I’m not doing it without meat

My eyes twitched back and forth with delight while my body was driven into a slow back and forth rocking motion. As my teeth broke down the flesh my tongue had softened, my eyelids closed with recollections of the taste I was used to. This was meat. This was flavor. This was unlocking a long denied desire, the deprived soul. The journey had been long and I found it impossible to say no. The seminar at church that had secured my loyalty 10 years ago was melting away in the Carribean heat. The breeze was introducing me to freedom. The sand and waves beckoned me to embrace this one time thing…

“You’re moody.” We were walking through Walmart when this unexpected, unprovoked verbal attack came from the first boy who made Love of my Life by Faith Evans play in my head whenever I saw him. He wasn’t wrong, but his saying so did nothing to help me locate the internal switch to shift my disposition. And it did nothing to explain his wandering eye for the other young ladies on our college campus. Moody. I assigned this thing the responsibility for the demise of every relationship back then. I never assigned proper nourishment and the discarded ancestral diets that had provided sustenance for my people. The processed soy products I consumed at the time from Morning Star and Worthington “meatless” factory had done little to calm my mood swings and chronic fatigue, rather, it sealed my devotion to the teachings of health promoted in the church culture of my upbringing.

Animal cruelty and quality meat processing cannot be negated within the U.S. meat and poultry industry, but I do look for the best quality which is to my knowledge not Chick-fil-A, however a very delicious choice. When I do prepare “manna” at home, I look for labels like “organic-free range, cage free, no antibiotics.” Despite receiving the positive results as the aforementioned–lower sugar cravings, energy, more balanced mood–I still struggle with preparing and consuming meat. With my newfound devotion of listening to my body, I am always drawn back to my animal instincts. I return to my tia’s kitchen table, to arroz y pollo.