CALVIN

7/5/96

We drove down to Pittsburg last Saturday and brought Scott
home for the week. Tomorrow we have to return him to the art institute,
his dream come reality.


Yesterday Scott hollered up from the pasture to me as I
started supper, "Dad, when did you buy a calf"


I shouted back, "Just about nine and a half months ago."
Daisy-Mae had her calf! She was cleaning her new baby when Gin
and I approached. Gin had brought her camera and a roll of film
was shot as Scott and I posed with the proud mother. I asked
Scott what we should name it and it didn't take him long at all
to come up with Calvin.


"Calvin? How'd you come up with that for a name?" I asked him.


He said, "Rosi is due soon, isn't she? You can name her calf Hobbs."


Calvin weighed just over seventy pounds and is mostly black
but does have a white tip on his tail and some under his belly. He
has a lot of Momma in him, not like the last one, Nicky. He was
pure Angus! We butched him at only nine months. Maybe this one
will be more mellow.


5/6/98

I may be ahead in the gardening chores, but I'm way behind in others.


Taking the camera with me, I went out to photograph the
garden. There was Calvin, the eighteen month old calf, just
munching away at the grass along the fence line. I set the camera
down and walked on by. Grabbing his lead rope from the barn, I ran,
then walked along the other side of the garden, nonchalantly
dragging the rope behind me. As I turned the corner towards the
calf he looked up from his mowing and then ran right to the pasture
gate. He knew he'd done wrong. I opened the gate while keeping the
other two cows from exiting, not an easy task, and Cally went in.
I closed the gate behind me and checked all the wire, I couldn't
find any broken but there was a loose post at the bottom of the,
pasture, he might have pushed it up enough to get through. I swapped
the lead rope for the postmall and set the post tight before
calling the butcher. He'll be over Friday. something that should
have been done long before Spring arrived.


5/11/98

I heard the continuing rain on our tin roof before opening my
eyes to a dark room. Daybreak was still hours away but Gin switches
to the 'early-shift' today as 'her kids' leave for the summer;
and I had to call the butcher before deciding which hat to
wear on this dreary Monday morning.


Some folks turn on their television or lately, their computer,
to, "...catch the weather report," while drinking a morning coffee
or tea. I slipped on my moccasins and walked to the outhouse.
"Yep, it's definitely raining! The butcher ain't coming today either."
When the clock showed 6:45 I gave him a call. He verified my guess.


Gin left for the city and I left for the barn. The cows
didn't want to go outside. Luckily I've learned since the grass
started growing not to let more than one out at a time. I led Daisy
to the door and she balked, turning toward the the neighbor's lawn.
I also have learned to keep a hand on her collar when it's muddy
at the lower gate, she doesn't like to get her hooves wet and
I'll sometimes lead her up the path to the upper gate. I swung
her head back in that direction but she only wanted to graze
some of the rain-washed, sweet-smelling grass down at
Rick and Audrey's. I moved to stare her in the eyes and told
her she would spend the morning in the barn if she wouldn't walk
through the mud. She turned and walked back to her stanchion.
I gave her an extra scoop of grain and hay to them all, shut and
locked the doors behind me, and took the morning's milk up to the cabin.


I know darn well why Daisy balked, she knows that her baby is
going to take a trip. She has seen it before, one day the Man
backs his loud truck down to the back door of the barn and carrys
her calf away. She won't be lonely for long though, Rosi is
going to give her a grandcalf any day now. That's one of the
reasons Calvin had to go, his pen is needed for the new baby.


5/12/98

Merci, encore une fois mon mettre a la terre! For providing
this small family with another year's worth of beef.
Calvin took
it pretty well, I hooked the lead rope to the new collar on his
thick neck and led him to the awaiting truck. I broke off a maple
sapling and offered it to him as a goodby. He was happily munching
when I left for work, not wanting to listen to his mother's cries.


I had kept the two cows in the barn all morning while checking
out another (yuk!) plumbing job. I sure wish that cabinet job
would come through soon! I took them up to our back lawn to mow
it for me, using locust trees for hitching posts. They aren't
going to make me chase them all the way to the butcher's! Acually,
both Daisy and her daughter, Rosi behaved rather well while
I put away my books and made a coffee. It wasn't until I'd
moved them to the pasture that Daisy began to mourn her last
calf. Indeed it might just be the last one she'll ever have.
We've had her artificially bred three times since Calvin was born,
almost two years ago, none 'took'. I might ask a neighbor if I can
pasture her with his heifers through the summer while I dry her up.


Have you ever heard a cow cry when she has lost an offspring?
It's a sad, low moan, like the sound of a train whistle far
in the distance. She stands at the gate with her neck outstretched
toward the barn, softly mooing. It's almost enough to turn me vegetarian.


5/13/98
And another circle is complete, a call to the butcher said that
Calvin weighed 546 pounds, hangin'.