Killing Clyde

My extended family in rural Kansas is facing a dilemma common to many farm families every year--to kill or not to kill the pet turkey for Thanksgiving. The pet's name is Clyde and has been raised by my sister-in-law and her two daughters for the past few months. They vote to pardon Clyde, similar to the two turkeys set free each year at the White House. They believe it would be unconscionable to eat Clyde on the holiday. On the other hand, one of the alpha males in the family has volunteered to shoot Clyde and dress out the breast meat only since he considers working with the dark meat "too much trouble."

I know that the usual advice to farm families in similar situations is to simply suspend one's emotions and go ahead and sell an animal such as a steer at the auction. It's also not that hard to kill the chickens on the farm since one does not get so attached to them perhaps. The whole incident has led me to question whether there are famous birds in cartoons that we grow attached to. I know there is Foghorn Leghorn, but he's not exactly a lovable character since he's always pestering all the other animals in the barnyard.

I lean on the side of buying a fully-dressed turkey, unknown as a personality to the family, at the grocery store and allowing Clyde to live. Oh, by the way these girls are not small in the family, 23 and 27 respectively. More on the story will follow--after Thanksgiving.