A really good life and one awful day

(Today's story was triggered by a desire that's been building in me to explore my growing relationship with farm animals and the ultimate consumption of their meat. It is not meant to be graphic or judgmental but more of an exploration than anything else.)

Bertha's facial expression remained stolid as two customers approached her cheese display case at the farmers market in Salvation City, NY. The customers were less interested in her varieties of goat, sheep's and cow cheese, however, than in the array of meats listed as available on her sign.

"Remind me again of the shank," said one of the customers, a farmers market regular.

Bertha gestured toward her arm. "It's this part of the goat."

"And you've liked it in the past," the customer's husband said.

"It's an absolutely wonderful cut of meat," Bertha affirmed. "Soft, tender, really delicious."

"Unfortunately," she added, "I don't have any today. But I will soon."

Her face fell. "Today was the day."

Further queries from the customers revealed them to be well-acquainted with Bertha and her farm. They had visited often, and knew several of the goats by their names. The male half of the couple was particularly affectionate with the animals, and loved every aspect of them, from the soft fur under their throats to the products they produced: sweet milk, aromatic soft cheeses, manure converted into compost for the garden, and ultimately their lean, tender meat. He had been convincing the woman -- with Bertha's nuanced support -- that they needed four to six goats for their yard. It would save on lawnmower costs, and even if the woman didn't care for the milk, it would create delectable yogurt to feed the hens.

The woman grew up in an Indian immigrant family in Indiana in the 1960s. Her parents were lifelong vegetarians but had worked to acculturate their three daughters, of whom the woman was the eldest, in every American way they could imagine. At the core of the assimilation exercise was eating meat. Once a week, the family would drive to a local hamburger drive-in, and order french fries for the parents, burgers for the girls, and chocolate milkshakes all around. Five decades later, the woman could claim to have tried to be vegetarian and failed. She didn't eat a lot of meat, but she valued her three ounces of animal-based protein that centered most of her dinners immensely.

Goat, however, was a different challenge. Back in the early 1970s, the woman's family had traveled to India and visited Kashmir at a time when tensions between India, Pakistan, and the People's Republic of China were high. In Kashmir, a former princely state turned contested terrain, Muslims predominated and, as result, so did meat. Only the meat was not beef but either mutton or goat. For the unfamiliar Indiana palate, the smell was gamey and the taste was one of those combinations of sour-sweet-bitter that diner either loves at first bite or feels her stomach turn.

The woman -- age ten at the time -- found herself in the latter category.

As the feta craze swept America, she learned to appreciate crumbles over a salad but couldn't stomach it in lasagna or omelets. As for the goat meat, she tried it in tacos at a Mexican food truck and in curries made in highly urban hole-in-the-wall Indian restaurants. But moving to upstate New York created a new challenge. Farmers were into sustainability and living close to the land, and pocketbooks quickly revealed that goats trumped cows when it came to the initial investment, output for feed, labor for milking, production of cheese, and the ultimate slaughter.

So the woman -- with the hand-holding support of Bertha who dearly loved goats -- was working to learn to like goats. She had mastered the art of stroking their noses, letting their rough tongues graze over their hands, and goat kebabs, loins, legs, shanks, and shoulders had begun to taste good slow-cooked on a grill.

As the woman overcame her distaste for goat, Bertha underwent a transformation in thought, too. The goats -- initially just animals for consumption and close-to-the-land commerce -- evolved into pets and ultimately pals. The woman and man might have had something to do with this. After they acquired their first four backyard hens from Bertha, they proceeded to name them, much to Bertha's disdain.

"They're creatures of limited intelligence," she warned. "Don't get too attached to them."

But attachment was building between Bertha and the goats. And, as the appointed day to herd the animals to the butcher drew near, she found herself spending more and more of her limited spare time hovering near their barns. She stroked their necks, and gave them special tufts of alfalfa and other grass sweets. She thanked them for enlivening her life, and the night before they were to depart, she sang them to sleep. Her voice, trained to sweeten the heavens, lulled them into peace. So much peace that when the next morning came, the goats rose with what Bertha believed were smiles in their mouths and eyes. The peaceful feeling remained as the goats were loaded into the truck and dispatched to the butcher.

They have a good life, Bertha said. A good life that includes one awful day.