You ever been to Iowa, Ashley?
I’ve never been out of my congressional district, Sterling.
Minnesota?
Knock it off.
North Carolina?
That’s the Confederacy, Sterling.
That’s also our first stop on the FTP Tour.
Ashley squealed.
You found us a juicy jam band to follow? I never heard of FTP. Are they like the Grateful Dead?
Dead, yeah, grateful, no.
Are you tripping, Sterling?
FTP means free the pigs, Ashley. There‘s tons of pigs getting mass murdered in each of those states. Iowa leads the pack then Minnesota and North Carolina. Thousands of pigs are backed up at the meat processing plants because of worker shortages and Corona closures. Corporate killers are pushing the poor pigs into wood chippers, shooting them or exterminating their lives with blunt force trauma to the head.
That’s creepy, Sterling.
Business calls the slaughter just-in-time manufacturing, Sterling said. Mature hogs are sent from barns to the slaughterhouse and another group of young pigs take their place in a few days. The production slowdown backs up the young. Sometimes many hogs are waiting the farmers set up an airtight truck and pump in carbon dioxide to put the animals to sleep.
Permanently, Ashley said.
Sterling’s eyes welled up.
You call yourself a COVIDtarian, right?
A hundred percent, Ashley said.
Me, too, Sterling said. I gave up eating meat to stay safe during the pandemic and help save the planet. Until then I never ate a meal without beef, pork, poultry or the squeezings.
Squeezings?
Yeah, like chicken broth or chicken fat or whatever else they choke out of those poor birds when they wring the chickens’ necks.
Can’t we do something about it?
Free the pigs, Sterling said.
Ashley pondered the rallying cry, slowly repeating each syllable like an actor tasting the strong words of a good script.
Free.
The.
Pigs.
Yeah, Sterling said, free the pigs.
Ashley sat up in her seat.
Free the pigs, free the pigs, free the pigs, she said.
Sterling joined the chant.
Free the pigs, free the pigs, free the pigs.
Together they chanted louder and louder until they screamed, the veins bulging in their necks.
My father orders steak for lunch at the country club every time he finishes playing golf. I hate meat. I hate golf. I hate the country club. I hate my father, Sterling said.
Me, too, Ashley said. My father, not yours but actually I hate yours, too.
Heading south in the van, Sterling slipped a vintage CD into the vintage boom box he bought at a yard sale before they left. Jerry Garcia’s voice came through loud and clear singing about the love light.
In her mind, Ashley heard a sonic schroom.
Whoa, she said.
Sitting cross-legged in her seat, she turned to face Sterling.
One of the Dead’s founding members was named Pigpen, right?
Impressed, Sterling heard his own sonic schroom.
Karma, Ashley, karma.
How many pigs do you think we can free?
Thousands, maybe.
In three states?
The top three states.
Then what do we do?
Free our minds, Sterling said.
Ashley repeated her new mantra.
Free.
Our.
Minds.
Free.
The.
Pigs.
Free.
Our.
Minds.