BROOKE BIAZ

New Story-in-Progress - November 2010

 

Living with Cows

Brooke Biaz

 

1

I have been living with cows. The choice has been mine. I came upon them one day, out in the field, and simply moved in. It’s been quite a life. There’s plenty I could tell, but I wonder if I should. If you’ve never lived with cows what I say might alarm you and I don’t want that. I don’t want all that ‘Oh my God!’ thing or even that ‘So that’s what it’s like?’ thing, or that ‘Well I wouldn’t have expected anything else’ thing, or the ‘So you say, huh?’ thing. Maybe I shouldn’t mention. But, yes, I have been living with cows. It’s almost 6 years now.

2

I have been living with cows. So you think that’s something? Well, I tell you, it beats almighty Hell out of living with goats. I’ve met guys who’ve lived with goats. I’ve shared some of their stories. The impression you’d have is that it’s all pretty easy; on account, perhaps, of their size. Or, indeed, their innate warmth. Sure! But, frankly, it’s no freaking picnic. You live with goats you need a certain mettle. To speak metaphorically: you don’t get accepted into that flock easily. Those guys who did it, with whom I shared some stories (did I mention?), are all a bit damaged. They went in all bright and keen and looking toward the future. But that’s not how they came out.

‘Want to live with goats?’ one of them said. ‘Hey, then you need to have some pretty big jewels.’

We can all understand what he is talking about. But why?

I figure, from the evidence, that it’s a lot to do with attitude. You only need to look out into the field. Those goats out there are going to take no prisoners. It’s not for no reason that they have a reputation. And it’s nothing to be proud of. Also, there’s the issue of outlook. Goats are goats. They look at the world through goat eyes, golden, gripping, quarrelsome, unerring. They think goat thoughts, deep in the general realm of their caprid, goat natures. I wouldn’t choose to live with goats. I’ve heard stories.

One guy lost an ear. The time it takes to marshal a bit of support in the flock: impossible. The sense, there, that even if you work all your life you’ll never break down the barriers. Goats hold their own counsel. They carry grudges. They share secrets maliciously. They make things up. It starts with that kind of stuff and, I’m afraid, it only gets worse. Next thing you’re an outsider; the brunt. I’ve seen grown men shake, just talking about it. All that talk about fleece gets you nowhere. Not to put too fine a point on it: that stuff’s all a cover-up. I think of goats as cloaked evil. Unmoved, immovable, unsupportive, devious, remorseless, determined, unfair.

 

3
Anyway, that ’s goats. But I’ve been living with cows.

Not pigs, that’s another story. There are possibilities there. You’ve heard all that scientific stuff about the intelligence of pigs? Well, it’s true, they’re a hoot. Very informative, in their own way. And not chickens either. Let’s not go down that wiry wooden track. Cows. Entirely cows. I’ve been living with cows. It’s impossible to come to this lightly, the experience of the whole thing. But, to start simply, I saw a field and there they were and I moved in. Previously - I may have mentioned? - previously, I had  been living in an apartment over on Eighth.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with Eighth and if you happen to be looking at an apartment there at this very moment I can do nothing less than recommend fully it to you. You’ll like the general bustle of the place. Antonionis on the corner of Eighth and Jackson is a fine joint. Probably the best Fried Kreplach in the neighbourhood. And you’ll like their Roast Brisket of Beef Sandwich too. You could move over onto to Eighth just for Antonionis. But there’s other stuff as well. Old Mrs Wynkoop. You simply can’t buy personalities like that! That girl’s got a telescope thing going. She faces it out over Montgomery Park.

She can see all the way to Kingston with that dang thing!

You want entertainment? Drop in on old Mrs Wynkroop. Maybe she’ll have her famous Red Beer brewing. Have a look through her telescope. You might see Jack Black. Jack Black, the movie actor. Yes? She often goes looking for him. That dang thing is supposed to be for looking up at the stars, but . . . . She’s got a NSA license for it and everything! But she doesn’t use it for that. She uses it to spy on folks from Eighth to Twenty-Second and on up into Broyton. And she sure does see some stuff. She can tell you a thing or two.

So Mrs Wynkroop is one. And then there’s the fleamarket under Angel Stores. ‘1200 Vendors!’. Or so it says on the posters. I’ve never counted them. But it’s possible. It is a lively place. There’s artists and tourists and antique sellers; places to buy jazz records and hunks of cheese and tribal art and parts for your vehicle and clothing and postage stamps. Not bad! You could spend a whole day there. You could spend every day there, come to think on it, if you lived down on Eighth. So that’s another thing. Then there’s the Chalk Ball, the Potsie, the Hit the Penny. You don’t need a wad to buy in and sometimes people even play for bags of sourdough, or they set up a game and call for shoes in. You can win a pair of vintage leather Martellinis or grab some canvas sneakers from some guy who keeps up with the current stock. And, in all that, you get to meet people, friendly, soul-searching people like those who live down on Eighth.

So make no mind about my moving out. Pay-in that lease, if you’ve found one. I’d say some of the same stuff about Fifth and Twelfth, those few shiny places off Healman and the bits of St Guinevere that are not being currently knocked down and rebuilt by developers. Because of the famous trouble with the water, I’d probably avoid areas around Vine and Seventh. And, I hate to sound biased, but I’ve never been a great fan of Fourth or those Victorian facades up on Vanderloon. Too dark for me; the place gives me the creeps. But don’t take my word for it: it’s all worth a look. Anyway, as I said, I’m not there anymore: I’m living with cows.

4
I didn’t set out to do it. I was on my way to Molly’s place. Like always. No big deal.

She was none too happy when I called in.

