My Year of Meats

by Ruth L. Ozeki

  Mrs. “Bunny” Dunn loves variety meats and has suggested her special recipe of Pan-Fried Prairie Oysters. Do you know what a prairie oyster is? It is a bull’s testicle, a traditional delicacy in the American West, which American men eat in order to increase their strength and their manhood. I think this would be a very nice custom to introduce to Japanese families. However, if you think it is too crass a meat for the refined Japanese palate, she also has a very nice recipe for Scrambled Brains ‘n’ Eggs or Simmered Heart.

  I will visit Chicago and Colorado and scout both women. I will send you my opinions, but of course, the final decision is yours. You call the shots.

  Sincerely,

  Jane Takagi-Little

  FAX

  September 5

  Sloan,

  I will be in Chicago next Monday for a location scout and I can see you then if you want. However, I will be spending most of the day at Blatszik Meat Fabricators. I haven’t yet aborted, although I did deposit your check.

  Sincerely, Takagi

  FAX

  TO: Mr. “J.” Ueno

  FROM: Jane Takagi-Little

  DATE: September 5

  RE: Wild West

  Dear Mr. Ueno,

  The more I find out about “Bunny” Dunn, the more I like her. She is a former rodeo queen and everyone says she is physically quite attractive. She was born and bred in Texas, and perhaps you may recall how charming Texas girls can be. In addition she has a warm, outgoing personality. She and her husband, John, have a feedlot, which is different from a ranch and better for the purposes of our program, I think. A cattle ranch may have several hundred or maybe several thousand animals. But at the Dunns’ feedlot there are cattle from ranches all over the country, about 20,000 head in all!

  The Dunns feed the cattle special food to fatten them up and give them medicine to make sure they do not get sick. The cattle are kept in one place, so they will be easier for us to film and get all 20,000 into one spectacular shot. Now that’s a lot of beef! In addition there is a meat-processing business nearby owned by good friends of the Dunns who have agreed to allow us to film all the different and interesting steps involved in meat production.

  Aside from the attractiveness of Mrs. “Bunny” Dunn, there is much to recommend the rest of the family as well. Mr. Dunn is quite a bit older than “Bunny,” but he is still vigorous, and the two fell in love at first sight. John Dunn has one grown-up son from a previous marriage who works with his father on the farm. John and “Bunny” have a Little daughter as well. John sired the girl at the age of 72 and he says his virility comes from the red meat he’s eaten every day since he first grew teeth. “Bunny” swears it’s her Prairie Oysters. All in all, I feel that the Dunns are a pretty typical American family who would do much to promote an image of the wholesomeness of BEEF-EX.

  Sincerely,

  J. Takagi-Little

  Journal: September 5

  Bunny Dunn was indeed a rodeo queen, in the small town of Fossil, Texas, when she was in high school. Then she took a shot at the state title and ended up as a stripper and an exotic dancer, moving from town to town until she wound up in San Antonio. John Dunn is old enough to be her grandpa. He spotted her at the club where she was working, bought a ring at a pawnshop next door, slipped it on her finger during a lap dance, and took her back to his spread in Colorado.

  If the feedlot is anything like the ones I’ve been reading about, there should be plenty of opportunity to shoot some pretty horrifying material. And the slaughterhouse—I have high hopes for that.

  What am I hoping to accomplish? Am I trying to sabotage this program?

  I need this job. I can’t afford to get fired now. On the other hand, I can’t continue making the kind of programs Ueno wants, either. What am I supposed to do?

  FAX

  TO: “J.” Ueno

  FROM: Jane Takagi-Little

  DATE: September 6

  RE: Documentary Ethics

  Dear Mr. Ueno:

  There are a couple of things that have come to light in my researches that I think you should know about. I have inadvertently discovered an unsavory side to the meat industry. I am talking about the use of drugs and hormones in meat production, which are being blamed for rising rates of cancer, sterility, impotence, reproductive disorders, as well as a host of other illnesses and harmful side effects. These drugs are routinely given to the cattle that end up as steak on the plates of the Japanese television viewing audience. I am concerned about the ethics of representing either the Blatsziks or the Dunns in a wholesome manner, knowing what I now know about the health hazards of meat production.

