Life in a Nutshell

The Butcher

He'd kill up to fifty animals a day and when it was slow, they showed him how to butcher; take a carcass from hanging weight to quarters, then roasts, steaks, chops, ribs. Then he learned to cut meat and wrap it all up for the grocers and supermarkets.

He did that for three years and became someone his mom didn't recognize. She was worried he was going to kill somebody. He would have become a criminal or a murderer at nineteen, because killing was so easy for him and he was a hothead when he was drunk. His dad and the family recommended the army instead of jail.

Stationed at Fort Knox, Kentucky, he stayed for three years and became a PFC and lead cook in the mess. He was narrow, wiry, had a big pompadour, and a big mouth that always got him in trouble. He kept a clean kitchen though.

When he was sitting in the trucks with the rest of his unit, ready to get on the planes and go fight a nuclear war against Russia and Cuba during the missile crisis he realized he wanted out.

Killing wasn't what he wanted to do with his whole life.

From the time I was a little girl, dad would take me with him when he needed a helper. Butcherin' days were fairly frequent working on the ranches. Dad was known as a good, quick and clean butcher. Animals that were frightened or stressed had adrenaline in the meat which made it tough and gamey.

Because of this, he would always tell the customer, to bring them to a small corral at least a week before the kill day, so they just had some time to get used to being there and the fear would dissipate. He told them to give the animals lots of food and rest.

He'd use a .22 rifle. One small bullet, and he'd wait until the animal was looking away. He'd tell everyone to stay clear and stop talking. His goal was always the hollow in front of the ear, or right between the eyes. Staying on the outside of the fence, he'd aim and pull the trigger. He never missed a shot in all the years I was with him.

The beef would just drop, and dad would rush over and slit the throat right away. Draining the blood quickly was very important.

First, I was just a watcher, then he had me hand him knives. By the time I was twelve, I was elbow-deep in the gut pile with him. I never particularly liked it, but I wasn't squeamish either. He'd give me a biology lesson afterward.

He cut open the lungs, trachea and stomach; showed me how their digestive system worked. He'd find the kidneys and heart and showed me the chambers. He even cut open an eyeball, and we looked at the retina. You could see a blurry hint of the last thing the animal was watching on the back. Usually blue and green with hints of yellow and tan.

He taught me how to debone a leg and save the scraps for hamburger. I had to learn all the cuts of meat, too.

After the beef had been quartered and hung, it had to age for a few days or weeks in the winter. After it had aged, we'd have a 'wrappin' party.'

The beer and whiskey would come out and all the ranch hands would help grind hamburger, cut steak and saw through ribs. The ripe smell of fresh meat, sweet whiskey and hot bone dust is a memory that won't soon leave me.

I was a wrapper. My mother would rip off big sheets of waxed wrapping paper and I learned how to package all that beef in air-tight freezer-taped packages. Then I'd have to use the big squeaky markers before Sharpies came out to write on the packages what they were. HB for hamburger, Sirloin, T-Bone, Rump Roast, Shoulder, Ribs, Stew meat, Ox Tail, Liver, and so much more. I learned how to spell on butcherin' days.

After I left for college, my parents were still trying to glue their marriage together and I didn't want to come home to visit very often, but one spring break I did, and my mother's milk goat was sick.

She was very ill, and my mother was distraught. The vet had been out, but he thought it was either poison or a tumor, or just plain old age. He gave her a shot of pain killer and left.

Pearly had been with us almost fourteen years. She was part of the family and gave us milk almost her whole life. We were her kids, and she mothered the whole family.

A large white Saanen goat, she was paunchy with a big udder and sweet disposition. My mother let her keep one daughter goat, Blue-belle, and sold the other babies when Pearly had weaned them. My mother and Pearly were friends, confidantes and sisters.

Pearl wore a big brass bell, and mom would turn her loose on the property. She never went very far and the places she shouldn't have gone were fenced. Goats are browsers, so the creek beds and trees were nicely trimmed year-round. Every morning and evening we'd go out and call her home with a scoop of molasses feed and a milk bucket.

Pearl would come running. That big bell would da-ding, da-ding, da-ding her trip back. She'd bleat and call to mom until she got her feed. She'd shove her face, eyeball-deep into that homemade bleach bottle scoop, close her eyes and mumble her thanks.

Pearly wouldn't eat anything this day, she was just standing there trembling and moaning, her front knees on the ground, head down. My mom couldn't stand it, anymore and asked dad to put her down and find out what was wrong.

My mom was tough, but she couldn't be there for this.

They went and dug a hole in back of the propane tanks down by the haybarn, where the ground was soft, but there was no water to leech. Dad took his rifle out to the goat shed and had to half carry her over to her grave.

We both heard the shot, and he was gone a good while. He'd taken the knife roll with him and found that Pearly had a twisted gut and a tumor on her liver. She had been in a lot of pain, and it was just her time.

Dad buried her deep, she was home safe. When he came back, he was sobbing.

"That damn goat did nothing her whole life but give to us. She gave us her babies, and her milk and her love. And damned if she done made me cry."

We all were a mess, but I knew that day that my dad had a heart as big as the stars.

As we wept, he was no more a cold-blooded killer, nor a butcher, but a man with a soft heart and I loved him so much harder for it.