"Peaceful Assembly"

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

—Martin Niemöller 

There is a buzzing in my mind.  Unpleasant, erratic, insistent, distracting me from my work.  I am more afraid right now than I have ever been in my life. 

            This isn’t like the times when I was nervous about jumping off a rickety rope swing in backwoods Missouri, when my heart would race, thumping out of my chest, and my hands would shake.  This is painful.  I’m not shaking, my heart isn’t racing.  I would be sick to my stomach, if my stomach weren’t empty.  This is absolute terror, down to my very core. 

            I could die tonight.

            This might be my last meal, but I don’t have time to make anything fancy.  I just reheat a buffalo blue cheese sausage link in the microwave and wolf it down as fast as I can. 

            I look in the mirror.  Ugh.  My eyebrows are a mess.  I don’t want to die with bad eyebrows.

            This is silly.  Every day could be my last day.  Accidents happen all the time.

            My phone dings.

            Mom:  “I cannot stress enough what a bad idea it would be to go tonite. Please don’t go.”

            As much as I hate disappointing my mother, and my soccer team, and the social committee at work, some things are just more important.             

Meat People Meet Meat People

I often wonder if other people—“normal people”—have trouble with life the way I do. 

            As I sit at my kitchen table, picking fresh thyme leaves off their stems, I think . . . no.  No, normal people do not encounter the same issues I do.  Because they don’t need to grocery shop for two days before they can cook a meal on the third.  They shop at Walmart, which already has all the things they need.  The meals they make don’t take two to three hours to cook because they don’t make everything from scratch, including their laundry detergent.  They probably have hungry families waiting for them at home, wanting their meals right now.  So whatever premade stuff in a box or a bag goes into the microwave and voila, dinner is served.

When I do go to stores, I lose myself wandering around looking at all the neat things they’ve got these days:  things to make peoples’ lives easier, things that are absolutely superfluous to life, and so many things in the grocery store that simply aren’t food.  And ooh, frozen bibimbop at Target—who’d have thought? 

No . . . no I don’t imagine that normal people have these sorts of concerns.  

Log Jam

Get your head together, girl.  You’re going into the wild tomorrow.

            I can feel a tear hovering on my cheek; the breeze does nothing to disturb it.  The droplet lingers—frozen—then gradually evaporates.  I gaze at the stars the only way I know how:  in reverence.  I don’t pray, but this is what I imagine prayer to be like.  The wind gently brushes my sun-tipped hair away from my face; the ringlets scatter over my shoulders and flutter down my back.  Why was I crying?  I can’t remember.

Quitter

Let’s face facts, people.

I’m not a butcher.

Hell, I barely qualify as a meat cutter.

What I am?

What I am . . . is a quitter. 

Let them Eat Filet

The masses are clambering for filet mignon and my hands glisten with bacon fat.

            “Welcome to Burt and Grace’s meat shop:  the only place in town with one meat cutter on Memorial Day weekend,” Tommy gripes.

            “Hey,” I say indignantly, “don’t I count for something?”

            Tommy says nothing.

            “Don’t I count for . . . half of something?”

Tommy pretends not to hear me as he goes to help a customer.

In Like a Lamb

When the pit master of the best barbecue joint in St. Louis asks you if you want a random hunk of lamb meat, the answer is yes.

            The shop gets in legs of lamb around Easter—it’s the only time they have enough demand to justify carrying it.  They have frozen ground lamb year-round, but fresh cuts aren’t really flying off the shelves in Brentwood; you have to frequent the more ethnic areas of the city if you’re looking for lamb stew meat in the middle of July. 

            “What’re you doing here?” Tommy asks.

            “She’s here to see me,” Cory answers.  He’s mostly right.  I need jerky for a birthday party I’m attending tonight, and purposely waited all week till I knew Cory would be working so I could say hi. 

He’s boning out a leg of lamb.  He separates the femur bone from the pelvis, and holds out what is left of the pelvis.  “You want this?”

“Is that even a question??  I course I want it!”

Luke Johnson is hovering behind Cory.  He pokes his head around, scrunches his nose up in distaste and asks, “What’re you gonna do with that?”

“Throw it in a crock pot with some delicious sauce and cook it low and slow till the meat falls off the bone.”  Duh college boy.  Your parents own a meat shop and you don’t know what to do with a random hunk of bone-in meat? 

Cory points at me with his knife and says, “Yes.”  And that small amount of approval means more to me than he knows.  I wrap the lamb in plastic wrap and white butcher paper to take home.

The Butcher's Apprentice Will Return after a Short Break!