The cow died this afternoon. Kate and I stopped by to check on the cow after school. She was breathing heavily and kept on sticking her snout in her water bucket but not drinking. Shortly after we got home, our neighbor called and told me the cow was in the last moments of her life. About 20 minutes after that, Rick called to tell me the cow had died. (Our neighbor had called him.) I held off telling Kate. She had a private tae kwon do lesson late this afternoon and didn't want to tell her about the death until we had driven by the cow's body. When we did drive past the cow, Kate was busy playing with my iPod and did not see the cow dead. I, however, did glance over. She was on the ground like she had been the whole time I have known her, but her head was over her shoulder. Once Kate and I were a few miles down the road, I told her that the cow went to heaven and was no longer in pain. Thankfully Kate and I have had a couple of conversations about the cow dying. She took the news rather well; however, I was another story, but I am thankful that the cow is no longer in pain. I was being foolishly optimistic that particular cow was going to be a miracle. (If a cow goes down, you need to get them on their feet as soon as possible otherwise they get crush syndrome and the muscles in their legs apostrophized. Cows will get on the ground but apparently the the position of their legs determine they can get up or not.) What made me cry was how man failed her. It is depressing to realize what bastards humans can be. I would like to know how that cow ended up on our neighbors land. She did not belong to anyone around here. We are not even sure if she got hit by a car or if she fell off of a transport truck. (Did she get hit elsewhere and that person dumped her in our neighbor's pasture out of fear of legal repercussions? Had she been wandering for days on end without food and water? Just a few of my questions.) Regardless, humans really did her wrong from her owner down to the owner of the land on which she died. Everyone seemed so la-di-da about this suffering cow. Matter of fact, Rick, who is in Springfield, Illinois, is the one that called the sheriff, which is what you are supposed to do with a stray cow. He cared more about that cow 1000 miles away than those who could take action. (The sheriff did come out to check the cow. They went back
into town to get the vet so the cow could be put down. The vet doesn't use a gun, but an injection. However, the cow died
before they got there.) I am glad Kate and I were able to make her last days a little more comfortable despite not knowing anything about cows. An interesting tidbit about the cow is that she had already started to recognize Katie and I when we pulled up in the car. It didn't take her long to figure out who was the hand that fed her.
So the saga of the cow is over and I can put my riding boots back into the closet. I am grateful that Rick didn't have to put her down. If he would have had to shoot her, he would have been in a stupor for a long time, but that is what we were looking at since no one else would do the humane thing because of worry about the liability. (If you kill another's cow you can end up in court and shelling out big bucks to compensate the owner.) Rick said, "Screw it. Her owner--if they ever surface--can come after me." (If you recall from my last post, the land owner wanted nothing to do with the cow because he didn't want trouble from the cow's owner, whoever that may be. But the Lord took that option off of the board. Thank you, Lord.
One last note, it is true that cows have the sweetest eyes. She had those incredibly long eyelashes and big brown eyes. It was very easy to become emotionally invested in her. Here's one of the pictures that I took yesterday.
In this picture you can see her long, thick, black eyelashes. You can also see a hole through her ear. A identification tag once hung from there. The tag she had on the other ear was a generic tag like the ones that get attached to cows that are auctioned.
Ciao.
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