Protecting the Kill

This will be short. I'm feisty, not in that moon spell, waters rippling from a raindrop outward to evermore. Nahhhh, I'm home, no TV, nobody around which for 5 minutes I think is good, then the next 5 I feel like a hermit freak wasting my time. I did get out of my asylum for a jaunt, late afternoon, and busted up Divisadero. It turned slap-face cold today and my fingers stung inside my crap gloves. No mud, all frozen dirt lips and glass shard snow. It's 8:19 and I'm wide eyed, too much energy to tame. I have gourmet fries in the oven, 425, the olive oil and basil baking in, hitting their point of crisp perfection. I'm hungry, so much so that I ripped into a ham shank with my bare hands (after the knife and fork failed me) and started gnawing on it like a desert wolf, the lobo. And I caught myself baring my teeth when I looked at it on the plate, trying to figure out the thickest part. Here I am in front of my computer, 7 o'clock at night, craving meat after a day of eating apples, snap peas and jalapeno jack, and I have a lamb shank, already half eaten, but cleanly so, shaved with a knife for use in a morning scramble, and I'm moving my head up and down, side to side, eying that shredded shank like I'd killed it myself. And I notice my elbows are out to the sides and my back is hunched, the muscles alert. Fuck, I was protecting my kill. Who knows what other animal, some Facebook foe or IMing hyena, would pop out of the big screen and snatch my flesh? No fucking way. So I found myself with the shank in my mouth, scraping with my front teeth and incisors, chomping, but having a hard time finding the thick payoff. It felt lousy, sloppy, crummy and my right cheek was smeared with a white streak of chilled fat. I put it down, disgusted, although the aftertaste was sweet and I thought of cubed ham, or a much larger ham I could slice into with an electric knife like lamb on a skewer for souvlaki. And then I looked around my big, minimalist-style house, and remembered I was alone, and I laughed a little, and thought as I walked the long plank to the kitchen that I'd never have man-handled a ham shank like that if I'd been with a woman, and that maybe that was the problem...you know, not being yourself. If you're a ham shank devourer, a face in the gristle motherfucker, then be it, man! And I had it resolved right there in the kitchen that I'd be that guy in my next relationship. Yes, that would make it work and lead to fat streaked sex all over the house, and especially the kitchen. But, then I realized that that was the first ham shank I'd ever eaten, indeed maybe ever seen. I'd bought it on a lark, when I was hungry, looking for something to kill and there it was at Cid's, in the refrigerated meat section with the specialty products. And I lifted it and it had heft. I looked at the price - $7.59. Hmmm, steep but it had bulk and it felt meaty. But there you go, it was my first, and I was mistaken, it was mostly bone, maybe better for hambone soup. I really have no idea. So, now I'm sated, and feeling sheepish about my ham shank, and that revelation in the kitchen is long gone, and I hardly ever eat pink meat, maybe a Denver omelet here and there. It was a one-time thing, and it's not that I'm so neat and clean and civilized with my eating, indeed I've felt the filling mouth crumbs on goatee sloppiness a lot these past years, but ham ain't my bag, really. That said, I am a wolf and I do need more kills, so I think I'll head to Cid's tomorrow, probably after my hike, and stalk the meat section, but this time with an eye toward something sliced or pounded and wrapped up tight.