Even though I've been a vegetarian on and off for twelve years, I jumped at the opportunity to help cull (ie, slaughter) a couple chickens the other day.
We started by taking the chickens out of their coop at dusk because we knew they would be roosting for the night. As she carried one under her arm, my friend commented on how she could feel the chicken's heart beating - as if it knew what lay ahead. A quick chop of the neck was all it took, then we hung them up to bleed while we ate dinner. After an hour or so, we stuck them in hot water, de-feathered them and then cut off the feet and gutted them.
I didn't handle the live chickens, but it was very real to hold one up by the still-warm leg so someone else could string it up to the fence to bleed out. That line from living to dead was so thin, in this case. It was amazing to watch the transition between life and death and to think about how my reaction to this whole process shifted once the chickens were de-feathered because they became a form of food that I'm familiar with. At that point I was more intrigued with how one goes about removing the innards instead of being hyper-aware that this had been a live animal.
I'm not planning to start eating meat again but if I were, I would be much more grateful because I would recognise the sanctity of life that had been sacrificed. Death so that I could live.