The Butcher's Apprentice Explores the Meat Sciences

(Courtesy of smbc-comics.com)

I have no idea what I’m doing here.

            I feel so stupid.

            What am I doing here? 

            Where am I even going?

            Oh shit . . . I’m lost. 

            I am so lost!  This is not where I’m supposed to be!

            Why did I think this was a good idea?

            “Permit Parking Only”?  I don’t have a permit!  Shit I’m gonna get a ticket.

I shouldn’t be here.  I’m too old to be here.  I don’t belong here.

            Oh god, what am I even doing??           

I don’t belong here.

I can’t believe I drove two hours to meet a man I’ve only spoken to one time.  He’s practically a stranger!  If my mother knew what I was doing, she’d think I was crazy.  Don’t look at that guy, he’s probably a decade younger than you.  There, look at that old guy.  Oh crap that’s a woman.  Between 9 and 10am he said . . . if I don’t figure out where I am soon, I’m not going to make it.  It’s not too late to turn tail and just go home; continue on with life like nothing ever happened.  F103 . . . F103 . . . crap it’s the other direction, I have to turn around. . . . Oh god those kids are staring at me.  It’s like they know.  They know I don’t belong in this building.  They’re probably like, “What is that old chick doing here?”  Not just old, but utterly clueless.   

Chuck’s office is cleaner than I expected.  He is currently researching dog breeders.  I knock gently on the open door.  He immediately stands and shakes my hand.

“Pronounce your last name for me?” he inquires.

I get that a lot.   

Of all the ways to meet someone . . . back in October, my parents and I flew to the Baltimore Washington International Airport to visit my little brother.  After claiming our baggage, we hopped on the shuttle that would take us to pick up our rental car.  As the shuttle was crammed fuller and fuller with more and more people, I was shunted to the back.  My mom offered me a seat, but I declined.  I just sat on a plane for two hours, standing is nice.  Having two healthy legs to stand on is always nice, and I so rarely have both healthy that I enjoy the full advantage of it by taking the stairs instead of the escalator, parking at the back of parking lots, and forsaking a seat for senior citizens. 

Finally, the shuttle has reached capacity and takes off.  Each time we hit a bump, I find myself jostled into the man standing next to me.  He’s a bit older than me, but has a young face, browned by the sun.  Slightly taller than me; clean-shaven, short hair.  He wears khaki work pants, brown work boots, a plaid shirt, and blazer.  He has a laptop bag hanging from one shoulder. 

“What brings you to Maryland?” he asks me.

“I’m going to Hagerstown to visit my baby brother.”

“What’s in Hagerstown?  Why is he there?”

“He’s a big shot engineer for a company that makes cherry pickers; he goes around and inspects all the plants and tells people what they’re doing wrong.”  Both of my brothers are wicked smart.  (I can say that now, I’m on the east coast.)

“Interesting.”

“What about you?  What brings you here?”

“I’m here to negotiate a livestock deal.”

I resist the overwhelming urge to grab him by his lapels and shake him when I ask, “Who do you work for?”

The expression on my face must have betrayed my apparent urgency, because he looked confused.  “Um . . . The University of Missouri at Columbia Animal Science Department. . . . What’s your interest?”

“Meat.  I’m trying to be a butcher.”

“Really?”

“Yeah I sort of . . . apprentice at a few places in and around St. Louis—wherever I can find someone to teach me.”  Wherever I can find someone to trust me with a knife.  No matter how many times I explain it, it never gets easier.  It just takes a long time to say.  It’s not as simple as saying, “I’m a butcher.”  I’m a wanna-be butcher.  I wish I were a butcher.

He shifts the bag hanging from his shoulder and holds out his hand.  “I’m Chuck.”

I grasp his hand and give my name.  We talk the entire rest of the ride.  He tells me all about Ag School and the kinds of courses they teach.

“A woman interested in this sort of thing . . . well, they’re in high demand.  You get into one of the bigger plants, you can move up to management quick and be making six figures in no time.” 

“I feel like I’ve met nothing but resistance because I’m a woman.  Or I’m too small.  Or I’m too young.”  The times I’ve tried to venture out and expand my experience beyond Burt’s shop, I’ve felt heavily discouraged. 

“Are you kidding?  They want young, so they can keep you around as long as possible.”

