show. So, today I just hung out. Went and watched the zucchini grow for a bit, tidied my kitchen, and read.
Sort of giggled a bit when I realized that the reading I'd done was bouncing between my new obsession, permaculture design book, and online info for what ails my tomatoes, to a common weed book of Alberta. Then, a friend called to ask if her garden was OK (I think I recognized the somewhat subdued excitement as she asked if the peas were ready, and if the squash was supposed to be on the vine already). It's all about growing things, even on my day off! Ah, I guess it gets in the blood.
Wed, July 18, 2007 - 6:38 PM -
permalink -
3 Comments
3 Comments |
add a comment |
|
Wed, July 18, 2007 - 9:14 PM
>Went and watched the zucchini grow for a bit<
Love this. Loved the recent rain. Went for a midnight drive in it. And today, roamed the garden enjoying the freshness of it all. Wow, re chickens. I've never done that-- have a difficult enough time killing grasshoppers--have had dreams about it after when I have. A woman I met suggested that it could be a good thing to do, said it brings out the warrior. She told me about her first experience with it-- she's gone over to an elder woman't house for lunch, and the hostess asked how chicken sounded for lunch-- the younger woman said great-- the older woman gave a hatchet and told her to go out and get her chicken then. She said the moment she chopped the bird's head off, all the other chickens got totally silent. Then they all came rushing up to drink the dying/dead chicken's blood. Anyhoot... serious, I've had moments of difficulty putting broccoli in boiling water b/c putting anything alive in boiling water strikes me as inhumane. (I've been burned by boiling water.) And walking around, we crush things all the time, I realize. This isn't really mental with me--well, I may seem a metal case talking about this-- what I mean it's more on an emotional level, a sensitivity-to-life level. I'm not saying right or wrong here-- just saying that level of sensitivity means that when it comes to slaughtering another aspect of life, that's not an easy thing for me. Again, not judging-- in the bigger picture, cycles of life are ongoing, plants need to be thinned, life consumes life and transforms that energy into a next level of being. Do do what you do with the chickens, do you disconnect emotionally? How do you frame your perspective? I'm curious. |
|
Thu, July 19, 2007 - 4:22 AM
glad you asked
I still feel more than a pang of regret and conscious for taking a life. It was a progressive thing for me to be able to do it. When we'd first moved out of the city, I had a succession of killing for a purpose and being exposed to death regularily. The first was a mouse who'd gotten into my kitchen drawers every night. I could hear it in there, and in the morning had to wash everything with bleach (something I don't use much), including my dishtowels. Sounds funny, but some of my dish towels are pretty special to me cuz my God mother, now dead made them and willed them to me. That was probably 30 yrs ago. And, there was the fact that in the news 3 or 4 people had died locally from Hanta Virus after sweeping out their garage. Probably mice droppings.
So, one night I'm on the phone with my sister, and SNAP! The mouse trap got the thing. I jumped up and felt exhuberant. Until then, it had only been bugs and fish, both of which are ugly and slimey and taught to me as necessary death. When I heard that it was struggling in the trap my heart sunk. It must've been funny for my sister to hear the transition from exhuberance to worry to regret. I had to kill it, it's innards were squished. I was chicken and flushed it. After several mice (it's never one, and I learned that a dead mouse is a good mouse), a batch of kittens that died either from my letting a bunch of kids handle them or an inexperienced mamma cat (I told the kids it was the latter, but on the safe side, didn't let them handle any kittens til a couple weeks). Then, my meat birds started dying, one by one from heart attacks. I'd let them get too big and it was hot out. And, here's a kid/chicken story (not for the light-hearted). The first chicks we got were day olds. My sons and daughter raised them as pets. I knew I'd have to kill one that the dog got to, but left it for a couple hours while I went out to the store. I was having a hard time thinking about killing it. When I got back, I got the broom handle, held the chicken by the feet, placed the broom handle across it's neck, stepped on the broom handle and closed my eyes...and pulled! I didn't hear a snap, as I'd expected, but felt the chicken doing the hibbidy jibbidy. I know chickens 'run around with their heads cut off' and didn't know if I'd completed the job. I thougth "oh no! it's still alive, I haven't done a good enough job and it's suffering!' So, I did it again. This time, simultaneously, I saw that I'd pulled the head right off, blood spraying all over the place, and my son, then only 7, who is very sensitive and loves animals....talks to them and is sooooo sweet, looking at me with horror in his eyes. His Mom is a monster. Talk about trauma for both of us. Anyway, after all that, and some cats dead on the highway next to our house, and a dog with cancer that I had to take into the vet for a mercy kill, I was, to a degree, desensitized. It's funny and weird for me to look back at my city-chick days and think I was that concerned about killing, and weird at the same time, cuz that city chick is still in there, somewhere. Hence, my not being able to eat the chickens for a month. I tell everyone out here it's cuz of the smell. My ole factory relates chicken meat to that smell for some time. It does, really, except now we've used dawn and the wet, poopy feathers don't smell quite as bad as they did. Plus, it helps with releasing the feathers, so the job doesn't take as long. Really, it's something about catching and killing them. This time, the men did all that so by the time I got them, I didn't have to look them in the eyes, or watch the life slowly leave their bodies (altho we did for a while as it was so entertaining to watch the kids see that). See? I flip flop between being sad and reflective and talking about the rush that some get. Death is a big issue. When we were butchering, the people who came out to do their weeding, got out of their car. I went over and asked them all to turn around (I'd sent an emailing them with a heads up, but didn't know if they'd gotten it) so they couldn't see what was happening. One lady had lived on a farm, so she said it's ok, the other, even tho pregnant (funny me, I thought she might be hiper senstitive) was fine, it was the man who admitted to being faint of heart with the whole thing. I'm avoiding. The real question, is what do I do to allow myself to kill? I say a little prayer/send energy to that chicken, asking forgiveness, promising to appreciate it's life. that's just before they die. A couple weeks before, I play a cartoon game. I stand in front of the chicken fram and visualize little steamy roast chickens. It's my way of preparing. I take absolutely the best care I can of them while they're alive. I use it as a learning tool for preparing my kids for a hard life. Then when it's all done, I go out into my garden and am glad that killing veggies is all I have to do for another year. |
