Jessie Gussman's Blog

Saturday we put embryos in. I love working cattle, but by the time we’re done, I’m tired and sore.

And, making things a little harder, I had to stop and get Finn up and feed him. The girls had been taking the overnight, but I tried to help out starting with the early morning feeding, since I’m up anyway, and doing what I can through the day. It’s made things hard since I’m also trying to write two books each month, and, actually, I have two extra books to write this month.

Anyway, at ten I fed Finn, then I let Hope and him out, since the cows were done, Watson had left to go to PA and Hope could eat in the yard and Finn would have a little room to move. He didn’t do much playing or running like a normal foal, but he’d been getting stronger and stronger.

I walked to our porch, then, before I went in to start my writing for the day, I turned around and watched Hope and Finn.

For the last three weeks, Finn had basically walked with his head down, just no energy, but Saturday, as I stood on the porch, I saw him sniff a flower, then act all startled the way foals do, turn and almost fall, then he trotted to his mom.

I was so thrilled to see those few steps at a trot – it was the first time he’d moved faster than a walk and I was thinking in my head that he’d be getting himself up any day since he would strengthen those muscles by using them. I was pretty excited and couldn’t keep from smiling.

I went inside and cleaned up a little and started writing.

An hour later Pie came in and cooked lunch, and she called me down and she and I sat on the front porch and ate. Julia had been up most of the night with Finn and she had just gotten up an hour or so earlier, so she wasn’t hungry.

Anyway, Pie and I were watching as our dog, Diesel, ate one of the Brussels sprouts Pie had thrown off the porch, when my phone rang.

It was Julia.

I answered.

Julia said, “Mom, I need you to come over here right away.”

I said, “Okay,” and stood up, shoving my phone back in my pocket and putting my plate on the banister. I didn’t bother to ask what the issue was. I could tell from the tone of her voice that there was a problem, and I’d rather see it than hear about it anyway.

I power walk to the barn and Pie comes with me.

Julia is in the barn, Finn is on the floor and Hope is standing beside them.

“What’s up?” I ask this as I come over and stand beside her and Finn. We’ve been flushing Finn’s wound and sometimes Julia needs me to hold him for her. I thought she might be struggling with that.

“Finn can’t stand on his front leg and he keeps falling.”

Okay. I’m not sure exactly what might be causing that – had he broken something? – so I help Finn up. He doesn’t even stand for a second before he falls to the ground. I help him up again. This time, he balances a bit and I’m hopeful he’s going to stay up, but as soon as he tries to take a step, his leg gives out and he falls.

I don’t think it’s broken. It’s holding his weight. But there’s something.

It’s one thing for him to not be able to get himself up. It’s a completely different story for him to not be able to stay up once he’s standing. Add on to that the fact that he still wasn’t eating as well as he should and also the wound that he had that we were flushing and draining and trying to keep clean and free of flies, and I stood there for a moment, then I stepped back and looked at my girls.

“I think it might be time to have that hard conversation.”

We’re all exhausted. They’ve been up almost around the clock, all night some nights, and then we’re still doing all the regular farm work, and we’d been working hard at getting our rental up and our other one has been booked solid, plus Julia is still doing covers and I’m writing two books a month, which isn’t easy even if that was the only thing I was doing.

We are so, so tired.

“I don’t mind getting him up, but if he can’t stay up long enough to eat…I can’t hold him up and feed him from the bucket at the same time.” Julia is standing beside me, looking at Finn who is sprawled on the ground.

“He’s too big and too heavy for us to do that by ourselves. We’d need two people to get up with him at night.” Pie was right.

“I think we need to talk to the vet.” My heart hurts.

It’s Saturday, but our vet answers her cell phone. We explain how Finn had been doing so much better and had even trotted a little! But she said if he can’t stand, it’s time to put him down.

Dr. Shane, who did the ultrasound, is on call, so she relays our info to him and he says he’ll be out in an hour or so.

The girls and I sit in the barn and we talk again about whether we’re making the right choice.

We get up, because it’s better to be working, right? So Julia cleans the barn, Pie takes care of the garbage and I go clean the refrigerator (which says more than anything about how upset I am).

Dr. Shane comes.

He palpates his leg while Finn’s lying on the ground and can’t feel anything wrong.

I get Finn up for him. He sees how Finn’s leg is fine then just gives out. He says it’s probably a nerve issue. One that he can’t do anything for and he can’t tell us when it will get better or IF it will get better.