  I am sending you a summary of all of my research. Since there is so much technical language, I’ve asked Kenji to translate it into Japanese. Please advise how to proceed.

  Sincerely,

  J. Takagi-Little

  P.S. On a more personal note, while there is still no proven link to meat, did you know that now the average man produces less morphologically sound sperm than an average hamster?

  FAX

  September 6

  Dear Dyann and Lara:

  Thank you for your articles. They were very helpful in planning my next show. To answer your question, yes, the commercials for the program sponsor go into the black spaces in the tape. The copy I sent you, without commercials or titles, is called a “white mother.” This time I am enclosing the “on-air” copy with the commercials included. Before you watch it there is something you should know—and I’m afraid it’s going to make you angry. The program sponsor for My American Wife! is an organization called the Beef Export and Trade Syndicate, or BEEF-EX. I neglected to tell you this before the shoot, probably sensing that you wouldn’t go along with it, and after the shoot was over it was too late. I didn’t have time to reshoot, and your program was so good. I felt it could deliver a truly affirming message about sexuality and race and the many faces of motherhood to Japanese women. I know these aren’t adequate excuses, nor do they tell the entire story, but there is nothing I can say that would be sufficient to exonerate myself. All I can do is apologize and ask you to forgive me and promise to make it up to you somehow.

  Sincerely,

  Jane

  FAX

  TO: J. Takagi-Little

  FROM: J. Ueno

  DATE: September 7

  RE: Beef Safety

  Dear Takagi-Little:

  Please do not be concerned with these matters that are none of your business and which you know nothing about, and that is the wholesomeness of BEEF-EX. They have one good committee called the Meat Affirmation Task Force who assures me of high quality of all meats. So do not waste your time. This is not hobby. If you cannot be professional television director and make wholesome program of My American Wife! I have asked Mr. Kato to send some another director instead.

  Sincerely,

  J. Ueno

  Journal: September 7

  Well, that settles it. Ueno will have his meats. I leave for location scout tomorrow. I don’t want to see Sloan.

  That is such a lie. Of course I do. He is picking me up at the airport.

  AKIKO

  Dear Miss Takagi-Little,

  You do not know me because I am only the wife of Ueno of BEEF-EX so I regret to bothering you at all. But I feel compelled to writing for the reason of your program of the Lesbian’s couple with two childrens was very emotional for me. So thank you firstly for change my life. Because of this program, I feel I can trust to you so that I can be so bold.

  You see, Ueno and I wanted to have the child at first but because of my bad habits of eating and throw up my food I could not have monthly bleeding for many years. But now I can have it again thanks to eating delicious Hallelujah Lamb’s recipe from your program of My American Wife!, so secondly thank you for that also.

  But I am most wanting to say that I listen to the black lady say she never want man in her life, and all of a sudden I agree! I am so surprising that I cry! (I do not know if I am Lesbian
since I cannot imagine this condition, but I know I never want marriage and with my deep heart I am not “John’s” wife.)

  I feel such sadness for my lying life. So I now wish to ask you where can I go to live my happy life like her? Please tell me this. Sincerely yours,

  Akiko Ueno

  Akiko painstakingly finished copying the final draft of her fax. She had written it several times, consulting the dictionary, and felt that she had managed to express herself rather well. She put down her pen and read it over once again, checking for mistakes. The problem that remained was one of courage and logistics. She didn’t dare use the fax machine at home because the New York fax number would be recorded in the machine’s memory and John might see it and recognize it.

