Black Holes and Revelations

When I walk in, the shop is silent.  I put my purse down in the back, my breakfast and lunch in the cooler; grab an apron, and take my knife kit to the cutting board.  I think about calling out to Tommy, but then think better of it.  He’s probably in his office, enjoying the lull.  I won’t bother him.  In fact, the quiet is nice.  He most certainly heard me come in—the guy has ears like a cat.

            There was no car parked out back, so I assume that Grace dropped him off and then went to run her errands, which happens often.  I do my usual routine:  put away the clean(ish) dry dishes from the previous day; wash any dirty ones waiting in the sink; dump the cold water from the rag buckets and replace it with warm water, soap, and bleach.  Both boards are a little dirty, and all the knives are as well, so I give them all a good scrubbing. 

I check the case; it looks pretty full.  The filets in there look like shit, so I can’t do any of those yet.  If I put any of mine in there, the old ones won’t get bought, and they need to get sold first since they’ve been sitting there since yesterday.  Pretty sure I still need to cut some for gift boxes though, let me check. . . . In the freezer I quickly find the box of individually wrapped six-ounce filets that I started and filled last week.  I needed 72.  I cut 72.  The box now has 24.  So that’s what I get started on.

There are some tenderloins already trimmed in the cooler; I’ll save those for when we get busy, or if someone asks for a filet with no bacon. 

Soon, Kyle and John walk in.

“Just you today,” Kyle states rather than asks.

I cock my head to the side, indicating my confusion.

“Tommy’s in a black hole; he hasn’t been here all week.”

That’s why it’s so quiet.

It’s funny how they gave him off last Saturday specifically so that they could try and prevent him from going into a black hole during the holidays this year.  I remember thinking that giving him a day off would only delay the inevitable.  

That Old Familiar Bullshit

It’s already September 20th.

            Things are starting to die here.

            Leaves tumble from the green trees with little ceremony; the fallen scrape along the sidewalks and roads, yellow and crunchy. 

            There hasn’t been much work for me this year, which is my own fault.  I was out of town for . . . St. Patrick’s Day:

(went to The Farm where Hunter’s parents live and did a 1-mile beer run)

Father’s Day:

(I was all over Europe for two weeks, but I was in Paris on Father’s Day.

We rode a bicycle-powered carousel.)

Fourth of July:

(Florida with Frank’s family for his parents’ 50th anniversary.

I got to watch these dudes expertly filet a ton of fish—and shark!)

and Labor Day:

(Austin for the World Beard & Mustache Championships.

We got to see the bats!).

            I haven’t even had time to cook anything fun lately.  Breakfast is protein cereal and cashew milk.  My other meals consist of thawing out either chicken thighs (lunch) or fish filets (dinner) and baking them in the oven (or browning some sausage or a pound of ground turkey in a skillet), then tossing seasoning or sauce on it; boiling a bag of frozen veggies, and/or throwing some quinoa or couscous in a pot on the stove.  I haven’t cooked off a recipe in a long time. 

I found this amazing seasoning/sauce combo at the Kimmswick Strawberry festival;

it’s all I use now.

I was going to make a post about Valentine’s Day but just never got around to it.  I worked Easter and Memorial Day, but there just wasn’t much to say about it.  Or there was, but it was all the usual bullshit that you’re familiar with by now. 

*                      *                      *

            Tommy turned 50 in May of this year.  I kept meaning to ask Grace if she had anything planned for him.  I finally talked to her the weekend before he turned. 

            “I was just gonna get him a cake and a balloon, ya know?  I don’t really know what else to do.” 

            Well, I knew.  Tommy had been admiring the apron that Frank got me from butcherandbaker.com for our anniversary this year.  Technically he got it for Christmas, but they handmake every order, so it didn’t arrive in time. 

Obviously, it was already too late for me to try and custom order him one, but a new knife shop opened up in Frank’s neighborhood that I knew had aprons for sale.  The only other place I could think that might have butcher aprons was the knife shop on The Hill where we get our knives sharpened.  (Fun fact:  the shop doesn’t actually own any of the knives that they make, but I do.) 

