Eeeep! I’ve been so busy organizing for the opening of Sarah’s Place on July 15th that I forgot to flip my calendar page!! 🙂 This month I’m paying homage to The Smiths …
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What can I say about The Smiths that hasn’t already been said? Meat Is Murder album is a classic and for me is one of those albums that I can listen to 1000x over and it never feels dated.
I got a hold of the album in 1985 when I was 16 years old and was really struggling with my vegetarianism. My Mum raised me vegetarian since birth but I must confess that had a brief experimental period in high-school where I tried meat.
Part of my exploration was that I was curious … For the first time in my life I was questioning the things my parents had taught me. Now as a teenager I wanted to feel independent from my family and feel that the choices I made in my life were because I wanted them, not because my parents told me to do it…
The other part of experimenting with eating meat was that I was tired of being the weirdo. In the 1980’s in my hometown of Regina Saskatchewan; not a lot of people were vegetarian. In fact – I don’t think I met another vegetarian until I moved to British Columbia in 1989.
I felt very alone in my feelings about animals … and started to wonder if maybe my thoughts about respecting animals by not contributing to their suffering was crazy. Was I crazy?
When I heard Morrissey sing “This beautiful creature must die. A death for no reason. And death for no reason is MURDER.” I realized that I wasn’t the ONLY person in the world who felt that way. That I was on the right path for me … and I wasn’t alone. 🙂
For the cover shot – I rented a helmet from my local Army Surplus store and when we shot it – I didn’t want to mimic the album cover but wanted rather for it to have similar flavour but with a Sarah twist. I was so surprised that the helmet was SO HEAVY! I can’t believe that a soldier could wear that all day/night and not end up with a raging headache. Maybe I just have a weak neck from my lack of protein. 🙂
The recipe is for Emily’s Mock “meat loaf” which is a recipe from my pal Wolffie… it’s a great recipe. Especially to share with non-vegan friends. Try taking it to a potluck or having them over for dinner. It might encourage a positive conversation … about how it’s not “natural”, “normal” or kind to eat meat.