A Body Under Duress

I recently read an article about an Irish man who was injured as he tried to tend to a newborn calf. “Never trust a cow,” he said. How right he is.

This week, we sold all of the yearling heifers that didn’t make the cut as replacements. We had to get a cattle liner in, so we put a few cows on as well. One of the cows was a cantankerous old thing: 49w was her name. On a previous occasion, we had had to sort a group of five animals with 49w in it. She got everything stirred up, but also learned a neat trick. You see, she would refuse to sort off from the others in the narrow pen we were in. Every time we attempted to stop her, she would just run right through us. The trick she learned was that if she ran right at us fast enough, her own resolve to get with the other cows would be far greater than ours was to stop her. As a result, she would get closer and closer to the person who was trying to stop her, eventually driving that person right up the fence.

So we then had a very wild cow who knew she could get her way.

I rather think she had fun with this new found knowledge.

I guess you could say she had us... cowed.

So, anyway, we were happy to be loading her in the truck to go to town.

Unfortunately, that did mean we had to bring her in, sort her off, and load her in the truck.

Surprisingly, the sorting worked magnificently. We went into her pen thinking we would have to run them all up the chute and sort individually, but the two we wanted out happened to come a runnin’, so we really lucked out. This meant that the only remaining interaction we needed to have with 49w was to run her up into the trailer.

After loading all the the heifers, it was time to get 49w.

I set the gates and asked Dad if they were ready for her.

“Yep!” He said. Then he looked worriedly over his shoulder and shouted, “Just wait a minute!”

He swung some gates then came running over. Partly, he came to help me with the cow, but he also didn’t want to be in front of her when she ran up.

We edged our way along the fence of the pen, watching 49w like a couple of hawks. Or like a couple of scared rabbits that are being watched by a hawk. That’s probably more accurate.

Once again, it went alright. We just kind of waited for her to figure out that she had to run in a certain direction to not be interrupted by fences. Once she bolted through the gate, Dad and I ran after her, so we could shut some gates behind her before she found out it was a trap.

I stopped at a gate farther back (but not much farther back) to shut it while Dad sprinted on to try scaring the cow past the next gate, too. Unfortunately, the cow caught on to Dad’s ploy before she committed herself to going through. She promptly turned, then, and decided to head on back.

Back through the gate where I was.

The gate I was still attempting to close.

Neatly chasing Dad up the fence like a treed raccoon, 49w was wasting no time in charging back towards me.

The gate I was closing swings easily on a hinge, so the only thing to hold it in place is a chain. This chain needs to be looped and fished between two pipes. This isn’t necessarily a difficult task, but having a raving mad cow rushing the gate as you try to complete these fine motor skills is a bit of a game changer.

Since I was pumping with some adrenaline from running the cow up this far, fine motor skills were something that my body wasn’t prepped for. Evolution has made this two-legged Homo Sapiens relatively fit for flight when the adrenaline comes rushing in. My heart gets pumping, my legs are given a generous supply of blood, and tunnel vision allows me to pinpoint a safe location to get to. These things are all good. I appreciate these things. Unfortunately, a recovery time is needed in between these episodes, otherwise evolution begins to work against me.

By the time I got to the gate, adrenaline levels were dropping, my hands were shaking a bit, and I was panting. These things all made it hard to get the chain fastened, but perhaps the hardest of all was my sense of self-preservation. What I wanted to do was climb a fence and get the heck out of Dodge. I wanted this above all things. However, my sense of duty (something which trumps evolution and probably verifies the existence of God) required me to stay in that danger zone and get that gate chained.

I dropped the chain once and looked up quickly. I saw that Dad’s attempt had failed and he was employing self-preservation tactics of his own (scampering up the fence). The cow was heading back, only momentarily distracted by getting Dad good and up the fence.

I had very little time.

A second adrenaline rush kicked in, and even though I appreciate what my body was trying to do for me, I really wish it just wouldn’t, sometimes. With this rush, even more blood was pulled down to my legs.

“DANGER!” cried my pituitary gland (or whichever part of the brain controls adrenaline) “Quickly! Pull the blood down to the legs so we can run!”

“But what about the brain?!” my frontal cortex shouted.

“What about fine motor skills?!” my fingers exclaimed.

“NO!” the pituitary gland commanded. “We don’t need those functions right now! All the blood must go to the legs immediately!”

I poked the chain through again, this time keeping my grip. I looked up as I tried to pull the chain into the slot in the gate to lock it in place. The cow was very close now, and I was painfully aware that if she hit the gate, it would go flying, along with my immaculate teeth. And the rest of my beautiful face. And some of my gorgeous limbs, too. I began to get lightheaded.

“NARROW THE TUNNEL VISION!” screamed my pituitary gland, which became the command centre during natural disasters. “I DON’T WANT US FOCUSED ON OUR SENSE OF DUTY! WE NEED TO BE STARING AT THE COW LIKE A DEER IN THE HEADLIGHTS WHILE THINKING ONLY OF HOW TO CLIMB THE FENCE!”

“Please,” begged my frontal cortex and fingers weakly, severely deprived of blood, “just let us get the chain in!”

“NO!” the pituitary screamed, louder still, “PUMP MORE BLOOD TO THE LEGS!”

And so, as I shakily fumbled with the gate chain, I was becoming increasingly lightheaded.

And the cow was getting closer.

I glanced down at the chain every now and then to see if it had, perhaps, fallen into place of its own merciful accord. It had not.

My breathing had mostly stopped, since I couldn’t afford to multitask that much, my head was still spinning, my vision was beginning to darken around the edges, and my ears were ringing.

And the cow was very close now.

In their last, defiant throes, my fingers shook the chain into place, securing the gate. My sense of duty fulfilled, I lunged back from the gate just as the cow charged to that corner. I had made it. The gate was chained.

I backed off and let Dad finish up the job then, as I couldn’t afford to have more blood pumped to my legs.

******

“Did we make it?” my frontal cortex asks weakly, barely having regained consciousness.

The pituitary gland takes a deep breath of relief. “All clear. We’re safe. Good work people!”

As various faculties regain themselves with the resupplied blood flow, there is a great ruckus of cheering as all departments celebrate successful survival.

The heads of department for the bladder and bowels secretly high-five each other for another successful day at the office. They boastfully flip up another number in the sign that reads “657 days without a workplace accident!”

All is well.