  Akiko had found the fax number by accident. She had brought John’s suit to Hashimoto Dry Cleaners the week before, and when she went to retrieve it, old Mrs. Hashimoto pulled a plastic sandwich bag carefully labeled with her name from under the counter. In it, folded in quarters, was what looked to be several pages of a fax. Akiko’s heart sank. She was usually so careful about checking pockets. The wives in the line behind her looked up expectantly.

  “You’d be surprised at the things I find in husbands’ pockets!” The old woman cackled. “You are a lucky wife. Only letters. Sometimes I find other things too....” She looked ominously down the line of wives waiting their turn and they ducked their heads or looked in the opposite direction.

  Akiko fumbled with her wallet. She paid the bill in a no-nonsense manner, hung the suit over her arm, and held out her hand for the plastic bag. Mrs. Hashimoto ignored her and, instead, opened the zip-lock with her crippled fingers and peered inside.

  “It is written in English, your husband’s letter! I wish I could read English. Perhaps it is from an American lover? You must scold your husband severely!”

  Mrs. Hashimoto had no teeth and no respect. She held the letter behind the counter, just too far for Akiko to grab and still maintain her politeness. The old woman leered at her from underneath wrinkled, hooded eyelids.

  “Perhaps that’s why ... perhaps he is spending all his stamina elsewhere. Perhaps you have some nice stepchildren in America—”

  Akiko lunged over the counter.

  “And none of your own children here!” the old lady crowed as she relinquished the paper to Akiko, who crushed it and shoved it into her pocket.

  “Shut up, you old turtle!” she shouted. The waiting wives gasped behind their fingers.

  “I don’t even care!” She glared at them.

  She backed out the door and a tinny digital voice chip thanked her for her continued patronage.

  When she got home she looked at the fax. She recognized the name, Takagi-Little. It must be the same Takagi. The woman who defied John, who went to prison, who made programs that were true and authentic and that Akiko could understand. And with that, she made a decision. She poured herself a shot of scotch and sat down to write the letter that would express the contents of her heart.

  p.s. please do not tell my husband I write this to you because he will anger and maybe hit me as he is sometimes wont to do.

  The nearest public fax machine was at the stationers. Akiko folded the fax from Takagi-san and put it in her pocket just in case she forgot the phone number when she got there. Then she put her own fax in a plastic folder to protect it.

  There were two employees behind the counter at the stationers, a studious-looking girl with glasses and a teenage boy with pimples, wearing a Hello Kitty apron. Akiko chose the boy. It was less likely, she thought, that he could read English. He took the pages from her and looked at them curiously. For a moment Akiko thought of snatching them away from him, but then he handed them back to her, along with a cover sheet to fill out. She carefully wrote Takagi-san’s name and number, then checked it against the number on the fax in her pocket. When she finished, the boy took the pages away to the machine in back.

  Akiko looked at the fax from Takagi again. The first page was a letter, typed, in English. There were several long words—“unsavory,” “sterility,” “impotence”—that Akiko didn’t understand, but it certainly should have been obvious to anyone that this was not a love letter. She turned the page. What followed was a long list of research, covering three pages, in tightly written Japanese. She’d glanced at it earlier but hadn’t paid attention to what it said. Now, as she waited, Akiko read it through without stopping, holding her breath. Then she asked the girl clerk for another cover sheet. She took a pink-and-white pen from a plastic Kitty display on the counter, addressed the cover sheet to Takagi, then wrote:Dear Miss Takagi.

  I read your Japanese fax to my husband Ueno about some dangerous meats. Can it be true? Is the seed of meat-eating man weak from bad medicines, or perhaps he becomes not able to perform the sex act even? Please tell me answer to this important question, too.

  Sincerely,

  Akiko Ueno

  “Customer, are you studying the English language?”

  Akiko looked up, confused. The boy with the Hello Kitty apron had returned and was standing in front of her, looking at the letter he had just sent.

  “I can read some of this, but you are at a level far more advanced than I. May I ask you for your advice? I am studying English conversation myself, and my teacher says that a pen pal from a foreign country is a good method of practicing idiomatic English. Do you agree? Or do you—”

  Akiko snatched her letter from his hand, knocking over the plastic container and scattering the pink-and-white pens across the floor. The other shoppers fell silent, watching.

