It was approximately sixteen years ago when I was an on going temp worker in southern Ontario. I worked in a fruit and jam canning company.
I could work as a temp everyday if I wanted. This company liked to use temps on a regular basis so I would never be out of work.
You would think that was a good deal. I could decide at any moment that I wasn't going in that day and it would be no problem.
But I felt a certain lack of something by not having an official job, so I made a decision to look for a job that was permanent.
It didn't take me long to see an ad searching for an employee at a sausage kitchen. I had quite a bit of kitchen and food factory experience so I thought it would be perfect.
I applied and was contacted shortly afterward, to come in for an interview.
Off I went to the outskirts of town thinking it would be a small mom and pap kind of operation in a small kitchen. That's what I imagined.
When I got there I saw a large building attached to a large supermarket and surrounded by a large parking lot full of cars.
I was nervous going inside as most people would be for an interview. All insecurities seem to surface during these times.
There were a few people that directed me to a waiting area, where I would wait for the "boss" to interview me.
A man showed up and took me to the kitchen. As we strolled to this area, I realized this was a very large commercial operation. A meat processing plant.
I was introduced to an older German man who was the manager of that department, and to three other people that worked there including the son of the German man.
I wasn't exactly interviewed, but just told to show up on Monday. So that was it. I had a job.
Monday rolled by and off I went to the sausage kitchen. There I was introduced formally to a woman and a man in his twenties, and the manager's son who was twenty four. I was thirty nine at the time.
On the first day I was shown to the lunch room by the woman who was close to my age, where we had our lunch.
During this time I heard what sounded like shrill screaming coming from below. I asked what it was. The woman told me nonchalantly that it was the pigs screaming in the kill room.
I realized that this was not just a kitchen and supermarket but also a slaughterhouse. I soon found out that the products we were processing were coming fresh from the pigs and cows that were being slaughtered close to the kitchen.
Inside I was gasping at the horror but I didn't want to show it on my first day in case they decided I shouldn't work there.
If that wasn't enough, after break the women said she would show me around more and I followed her with a sick feeling inside me which would only escalate after following her into the kill room and not having the nerve to say no.
The scene in this room was one of the most horrifying scenes of any horror movie anyone could see. I was seeing it live before me.
The screaming pigs were lined up and corralled toward the killer with an electrical device that he would use to grab their heads and electrocute them as they writhed to the ground. I was frozen with horror looking at the live pigs staring into their eyes which were full of terror as any being would be in such a situation. I remember feeling that one pig that locked eyes with me had a look as if he or she were pleading for me to help.
There were cows in another location being slaughtered as well. It was a place of horror and despair for so many innocent beings.
I was devastated and shaking but still trying not to show it too much. I just said how awful it was. She agreed but didn't really seem that phased by it. I was surprised that it was her first time in there.
I went back to the kitchen and told the son what I experienced. He was the easiest one to talk to. I thought he was just friendly but later I would find out that he "liked " me. I told the woman who told me that, that it couldn't be true since I made it a point to mention to him that I was fifteen years older than him.
However we have be together now for sixteen years.
After my experience in the kitchen I found it impossible to eat meat or animal products or even anything for that matter.
In this kitchen we were processing hot dogs, sausages, ham, salami and other items made from the victims next door. We could eat as much as we wanted. They offered it to me several times a day and I turned it down.
I was hungry on regular basis and eventually caved in after two or three weeks of working there. I took a bite of sausage then lost my mind. I was back to eating meat and plenty of it. The screams still bothered me but not to a level where I would let it stop me from eating the product. I was disconnected again. Perhaps I never had gotten connected really at all.
Marc and I eventually within the next six months moved to Montreal where I would become a line cook in a popular chain restaurant and he would be a clerk in a fruit and vegetable store.
It was another year before my daughter would introduce me to P.E.T.A. video which showed a wild dog being skinned alive for fur. It disturbed me on a deep level all over again. I continued to eat animals but tried to substitute meals with vegetarian meals instead, not yet realizing the horrors of the dairy industry and that it is just as bad or worse.
The egg industry is also a cruel one.
After visiting Marc's parents on a weekend trip, where we had consumed his mother's over the top meat spread, we felt a drastic change in our gut and well being. We were learning by experiencing the difference in diets, that we could feel better by consuming less meat and dairy.
After the year rolled by, we got a call from his parents saying that Marc's father was having kidney failure and would need a new one. Marc without hesitation offered his, as long as it was a match. It was.
Things were serious now so we started investigating everything we could regarding this health dilemma and at the end of it all, and with everything we had seen and found out, we decided to cut meat out of our diet. We did not stop dairy and eggs. This was a very devastating thing for Marc's mother. She liked to cook meat. She rarely made a vegetable, other than a can of over cooked peas.
We eventually found a way for us to justify eating fish and seafood. This made his mother happy when we would visit and we continued eating it whenever served.
Over the last fourteen years we often tried to fight this flip flop from vegetarian to pescatarian. We also tried eating vegan and raw vegan and during those times we knew that it was the better way and that Marc's father should stop eating meat and have a better diet so he could reverse his disease.
The kidney transplant operation was a complete success. Marc's father even started eating healthier for the first couple of months. But eventually he went back to his old eating ways.
Two years later the transplanted kidney failed and Marc's father returned to his dialysis treatments 3 times a week. It was a massive disappointment for everyone.
Marc and I moved back to Montreal and got a job working in a steak house. After working for five plus years as vegetarian pescatarians, we finally quit and went vegan. It has been two and half years of understanding. We are not turning back.
We realize animals and all life want to survive and live their lives, as they should. It's easy to live without eating animal products in our diet and it feels better.
Most people say they want peace in life.
But how can we have peace living under a dark murderous cloud of perpetual slaughter?
All images are from Pixabay except for the last one