Cows

Today we looked at cows. Grace and Frances and I stood at the side of the road, in the rain, and talked about the cows whose milk we had just purchased from a small farm. Frances was the one who didn’t want to drive away without seeing them. They weren’t where they were last year, but we found them down the road. There were three cows, three calves, and two heifers. “Heifers are like teenagers,” I said.
“What’s a teenager?” Frances asked.
“Someone who is no longer a child but not yet grown up.” We tried to guess who was whose mother and if one of them was pregnant. As we stood there talking about them, the cows moved closer. Big brown eyes and a wide wet nose covered in flies, came real close. Frances wanted to touch her and this one, the biggest of them all, a beautiful brown lady with horns, let Frances’ tiny finger touch her wide nostril. “We’re all girls!” Frances said with glee.