I can’t stop thinking about turkeys. A few days ago while out driving, I notice the open field next to my children’s former preschool has become home to a large flock of turkeys. A temporary fence encloses 50 or so beautiful white turkeys roaming the pasture. Who knew turkeys could be white, instead of the typical brown versions that adorn grocery store ads in November?The next day I find myself drawn to the turkey encampment again. Having grown up in an ordinary suburban environment, I still delight whenever I stumble upon cows grazing on a nearby farm or deer strolling through my backyard, evidence of my current semi-rural location. Roaming turkeys certainly trump the more pedestrian fox or doe sightings.
Impulsively I pull over and park the car. It is a gorgeous fall day, leaves crunch under my feet as I walk closer to the enclosure. Suddenly the birds leap up and start waddling en masse toward me, straining against the wire fence. I stop and then step back. I didn’t expect them to notice me.
Simultaneously they begin cackling with excitement over their visitor. Oh dear, this unsettles me a bit. It’s obvious why these birds are here and their cacophony makes them that much more alive.
They settle down some and I can see their pale pink heads and darker pink wattles. Their feathers are pure white, almost dazzling in the sun. They keep me transfixed.
After a while it begins to get cold standing out in the breeze. I walk back to my car and get in. As I turn around to leave, I see a large sign posted on the other side of the field, “Pastured Turkey $3.50 lb. 610-555-5440.” I pause and silently regret volunteering to cook and host Thanksgiving dinner this year.
This is a terrific, timely post. As another suburban kid transplanted to a semi-rural place, I particularly love these lines (and how right you are):
ReplyDelete"Having grown up in an ordinary suburban environment, I still delight whenever I stumble upon cows grazing on a nearby farm or deer strolling through my backyard, evidence of my current semi-rural location. Roaming turkeys certainly trump the more pedestrian fox or doe sightings."
Your post puts me in mind of Michael Pollan (The Omnivore's Dilemma) and his "one bad day" remark, from which (perhaps) we can take heart on our way to the Thanksgiving table.
Here is a snippet from an interview:
Hayes: What stops you from being a vegetarian?
Pollan: It’s a great pleasure of life, and I realize that even if you’re a vegetarian, there are still a lot of animals dying in agriculture. Half of those dairy cows born are not dairy cows, they’re males, and they get turned into meat. And also, discovering there are alternative kinds of farms where animals actually had really good lives and they only had one bad day. A lot of these domesticated species would not be alive if we didn’t eat them. Chickens do not make it in the wild. Cattle are probably extinct without humans. If you really want to have a sustainable agriculture, you need a system where the plants feed the animals and the animals in their waste feed the plants. If you’re going to keep animals on farms, you’re going to eat them, so that’s one of the reasons I eat meat, and in a limited way.
The whole interview can be found at this URL: http://www.stmarys-ca.edu/news-and-events/saint-marys-magazine/2009/winter/features/02.html
Brilliant. You name the dilemma. At least these turkeys have a reasonable life now. - Josie
ReplyDeleteTruly an omnivore's dilemma. Your piece resonates on so many levels; I am also thrilled by sightings of "undomesticated" animals, and I, too, am conflicted about eating animals when confronted with their live brethren. You describe this odd part of our everyday life so well. A pleasure to read.
ReplyDeleteVery nice . . . it's so true that those of us who grew up in urban or suburban environments find this difficult, but I don't find it to be as much so with people who grew up on a farm. One of my favorite stories about my mom, who did grow up on a small farm, is that when she was a little girl she would keep track of how many eggs each of her hens were laying and, at the end of a few months if one wasn't performing, it went into the pot for dinner. It seems so cold and animalistic to me, but to her it was just the way life worked.
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