Both shops are only open during bank hours, (i.e.:  the hours that I’m working my desk job) and I only had one day when I could get there before they closed, so I could only make it to one shop.  I went with the one in Frank’s neighborhood, since I had visual confirmation of their aprons. 

They were $90, and not of as good of quality as mine. 

I didn’t know what else to get him, so I went with a green one and had them gift wrap it. 

I drove directly to the shop so I could leave it there overnight and he would find it waiting for him the next morning.  Lately every time I’d stopped by, Tommy was gone by 2pm, so I was surprised to find him standing in the back door when I opened it.  I tried unsuccessfully to hide the bag from him, and he tried unsuccessfully to hide his smile from me. 

He wasn’t expecting it.

He wasn’t expecting much of anything I think, with all of his family living out of state, and very few friends and not much of a life to speak of outside of work. 

And that’s why I did it.

I’m a softie when it comes to birthdays, and all I could think was, when I turn 50 . . . I hope someone remembers me. 

The next time we worked together, he made sure to let me know that he was going to be wearing his new apron and I should wear mine, too.  He couldn’t help complaining that mine has more pockets than his.

*                      *                      *

No one’s seen Nicole in over six months.  I always ask if anyone’s talked to her; no one really has.  Gus doesn’t work at the shop anymore, since he makes more money building houses with his dad.  And Kyle is actually not her nephew, like I previously thought; he’s just Gus’ friend, and therefore doesn’t have regular contact with her.  Nicole used to call Grace every day just to talk.  Now she might call once a week. 

She met a guy on some online dating site.  For their first date, he took her to Grafton on the back of his motorcycle.  For those not familiar with the St. Louis Metropolitan and Surrounding Areas, Grafton is a town in Illinois known for its steep hills and sweeping views of the Mississippi River. 

This guy tried to take his big ass Harley Fat Boy or Road King or whatever the hell it was, up one of these hills . . . rode over some gravel . . . dropped the bike . . . and Nicole with it. 

Mr. Fat Boy was fine.  Nicole shattered her wrist and had to have pins and plates and screws put in.  She was not expected to be able to work either of her jobs for six months. 

A few weeks later, Tommy hadn’t seen or heard from her, so he sent her a text to check up on her and ask how the recovery was going. 

The response that came was, “Nicole lost her phone this is Craig.”

Tommy already knew Craig as the guy from the Fat Boy incident, so he knew that Nicole hadn’t actually lost her phone.  Tommy simply replied, “Hi Craig this is Tommy.”

When someone finally was able to talk to Nicole, she explained that Craig only takes her phone “sometimes.”  “Because he just gets so jealous.”  Particularly of Tommy. 

. . .

Jealous.

. . .

Of Tommy.

. . .

O-kaaay. . . .

Her daughter Jill doesn’t like the guy, either—says he’s really possessive and insecure.  Grace started theorizing that maybe the “motorcycle accident” . . . wasn’t really an accident.  Stockholm Syndrome, anyone? 

“We gotta get her away from this guy,” Grace concludes.

How?  If you text her, you don’t know if she’ll read it, or if Craig will see it, delete it, and block your number for good measure.  Nicole is my friend on Facebook, and <3’s everything that I post, so maybe try a Facebook message?

Tommy cuts in, “You think it’s Nicole hearting all your posts, but it could be Craig. . . .”

            Right. 

            I’m stuck.  I don’t know how you make a human do something they don’t want to do.  In my experience, any attempt at dissuading a person from doing anything only makes them want to do that thing more. 

            So for now . . . we don’t really know what to do. 

            Blink twice if you need help?

*                      *                      *

Burt passed away. 

I don’t know much about the circumstances, but his health hadn’t been good in a long while.  I know that he was on life support, and they decided to take him off of it.  I missed the service because I was still in Austin.  When I got back, the whole family had left town for a wedding. 

