He came into the house at 9:30.
“I’m going over to ‘15’ to feed the cows. Wanna ride along?”

After a drive of five northerly miles, we park outside an electric fence and unload five-gallon pails of chop from the back of the truck. He opens the barbwire gate and carries two pails in, starts spreading the chop out on the ground.

I do the same.

Before we finish I say “Here, take a picture. There’s never a picture of me, I’m always behind the camera.”

He snorts goodnaturedly and says “It’s not like you’re out feeding chop all the time.”

“I am today,” I said, and handed him the camera.

It was windy enough that Farmboy’s voice wasn’t carrying in their direction, and there were no cattle in sight, so after several calls and no response, we set out towards the big stone pile to try to spot them. Talk about yer mosquitoes! I should’ve worn long sleeves.

“Ka-boss, ka-boss, ka-boss, ka-boss!”

Before Farmboy could, I could hear the cows calling back.

We turned and headed back toward the corner of the field, me trying to outrun some mosquitoes, Farmboy trying to establish himself at a vantage point ideal for counting cows and calves on the run. They know where there’s chop to be had and they’re wasting no time getting there.

I counted 81, he counted 79. There are supposed to be 83.

The calves were curious and rounded on me like a line of little soldiers.