Finn collapses under Hope. Still, I ask the doc if we’re making the right decision.

He says some pretty nice things about the care that we’ve given Finn. The girls did most of it and he calls their efforts valiant (the writer in me smiles at his use of that word – I love it!) and heroic (I love that word, too). He says that if it were him, or most people, he would have quit long before this. That in his opinion, the ethical thing to do is what we were going to do.

I guess I needed that validation, because, while I’m not a very good fighter, I’m an even worse quitter. And no matter how tired we were, and how impossible our odds and how we were making the only decision that made sense, it still felt like quitting. Like we were letting Finn down. Like I didn’t want to let go.

Doc goes out to his truck to get the stuff he needs and Pie and I pull Finn out from underneath Hope so we don’t have a 2000 pound draft stepping on us as we work.

Dr. Shane comes back, gives Finn a shot to relax him and asks for someone to help hold Finn while he gives the shot in the neck. I step forward. He shows me how I need to hold him so his neck is stretched out and he can’t jerk away from the needle.

The girls leave, but I call Pie back to hold Hope in case she decides to move. Pie turns her back on us, holding Hope’s halter.

The stuff is powerful and acts fast.

I follow the doc out to the truck to pay him, and he leaves us with some gel to give to Hope to “make her drunk” (Dr. Shane’s words) so she doesn’t go crazy and hurt herself when we take Finn from her.

As soon as doc leaves, Pie gives it to Hope while I hold her. It is absorbed through the membranes in the mouth and that reminds me of the morphine I gave my mom during her last days – same deal. I used a dropper to put it slowly in her cheek to be absorbed through the membranes in her mouth, since she was no longer waking up or swallowing.

Anyway, it takes forty-five minutes to work, so I leave the stall and Julia is standing on the other side of the barn. She holds her arms out and I walk to her and hold her while she cries.

I’m so terrible at this.

I’m not crying and I’m not going to cry. I hate crying. I’d rather laugh and that’s how I cope. So I apologize for not being a better mom and then I make stupid jokes that make Julia criggle (which is cry and giggle at the same time for those of you new to my newsletter. Julia does this all the time.)

She knows, but I explain that I cope by laughing. Then I joke that Pie needs a picture of the dead body so she can make one of her sad TikTok videos that will make everyone who watches it cry. Before Julia can say anything, Pie says, “Oh, I already did that last week when we thought we were putting him down.”

Oh, goodness.

Pie also jokes that at least it’s not her birthday. (We lost five horses on her birthday last year from botulism and I never told that story, because who wants to hear a story like that?)

Bill, our neighbor who teased the girls about being sissies because they didn’t want to work the Akaushis, came and dug a hole with his bulldozer for us.

I sat on the porch for a while with my dog and stared down the hill and across the creek at the horses grazing on the other side, and at the herd of cattle on the hill and watch the ponies eat and play along the driveway.

I wasn’t really thinking about anything, just being still and knowing that God is God and God is good and that it’s okay to be sad and it’s okay to hurt and it’s okay to cry. Jesus cried at Lazuras’s grave, even though He knew He was going to bring him back to life.

Finn isn’t coming back.

I thought back to some of the losses we’ve had over the years – there have been a lot of them. I don’t think it gets easier, exactly, and the sadness and grief sometimes feel heavier than a person can handle, but it is SO much easier for me to turn to God immediately and know that His plan is perfect. I don’t wonder why, unless I’m trying to figure out what lesson I’m supposed to be learning, and I don’t question Him. He’s God and I’m not. That has definitely gotten easier over the years.

So, I sit there for a little bit. The hardest losses are the ones where you know you cut a corner that you shouldn’t have, or when you feel like you could have done more, but didn’t. With Finn, I looked back and didn’t see a single thing I could have put more heart and effort into. That isn’t always the case, and it doesn’t help the sadness, but it does a lot to soothe any guilt or regret. Maybe that’s one of those lessons I’ve learned over the years. That I would rather put my whole self into something than look back with regrets.

And, of course, there are no hard times in your life that aren’t there to make you a better, stronger, more compassionate and wiser person. 

This time isn’t any different. We learned a lot, and the girls gained confidence as they shouldered the responsibility for Finn. And, honestly, if you’d have told me a year ago that Julia would take a syringe and put it in a hole in an animal’s coat and flush the pus and infection out, I never would have believed it. But you do what you have to and it makes you a better person.

