"It'll Just Take a Minute"

 Here I am; back by popular demand, more or less.  I have missed blogging, and since I can't really get settled into a different blogging platform and didn't want to lose this blog altogether, I have just decided to continue on.  

Here is a story I had meant to write during the first year or two of this blog but somehow never got around to writing.  Just this month I pulled this story out of my memory and worked it over a bit.  So here it is.  Enjoy!

"It'll Just Take A Minute"

One spring day, that first year we were married, I wandered outside to watch Gary move a cow with her new calf into the holding lot behind the milk barn.  He was driving the 4-wheeler with the calf in a little trailer behind; leading the cow across the field.    

When he got to the gate he saw me and hollered; “Hey, come help me.  It will only take a minute.”  

Good one.  Anyone who has lived on a farm knows that random chores seldom take “just a minute.” Odd,time-consuming things tend to happen quite unexpectedly with no warning.  But I had yet to learn that at the time.

It had been a very wet spring so I quite fortunately had my rubber boots on. I obligingly tromped over to see what was going on. Gary needed help because he had to get off the 4-wheeler and walk the calf and cow across the muddy lot to reach the corral; maybe a distance of 100 yards. He pulled and lugged the front end of the calf while I pushed and h’isted the hind end along.  

This was no joke.  The further we went, the deeper the mud got and the more reluctant the calf became.  A calf is a cute little critter, but unbeknownst to most people, a calf is equipped with four sharp little brakes and when she decides to stop and set the brakes, it is well nigh impossible to move her forward.  When the calf threw on her brakes, like we knew she would eventually, I scooped up the rear end of things, Gary hauled away at the front end and we made a bit of fast progress for a few feet.  Then we stopped to breathe for a bit before beginning again.  We lurched along in this fashion until we got into the ankle deep mud, where things became a bit more challenging. We were in one of those bursts of great speed, when my boot got stuck in the mud, my foot came out of the boot and landed ankle-deep in the mud.  

And it was then that Gary’s sixty seconds of “it’ll just be a minute” ran out; along with my good humor.

At this point I will add in a random detail hitherto left out.  Mama cow.  Mama cow was not at all impressed with these goings-on concerning her calf.  Mama cow was hot on my tail, her nose just a few feet from my back the whole time; moaning to her calf.  We just wanted to get her and the calf to where we could check on them and make sure all was going well; but Mama cow had a much different opinion.  She was making sure we didn’t get her calf too far from her and was muttering about it the entire time.   

So there I stood:  balanced on one foot in ankle deep mud, the other foot waving in the air, muddy sock and all.. The calf was ready to just lay down right there in the mud, the agitated cow was restlessly shifting around  just at my shoulder honking her protest, and my beloved husband was standing there bent double laughing.  

In the few moments I wavered there on one foot, I weighed my options; do I just abandon the boot and walk in the mud in my sock? Do I shove my muddy sock back into the boot?  Do I throw a mud ball at Gary?  

Finally I did the only logical thing; yanked off the nasty sock, wadded it up and tossed it over the fence into the grass and jammed my bare foot back into my boot.  When Gary had recovered sufficiently to carry on, apologizing and patting the air to ward off my dark looks, we proceeded through the mud to the corral.  We left mama cow in peace with her baby, I retrieved my sock, along with my dignity and sense of humor, and Gary and I went on with our chores.  

Every day in agriculture is an adventure and I am always willing and ready to help at most any task.  But since then I have never believed the line; “it will only take a minute” because you never know what will happen or what mishap may come along.