Cow Chips: Of Cows and Men

One of the first lessons that I learned from the cows really did not have anything to do with the cows. This lesson came to me shortly after we first put cows in the St. George field in early October. I can remember driving down to the field the first couple of days and checking to make sure that my fences had held. I spent a lot of time watching the cows and feeling a great deal of satisfaction with my work. It felt good to see them grazing in the alfalfa, or stomping around in the growth in the river bottom. The calves were getting plenty of milk from their mothers and the cows looked fat and healthy. The fences were holding; the cows were content and doing well. The image of the cows in the green alfalfa field is burned into my memory. This is not the first time I have seen this scene, however, this time it made an impression on me.

As I reflect upon why seeing the cows in the hay field this time made such an impression upon me I realized that I enjoy the work. There is satisfaction in working hard. There is something that a person gets from hard physical labor that can be obtained in no other way. Seeing the cows in the St. George field this fall had an impact upon me because of the time and effort that I put into making it possible. I have been taught all my life that there is joy that comes from working hard. Seeing the cows this year helped me recognize the joy and contentment that comes from a job well done. Reflecting back, there are many aspects of farm work that causes this reaction in me. I have always felt satisfaction in seeing freshly cut hay in neat windrows, bales in lines in the field, a new stack of hay or a freshly planted field. This time seeing the cows in the field helped me to recognize that there is joy in these things.

Satisfaction in hard work is not the only thing that I learned about myself over the summer. I realize that I truly love the land. Deep down I have always known that I have a love for the land and what it can produce. I have always been sickened by subdivisions, commercial developments and golf courses being built on farm land. My own home is sitting upon a onetime onion patch and hay field. Progress will continue to claim more and more land; the thought saddens me. Seeing a lava rock pile pushed over for homes dose not bother me so much, but I really hate to see good farm land used for building lots.

I miss the days of going to the St. George field and not being able to see the development around. This part of our farm was undeveloped when I was young. There was no golf course or houses. When we were on the property we were at the farm, and that was the amount of it. We could go and work at the farm and no one knew what we were planning to do with the property, and no one asked. As I was building fences I had people from both sides of the Santa Clara River come and ask what I was doing, wanting to know what my plans were. I had people at Sunbrook tell me that I couldn’t build the fences across the river; they were going to go to the “city” and put a stop to it. I had one neighbor to the west tell me that we could not put cows on the property arguing that there were no cows there when he bought his property. There were others who were upset because my fences blocked the four wheeler trails; and still others who were upset because the fences blocked their access to the river bottom. I had to move one fence to accommodate a turnaround at the end of a street. I learned to bite my tongue, to be patient, to explain what I was doing, to be a liaison between the neighbors and my dad and to negotiate with people. Working through all of the difficulties was a pain, but in the end I was able to work it all out.

In the end I have had great satisfaction in seeing the cows on the property. For the first time in my life I really liked seeing the cows, I found myself looking forward to seeing them and some of the interesting things that they do. I started looking for the lessons that I could learn from them. Some of my observations were funny, all were thought provoking for me. This became even truer after Barb asked me to write this book.