God has plans for us, and taking care of Finn – and losing him – the things we learned, the things we did and the wisdom and knowledge we gained, was part of those plans.

So, Saturday night we all got a full night of sleep for the first time in weeks, but it was bittersweet without our brave boy.

Thanks so much for spending time with me today.

~Jessie 

I was at my mom’s this week and one of the things we did together was listen to the Bible on my Bible app. (I’m sure it doesn’t surprise anyone to know that I have several Bible apps on my phone and one that even reads it to me as well as several Audible audio Bibles.)

The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts. Psalm 10:4

As the narrator read this verse, I thought that if the wicked *don’t* have God in all their thoughts, then it stands to reason, that the righteous *do* have God in all their thoughts, right?

I wondered, does God really expect us to sit around and think “religious” thoughts all the time? How are we supposed to get anything done if all we’re doing is thinking about God?

I admit, I wasn’t listening anymore as I pondered if that’s really what the Lord wants.

I think when ladies get upset that their husband doesn’t remember their birthday or anniversary or some other special thing, it’s because it makes them feel unloved because they feel like he wasn’t thinking about them. Usually we don’t articulate it like this, but we feel like if he loved us, he would think about us. (I think in general, men compartmentalize their thinking and women don’t, so some of the disconnect is there, but that’s a distracting rabbit trail right now.)

Now, I write romance ; ) and one of the ways that I often show that my couple is falling in love is that they think about each other all the time. They can’t get the other person out of their head and can’t keep from wondering where they are and what is going on with them.

Maybe that’s a little of what the verse means.

Still, as I was thinking about the verse below, I noticed the preposition “in.” God is not “in” all his thoughts. It’s not a matter of thinking about God all the time, it’s that He’s “in” the thoughts we think.

Ladies, I think you all will know what I’m talking about, but our home pretty much revolves around Watson. I don’t cook with mushrooms, even though I love them, because Watson hates them. I don’t typically even buy mushrooms. If he’s going to be late – I make a late supper. If he’s in the field, I cook something that we can take out to the tractor easily. I set my book and writing plans around when he’s planning to be in PA or Virginia. If he has a big project going on, I clear my schedule. Thoughts of Watson affect what I do, when I do it, what I buy – they affect pretty much everything. It’s not that I’m thinking about him, necessarily, it’s just that he’s in my thoughts and that affects what I do.

I believe that’s what this verse is saying – we don’t have to sit and do nothing but think God thoughts.

God is in our thoughts when we smile and treat the clerk who is being short with us kindly.

When we don’t flip off the driver who cuts us off. When we give a soft response to unkind words.

When someone cheats us or puts us down and we don’t think about getting them back – God is really in our thoughts if we pray a blessing on that person instead. (That is something that is SO hard to do, right?)

When we get up on Sunday morning and go to church – not because we “have” to or because people expect us to, but because we love God and want to fellowship with other believers (even if/though they’re not perfect).

When we see others’ imperfections and cover them with love.

When we do these things for Him and not for our own benefit or glory.

God is in our thoughts when what we do reflects who He is – the Bible says, As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.

When God is in our thoughts, we become more like Him. It’s one of God’s laws. It has to happen – think about God, reflect on who and what He is and you will become more like Him.

If we’re Christians, that’s our goal – to become more like God. It starts in our thoughts and it manifests in what we do.

Friend, I challenge you, make what you do a reflection of Who you think about – put God in all your thoughts.

I had a busy weekend, and I actually have a couple stories from it. I’ll tell the one about my day on Saturday next week, maybe, but for today, I wanted to talk about Finn.

I mentioned before that last December I did something crazy and bought a few draft horses. I’ve always loved them, but have never been around them much. One of them was pregnant and expected to foal in March. We named her Hope. 

Now, the dude we got them from told us Hope was in her mid-teens. The vet has since told us she’s probably more likely in her mid-twenties, which is old age for a draft horse. 

Anyway, she had Finn at the end of April, and she hasn’t had enough milk for him. I’ve never been around foals and so I thought his wobbly legs were normal (and to a certain extent, they are), but when he was a week old, he laid down and couldn’t get back up. He has not gotten up on his own since then.

That was a Saturday morning. We scheduled the vet to come Monday morning, and in the meantime, we got foal milk replacer powder and pellets and went out every two hours to get him up and to try to get him to eat.

When the vet came on Monday, she gave Hope some things to try to stimulate milk production and told us to feed Finn as often as we could, just trying to get him all the calories and nutrition we could to get him moving, strengthen his legs and hopefully he’d develop the strength to get up. 