  “He was reading my letter,” she explained, clutching it to her chest. “He shouldn’t read my letter, don’t you think? It is private....”

  But wives should not be sending private letters in the first place. She backed toward the automatic doors. The boy in the apron was defensive. He had just been making polite conversation. He noticed her new fax on the counter.

  “Customer, you didn’t pay for your first fax. And now here is a second. Do you expect me to send this for free as well?”

  Akiko stopped, realizing she had no choice. She approached the counter again. She took two thousand-yen notes from her purse and put them on the counter.

  “Here. For both,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry....”

  She leaned down and picked up all the pens from the floor and replaced them clumsily in the Kitty container. The boy came back with her second letter. Clutching it, she backed out of the store, under the inquisitorial gaze of the neighborhood. For the second time that day.

  JANE

  Sloan lives in the penthouse of one of the high-rise apartment buildings that cluster along Lake Shore Drive as it winds around the southern perimeter of Lake Michigan. From his vantage, the horizon line is negligible, obscured by smog and slatted blinds. Floor-to-ceiling windows frame the gray lake and the steel waves that lap the concrete shore. The carpet is gray and mimics the water.

  When he picked me up at the airport, I could tell something was different. With clothes on, I was barely showing, but his eyes dropped surreptitiously to my stomach and he immediately took my bags away from me, with an accusatory grimace when he felt their weight. He didn’t kiss me or engage in any other proprietary demonstrations, but something had subtly changed. He had a limousine waiting at the curb and he ushered me into it and gave the driver the Lake Shore Drive address.

  “Are you tired? Do you want to rest for a while before dinner?”

  “Sloan, I have a meeting with a meatpacker in a couple of hours. It’s at least a hundred-and-thirty-mile drive to Normal, and I can’t show up there in a white limousine.”

  “Oh.” He thought for a moment. “What kind of car would be appropriate for a visit to a meatpacker?”

  “I don’t know ... something rented and innocuous.”

  He phoned his secretary on his cellular phone, and exactly two and a half hours later we were sitting in front of Blatszik Meat Fabricators in a metallic-gray Ford Tauru
s, and he had changed from his linen suit into a pair of jeans and a T-shirt and a Bulls cap and could pass for the local driver I should have hired.

  A rusting sign at the top of the exterior stairway read:Blatszik Meat Fabricators, Inc.

  Precision Meat Products

  Custom Slaughter

  “You want that I should come inside with you?” He was playing the driver.

  “No; stay here.”

  He dropped it. “Please. I want to see this.”

  “Okay, but behave. And don’t say anything.”

  Anna Blatszik met us in the small office that overlooked the packing plant. She was large and apologetic. Her husband was seated behind a metal desk, screaming in Polish into an old black phone. The desk was piled high with bloodstained packing slips and invoices. A shipment of lambs was late in coming, Anna explained, and the workers were just sitting around in the slaughterhouse, waiting. Her husband was upset. Every hour that went by was costing them money. The lambs were apparently stuck in traffic on the outskirts of Gary. Anna regretted that she would not be able to show us the plant in operation, but would we like to see the facilities? She took two bloodstained white coats from a steel locker in the corner of the office and offered them to us.

  The air in the abattoir felt like cold metal, solid, like something you could hurt yourself against. Yet it was volatile too, permeating your lungs and sinuses so you could taste it immediately as it stained the back of your throat. It was hard to breathe and not choke on it.

  The workers at Blatszik Fabricators were sitting around, talking softly, and some were sharpening their knives, so the metal was in your ears too, a rhythmic shuunck, shuunck, shuunck of steel against stone. They glanced up when we walked in, and fell silent except for the sharpening. Some drank coffee, others smoked; each cupped his own private thread of vaporous comfort against the cold.