So, my family is on vacation in Arizona, visiting my in-laws, who “Winter” here. (They live on what used to be a farm in Rhode Island the rest of the year. Yep, my wife grew up with two pet pigs…Oscar, and Mayer…seriously.) We’ve been coming here for years, but something happened this morning that is a first, to say the least.
They live on several acres that are adjacent to various foothills and mountains, and, next to a few cattle farmers. Early this morning, we all heard a moo-ing soud that was closer than usual. Sure enough, my father-in-law comes scurrying back to the house to inform us that a cow and a calf somehow found their way onto my in-laws’ property, and were walking around, about 100 yards away from the house! “Get dressed and come help me shoo these cows back off of our land” he says calmly, perhaps forgetting that I’m from inner-city Brooklyn, and that this is NOT something for which I am trained or prepared!
So Miles and I go to our rooms to get out of our PJs and into whatever one wears to shoo cows away (I dunno, I’m guessing jeans, sweatshirts, and oh, maybe a large rifle?)
Here is where the Generation Gap kicks in, which insipred the title to this post. While I’m pulling on my jeans and calling out to my in-laws “Hey, shouldn’t we just call the owner of these cows and ask them to come get ’em?” (To which the answer comes back, “No, the law says that if you have a breach in your gate, it’s your responsibility to remove any animals from your property.” Talk about a deal-breaker!). Anyway, while I’m doing that, what is my 13-year-old son doing? He’s getting dressed, don’t get me wrong. In fact, he’s excited about this whole ordeal. But he’s also doing something that never dawned on me–he takes out his phone and Googles “How to scare off cows from your property.” I shit you not, that’s exactly what he did! And, like Carrie-Anne Moss with flying the helicopter in “the Matrix,”
within 2 minutes, he’s now an expert on how to wave your arms, shout, and run right at these behemoths–things which are so counter-intuitive to me that I can’t put into words how shocked I was when he did it. But I digress.
So, Miles and I run out the back door calling out for my father-in-law, Ed. He shouts back, “Clay, go close the gate so no more cows can get in, Miles you come help me!” First instinct, bring Miles with me, so I can make sure he’s safe. But I trust Ed not to put Miles in harm’s way, so I follow the plan. I run the 200 yards or so–the last 50 of which are almost straight downhill, and close the gate. On the way down the hill, I see, off in the not-nearly-far-enough-for-my-liking distance, the calf, and another cow. As I’m running back up the hill, I hear Miles shout, “Dad, open it back up, and get out of the way, she’s coming your way!” Hmm, I think, is Miles safe? Do I really want to run back away from him with a cow supposedly nearby? But then I SEE the cow, enormous, and trotting right towards me, and I realize that if that gate is still closed/locked, she can’t get out. So I run back down the hill and open the gate. Now the cow is at the top of the hill coming right down towards me. And I hear someone shouting at her from behind/over the horizon…it’s Miles! Now I’m really torn. Do I run back up the hill to “help” my son, who seems to somehow have things under control (and, who hopefully is being assisted by Ed, who I still can’t see yet)? Well, that might scare the cow into running away from the gate, which is clearly not the goal. Or do I get out of the way and leave my son (and hopefully, my father-in-law) to finish the task and get the cow through the gate and off the property.
“Dad, get out of the way!” Miles shouts, while standing no more than 25 yards behind the cow, who is midway down the hill. Miles is still waving his arms and shouting at her. “Uh, you sure you’re okay?!” I shout back. “Yes, Dad, I’m fine, just get out of the way so she doesn’t turn back around!” “Um, okay” I say, sheepishly, hoping I’m making the right decision to trust my son, alone, with a scared cow. I run out fo the gate, turn left, and run another 20 yards or so to clear a path for the cow to exit.
Sure enough, after the longest 30-40 seconds of my parental life, Miles shoos the cow through the gate…and right towards me! I freeze for a second, calculating my odds of hurdling the barbed wire fence I’m standing beside, from a standstill, if she comes running at me. But she seems to hear/smell/see or somehow sense her calf, and suddenly darts away from me, in the direction of the calf and the other cow I’d seen moments ago. So now I go running back through the gate, and Miles and I lock it.
“Miles, how did you know that would work?” I shout, both proud of him and terrified at the same time at what just transpired…and at what could have. “Don’t worry Dad. I knew what I was doing. I Googled it!” he said, beaming.
I Googled it.
My son risked life and limb with a 1,500 pound, scared mother-in-search-of-her-calf, because of a 2-minute Google search…and it worked! Not sure what to do with that little nugget just yet, other than to thank our lucky stars that the first answer that popped up was right…this time, and, to write this post before I collapse! 🙂