Tommy disappeared for a few days, leaving Kyle and John to run the shop on their own.  They said it wasn’t a problem because business has been super slow lately.  I gave Kyle my number anyways, and told him to text me if they needed anything. 

A few days later, Tommy’s neighbor—the one who always gives him rides to and from work—passed away due to heart surgery complications.  He was 50 years old.

*                      *                      *

Work at the meat shop won’t start up again for me until November, but I still drop by every other week or so.  Hold your loved ones tight, and make sure they know how much they mean to you. 

Cheers, Burt.  Thanks for initiating me into the world of meat.  I won’t forget it, or you.

Squad Goals

Sometimes I wonder what other people think of me.

            Not often, but sometimes I do.

            I know that there are plenty of people out there who just don’t like me.  (Just ask any of my exes.)  And that’s just fine. 

            Sometimes I wonder what the guys at the shop would say about me, if someone asked them:  “What’s she like?”

            Am I . . .

            A bitch?

            Funny?

            Sarcastic?

            Weird?

            Smart?

            I think that I am all of these things and more . . . but I realize that the guys at the shop don’t really know me very well. 

            None of them hit on me, so obviously none of them think of me in “that” way.  Or they know I’m too old for them; or they respect the fact that I am unavailable.  Maybe I’m just the chick at the meat shop to them.  

I Got Your Hollies and Your Jollies Right Here

Grace is really excited. 

            She has this great idea to have me come in weeknights to get started cutting filets for gift boxes.  I can just cut the beef—no bacon wrapping and skewering—and she will cryovac them and freeze them.  It’ll save so much time later on; she’ll just thaw them out, wrap them in bacon, and wrap them for gift boxes. 

            The delivery truck comes Tuesday, so she tells me to text her Wednesday about coming in Wednesday night. 

            Wednesday comes, and she tells me not to bother coming in. 

When I come in Saturday, there are two trays of filets in the cooler. 

“So after Grace asked me to come in and cut filets, you guys decided to have someone else do it?” I ask Tommy.

“I—I don’t . . . Leroy did those, so yeah I guess.” 

Leroy’s new nickname is Leroy the Tornado.  Because he whips through fast and leaves mass destruction in his wake.  He is fast and furiously trimming and tying tenderloin in the back room; standing in pools of blood of his own making.

As I start to get myself situated for the day—clearing off the work space, straightening everything, putting gloves, skewers, and a scale within reach—Grace comes by and whispers, “I love the guy, but I hate how all of Leroy’s filets are different sizes.”

I simply shrug.  I suppose that’s what happens when you call someone else in to do what I do best.

A few weeks ago, she was wrapping up a bunch of six ounce filets that I’d cut, and she kept asking, “Are these sixes or eights?” 

Those are sixes.  That’s what they look like when you weigh them. 

I’m cutting for orders and gift boxes, not the case.  They stock the case with the filets that Leroy made.  Once I start cutting, their shittiness becomes even more apparent.  Tommy starts throwing them away and taking my fresh ones for customers.  Not even tossing them in the grinder, just putting them in the garbage.  Meat that we could have sold for $19.99 a pound.  One . . . two . . . three . . . and it’s official:  if they’d had me come in for a few hours Wednesday night, they would’ve made money on this deal. 

Grace asks me to come in Sunday, strictly to cut filets for gift boxes. 

Her other great idea—spurred on by Kyle—is to limit the number of orders we take each day this holiday season.  We are accepting 175 orders to be picked up on Christmas Eve; 250 orders for pick-up on the 23rd and 22nd.  After that, customers have to pick up the 21st, and so on.  Orders for the 21st will have to be frozen if they’re expecting to be served on Christmas. 

This will work out great—if they’re actually able to stick to it.

Deer oh Deer

Deer oh Deer

Ugh.  Again?

            Bad decisions . . . bad decisions. . . .

