I was getting married in three days. My nails were done.
They looked so nice. My soon to be husband was feeding for me so that I could
stay pristine (the struggle is REAL), and I just had to go and ruin it. How do
you ask? Oh, let me tell you the tale:
I stopped by the farm to drop some wedding stuff off and
glanced at the fencer. The tiny check mark that symbolizes a short was flashing
with a vengeance. Tick, tick, #itch. You’ve got a problem. I walked around to
see if the weaned calves had shorted the fence out again, a somewhat frequent occurrence
given my substandard fence building skills. They hadn’t, but as I did a quick
head count I noticed a problem, where oh where was lucky number 16? I walked
around the fence, my capri pants and slip on shoes not giving me much
protection from the weeds and mud. It had rained the night before and was
looking to do so again, and soon. Because of course it was. Why the F not. This
stuff never happens when it is 70 degrees and sunny.
I saw the heifer grazing by herself in the top rotational
paddock, fortunately the main herd was on the other side of the rotation (which
happens to be seven parallel paddocks that run perpendicular to an aisle down a
hill – important later). With a heavy sigh, and a quick glance up at the
oncoming clouds I entered the paddock and began to give chase. It should have
been easy. She fell out of the fence, so she should jump right back in, right?
Wrong. She ran to the corner and I gently urged her back with her friends. She
ran past me, and I panicked thinking that she might run out to rejoin the herd
(to become her future calf’s sister mom if her daddy had anything to say about
it – she is starting to be “that age” when a bull starts to notice her sweet
brown eyes… anyways…)
I ran to cut her off, and running is not my thing. We
repeated the run about a hundred times. Back and forth. Back and forth. I got a
stitch in my side. My aggravation with the situation started to ratchet up. She
started bellering with all her considerable lung capacity – “Mrrrroooo
MrrrrroooooOooo!” I started yelling back, “Go back to your new herd you stupid
heifer!” It kept up. I got more pissed by the minute. Sweat was running down my
back, weeds were cutting my legs, and the mother flipping sonnofabitching heifer was NOT cooperating. Ugh.
The main herd started to pay attention. I panicked
and yelled: “Stop calling for your mother! She doesn’t love you anymore! She
has a new baby now!” I chased her back towards the fence. Hell, I even grabbed
the fence and laid it down for her, but of course, she wouldn’t go through. The
rest of the calves came up and thought about coming out, but this basic B would
not cross the freaking fence.
I grabbed my phone as the thunder rolled. “Eric, we have a
calf out.” “No I can’t get her in. Don’t you think I tried that?” Frustration
gave me what I like to think was an edge to my voice like Liam Neeson in Taken
or something, instead I am pretty sure it came off as hysteria. Which was not
what I was going for. He said he was on his way, so I started out to try to
find the short, at dusk with no flashlight and the rain starting to come down.
My legs quickly became covered with seed heads as I wandered along the
perimeter fence checking each insulator to see if it was off. I reached the
paddock with the cows and my usually docile animals decided to channel their
inner buffalo and started charging en masse at me. My inner voice mumbled, “This
is it. I’m going to die here.”
I plodded along, too pissed to care, as the herd
milled around me with murder on their mind. I finished my perimeter check,
still finding no short and no power to the fence and started walking along the
top end of the paddock when Eric called. He was here, where was I? I started
trudging up towards the gate. Surely if I wasn’t in the aisle the cows would
just stay down here and eat like good cows. Oh, but no.
I was about halfway up the hill when I heard them start to
come, hooves sucking in the slick clay as they headed for the top of the aisle,
where their presence would cause the calf to break out of the paddock and
rejoin them. I couldn’t let that happen. I fell to the ground and shimmied
under the “dead” fence, only to have it light up the wet back of my shirt while
I was on my belly in the mud and shock the ever loving muck out of me. Which of
course caused me to spasm and throw myself out of my army crawl into an
ungainly sprawl right in the middle of a couple piles of manure. I leapt to my
feet, wiped God knows what off my face and sprinted for a slinky gate to hold
the herd back. I made it just in time. I mean, just in time. I no sooner got
the gate pulled taut than the herd skidded to an angry stop.
I slogged up the hill, my feet slipping out from under me
with every other step. The rain wasn’t coming down hard enough to wash me off,
just hard enough to turn everything into a God damned mess. I got to
the top of the hill and glowered at Eric, who had the good grace not to laugh
in my face as I explained what happened. Which was wise. I would have probably
attacked. Frustration does not bring out the best in me. My grandma would be so
ashamed.
We got to work with the heifer. Again we went back and
forth, back and forth. I noticed that I wasn’t the only one frustrated now when I
saw Eric’s iPhone “flashlight” spin off into the night as he winged it at the
heifer when she ran past him. He started to yell obscenities.
“I told her her
mama doesn’t love her anymore.” I added to the string helpfully as he ran by. It was dark so
I couldn’t see his look of what I am sure was appreciation. He jogged past me
and the 50’ span of fence I had laid down so the heifer could go through. Her
little calf friends were all lined up on their side of the fence, so I couldn’t
leave my post or EVERYONE would be out. I watched the bouncing light run
circles around the paddock after the heifer, and I patrolled my man made hole in
the fence.
My phone rang; my buddy John had called. “Call you back. Cow
out.” Click.
After another fifteen minutes, or years – it felt like
years, we got her back in. Eric left to go finish feeding and I called John back
and started relating my tale to him as I tried to make it down the giant slip
and slide that was the aisle without falling down again in order to release the herd from containment.
His response? “Well, I had called to complain, but I can’t do that now.” Yeah,
that’s right John. You ever want to feel better about your life choices? Call
me. Call me when the cows are out and it is now ten o’clock at night and I have
freshly manicured nails that are now shoved full of manure and clay and I haven’t
had dinner, and I am covered in literal shit and have to drive home. In my
freshly cleaned car. That I have to ride in in my wedding dress. Can we all just
say muck with a capital F? Hmm?
So I of course do what anyone would do and strip down to my
bra and underwear to drive home so I don’t get my car dirty. Which is fine, and
a great plan until I get to the bottom of the driveway and see the gates. Which
I have to close. That are next to a highway, with traffic.
And my bra and panties don’t even match…
So I wait for a lull in the traffic and run out to try to
shut one gate, and dart back in the car so that I don’t get slapped with some
sort of public indecency ticket; and the freaking gate falls off one hinge. So
I am wrestling with a shitty gate, in the rain, half covered in mud and manure,
in my bra, trying to not be seen by neighbors or oncoming traffic.
And THAT ladies and gentlemen, is how a farmer does a walk
of shame.
