I’ve witnessed a terrible thing. Appalling crowds crush into jagged queues, necks craning, eyes deadened, and voices silent. Line members struggle forward, enfeebled by expectation, inching towards ecstasy. Humanity is put on hold when the University’s dining halls serve salmon.

One day, you’ll be in the salmon line. Teriyaki salmon. You’ll watch helplessly as a hand scoops the last portion onto their plate. Lemon and red crushed pepper salmon. “Where’s the next platter?” you’ll cry. Smoked paprika salmon with kale, chickpeas, red onion, and dill aioli. Nothing else could fill your appetite. Lemon garlic greek grilled salmon. But the next platter will never come. Baked lemon salmon. Can you feel that sinking loss, that stinging pain? Honey chipotle salmon. You’re an addict.

Who can we blame but ourselves? We give in so quickly to macronutrient gluttony; we’re so eager to give up our individuality for a rare treat. Our mealtimes are an escape from the dull stress of higher learning. In most corners of the dining halls, passing friends treat each other to relieved smiles. But where are those smiles in the salmon line? In that line, there are no friends — just competing mouths twisted with hungry frowns. Every time we join that line, we become animalistic beasts with no higher concern than that sweet, buttery filet of salmon.

Is it worth it? Is any meal worth that kind of mental barbarism?

You and I are soldiers, and we’ve been enlisted in a never-ending war. At the sight of the salmon line, we shed our humanity and are deployed into a silent battlefield. We’ll win no medals, nor suffer any casualties. But each time we deploy, our humanity shrinks from us. Those few minutes of warfare add up. At the end of your next battle, will your personhood still be there for you? Will you still be you, and I still be me? Or will we remain stomachs with legs, fighting invisible enemies for the mouth-watering privilege of a delicious, nutritious dinner?

When we see each other in the salmon line, I’ll meet your gaze. For that brief moment, we’ll witness each other as people, hungry people, just looking for our next fix. If you can bring yourself to smile, to channel the joy of being a person imbued with all that makes you wonderfully unique, I’ll smile back. On that day, we’ll escape our shackles and be free, truly free, of our salmon line selves.

Image Credits: Will Pipkin