            Not terrible bad, just . . . one too many margaritas . . . stayed out one hour too late. . . .

            And there’s that feeling, in the pit of my stomach, like we went to bed mad. 

            I make a pot of coffee, pour myself a cup to drink while getting ready, and pour the rest into one of my thermoses.  Then I make another pot, fill a second thermos, and leave the rest for Frank.  I’m not fucking around today. 

            I had such grand plans for this morning, too.  I was gonna make a big pot of oatmeal, and clean up the mess that’s been laying around since Thursday. . . .

            I don’t normally shower before going into the shop, but today I need it.  And maybe, just maybe, my body will be able to hold onto some of that cleanliness until the end of my shift, because I have two weddings to attend tonight. 

            So of course there’s no hot water.

            Not how I wanted to start this day. 

            My car says I have about 30 miles until my tank is empty.  I’ll make it to the shop easily, but the first wedding is out in O’Fallon, so I’ll need to stop before then. 

            High of 47 today; it’s been such a warm fall that this is the coldest day we’ve had so far.  It’ll be even colder in the shop; they don’t like to turn on the heat or the air because they’re cheap.  My number one priority today is keep myself warm.  If I can keep myself warm, my hands will be warm.  If my hands are warm, they’ll work better, and I won’t cut myself like I did last weekend.  Although last weekend . . . was a little different.

55

I can still feel the tears on my eyelashes.

            I really hope it’s not surgery.

            Not again.

           

            I found a second grey hair last week.

            When my first alarm goes off in the morning, I hit the snooze button.  Frank rolls over and wraps his arms around me so that we can cuddle for ten minutes until my second alarm goes off.

            I have never—not one single day in my adult life that I can recall—woken up rested, refreshed, and/or ready to face the day.  It doesn’t matter how much sleep I get, I don’t want to wake up.

            Frank is still in bed 25 minutes later, when I’m ready to walk out the door.

            I crawl across the covers, snuggle up next to him and ask, “What time are you getting up?”

            “I dunno,” he answers groggily.

            “Do you have to work today?”

            “I worked extra hours all week so I’m off today.”

            “Oho, jerk!  Then you’re driving tonight.”

*                      *                      *

Comeback

“How do you come back from that?”

            How do you come back from that? 

            I’ve been asking myself that question for three weeks now, and I still don’t have an answer.

            Not really.

            How do you go from looking upon mountains to staring at spreadsheets all day?

            How do you climb a glacier . . . and then just go back to sitting at a desk?

            How?

Flayed

“Looks like you’re getting a bath tonight, baby,” I say aloud, my voice oddly muffled inside my helmet.

            The sky to the right of me—south—is a pale blue smattered with white clouds.

            The sky at my left is ominous with black storm clouds. 

            At a stop light, I glance down at the middle finger of my right hand.  It is smeared with blood, but the blood is dry.  Oh good, at least it stopped bleeding.  A flap of skin is clearly separated from the fingertip where it should be attached, and the exposed inside of the digit stings with pain each time I grip the throttle. 

            This has not been a good week for my skin staying affixed to my body. 

Culinary Execution

My cooking game has been in the shitter lately.

            I don’t know what the hell’s wrong with me. 

A few weeks ago, I was trying to make thai red curry with the beef stew meat that Nicole gave me last time I worked.  I browned the meat, chopped all the veggies, mixed in the sauce ingredients, and set the slow cooker to cook on Low for 8 hours.  That was at 9 o’clock at night.  I woke up in the middle of the night and set the slow cooker to “Keep Warm.” 

Or so I thought.

I accidentally set it on High.

By the time I woke up, I had myself a well-done beef stew. 

The carrots soaked up all the curry flavor. 

Look here, I like a couple carrots grated into my curry.  But Green B.E.A.N. Delivery doesn’t let you buy just two carrots, so I bought a pound.  (I signed back up in January, because they were running a special where you got 20% off your first 3 orders.)  And then I had a brilliant idea:  I wasn’t going to use rice with this curry, so if I grated all the carrots into it, they would give it the texture of rice! 

