The one where responsibility strikes again

Ignorance truly is bliss.  The older I get the more appreciative I become of a sheltered life.  That’s not to say I’d choose the sheltered life now that I’m learning the truth about our world.  I just understand why many people refuse to leave that sheltered space full of warmth, comfort and safety.  I remember how easy life was twenty-some years ago, living on the prairie, riding my bike for hours on end with my brother, traipsing through the Yucca and Indian Paintbrush looking for fossils and in general, exploring the world in which I lived.  Exactly when did the reality of life start to creep in?  I don’t know.  I honestly, don’t know.

I remember heading off to college, pulling into a parking space in front of my new dormitory, peering up at that huge building from the driver’s seat, finding comfort in the fact that my brother sat next to me in the passenger’s seat, thinking to myself “This is it.  I have to start doing my own grocery shopping.”  Ha!  Food was my first major concern.  Maybe that moment was the first moment when true “grown-up” responsibility started to creep into my life.  I don’t remember feeling any type of grown-up feelings or thinking many grown-up thoughts before that.

I also remember feeling a bit overwhelmed picking out our first washing machine and dryer.  “Can we afford this?  It’s like $900 for these two machines!  Do we really need them?  Yes, we do because we’re spoiled.  What a large purchase!  I feel so grown-up and scared!”  I still find it hard to believe that the purchase of a washing machine and matching dryer really freaked me out.  Thankfully my first “large” purchase as an adult wasn’t a house!

My latest encounter with adult responsibility dug up feelings of sadness and extreme guilt.  I love animals.  Always have.  I routinely passed up Barbie Dolls in favor of stuffed animals as a child.  I own four dogs and foster 1 other.  Maybe I should live on a farm.  Anyway, a simple lunch meeting with old friends forced me to reconsider my eating habits.  The truth of the matter is that America must produce A LOT of meat to feed our population and the methods used to cultivate this meat are often less than friendly.  One of my lunch buddies told me a story about her “accidental” change to a vegetarian diet.  She recently surfed the ever-informative Internet for vegetable recipes when a film called “Meet Your Meat” popped up.  Not realizing the true intent of the film, my friend played it.  I’m not sure if this proved to be her first introduction to animal cruelty but it struck a chord in her and she made an immediate decision to stop supporting such horrible actions.  Seeing her decline cheese on her salad because of the high probability that a dairy cow suffered intolerable acts of cruelty in order to create that cheese made me realize I need to make a change myself.  Many years back I started a search for a farm or ranch that raised their own animals to ensure that their stock lived happy animal lives.  However, life got the best of me and I wound up going back to HEB or CostCo for my meat.  Well, now that I’ve been reminded of the horrible lives many animals lead just so I can have a cheeseburger, I know I have to do something.

I’m looking into Kosher meats and farmers market’s.  Admittedly, I’m a bit scared and overwhelmed but I know it’s important.  If someone boxed one of my dogs into a pen, even for an hour,  that forced them to stay standing because there isn’t enough room to even lay down comfortably I’d lose it.  Pigs, I’ve heard, are extremely intelligent critters and being forced into similar box-like pens for the entire extent of their life just kills me inside.  How can people do that?  How can they get a kick out of hurting animals?  How can they look at suffering and not be repulsed?   How can they cut off a bird’s beak or burn it off, knowing the pain that animal experiences in the process?

I can’t bring myself to watch “Meet Your Meat”.  I don’t feel I need to.  I already know that it is my responsibility to at least know what may be happening due to my purchase of meat or dairy products from the local grocer.  This knowledge is enough.  I don’t need graphic pictures of animal cruelty to make me take responsibility.  I can’t change the world but I can choose who gets my hard-earned money.  I’m choosing not to give my dollars to those people who torture animals for profit.  One step at a time, I’ll get there.  I hear the HEB on NW Military has a good Kosher section.  Maybe I’ll check it out today.

This entry was posted on Fri, Sep 19 2008 at 12:22 and is filed under Vanessa's Ramblings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.