We were supposed to watch him pretty hard because there are a bunch of things that can happen that will basically cause him to need to be put down.This past Friday he developed a swelling in the upper joint of his back right leg.

Our regular vet was away, so I ended up talking to her colleague, Dr. Shane, who was covering her calls. Julia and Joy hovered at my elbow while I stood at the opening of the barn and talked to the vet. I knew swollen joints in a newborn is a serious issue (which is why we called immediately), and Dr. Shane said, “I’ll come out, but most likely you all are going to need to make a hard decision tonight.” 

I knew what that meant, but listened as he said that if it was what he thought it was (and what it most likely was) treatment would require us to load Hope and Finn up and drive them to Virginia Tech (almost two hours away) and it would cost thousands of dollars, if not more, and there was no guarantee that he would not be lame for the rest of his life.

The other choice, of course, and the one that made the most sense, was to put him down.

So, I gave the vet our address and instructions on how to find us and he said he’d be there in an hour and hung up.

My girls are looking at me, waiting for me to tell them what he said.

So, how do I do that?

So, yeah, we stood in front of the barn while I told them the foal we’d been getting up to feed every two hours for the last week was most likely going to need to be put down. I explained about the expense of treatment and said that was an option, but we all knew people who had spent thousands of dollars on treatments that didn’t work and who ended up putting their horses down anyway. Aside from the work in the extreme heat, cold, rain and snow, the flies and pests, the predators and disease, the long hours and low pay, that’s the hard part of farming – knowing that it has to make financial sense or you can’t keep doing it.

We stood there, discussing it, trying to figure out what to do. We’ve all fallen in love with Finn, who is such a sweetie, so sweet and gentle, with a draft horse’s calm disposition and a slightly protruding lower lip he inherited from his mom that is just the cutest thing, but we finally decided that we weren’t going to put them through the ride (and Watson already told us he wasn’t going to drive the truck and trailer that far anyway, so it would have been a much rougher ride with me at the wheel) and that when the vet came and diagnosed him for sure, we’d say we were going to put him down.

I’m just gonna be real with you here and say that we talked about digging a hole. Finn weighs about a hundred and fifty pounds. When the vet puts an animal down, he uses strong drugs that will kill anything that tries to eat the body. So it has to be buried, and right away. 

It was already late and we were all tired (Friday was a long, hard day and Saturday was even worse.) No one wanted to think about that much more work. I guess the way I deal with things is I always try to go to the positive, so I was thinking to myself, yay, I won’t have to get up at night anymore and I could really use the rest. (I was sweeping hay in a dark corner of the barn so no one would notice that I kept having to wipe my eyes.) I was trying to let go of all the plans and ideas and love I’d had for Finn and just let God’s will happen and know that my way wasn’t meant to be.

The vet came, looked at Finn, took his temp, etc, and said…maybe it wasn’t what he thought it was, since Finn had no fever, was eating, moving around and didn’t act sick at all. He got his clippers out, and shaved the hair off the swollen part of his leg (it was my job to hold Finn still, which was hard, Pie’s job to keep Hope from biting us, which was even harder, since Hope did not like the sound of the clippers, and Julia acted as the ultrasound tech, holding the laptop-like machine as the vet proceeded to ultrasound the shaved area.)

Now, I’ve had five children and I’ve seen my share of ultrasounds. I can’t always tell exactly what’s going on, but it really looked to me like there were two pockets of fluid – one in the joint separated from another by a membrane. I could feel myself starting to hope that maybe the worst-case scenario was not the one we were going to have to face that night.

Indeed, that was the vet’s diagnosis. That Finn had most likely bumped it somehow, developed a blood clot and the swelling was the natural swelling that occurs when we bump something. It just happened to be on a joint.

So, yeah, Finn is still not getting up on his own, and in the pic below you can see the (shaved) swelling on his leg, but he seems to get a little better every day and I’m hoping that he’s going to start getting up and taking off any day now. : )

A couple days ago someone in the Chat mentioned it was worldwide nude gardening day, which is…not something I celebrate, and I was not gardening in the nude, but I did end up losing my clothes on Saturday. I’ll tell you about that next week.

Thanks so much for spending time with me today!

~Jessie

I think it was last Saturday that I needed to write 30K words to finish a book on time. That’s a lot of words for me. I had just finished and was pretty tired. I figured I’d call it a day, when Julia screamed up the stairs that we needed to go outside right away.