Well that stroke of genius certainly backfired.

Luckily Frank liked it, so I gave it all to him and just roasted some frozen chicken thighs to use as my lunches for the week.

Does Your Beef Swing?

“Look who finally decided to show up.”  Today I get to gloat about getting to work before any of the boys.  Grace had me come in at 8:30, when it was just her and Tommy here.  Usually the boys are here around 6 or 7am; I wonder why today’s different.

            Tommy tells me:  Kyle and Gus were supposed to drive down to Texas this weekend for a friend’s graduation.  They rented a car, packed their bags, picked up the rental car, and started driving south.  About three hours later, their friend called and told them that graduation is next weekend.  (Aww . . . they’re so pretty.)  So even though we’re staffed extra this weekend to compensate for their expected absence, now they have to work in order to make up the money for the extra car rental.  But, it’s also Easter Saturday, so we’re expecting to be busy anyways.

            The shop looks unusually clean.  Not sanitized, just picked up—decluttered.  I guess they finally had time to recover from the holiday rush.  I mean, they still need new floors and the back room’s ceiling is water damaged and caving in, but all the empty boxes have been cleared out (thrown away, not recycled, ugh) and things have been reorganized.  There are two new stainless steel rolling tables in back by the smokers so that Burt and Kyle have more room to work.  And there’s a new shelving unit back by Grace’s desk with all the backstock of non-meat food items (red beans and rice boxes, barbecue sauces, pickle jars, etc.). 

Some Girls get Roses

Some girls get roses for Valentine’s Day.

            If you’ve been following along for any length of time, you may have surmised by now that I am, in fact, not one of those girls. 

            There was a time when I gave whatever cursory attention I could to the holiday, but those were the days of giving a valentine to everyone in the class.  Since then, I’ve always made sure that I have something to do on the V-day—work, volunteer—anything to take the focus off of the VD and place it somewhere else.  It’s not that I didn’t care about love, or even that I didn’t have anyone to share it with.  It’s just that if you love someone—platonically or romantically—you should show them every day; there shouldn’t need to be only one designated day on which to celebrate it. 

            What a cruel hand Fate dealt me then, when I met Frank.  On Valentine’s Day.        

Cleaver Fever

The day after Christmas we aren’t opening until noon.

            I told Tommy I would meet him here at 8am to help with the post-Christmas Eve disaster cleanup. 

            Four whole hours without customers!

            I arrive a little early, and receive a text from Grace that she is running late, and Tommy is running late, so she’s on her way to unlock the shop for me; then she’ll turn around, pick Tommy up, and bring him here. 

Tommy doesn’t drive.  A few months after I started working here in 2012, he let the plates on his car expire and never renewed them.  It was an unreliable car that didn’t work very well anyways, and he doesn’t really go anywhere other than home and work.  He lives maybe ten minutes away from the shop. 

There are empty lugs in the cooler that need the blood rinsed out of them. 

Someone made blue cheese sauce at some point, and when they were done, instead of putting the bowl, ladle, and spatula in the sink, they tossed it inside one of the bloody lugs.

Tons of trays are stacked in the old cold sink water. 

There’s a pile of ground meat on the floor in the cooler that didn’t make it from the grinder into the catch lug. 

The case is exactly the way I left it three nights ago, minus all the orders that were picked up; none of the fresh meat trays were wrapped, and now everything is turning brown.

The box of 60-day-old tenderloins that our distributor gave us last week is still sitting on its side in the cooler; Grace wants to show it to them when they drop off their next shipment so they know she didn’t make it up.

I feel like I need a hazmat suit instead of latex gloves and an apron.

Tops & Tails, Trimmed & Tied

“God, it’s good to see you,” Kyle greets me on Christmas Eve Eve.

            “You just wafted a whole cloud of girl smell with you when you came in,” John tells me. 

            Yeah, JohnJack is back again this year!