He keeps talking about how much money I could make, and climbing the management ladder.  Management?  A big plant?  I don’t know about all that.  I shouldn’t be in charge of anything.  And it’s really not about the money . . . although if I could do it full time and make what I make at my day job . . . well, that’d be a different story. 

“What do you do full time?” he asks.

“I do finances for a commercial insurance company.”  Them’s fancy words for “We insure the buildings and content of businesses and hospitals and such; and I input some numbers in a computer and my company’s money magically goes to someone else’s bank account!”

“Hmm.  And it’s a good job?”

“It’s a really good job.  And I already went to college and got a degree.”

“In what?”

“English,” I say sheepishly. 

“That’s okay!  Everyone in the Meat Sciences comes to it with different backgrounds and experiences; that what makes it such a fun, eclectic group of people!  They know how to live, how to have a good time; they eat good. . . .”

“I don’t doubt that.”

“What has been your favorite part of meat processing?”

“Honestly . . . I really didn’t expect it, but . . . the Kill Floor.”

“Interesting,” he repeats.

He mentions some “short courses” I could take, that last three to five days at the most.  It’s like Meat Bootcamp:  an entire semester’s worth of knowledge crammed into a few days.  This appeals to me.  Plus, my older brother lives in Columbia; I wouldn’t even have to pay for a hotel. 

Chuck reminds me of a science teacher I had in middle school—Mr. Jansen.  He was pretty young, too, and energetic and enthusiastic about his subject, which made me love it too.  Plus, he had a wicked cool mustache.  And holy shit, major props for someone finally encouraging me and making me kind of sort of think that this is almost possible.  Then again, when I was in college, all my English professors encouraged me to think that becoming a full-time writer was also possible. 

I could’ve talked to him all day, but alas we’d reached our destination and parted ways with a handshake. 

However, I did not despair, for college faculty are usually pretty available through their university’s website these days.  Soon upon returning from my vacation, I employed my expert internet stalker skills and found him out easy enough.  Stalker Level Increase:  +2 points. 

I didn’t email him right away.  What the heck would I say to him?  And how would I say it without coming off as a complete creeper? 

Finally, I got over myself and sent him a message: 

I don't know if you remember me, but we met on the airport shuttle at BWI a few weeks ago.  I'm very interested in learning more about some of the classes you told me about, and I was wondering if you could point me in the right direction.  I guess I should start with Admissions . . . getting my transcripts (eek!) . . . would I be considered a graduate student?  Any advice you can provide for how to get started would be much appreciated. 

Thank you for your time! 

And he responded: 

I definitely remember the visit.  It made the shuttle ride at BWI worth it. 

Lots to think through but I'd be happy to point you in the right direction.  Challenge is what is the direction?  I'd think we could best figure that out with one trip to campus and a few appropriately geared visits.  Is it remotely possible to find an afternoon to travel to Columbia?  If so I think you would have a much better feel for your options.  I'd be willing to set things up with the right people. 

                Let me know. 

Holy shit.

I’m goin’ to college. 

I haven’t been on a college campus since I worked at UIUC’s press six years ago.  Holy shit, that was six years ago?  Six years ago I was 23.  I’m almost 30 now.  YOU GUYS, I’M ALMOST THIRTY.  My plan is to continue celebrating the anniversary of my 29th birthday every year until I am 39; then I’ll do 39 until I am 49.  After that I don’t plan on having anymore birthdays. 

We start with a tour.  Chuck is talkative and energetic as ever, saying hello to everyone we pass.  Oh crap, am I still allowed to call him Chuck now that we’re on campus?  Do I have to call him Doctor?  Professor?  That’s just weird, I’m only like five years younger than him.  I’m a grown-ass woman (bahaha), and we are not in a classroom, so I’m sticking with Chuck for now.  Then I notice that everyone else calls him Chuck, too.  Whew.  Crisis averted.

We start where the processing is done.  Everyone is walking around in white lab coats and baseball caps.  They make me put on a hairnet, ugh.  A hairnet!  USDA regulations.  I knew I should’ve brought a bandana. 

This place is huge compared to the places I’ve been.  And bright.  And clean.  USDA regulations:  this place has to be spotless.  They have all the same meat machinery I’ve used before, only on a much larger scale. 

