A Beginning?

They grow tomatoes out this way, milk and slaughter cows. The first time I looked into a cow’s woeful glassy eyes, looking like they had tears welling up, I thought I would never eat a steak again and the next thing I knew somebody was having us over for a barbeque and the smell of roasting beef mingled with peppers and corn and my moment of stern vegetarianism was clearly over. It was different when we went to slaughter the pigs. They reeked and their pink flesh was somehow so naked and raw, as though they had already been skinned.

We sat in the bed of the ute with Prince’s nose twitching at the air and bugs that flew by. The paddocks were littered with Turks picking and cows that were huddled together. A yellow torana with its guts ripped out lay beside a rusted tractor.