I said: ‘Molly, ol’ thing, I’ve got some news.’

I don’t tend to start off like this, so I think she realised straight-up that some new thing was hatching.

She said: ‘So, where you been? Down at the market, is it? You buy those pull-ups you’re always talking about, or what?’

Now, I think, unfortunately, this set the tone. She knew how I felt about that kind of stuff.

I said: ‘Molly. . .’
 

‘Molly,’ I said, ‘just ‘cause I always talk about those pulls don’t mean I ran out first chance I got and bought them. Some guys make careful choices, like I said before.’

She went silent a moment and then:

‘So, you didn’t buy them?’

Now this didn’t help because I could see things were leading nowhere and, being as I was standing in my new home, happy, free, and thinking about the future, this only made the situation even worse. Sure, I had bought those pull-ups, but not when she thought; in fact, I’d purchased them some weeks before. I didn’t feel I needed to make some big deal about that. I found a moment; it was a moment to purchase pull-ups. You don’t get opportunities like that often. So I took it.

‘Listen,’ I said, ‘ol’ thing. I got some news.’

Maybe I approached this all wrong. I could have said, for example:

‘Molly, my dearest.’

The ‘ol’ thing’ probably didn’t assist much. I could have put in all this stuff about how she was the girl I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. But I didn’t think of doing that. That was my failing. All I could think of was the green around me, the lush spread, the smell of the air, earthy, plain, the movements of those new found creatures around me, the quiet lapping of water in the nearby stream, the distance hum of the roadway, the warmth of the day, the hint of Cottage Pinks, Lemon Mint, Sweet Mignonette. You think I could just ignore all that stuff and get into some conversation about my new pull-ups?

Not likely

‘Molly,’ I said, ‘I’m moving out.’

What came next was awful. ‘Horrific’, you might say. Her wailing, her accusations. Me trying to keep things quiet, on account of the new surroundings and not wanting, frankly, to give a bad first impression. Also, I couldn’t entirely see her point. It was not like I was accusing her of anything; while she, by her own admission, had a big problem with my pull-ups.

The whole thing went on for a good few minutes. After which things went quiet. So, about that time, I hung up.

5
Living with cows is much easier. You can take things at face value. Since I moved in, the world has changed for the worst. You’ve seen it. There has been a kind of furore. The world in turmoil, that kind of thing. Corruption, war, disaster, ill feeling. But not around here.  Nothing around here is too much trouble. There’s no knocks on the door with guys bringing bad news. No big deals. I read, recently, about a woman who opened a cupboard – an ordinary cupboard mind you, in her kitchen; probably one of those laminated wooden cupboards with grainy doors and shiny shelves – she opened a cupboard and a snake slid out. A snake, mind you! Venomous, by all accounts. Straight out, like that. As if that’s a normal thing. It wasn’t like she’d invited that snake around. It wasn’t like she had a family of snakes she’d taken upon herself to feed and clothe and protect. The thing had just upped and moved in. Into her kitchen cupboard, mind you. If you think this is just to be taken for granted, think again. This kind of thing is indicative. It means something. Snakes in the cupboard. War. Disaster. Ill-feeling. It’s all linked. But not around here.

6
I’ve been living with cows. I get up in the mornings and the day spreads out in front of me. If you imagine a day spreading, this is it. There are sounds in the grass and sights in the bushes. This field is particularly well placed. A farmer lives nearby, but not too close. I think if he lived over the fence, there, that’d be a problem. He has several children and drives a tractor. His wife reminds me of a lemon, the kind that is large and a little browned and hard-skinned. She’s probably a nice woman, but her appearance does her no favours. I can imagine what would happen if she and the others lived nearby. They’d be heavy-handedness and contrition. It comes with families. They’d be all over the place, with places and intentions. I could see there being mowing, for starters. You don’t buy a tractor if you don’t want to mow. It comes with the territory. And, from there, planting, harvesting, bailing, wrapping, selling. The international commodities market would make itself felt. Issues of painting the guttering and mending the stone steps, would arise. There’d be visits, from bank folk, neighbours, representatives of the National Farmers Union, tool sellers, travelling pan salesmen. The whole thing would become overwhelming.

7
In the evenings, here, the quiet is remarkable. I have heard in this quiet the power of no one thing. I have detected, within it, the purity of the absolute. I could never have imagined, when I spied from the train, these cows, this field, this life, that the new things delivered to me would be delivered ten-fold, ten-times-ten-fold. What wonders! What glories! As night descends there is slow, but sure, movement. Gatherings. The waft of green breath. The promise of deep dark. A determined sense. I learn each evening of the things that define sublimity. When the cold is here, there’s a closeness. When it is warm, there’s detectable joy.  I have been living with cows. And ‘living’ is the word! How many of us truly live? Let’s face it. How many of us gather up the energy to step out and be; but nothing more? In this cow field, though . . . I’ve been living with cows and, let me report, life is here! There’s no borders, no boundaries, no untoward intent. When the sun sets we sleep and when it rises we wake. We eat what we like. We shift around as we please. Sometime for hours we might stare in contemplative wonder at a blade of grass or the run of wire along the top of a wooden fence. There’s interests shared and easy communication. This is not goats, this is not pigs, this is not chickens. No tussles. No terrors. No disruption of the self’s place in the universe or the generous communal ideals of the group or the situation of private thought in the public outlook or the importance of ambition or the likelihood of acceptance or the purpose of wonder or the pleasure of freedom.

I was just passing; none of this was intentional. But look! The world upsets itself in turmoil. But I . . . I have been living with cows.