Thereās a blind calf in our herd. He sits alone under our oak trees and his mother occasionally comes to make sure heās alright. We found him drowning in a pond, eyes barely open and clouded over. His mama stood on the bank wailing for her just barely born calf. He was so small then, fragile and frail, itās nothing Iād ever imagine these cattle to be. But he was. Nothing like any baby Iād ever seen, maybe thatās why the idea was so novel.
We kept him in a pen for a week, had a vet come out to look at him too. Not one of those real vets though, he got his license in the eighties and Iām not sure heās renewed it since. He told us there was nothing to do, the calf would either die out in the pasture or it would live its life the best it could. Suggested sell barns that would euthanize it, some that would even pay us, should living get too hard. After that week we put him back in the pasture, if he were to die he would die with his mama beside him, die in the grasses he was born in. Maybe it was mercy, maybe it was cruel.
He didnāt die, though. He found his mama, or his mama found him. In the feed lot by the abandoned school bus. she found him. She led him to the rest of the herd. Now he sits under the oak trees by himself, I donāt think he knows heās different in the same way I think he does. He doesnāt go near water anymore, nor does he play with the other calves. I counted just the other day, three new babies since he was born. All with perfectly functional eyes. They donāt treat him any differently, but they donāt treat him like he belongs in the herd either.
If I was any smarter Iād comment on how obviously this bull calf has no higher thoughts. Heās an animal at his core, his brain occupied by the need to eat, sleep, and reproduce. He doesnāt know any of the things I talk of, none of them do. Heās just an animal, ability to see or not. When heās old enough weāll sell him to the same sell barn that would have paid us to kill him. No matter what he will end as a meal on someoneās plate, processed in a cold factory. They wonāt care if he can see or not, heās meat to them.
And yet he sits under the oak trees. His mama has learned to announce her arrival. Never have I seen a cow stick so close to their calf, by now she would be pushing him away as he attempts to feed. Any normal cow would begin separating herself from her calf. But she doesnāt. Maybe she does know heās different, maybe she realizes it and she wants to protect her child from this world that doesnāt treat you right if youāre different. I couldnāt tell you what goes through her head. But maybe she saw that infant calf with film over his eyes and maybe she thought that the world is cruel, maybe she thought that despite the world being cruel she would continue to raise this calf that was so very different.
Thereās a blind calf that sits under the oak trees in my pasture, my grandfathers pasture before me. He doesnāt move from the shade of the trees, heās scared of thunderstorms. One day we will sell him and someone else will eat him, he sits under the oak trees. His mother refuses to leave him. His mama sits by his side under the oak trees, maybe she too knows the fact that he isnāt permanent. She sits by his side, sometimes the way she stares at me I think she knows whatāll happen to him. This isnāt her first calf after all.
Itāll be months until we sell him, for now he is a calf that sits under oak trees, that chews lazily on the grasses we thought he would die on. He knows nothing of his fate, and it is for the best. To sit and to know nothing, to see nothing. Itās for the best.