The grinder has a refrigerated funnel where the meat goes in so it stays cold as it’s being ground.  At Burt’s place, the grinder is small enough to fit in the cooler, so I guess that’s kind of the same thing.  The Ste. Gen shop is so cold all the time I don’t think they ever have to worry about it.  The reason meat needs to be cold during grinding is so that it retains its firmness.  Otherwise, the fat starts to melt and you get big smudges of meat that stick in the grinder instead of the well-marbled strands you see in the store. 

There are so many buttons and dials and screens on this stuff though . . . temperature, altitude, latitude, longitude, miles per hour, height, weight, body fat percentage . . . I’m kidding, I have no idea what all those numbers are for, nor can I even begin to imagine.  People butchered for hundreds of years without this kind of technology, so I don’t perceive it as a great necessity now. 

Chuck points out plugs hanging from a track on the ceiling, so they can move equipment in and out, and anywhere they want around this room. 

“Have you ever seen one of these before?”  He shows me to a giant stainless steel bowl that stands about waist-high to me.  A large paddle rests within the bowl.

“No, what is it?”

“An emulsifier, for making hot dogs.”  You flip a switch and the paddle starts spinning around the bowl, pulverizing whatever it touches.  I had no idea you could emulsify meat.  Although, it makes sense when you consider it.  Think about the best bratwurst you ever ate, and then think about the best hot dog you ever ate.  The hot dog’s texture is much smoother than the bratwurst, which is just finely ground beef or pork (or both).  This is how it’s done. 

Next Chuck shows me the biggest sausage stuffer I’ve ever seen.  Don’t say “Nice Dick Machine,” don’t say “Nice Dick Machine,” don’t say “Nice Dick Machine. . . .”   I hate that wherever I go, I can’t share that joke with anyone, because no one outside Burt’s shop and this blog knows the story!  Again, buttons and switches and screens and numbers light up one side of it . . . who knew it had to be so complicated?  Meat goes in the top; crank the handle, it comes out the bottom, and voilà:  sausage!  At the shop, we have a few vintage cast iron grinders that you clamp onto the side of a table on display in the retail area.  Again, people have been making sausage for hundreds of years without the benefits of this NASA switchboard.  Seriously, it’s wieners . . . this Dick Machine isn’t launching anything into outer space. 

In the next room we find several students breaking down beef on a long cutting board.  Chuck shows me the pork cooler, which is pretty empty—end of the semester.  Inside the beef cooler an experiment is going on.  Plastic-wrapped slabs of meat are laid out under fluorescent lights in order to demonstrate the affects of grocery-store conditions on meat. As soon as air hits meat, it turns bright red, which appeals to customers.  However, with prolonged exposure, the meat turns brown and, although still edible, loses its salability.  The plastic wrap slows this process, but can’t prevent it completely.  And close proximity to fluorescent lighting affects the product as well, although I’m not sure how (hence the experiment).  The banks of lights hang less than two feet above the meat. 

There’s a spice closet, and a freezer packed to the gills.  And back where we entered the building, there is a retail shop.  Do people know about this?  Mizzou’s campus has a retail butcher shop; anyone can walk in and buy the meat that they slaughter and butcher on campus.  People should know about this.  Tell your friends. 

            I shake my hair out of that damn hairnet the first chance I get. 

“So whatdya think?  Getting a better idea of what you’d like to do?”

“Honestly, my head’s spinning with information overload right now.  But I thought a lot about it since the last time we talked.  I’ve thought about owning my own shop . . .”

“Okay, so you’re looking more at the boutique market.”

His terminology kills me.  “Maybe . . . but wouldn’t that mean I’d have to take business courses?  That sounds boring to me.  And I’m terrible with money; I shouldn’t be in charge of anything.”

He laughs, “Not at all.  Maybe it means taking on a business partner.  You say you have a really good job, right?  So maybe you can be a financial backer, and work in-shop a few days a week.  Because you can’t just up and quit your job.”

I think he’s speaking hypothetically, so I respond, “People quit their jobs all the time . . . just not me.”

“Well I mean, you can’t just up and leave on a whim, and I understand that.  This isn’t everything I do; I have a few side businesses.”

Where I come from, the term “side business” means “I sell drugs.”  However, I’m pretty sure Chuck’s on the up and up, so I don’t mention it. 

“Honestly, all I’ve been trying to do for the last year and half is to get someone to show me how to break down a side of beef with a knife.”

“Oh well I can show you that!  We’ll swing back through the butcher shop after this.” 