            Tonight I said fuck it, I’m going to wear perfume, even if it doesn’t last.  At least I won’t smell like god damn chicken wings for a little while.  Ever since I got this bottle of grown-up lady perfume (the first I’ve ever bought), that’s all I’ve wanted to hear.  I’ve always wanted to be the one that people walk by and go, “God, she smells good!”  That’s the first compliment I’ve gotten on my perfume, and I’ve had it for almost six months now.

“Welcome to the mad house,” Gus adds.

I smile, “You think this is new for me?”

“Well it’s new for me.”  He already looks exhausted.

Tommy is gone, and there’s a large white lug on my side of the cutting board, filled with piles of meat.

“What is this?” I ask Gus.

He doesn’t know.

I ask Burt; he doesn’t know.
            Kyle doesn’t know either.

I ask Grace; it’s supposed to be odds and ends from ribeye roasts.

This is actually good.  I have several odds and ends in the cooler from doing orders last night; a lug to put them in would be useful.

I pull a slab of meat out of the lug and hold it up for Grace, “. . . this is a pork loin.”

“Yeah, well. . . .”  She walks away.

Well, I can’t cut anything until the board is cleared off.  Guess I know where I’m starting out tonight.

The Butcher's Apprentice 2.0

I play soccer with a girl named Summer who was diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer two years ago.  She went through treatment, and is now considered No Evidence of Disease.

Pre-cancer Summer never used cuss words.

Post-cancer Summer does not give a fuck.

We call her Summer 2.0. 

Back Where I Belong

Breaking up is hard.

            You know what else is hard?

            Admitting that you were wrong.

            Confessing that you made a mistake.

            And getting back together.

            Time to get my hands bloody again.

            Don’t worry, my darling.  I’ll be gentle.

            I run an ungloved hand slowly along six pounds of uncut tenderloin, reacquainting myself with this old flame.  We’re gonna do this together. 

            Flip it over, flip it over.

            Press it all flat on the board with the palm of my hand.

This is not the frenzied fumbling of first-time lovers.  This is the authoritative touch of that one ex who knew all your buttons, and just the right way to push them.

I can’t promise that this won’t hurt . . . but I can promise . . . you won’t feel a thing.

            I go for the strap first.

            My knife enters the meat like a sigh, gliding through blood and fat. 

            Next I go after the silver skin. 

            It comes off easy, and smooth.  Seems I haven’t lost my touch after ten months away.  So cutting meat is kind of like riding a bike; or if you’re me, like riding a motorcycle:  you do it inconsistently enough that it still gives you a little anxiety every time you hop back on, so you take it slow. 

            But I don’t feel anxious right now.

            As I clean the gunk off the underside of the tender, I go into a sort of meditative state.  My hands flow like breath; my mind is clear. 

              And my finished product is beautiful, as always. 

The One-Thumb Wonder

I’d hoped to have more to write about, but things haven’t exactly gone how I planned them this year.

            When I left Burt’s shop, I left with the intention of starting at another shop soon after.  A shop that processes whole animals, humanely raised, mere minutes from my home.  I gave them my “meat resume” months before they opened.

            And they never called.

            I went in and visited, because it turns out that Logan—the guy who introduced me to my “traveling wife” Ally—grew up a few houses down from the owner of this new butcher shop.  And Manfriend lives four houses down from where he lives now. 

            That was an awkward discovery.

            At 7:30am on a Tuesday, I was saying goodbye to Manfriend in his driveway, when here comes the butcher shop owner jogging down the sidewalk on his morning run.  Manfriend waves hi.  Shop owner nods hello, then looks at me, and his expression runs the gamut from confused, to surprised, to recognition, to acknowledgement, and back to confused shock.

            Obviously, I had to go in and explain that I was in fact not stalking him; I was (and still am) simply dating his neighbor. 

            He still never called me about a job.

            I offered to mop this guy’s floors for free.

            He still didn’t call me.