More screaming and running and doors slamming and I decided that maybe I wasn’t as tired as I thought I was. : )

Julia had just checked Hope around four and it was about seven, i think. So, sometime in those three hours, Finn was born.

Now, horses are a little different than cows. Also, ponies are a little hardier than horses. I’ve been around ponies and cows, but never a newborn foal.

It was kind of surprising to me when Finn tried to stand and the afterbirth was still attached. He couldn’t get up without stepping on it and having it pull at his stomach. I don’t want to gross anyone out, but cows eat the afterbirth and chew the umbilical cord off.

Apparently horses don’t.

I stood at the fence – I like to let nature happen the way God intended as much as I can, but Julia and Joy were down with Hope. I did a quick internet search on what to do when a foal’s umbilical cord doesn’t…detach, for lack of a better word.

Now, it’s supposed to twist and pull, which signals to the blood vessels that it’s time to close up, so when it detaches the foal doesn’t bleed out. (That seemed kind of important to me.) And it said to never, ever, cut it.

I read that to the girls and Julia said, “Mom, I think you need to come down here and do that.”

Ha.

So, yeah, I climb over the fence and walk toward Hope.

The first time I tried to pet Hope back when we got her, Pie was standing beside me and for some reason, Hope didn’t like Pie. I’m assuming this because I was standing there, looking at Hope and Hope reached across in front of me and tried to bite my daughter. Thankfully Pie has quick reflexes and she ducked out of the way. Me, I stood there watching, since my reflexes are about five minutes behind real time.

Anyway, I was a little like Red Riding Hood with the wolf – what big teeth you have, Hope.

So, yeah, as I’m walking down to Hope and her baby, I’m thinking about big teeth and protective mamas and horticulture, which seems like a very safe profession, since plants don’t have teeth.

But, I get to the foal and Pie offers to hold Hope while I try to tear the umbilical cord. Pie weighs about a hundred pounds right after breakfast and Hope is pushing a ton. I wonder who’s gonna win that tug of war?

But it made her feel better (and me too, actually, since it would give me another second to hit the fence, right?), so I knelt down beside Finn and started trying to rip his umbilical cord in two.

Now, for those of you who have had babies, or been in the room when the cord is being cut, it’s a tough bugger. I don’t really recall how it sounded after I had my children, but Finn’s cord, crunched like gristle on a chicken bone as I tried to rip it apart.

I guess I’m not a very good ripper, because I worked on it for around ten minutes and could not get it ripped. Finally, I said, “I know we’re not supposed to cut it, but surely all my attempts to rip it have resulted in the proper signals to the blood vessels. Does anyone have a knife?”

Someone gave me a very dull knife, but as I held it, the idea that I might cut this cord and that little baby might bleed to death felt too real.

So, we got some twine, tied the cord as tight as I could and then I cut it. (Which, as dull as that knife was, it was a lot like ripping.)

There was more blood than I was comfortable with and I just knew I’d killed him.

But it stopped, thankfully.

I think Finn was a little tired out from trying to stand with the placenta attached to him, but he did manage to get on his feet.

I have a video on my YouTube channel of his first steps.

I’m still supplementing him every two to three hours, day and night, although Pie is doing it today since two of my boys have birthdays this week and I’m heading to PA to see them for a bit. We had the vet here yesterday and she was optomistic that he was going to make it. We just need to keep him eating. : )

Thanks so much for spending time with me today!

Hugs and blessings,

Jessie

This is Pie feeding Finn last evening, with Hope supervising the situation. : )

A devotion from Jessie:

April was a busy month for me. I had some personal issues that made it rather difficult and I also had a couple of books I needed to write.

I actually write pretty well when I’m busy. When I’m physically active, it seems to help me think better. But when I’m stressed or upset, it’s hard for me to put my personal problems out of my mind and fill it with a story.

I know some people are the opposite – they write to relieve stress. Good for them. : )

Anyway, I think you all know we have a pretty creek on our farm. My favorite spot used to be one where the water ran over the rocks and flowed into a pool. It was really pretty, especially in the summer with the green moss growing on the rocks, and it made the babbling brook sound you could hear clear up to our front porch.

Something happened to that spot, which isn’t part of my story, so I was at my second favorite spot on the creek, the little waterfall we have.

Here’s a pic I shared on Facebook:

Pretty, isn’t it?

