The grass is greener.

April 6, 2020 – The grass is greener.

         Saturday morning’s trash run was a little unusual.  Heading north on Highway 64 – one of the main highways in and out of our county, I passed the lumber yard on the corner on the right, then passed the wide concrete bridge and up a piece on the left are fields with cattle – two kinds.  One kind has a white stripe around the middle and the other kind is all black.

         I have a ‘ tiny bit’ of country girl in my heart, I always enjoy looking out over the field to see these bovine in their pristine setting, wistfully hoping to see new calves among them.  I have this affinity for fields of hay that has been recently bailed, as well.

         Traffic is always heavy on Highway 64, so when I saw a cow – BIG cow on the wrong side of the fence on the left side of the highway munching green grass I slowed.  Other vehicles were slowing and as each vehicle passed, the cow seemed more unsettled.

         He’d gotten to the “grass is greener” side of the fence and now that he was on the wrong side, he gazed back at the herd. I believe he had second thoughts – maybe the grass wasn’t greener.  He moved North, then he turned and looked at the traffic deciding what to do next

         “Oh, you poor thing, you are going to get yourself run over.” I said out loud.  I turned around at the next road to the right and circled back to the entrance gate of the owners of the beef cattle who happen to be members of my church.

         I parked my car, left the motor running and pushed the gate buttons, nothing.  Then I heard a lawn mower or tractor not too far away and I slipped behind the fence, and walked four car lengths when I spotted a figure not too far off.

         I yelled and waved my arms and caught his attention.  A black rubber booted lad walked my direction as he pulled his ear buds out.  He was surprised I was in his front coral.

         I yelled loudly so he could hear me as he was 50 feet away, “You’ve got a cow loose.  It is out on the road.  You need to go get her before she is killed.”

         He understood, dialed his smart phone and turned to look north where I had pointed.

         I returned to my car and traversed north again, the cow still pondering and wondering on the side of the road.  Thankfully the motorists were being cautious.

         All the way to the trash dump, I prayed for that cow.  No one wants to hit a bovine that is probably 800 pounds.  It is a lot easier to walk a cow back through a gate than to get a dead animal out of the highway.

         About ten minutes later, after the trash delivery, I returned south on Highway 64, and the owner was standing on the shoulder of the road surveying the fence line. I believe the cow was safely inside the fence.

         All was well with that episode, but I’ve had this happen before.

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         One other Saturday morning, early, I was taking the trash out to the convenience center on the southern end of the county, when we lived on Trojan Lane in the Chase Community.  I turned left on a side road that had a dazzling display of daffodils in the spring along the bank and down around the curve came up on not just one cow, but four or five cows milling round the road in front of the trash dumpsters.

         “Moooo,” I heard as I tossed my trash bags into the large metal containers.  Not really knowing who owned the cows I went to the first house on my way out of the road.  No one home, but I looked further up and decided it had to be the red tin roofed farmhouse that was the owner.

         I pulled in the yard and drove up the circle drive to the back of the house.  I knocked on the back screened-in porch. “Hello, Hello,” I called loudly in the Spring sunshine.

         “Yeah, what you want,” came a cantankerous voice from within and the next moment I was in the presence of a stooped old man, with leathered skin in well-washed worn bib overalls and faded plaid shirt.

         “Cows, are they yours? There are four or five of them down at the trash dumpsters.”

         “Yup, they are mine, missy.”  He turned his gaze in that direction and immediately headed towards his truck tossing back a, “Thanks,” ever so quickly.

         I remember that I again, felt gratified that I’d saved the cows.

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         A few years later I was working in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and occasionally I would take the back way down Lamb’s Grill Road in the pretty weather.  Just on the outskirts of Spartanburg, just before a large church on the right, and housing development, there were half a dozen cows meandering on the outside of a fence on the left.

         Morning traffic, this is not good. I thought. I slowed to a crawl and one bovine meandered back out of the road and I followed the fence line and it took me to the next driveway and along a bumpy gravel drive. I eventually pulled up in front of a small house.  As soon as I stopped and stepped out and shut my door, half a dozen feral cats vamoosed off the porch, in different directions, instantly vanishing except one large black one that was curled up on top of a holly bush beside the wooden banister.

         I hesitantly walked up the wooden stairs as the cat stared at me and I stared back. How could it stand the sharp holly leaves? Was it going to attack me?

         I could hear people talking from within and I called, “YO-HOO – Hello, Hello,” and a teenage boy came to the screen door.

         “There are cows out on the highway, are they yours?”

         He turned to yell inside the house, “Ma, the cows are out again.”

         A woman’s voice yelled back, “You and sissy go out and get them rounded up, I will be out directly.”

         I didn’t say anything, except I walked back to my car as the young teenager jogged down the drive ahead of me.

         Oh, I saved the day again, but I thought about that cat with the sharp points of the holly bush leaves poking into it the rest of the day.

         Over the years, I would often glance at that house and the upcoming field of cows to see that all was well.

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Then, coming home one night from Spartanburg,

another incident involving an animal . . .

         Commuting to Spartanburg you just have to change it up sometimes.  When the weather was pretty, I’d drive home Lamb’s Grill road even though it was busy in the evening with commuters dumping out of Spartanburg.

         Halfway home I am traveling on a long open stretch of road where you can see quarter mile up the road, where the houses are spaced pretty far apart when I notice a horse loose, dashing from one yard to the next.  It paused a moment and then twirled around and hesitated before it crossed the road, in front of a slowed vehicle.

         Again, I say to myself.  “This is not good.  5:30 traffic . . .”

         I don’t know how to catch a horse, I haven’t a rope.

         I stop at the next house and knock on the door and call,  no one home.

         I look back and horse is still loose, an elegant cinnamon colored horse.

         I drive to the next house and same thing – no one is home.

         This continues for three or four more houses on both sides of the road and I am now out of sight of the horse, but I continue on. The next house looks more promising.

         Two pick-ups and a car are in the yard.  I pull in and as I am getting out of my car, a gent comes out the front door.  He was expecting a visitor and discovered I was a stranger.

         “There is a horse loose down the road.” I call out to him as I approach.

         “What you say?”  He comes closer.

         “There is a horse loose down the road, back four or five houses.”   I point and look down the road; he looks and doesn’t see a horse.

         “What color is it?”

         “Ahh, nutmeg color, no more like cinnamon color,”

         He laughs. “Cinnamon?” he says, his light blue eyes smiling.

         “Yeah, that browny auburn,” my voice trails off.

         He looks me up and down.  “Why didn’t you catch it?” he asks as he is looking me up and down and hesitates at my high heels.

         “I don’t have a rope and I don’t know how.”

         “I am just funning you.”  He steps toward the house and calls to his wife who steps outside wiping her hands on an old timey around her neck apron.

         “Horse loose down the road, probably Maud’s, I’ve got to go get it . . .”

         The wife answers, “I heard she sold that horse to her neighbor . . . I forget his name now.”

         “I’ll leave you to it then,” I said as I turned to get into my car.

         “Yeah, I’ll go catch me that ah, cinnamon horse as you call it.”

         This time I wasn’t sure if the beautiful creature had escaped injury, I just knew I had to ask my horse friend why I got such a jocular comment about the color of the horse.

         Later, my friend answered that question, “Sounds like a Sorrel or Chestnut,” she said with broad smile.

         Remember that “tiny bit” of country girl I have in me . . . it has grown in more knowledge over the years, but I still don’t know how to lasso a bovine or capture a cinnamon colored horse.