We cross the street to a small building with glass block windows facing the street.  We go around back and enter through the loading dock. 

Chuck flicks on a light.  “Here is where we do our slaughtering; does any of this look familiar?”

My jaw drops and my eyes widen.  I am speechless as I take it all in and only manage to stammer, “Yeh . . . this—this is at least twice the size of the Ste. Gen kill floor.”

We start where the animals come in.  Cows enter one at a time and get a .22-caliber bolt gun.

I laugh, “They use a twenty-two-caliber rifle in Ste. Gen.”  So like, maybe that’s not normal?

He assures me that it’s basically the same thing.

Pigs, however, are social animals; where one goes, they all want to go.  They are herded into a larger pen all together.  Less chance of them spooking, less stress, less unfortunate affects on the meat.  He describes group slaughtering to me:  some places have the floors electrified; the pigs all walk out onto this floor, and then they’re all electrocuted to death at the same time.  It’s not as traumatic as it sounds.

“It’s instant and painless.  They’re there,” he snaps his fingers, “and they’re gone.”

Someone recently asked me if stress has that much of an affect on meat.  It made me recall what massage therapists have been telling me for years.  Think about your own body.  When you’re stressed, your body releases toxins, and you get big knots in your back and shoulders, right?  Do you think that knotty meat makes for good eating? 

Why do you think the tenderloin is the best cut of meat on a cow?  They’re called “hanging tenders” because that’s all they do:  they hang there, underneath the ribcage.  They are not functional muscles; they don’t lift, hold, or support anything; they never flex, they never stretch, they never get pulled or torn.  They’re essentially the potheads of a cow’s anatomy.  Everyone’s got that one friend who just eats cereal and watches cartoons on the couch all day and never gets a real job.  That’s the tenderloin.  All the other muscles are like, “Dude, can you help us out?  We’re trying to help this thousand pound animal move around, get off your ass and do something!” 

So anyways . . . we move on to the scalder and the hair removal apparatus.  (You may recall me describing them as the “piggy Jacuzzi” and “piggy spanking machine,” though I’ve still never seen them in operation.)  If a pig comes out of these with even one hair still attached, it has to go back through the whole thing all over again.  And if there’s any hair left after that, it has to be individually plucked.  USDA regulations. 

Then he pulls down this huge, metal . . . thing hanging above us.  It is a portable circular saw, currently sans blade.  That’s what they use to split the pigs at the spine.  There’s an even bigger one for cows.  I tell him about the little saw they use in Ste. Gen . . . it reminds me of those little electric saws you use to slice honey-baked ham at Christmas. 

Chuck laughs, “I can’t even imagine.  It must take forever to split a carcass.” 

Butchery takes patience, Chuck. 

We return to the processing building, back to the beef cooler, and put our hairnets back on (ugh!).  Then we sort of “assemble” a cow from all the primals lying around.  I snap a pic when Chuck goes searching for a knife and send it off to The Rock Climber.  Or, “Bow/Beau” from this post.  I don’t know what to call him; I usually just say, “The guy I’m seeing.  Casually.”  Fuck, I’m hopeless.  Let’s hope he never reads this and finds out.  

 

 

Chuck doesn’t really tell me anything I don’t already know; it’s more of a review of how to break down a very large pig.  He introduces me to the concept of “Cowboy Logic,” by using the length of his knife blade for measuring.  After all, he’s just a simple farm-boy college professor—you know the type. 

He concludes, “And then you would saw the spine off.” 

Hang on, Chuck.  I didn’t ask how you’d do it here, with all your slick newfangled spacemeat technology.  I asked how you’d do it with a knife.  Period.  Not a knife and an electric bone saw.  Not a knife and an array of mechanized robotics. 

“Oh.  Well I don’t know how you’d do it without a bone saw.”

No one knows! 

Next Chuck is taking me to speak with another professor.

“You’ve come to us by way of a rather unconventional path, so I think it would be good for you to sit down with Dr. Hoffmann for a little while.  He’s quite unconventional himself.” 

Chuck sits me in the common area at the center of the building while he goes in search of this unorthodox doctor.  I check my phone and eavesdrop on the conversations of a few students lounging around the area with me. 

“I just need to meet a celebrity and trick him into putting a baby inside of me so I can take half his money.”

I can’t make this shit up, not even if I wanted to.

I decide not to eavesdrop anymore.   