I had a bunch of nice comments on it on Facebook. Some people said they’d love to sit there and read, and I had to agree with that. Doesn’t it give you such a nice, happy feeling?

Here’s an image, taken on the same day, with me sitting at the exact same spot as the first picture, with just a little different perspective. I did not share this one on Facebook:

Do you see them both?

So, yeah, it started to feel a little crowded and I left.

You could really get a bunch of different devotions out of this, but the one I wanted to talk about today is this: we have a choice about what we’re going to focus on.

So, I already said this, but I’m going to say it again – I took both pictures from the exact same spot. There’s a little rock shelf there, just high enough for me to sit on comfortably (as comfortable as someone can be on a rock, I guess). To my right were the snakes, straight in front of me was the view of the waterfall, barn, fence and sky. I didn’t move at all to take both pics.

When I put the first pic up on Facebook, I wasn’t trying to fool anyone or pull anything over on anyone, I just thought it was a pretty pic and I wanted to focus on the positive. And the comments were great. I think people enjoyed seeing it and it made them smile. It was a place most people would love to visit.

I think, had I put the snake picture up, people would have had the exact opposite reaction. It would NOT make them smile, and it would NOT be a place they would want to visit, right?

The spot is the same, the view is the same, but how we feel about it just depends on what we look at or focus on.

Isn’t that true in our lives?

Often we can’t change our situation, but we can change how we look at that situation.

We can’t change other people, but we can change how we look at them. That small change can totally shift our mindset and determine how we feel about the situation we’re in and even about our lives in general.

When I look at someone who is irritating me, or who has been unkind, I’m not always successful, but I try hard to look at them like Jesus does – someone worth dying for. Someone worth loving. Someone God loves. (God so loved the world…) Someone God commanded ME to love. They might not be doing what God wants them to, but if I’m not loving them, then I’m not doing what God wants me to, either, right? And it doesn’t matter who they are, a spouse, an ex, a friend who lied or hurt us, a stranger on the street. But trying to see them as God see them (and not focusing on the things they do that are wrong or irritating) should change how we feel about them.

In Hebrews, the Bible says: Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.

It’s clear where we’re supposed to look, right? And looking at Jesus will completely change our perspective.

The Bible says in Phillipians: Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

Now, the application is the hard part, right?

I mean, we can go all woo woo happy thoughts and it’s pretty easy. I mean, I didn’t struggle over which picture to post on Facebook.

But, when we’re irritated, when someone is bothering us, when our situation seems hopeless, when our checkbook bounces, when we’re sick, or someone we love is struggling, it’s hard to focus our eyes on Jesus and think about things that are pure, just, and lovely.

We want to complain, right? (Or is it just me?) We want to focus on the snakes.

But God has those people around us for a reason, he has us in those circumstances on purpose, He’s given us this trial for our good and His glory (we forget about His glory, but that’s the most important thing) it’s His plan and he wants us to focus on the pretty farm view – to look at Him and see the good wherever it is, so that the rest of the world can see God’s glory through us.

I admit, I struggle with this. I want to focus on ME, on how I’ve been wronged, lied to, how I’m suffering, how it’s not fair, or I want to worry (mostly about things that will never happen) and fret and complain.

It helps me to look at Jesus. The world, my problems, the things I get upset about, are just not important when I think about the people who are going to hell without someone to tell them about Jesus. I have problems, but I don’t have THAT problem, and any problems I have are minor compared to that, right?

I think about Heaven and what I want to be able to say about my life when I get there. I don’t want to be a quitter, a complainer, a fair-weather Christian. I want to be known as someone who loved Jesus more than anything. Who was faithful. Who loved with her whole heart – loved EVERYONE with her whole heart, even the hard-to-love people I’m around all the time.

When I think about standing in front of Jesus, it makes quitting, complaining, worrying, less appealing. I know He loves me no matter what I do, but I want to hear those words, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant.” I want Him to know I trusted him and had faith over fear and worry, that I was kind to people who weren’t kind to me, that I was generous in my giving and did not selfishly keep things for myself.

I want my focus to be on Jesus, on the things in life that are important and not be sidetracked by things that irritate or annoy me, but thinking on the things that are good and right and pure.

We have a choice. Honestly, the snakes are pretty compelling and I want to keep my eyes there. But God wants us to focus on Him, to let the problems of this world fade away as we behold His glory and majesty, to think about the things that are good and pure and lovely. Not only will that change our mindset at the time, but it will teach us a new pattern of thinking going forward, focusing less on ourselves, and more on God and others, which is the way it’s supposed to be.

