There was a direct correlation in doctoring our animals
and our personal trips to the emergency room. With a few exceptions, Danny and
I did all of the shots and medications. Most things went smoothly, but a few
incidents left lasting impressions. One time, Jessie had mastitis, a mammary
gland infection, and needed a shot of antibiotics. I hated giving shots so I
had the syringe ready for Danny when he arrived home late that night. He told
me that I had to give the shot while he held her with a headlock. Timidly, I
tried to push it in. Jessie stomped her feet and swished her tail thinking she
was being attacked by a horsefly. Danny yelled, “Damn it, jab it in!” I jabbed
it in her hip. She threw her head, shook Danny loose and caught him in the butt
with one of her horns. She ripped his pants from the bottom of his butt cheek
to his waist. If the tip of her horn
hadn’t been rounded smooth, he would have spent another night in the emergency
room getting his buttock sewn up. As it was, her horn broke off in his jeans
giving him a 10-inch scrape and bruise. All was semi well until Jessie and
Danny locked eyes. In a fit of idiocy, he tried to cold-cock her. She shook her
head to settle her brains and walked away. Danny spent the rest of the night in
the emergency room with his broken hand.
Over the years,
there were accidents that didn’t involve animals, just not many. Danny was
losing interest in farming. His eye wandered to the neighbor - a skinny drunk with a passion for pulp
wooding. They began accumulating equipment:
chain saws, pulpwood trucks, and skidders. Danny knew how to use them
most of the time, but he had a passion for altering or adjusting equipment and
disengaging safety features which he didn’t put much stock in. I was in the
kitchen one evening when Danny went to the garage to sharpen his Stihl saw. He
filed each little tooth and then cranked it up to try out on some nearby
saplings. The saw slipped from his oily hands and fell, still running, slipping
into his cowboy boot alongside his blue jean clad calf where the chain
proceeded to eat his leg and jeans. The Sunday evening emergency room nurses
knew us on sight. I think I still get Christmas cards from one of them. It will
probably be here soon.
We never had dogs
that earned their keep as Australian Shepherds do, but from time to time we
raised popular breeds that Danny thought would be cash crops, like Black and
Tan Coonhounds. Just as with the large animals, we did most of the doctoring
ourselves. We earned a reputation with animals, not of being good, just of
being willing to try anything. One time, a friend asked if we could help him
dock the tails of a litter of Doberman puppies. I was squeamish, so Danny said
he would hold the babies and Frank, the friend, would use the straight razor on
their little tails. Unfortunately, Danny could not keep his grasp on them
either. One puppy squirmed in his big hand and Frank docked Danny’s pinkie. We
spent another night in the emergency room.
Nowadays my
farming is limited; no big farm animals and no accidents—except for the yellow
jacket and hornets.
Unless you count the time my son held a match to the
spout of the gas can. Whoosh. Another trip to the emergency room. Or the time
he swung on a vine across the dry creek; fractured his arm in two places. Or
the time he ….
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