Our unconventional professor is MIA for the moment, and Chuck has to teach a class, so he leaves me in Dr. Hoffmann’s office to chat with Melanie, one of his grad students.  I remember spotting her among the white-coats and ball caps in the processing room earlier.  Without her white coat I now see she has on jeans, cowboy boots, and a flannel shirt.  Her mousey-brown hair is pulled back in a messy bun and glasses perch on her nose.  Despite myself, I can’t help thinking . . . this girl is damn sexy. 

She is currently finishing up her master’s and will be continuing her education to get a doctorate in Meat Science.  I wanna be a Meat Scientist! 

“So,” I ask, “what does one do with a PhD in Meat Science?”

“You know, I hate that question, because I don’t know.” 

Well I don’t know either, that’s why I asked.  I think it’s okay to not know, because that means there’s still more to learn.  I tell her a little bit about myself, my experiences, why I’m here.  “I’m not really sure what my endgame is either.  Maybe to eventually to find a way to do it full time?”

“The reason that I like Processing Day is because it comes once a week.  It’s really physical work.  I don’t think I’d like it as much if I had to do it for eight hours every day; you probably wouldn’t either.”

It is grueling work.  In fact, it’s the most exhausting work I’ve ever done.  But it’s also the most satisfying.  If I bust my ass skinning eighteen deer in twelve hours, what do I have to show for it at the end of the day?  Eighteen skinned deer carcasses dangling in the cooler, and a sore back, legs, and feet.  At my day job, if I pay eighteen clients eighteen million dollars apiece in one day, what do I have to show for it?  Not a goddamned thing.  It’s a bunch of numbers entered into a computer program that communicates with another computer program at our Home Office.  It’s data and formulas contained in spreadsheets saved on a computer.  So when I shut down my laptop and stow it away for the night, all the typing I did—all the figuring and contemplating I did—it all evaporates into thin air. 

Melanie goes on to tell me about Show-Me Beef, a three-day meat convention held at Mizzou.  She also describes “meat judging” to me.  She and a handful of other students travel to other schools all over the country and “judge” meat.  These schools present their recently slaughtered and butchered primals for competition.  You point out the marbling; all-over, even marbling is desirable, as opposed to a few big chunks of fat here and there.  Although in the end the amount of fat might be the same, it’s the distribution that earns you points.  I ask her if this is what she’ll continue doing once she graduates, but she says no; this isn’t a job, it’s something that only takes place between schools. 

 

(These primals are ready for judging.)

 

She repeatedly mentions all the “great friends” she’s made while going to school here.  I try not to roll my eyes.  I don’t recall listing “making friends” as a high priority for my trip here.  Although I suppose that if I came here and took a few classes and discovered that everyone here sucks . . . I probably wouldn’t stick around.  Just like I wouldn’t still be working at Burt’s shop if Max and Tommy were assholes. 

We discuss the meat packing plants Melanie has worked at.  She thinks that the big meat processing facilities are beautiful; what they do is so efficient, it’s like a symphony.  I’d immediately dismissed the idea of me in a large facility; Big Meat is part of the reason I’m in this.  What they’ve done to meat is a disturbing bastardization. 

“Have you ever been to one?”

“Well . . . no,” I reply.

“You should check it out, at least once.”

I just might do that.  I mean . . . can’t hurt to look, right?  I wonder if Melanie’s ever read The Jungle. . . .

 

Finally, our wayward doctor has arrived.

“Thank god; I was getting tired of talking!” Melanie says. 

I thank her for her time and bid her farewell. 

Dr. Hoffmann stops in front of me and introduces himself; I stand and shake his hand.  He seems a giant to me; his presence fills the tiny office.  He is hardy farm stock; tall and solid.  Where Chuck was energetic, he is steady, contemplative.  I can already sense him studying me as he settles into the chair behind his desk. 

“So what are you doing? . . . What are you doing with yourself?”

Smiling, I assert, “Oh ya know, just boppin’ along . . .” then shake my head, roll my eyes, and shrug matter-of-factly, “I have no clue.”

“That’s just fine.  I don’t know what I wanna be when I grow up either.  So imagine that you already have the knowledge you’re looking for; you’re the guru of meat . . . what do you do now?”

“I’m not entirely sure . . . I just have this cloudy dream of a cottage in Ireland or Scotland . . . of raising goats and a huge vegetable garden, and butchering all day long.”  A cottage by the sea, in a land verdant and green. 

