Welcome to spring

By TAD BARTIMUS

It's really Spring. In the night a new calf arrived, black as lava, perfect in that way that only babies are, all wobbly and soft. I think it's a girl, but Mama is making sure none of us gets close enough to verify our guess.

Dog, who has shown no inclination to bother anything on four legs, is intensely curious about this new arrival, perhaps because the calf is roughly his size, a circumstance which will change within the week. Dog goes to the fence and pokes his nose under it, sniffing so hard he sneezes. Baby is oblivious but Mama is ready to dispatch Dog to glory with one swift kick if he gets too close. I suspect Dog knows this, for he stays just out of range. All the while he is wildly wagging his tail as he watches Baby nurse.

(Beautiful) enough to make my heart burst as I watch her gamboling through the grass, kicking up her heels for the first time. (Beautiful) enough to make me want to do the same on this first morning that truly feels like Spring.

Which, by the way, seems to be a rather unpleasant surprise to Mama. Every time her calf gets a firm grip on her she decides to go for a walk uphill. Baby wobbles along behind, trying to bound after her, as she (he?) will probably do expertly tomorrow. But for now the infant seems to regret entry into this much harsher environment than the one she enjoyed yesterday. Stumbling, picking herself up, stumbling again, she mews faintly as she rushes to catch up.

Mama, having had a hard night, goes about her business appearing relieved that she is lighter on her hooves today than yesterday. Occasionally she stops to lick her calf, but aside from a keen vigilance about Dog (and me) she eats grass, empties her bladder and snoozes. What's the fuss?

The other cows take no notice of the newcomer; only the rancher counts noses here. Not a worrier, he checked his pregnant heifer last evening, saw she was about to deliver, then went home for a good night's sleep. Today he whistles as he rides through the field, boasting as though he'd had something to do with it.

"Isn't she beautiful?"

And so she (he?) is. Enough to make my heart burst as I watch her gamboling through the grass, kicking up her heels for the first time. Enough to make me want to do the same on this first morning that truly feels like Spring.

No midwife, no vet, no birthing shed for this arrival. Just a silent green hillside, a steady, cooling rain and mother's milk to welcome new life. This beginning evokes my own memories: when I was five years old I had a black Angus bull who began as a baby just like this one, leaning hard against me on unsure legs. I tangled my fingers in his silky hair and we grew together. Except in a year I was still a little girl in scuffed red cowboy boots and Blackie was a thousand-pounder who had to live on the other side of the fence.

Four droughts and a spring of floods changed everything. We were suddenly moving to the city, they said, because we couldn't make ends meet. Nobody explained which ends. The day came when Blackie was loaded into the back of the truck. I bawled as loud as he did. My father wouldn't look at me as he drove away.

That night the truck headlights pulled into the barnyard very late. I had my head buried in my pillow. Then came the unmistakable sound of hooves walking down the tailgate.

"Couldn't do it," was all he said. Later, it was we who drove away and left Blackie. His lifelong residency in the back pasture was a condition of the farm's sale. It was my first lesson in love over money.

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