A Trip to the Farm

Tell us about a time you went to a zoo, aquarium, pet store, or animal shelter. What did you notice about the animals who were inside the cages? How do you think they felt about being there?

“So, speaking of ugly animals. I actually – my story is not about a, uh, pet store, I actually… this story’s about a farm, and there was a certain ugly animal that made me feel ok about being there. So, I went to this farm, and the purpose was to go tour around and see how, ya know, the circle of life happens on this farm. So they grow the grass, and then the cows come and eat they grass, and then the cows get moved away, and then the chickens come in, and the chickens pick through everything that the cows left, and they fertilize the grass in their own way, and then the chickens move away, and then the pigs come in and they root around and they dig around in the dirt and then they move away. And the cycle starts over and over again. So, what you get are sections where there is grass like this tall, and then you have, you know, right after the cows have been there, the grass is this tall. Um, here was also a section where they had sheep or goats or something and oddly, they had been rotated into a particular spot where they were, you know, around farm equipment so you would see like – it was a really hot day and you would see this huge like piece of equipment and then like this sheep underneath there, hanging out, looking weird at you. Um, they also had the – the shed where all the little chickies were getting hatched. So you would see this huge round like – I couldn’t believe this – this thing full of sawdust with all these tiny little fur-balls – I guess they’re fuzz-balls – whatever they are, it’s not fur. But anyway, they were, you know, milling around like this. And, you know, I’m thinking to myself, like, this is, this is kind of a cool thing, I could get behind this. And all these animals are really, really, really cute. And the, the sad part of it was, I was there because, this is a farm that grows meat to eat. Right? So the point of all of this is that all of these animals are being raised to eventually be killed for dinner. And at the same time, of course doing it this way is so much more humane than any other way that you could do it – in terms of the mass production, and we all know the stories about that. But it still kind of made me sad because all of the animals were really freaking adorable and I kind of just wanted to play with them instead of eat them for dinner. Until, I got to the part where I was seeing the turkeys. And these were like just-past-puberty turkeys. And they are not cute. And, I remember looking through the chicken wire and I’m like, “where are they?” ‘Cause there was this little box that moved around, it’s like this mobile turkey house and you could see them through the chicken wire here and then this part was covered, and they were all in the covered part ‘cause it’s hot and I see them poking their heads out. And they were looking at me, and it looked like they were going to get me if I didn’t get them. So suddenly I felt ok about my purpose.”