“Goats . . . I like that.  I can do that.  It’s lunch time, you wanna go get lunch?”

            Food is the last thing on my mind right now.  I have a loaf of white bread and a sleeve of crackers in my car for my “meals” today.  After five days of stomach flu over Thanksgiving week, food is an afterthought.  Remember that weight I was complaining about?  All gone, and then some.  (Just after I bought new pants, too.)  I vomited so hard that toilet water splashed back up and hit me in the face, which grossed me out so bad I vomited even harder.

“. . . I could eat.” 

We pass by Melanie on our way out. 

“We’re going to grab some lunch,” Dr. Hoffmann tells her.

“But . . . you have class at one.”

“I’ll only be fifteen, twenty minutes late.  Give them the quiz and stall till I get back.”

 

So now I’m getting in a car and going on a lunch date with a man I just met, but not the man I came here to see.  His car is quite modest for a tenured college professor—it is by no means new.  He tells me about himself, his wife, their three kids, the hour-long commute he has to make every day from the farm where they live. 

“And that’s not all I do; I also have a side business with Chuck.”

Mm-hm . . . there’s that side business again. . . .

We hit up a little grill on campus, and spend so much time talking we forget to order, or even look at the menu. 

“I never apologize for what I do.”  He means slaughtering.  “People ask, ‘How do you do it?’ and I think there are different compartments in your brain for different things.”

“Honestly, I didn’t know what to expect from myself; I didn’t know what kind of reaction I’d have—if I’d be repulsed by it or not.  But I was just like ‘Huh . . . so that’s a thing.’  It’s a very . . . visceral experience.”  It’s warm; it’s wet; it’s intimate.  Like sex.  “Having your hands inside a body.  Feeling its muscles twitching.  Hearing its guts splatter on the floor.”  Smelling its last meal being digested.

He mentions several contacts in the industry that he’d like to put me in touch with, even tells me about a part-time job with the Missouri Beef Council where I would just follow them around to all of their meetings and take notes.  And it turns out he’s a judge at The Best of the Wurst every year!  He said next year I need to find him at the judge’s table.  Every year they have a judging of one particular kind of sausage from every meat shop; one year it was blood sausage. 

“There’s some pretty good blood sausage out there . . . but there’s a whole lot of bad blood sausage out there, too. . . .”

Finally he orders a portabella sandwich; I consider ordering a salad, then think better of it and order the New Orleans chicken sandwich.  I am very pleased with this decision.

Dr. Hoffmann comments, “I always get the portabella.  Funny, isn’t it?”

Just because we work with meat, we’re expected to have steak at every meal.  “That’s how it should be; humans aren’t supposed to eat as much meat as they do.  We should be eating less, but—”

“—higher quality,” we say, almost in unison.

He continues cautiously, “I built a ten-foot-by-ten-foot cellar at my home . . .” Okay where’s he going with this?  “. . . with ten-inch-thick concrete walls and floors and a drain in the center.”  Where is he going with this?  “And it’s stocked with everything we need.  I don’t know if it will be zombies . . . or maybe the Russians . . . but when the apocalypse comes . . .”

And there it is.  The tumblers have clicked into place, and the lock has finally fallen open. 

“That’s . . . exactly.  I mean I don’t have a fallout shelter, I just have a bug-out bag.  I joined Zombie Squad two years ago so I could learn more about survival.”  What I’m ultimately looking for is a something I can’t carry with me.  A skill; a trade.  Because some day when you need something from the store, there might not be a store. 

So what do you do?  Every day I ask myself:  Where would I get this if I didn’t have a store to get it from?  Where does it come from?  Would I grow it?  Would I make it?  Would I raise it?  Would I hunt it?  Would I kill it?  I recently got curious about where things come from—things besides food.  Toiletries mostly.  And so I started making my own.  It’s pretty nice not needing to go to the store when I run out of deodorant; I just make more. 

We talk about shopping local, supporting our own communities. 

“A general store recently opened up near the farm—the first one the area’s ever had—and one of my neighbors complained because the gas was three cents higher than it is in town.  I told him that he spends as much in gas driving all the way into town to get it from the filling station there.”  He sighs, “I told him some day he might need something and not be able to make it all the way to town, and then he’ll want a store in his own backyard.  If we don’t support it now, it won’t be there when we need it.” 

