Pig in distress

Last week my husband was telling our twins about my snoring. This is something new and amusing to the family as I have never been a snorer until recently. He suffers patiently and has his wax ear plugs on hand but they are not always enough. It was actually one of the first signs that there was an obstruction near my airways so I have been forgiven a little since the diagnosis. Now, following the lung biopsy I have developed some other new and amusing sounds as they scraped my vocal cords. I wake myself up breathing out on a note like I’m trying to form a sound. My youngest son, an articulate boy, volunteered a charming description of me as sounding like ‘a pig in distress’ and it made me laugh so hard I snorted, proving him right and delighting him further.

This phrase has stayed with me as I try to elevate myself from my diagnosis and find some dignity amidst the blunt mortality of the flesh. When we find out we are dying we are a bit like pigs in distress and this is exactly what I am trying to avoid. Nevertheless it seems kind of appropriate.

I once worked on a TV series about meat production called Kill It Cook It Eat It where we had the bright idea of getting an abattoir to take the bloody walls off and make them glass so an audience could watch the process ‘from farm to fork’. We built a studio around the facility and did a ‘farm to plate’ live show where we tried to connect people to what they ate.

I toured abattoirs across the UK. Some were clean, well ordered and dignified in their treatment of the animals and others not so much. The pigs always upset me the most though. They say they are intelligent creatures and it is true when they are being guided through the pens and they realise what’s just happened to the pig in front they squeal blue murder and try to run back in the direction they’ve come from. They feel mortal fear. But then they lick the blood of their dead friend which pig haters use to undermine the case for being kinder to pigs.

I too feel my basest instinct should be to squeal, turn in the other direction and run but unfortunately I can’t outrun myself. And I can’t just keep squealing like a pig in distress. Even if I’ve stopped doing this publicly I’m doing in on the inside quietly. It makes sense.

Instead we talk calmly about targeted drugs and healthy diets and no alcohol. We adopt spiritual activities and try to demonstrate how human we are. I am happiest when my nose is in the trough or I’m rolling in mud though. Sometimes I need to let out my basest instinct to squeal and run for the hills. Today is one of those days. But I’m already in the hills so I just went back to bed.