Thanks so much for spending time with me on this beautiful Lord’s Day!

~Jessie

So, another suggestion that I got from all of you was that you’d like to hear where my inspiration comes from for the books I write.

Sometimes I scratch my head about this, because I know I get it from somewhere, but I don’t always remember where. : )

But, yesterday I was driving to PA and I happened to be listening to the Clark family sing Middle of My Storm. It has a line that goes, “When the waves come crashing down, Lord, keep my eyes on you.”

As that song was playing, I happened to be driving by a big church. There were fire trucks all along the road, they had one lane of traffic shut down with police everywhere and other emergency vehicles. I saw a sign that said, “Funeral traffic this way” and two ladder trucks had their booms extended with a huge American flag draped between them.

Traffic had slowed to a crawl. After I passed the church, there was a line of about six police cars and several officers were carrying their hats and walking back toward the church. I saw one dude, his face series, his jaw jutted out (the way I do when I’m trying not to cry) and he looked like he wanted to be about anywhere else. It was not going to be a fun morning for them.

Obviously someone in blue had passed away.

It could have been a woman, but I assumed it was a man, and I got to thinking about his wife, left alone. Maybe she had small children, they were just starting out, now she’s facing a life alone, raising her kids by herself.

I spent a little bit of time thinking about how hard that would be for her, why she’d move to North Dakota and how that was definitely the kind of storm where a person would need to keep their eyes on Jesus in order to make it through.

So, anyway, I thought I’d name her Annie (because I passed Annie’s Lane near my house in PA, and happen to know the man who named his driveway after his beloved wife) and she’s going to be my next heroine in the next Sweet Water book I write.

Alright, don’t forget to check out all the stuff below.

Thanks so much for spending time with me this week!

Hugs and love!

~Jessie

We all have things we’re waiting for, right?

Healing. A better job. Children. A spouse. Wayward children to come back. A broken relationship healed.

I usually assume God has me wait because I need to develop patience.

But lately I was thinking that maybe God might be having me wait because I need time to become the person I need to be in order to appreciate or handle what He’s going to give me.

This week I spent a good bit of time on the phone with one of my boys. He called me (and gave me a hard time because I didn’t answer his texts fast enough, lol) and wanted a little advice. Right there, I just want to stop and shake my head in amazement. I can’t believe my kids call me and ask for advice.

Anyway, several years ago he asked me about a girl and I told him he was too young. He wasn’t ready and neither was she. (I know my beliefs are weird, but I am completely against dating. To me, it’s practice for divorce.) I told him they both needed to grow up; they both needed to grow closer to the Lord.

To him, the few years I suggested seemed like an eternity.

At the time I told him he didn’t have to “waste” those years. He could spend them working on himself, becoming a better Christian, a better human, to grow and develop himself so that she wouldn’t just be getting a good husband, she’d be getting a great one (we all have room for improvement, right?).

I said to ask people what his faults were. Ask God to show him areas where he could grow and get better. Then do the hard work of self-control and self-denial and become better. It’s tough.

Anyway, he didn’t want to, but he listened to me and didn’t pursue a relationship with that girl.

This week when we talked he said, “I’m reading my Bible, I have a closer walk with the Lord than ever before, I’m reading books, I’ve limited the amount of TV I watch to a football game on Sunday afternoon, I’ve lost ten pounds and here’s what else I’ve been doing.”

We talked for a really long time. Honestly, it was a little surreal because I heard echoes of my words through the years of his childhood in the things that he said to me and in the advice that he’d mentioned he’d given to someone.

My advice to him this time when he asked me (about the same girl) was much different than it had been all those years ago. For me, asking my son to wait wasn’t as much about him needing to develop patience as it was about knowing he needed to grow and mature.

He didn’t like the waiting, and it wasn’t easy, but he used that time wisely and the girl he wants is going to be getting a really great guy (okay, my opinion is just a touch biased) who loves the Lord and who wants to do God’s will for his life, wants to lead his family and love, (Biblically, sacrificially) love, his wife.

He will be a much better husband, father and person because he used his time of “waiting” to grow his character and develop his relationship with the Lord. Growth takes time. It also takes work.

Waiting on God to answer our prayer is hard. And some things just aren’t going to happen without a miraculous intervention. But, while I’m waiting for that miracle, while I’m waiting on God to answer, while I’m waiting for God to give me the desire of my heart, I can use my time wisely.