I nod.  “People look at me like I’m nuts when I tell them I can’t shop at Walmart for ethical reasons.  I look at them like they’re nuts because it doesn’t bother them to support a business that has to have a food drive for its own employees.”  My dollar bill is a vote that I earned with hard work, and I vote local; I don’t vote for conglomerations to own this world.  They’ll never own me.  And I’m not perfect; I struggle with it every day.  I know I’m only one person, and removing my pittance from the cash-spewing hordes doesn’t make that much of a difference in their bank ledgers; all I can do is try to make the kinds of decisions that don’t leave me hating myself at the end of the day. 

The tenured college professor sitting across from me leans back in his seat and says, “You . . . are an anomaly. . . .”

Tell me about it.  How do you think it feels to be an anomaly?  You think I don’t get tired of hearing people tell me that I’m weird all the time?  Sometimes I don’t understand myself. 

 

Dr. Hoffmann pays the bill (thanks for lunch, Mizzou) and I check my phone.  The Rock Climber has responded to the picture of beef primals that I sent him:  “Ok this shit creeps me the fuck out.”

I think . . . I think I just got dumped for being a butcher.  (Well, maybe not dumped.  If you’re not technically “together,” can you really be dumped?  I hope it’s not obvious to people outside the blogosphere how truly clueless I am when it comes to this dating thing.)  And then I think . . . Well that dude can go fuck himself. 

Now hang on a minute here.  That seems awfully insensitive of me.  Have I really become that fucking jaded?  Am I really that desensitized?  Maybe I should try to understand where he’s coming from.  He is a meat-eater after all, not some amped-up PETA vegan . . . he works in the culinary world . . . and has eaten meat that I’ve processed and prepared.  He knows where his food comes from, so what is this disconnect? 

So I ask him, “What about it creeps you out?”

He replies, “Do you look at me and think, ‘this is the best way to chop him up?’”

Apparently he hasn’t seen his cameo in my Halloween blog.  (I even gave him first billing!)  Since I’m trying to be “sensitive” to his “feelings” I refrain from informing him that I already do in fact know the best way to chop him up; I resist the desire to explain to him that on the inside, he’s no different from a hog; and I especially avoid using the term Long Pig in my response.  “No I think, ‘hmm . . . not much meat on this one.  Not worth the work.’” 

I tell Dr. Hoffmann about this exchange. 

“Well . . . obviously he won’t be your future business partner.”

“Heh.  Yeah.  I don’t think this one’s gonna work out.” 

 

We head back to his office in the Animal Sciences building.

“What do you think you’ll get out of this?” the doctor asks me.

“What will probably end up happening is . . . this will lead me to another topic that I want to learn about, and so I’ll follow that path for a while . . . which will lead me to something else I want to learn . . . and so on and so on.”

“I thought so.  I work with a woman who came to me and said, ‘I’m bored.’  And I said, ‘That’s good; that means you’re evolving.’  I think it’s a good practice to reinvent myself about once every ten years; it’s not good to get complacent.”

“I just like learning,” I respond.  “I loved working at an institute of higher education, around people who were all trying to expand their minds.  It’s just nice to be around people who aren’t convinced that they already know everything.”

“Yes it is,” he agrees.

 There is a third professor they want me to meet with, but he is unavailable, so my visit is drawing to a close much sooner than expected.  Dr. Hoffmann grabs a large book and a plastic bag from his office while I hold the door for him. 

“Last day of class; I read them Dr. Seuss and give them candy before sending them off into the world.  Can’t take yourself too seriously all the time.”

I smile, “I think it’s a good practice to never take myself too seriously.”

“Shoot me an email when you get back to St. Louis so I have your contact information.”

“I will.  Thank you for everything.”

I stroll back across the very big parking lot to my very far away car and find with glee that I have not been issued a parking violation.  A trip two hours west that was supposed to provide answers has left me with more questions than I had at the outset.  What do I want to do?  I was always comfortable just knowing that I want to learn the trade; once I learn it, I’ll worry about what to do with it.  Take things one step at a time, what’s wrong with that?  But the people I met today posed these questions to me—it’s their job to ask questions, to generate thought processes—and now I must ruminate upon them.  I might not have all the answers, but at least I’ve taken another step on the path towards my goal. . . . whatever it may be.