            He’s always very friendly whenever I visit his shop; they make amazing products and I’m always happy to support local. 

            At Vintage Bike Night I met the man who put together new guy’s charcuterie room; he tipped me off that they’re about to make a jump to higher production, so I went back and dropped off a new resume “just in case” they’re looking for help around the holidays.

            Still no call.

            The shop posted on Facebook that they are looking to hire some new people.  I about threw my phone against the wall.

            Then Manfriend’s sister tagged me in the post:  “This would be the perfect job for you!”

            Sigh.

            I simply responded, “They’ve had my resume for over a year, smiley face.”

            My guess is that they’re wanting daytime people, because every time I see the owner, he asks if I’m still working that insurance job.

            Yes, I’m still working the job that gives me health insurance; you’ll be wanting me to have health insurance if I’m gonna work your bone saw.

            I text Corey to tell him about the charcuterie man.  I don’t hear back from him.

A Recipe for Madness

This is why my life is a mess.

This is the week I decide to start cooking again?  Really?

Sigh . . .

Life got pretty hectic for a while there.  My wife left me, can you believe that?  She quit to run her haunted house full time—the haunt that is supposed to have a character based on me, although they couldn’t find anyone to play her last year.

So I got stuck doing both of our jobs during our busiest time of the year.  I had a headache for two solid weeks after she left.  I sprouted a grey hair over it.  I was more stressed than I’ve ever been in my life.  And we’ve discussed what I do about things that stress me out, yes?  I quit them. 

I didn’t quit my job.  But I thought about it.  I’ve thought about it a lot, actually. 

In July I went out of town every weekend:  the annual Stockton Lake camping trip with Hunter and his family, the float trip I wrote about in my last post, Whiskermania in Louisville where I competed in the Fake Natural Beard category and lost (Ally and Sophie took first and third, respectively), and girls weekend at my aunt and uncle’s property out in Williamsburg. 

Then I had the brilliant idea to start taking secret dance lessons.  In July.  In an un-air conditioned venue.  In St. Louis. 

All the while still playing soccer every Tuesday and Thursday night.

I learned how to dance, all right.  

Alone in the Wilderness with the Butcher's Apprentice

The mist is heavy on the water when we set out, even though it’s well after 9am by the time we hit the water.  The spring-fed river is cold, and the day promises to be hot.  The water is flowing high and fast as our canoes knife downstream between rock formations and vegetation. 

A Knife in the Hand & a House on the Rock

I miss having a knife in my hand. 

            Since I quit the shop, I haven’t been doing much with myself now that I’m a butcher-at-large.

            Nothing really productive, at least.

            Turns out, there aren’t many opportunities out there for meat cutters who can only work nights and weekends. 

            I got a promotion at my day job, which makes up for the lost income.

            And man, having weekends off is really nice. 

            I get to sleep in . . . went to Best of the Wurst . . .

saw the US Women’s National Team play against New Zealand (from the front row!) . . .

I’ve gone on motorcycle rides and hikes . . . and road tripped to unlikely places around the Midwest, taking pictures of weird stuff and drinking great beer (LOTS of beer).

 (Okay that one’s actually alcoholic root beer, but it’s 10% ABV.  Ten percent!)

*                     *                      *

After I leave on Valentine’s Day, Nicole walks into the back room to find Burt crumpled over in tears. 

            “What’s wrong?  What happened?”

            “She’s done.  She quit,” he sobs.

            “What?!”

            “She’s gone.”

            It takes Nicole a moment to gather herself, her thoughts and her words.  And then she explodes.  “YOU!  This is all! . . . You!  And Tommy’s fuckery! . . . And bullshit!  You drove her away . . . this is all your fault!”

            “She said she didn’t wanna trim tenderloin anymore,” Burt cries helplessly.

            “I don’t care what she told you, this is because of you two fuck ups!  You think she wants to clean up after you two every day?!  This is just great.  What’re we gonna do without her??”

           

*                      *                      *