Dust off my Bible, make a prayer list and talk to God, deny myself and look around for someone to help, walk away from the internet, turn off the TV, read books that inspire, find friends who encourage me to be a better human (and I encourage them the same way), stop fussing over stupid politics, focus on being a servant, take a walk, be thankful for little things, smile, laugh, find a way to make other people smile and laugh, encourage someone and pray for them, too…goodness, there’s no end to the things we can do. And we don’t have to do them by ourselves. If your kid wants to do something good, you’re going to do everything in your power to help them, right?

God will help you learn new habits and become a better person, just ask. (But still expect to put the work in. He’ll help, but He doesn’t usually do it for us. : )

Waiting is hard. It’s frustrating. It can be discouraging. But God always has a plan. And maybe He really wants to implement that plan, but He’s waiting on us to grow first, so we’re able to handle all the good stuff He wants to give us.

Are we working to become more like Christ while we wait for God to move?

Okay, so I’ve told you about our Akaushis and how they’re a little…aggressive. (Pie says the difference between the Akaushis and the Angus are that the Akaushis don’t quit. Once they go after you, they don’t stop until they have you.) If you didn’t read last week’s story, you’ll want to read that to get a true appreciation for this week’s story.

Before I tell this week’s story, I need to mention our neighbor. I’ll call him Bill. He’s a big guy, bearded and tall and often wears chains, etc. He’s a business owner – logging, snow plowing, trucking and cattle and farming. A businessman. Smart and resourceful. He always has a big bunch of keys attached to his hip. He’s also really sweet and often brings my girls breakfast sandwiches when he stops in in the morning.

However, while he has extensive experience with beef cattle – Angus, Charlois and Herefords – he has never been around Akaushi. So, since he’d come over a few times to help Watson tag calves, he’s been giving my girls a hard time because they don’t want to tag the Akaushi calves. He teases them about being sissies and scaredy-cats, etc. lol Well. : )

So anyway, Sunday afternoon Watson wasn’t home, and the girls and I went to check for calves. We checked the Angus herd and there was one baby that wasn’t hard to tag (once we caught her – she was born running). Even though we had zero plans to tag any Akaushi calves, we checked on them anyway, just to make sure there were no problems and to see if there were any babies so Watson would know whether he would need Bill’s help when he got home.

Now, when I go check the herds, I usually take Ethyl, one of our German Shepherds, with me. Sometimes she runs alongside the four-wheeler, and sometimes she jumps up and rides behind me. Julia and Pie decided they were going to go with Ethyl and me, and Pie wanted to take her dog, a German Shepherd named Roxie. I love Roxie to pieces, but she’s kinda like the Energizer Bunny. Anyway, Julia, Pie, Ethyl, Roxie and I were all on the four-wheeler.

Wait. It gets better. : )

First, I need to mention that I’ve talked about mama cows chasing me as we tag their babies, but usually cows don’t just charge a person for no reason. (Except for #16) But they will go out of their way to charge our dogs. Even mamas with babies that are several months old will charge a dog that’s just minding its own business.

So, when we got down close to the creek and saw that there was an Akaushi baby on the other side with no tag, I didn’t try to take the four-wheeler any closer, but just grabbed a picture of the mama cow. We were too far away and her ear tag wasn’t clear, but since we had the dogs, I did not want to risk getting charged with Julia and Pie with me on the four-wheeler. I wasn’t going to be able to maneuver very well and I didn’t want anyone to get hurt.

Watson and Bill made fun of me when they saw the pic because I didn’t get close enough for them to be able to see the tag from the pic, so they didn’t know exactly WHO had the baby. They laughed at my reasoning/excuse about the dogs and the cow charging and not wanting the girls to get hurt, etc.

On Monday Bill and Watson go down to tag this calf. The mama cow is not excessively large and they aren’t expecting any issues. They ride the Gator down and Bill parks so Watson can get out and chase the mama across the creek. As Watson is getting out, Bill gets his phone out to take a video.

Watson sees the phone and says, I’m not sure that’s a good idea.

Bill wants to know why not.

Watson says these girls can be a little more aggressive than the Angus.

I’m not sure what happened to the phone, but I didn’t see any video of what happened next.

The cow charges Watson, who sprints across the creek to get away from her. He cuts to one side of the Gator, and the calf cuts to the other side where Bill is waiting. Maybe with his phone, I’m not sure, but he misses the calf and it runs by.

The cow and calf go up to the top of the field with the rest of the herd and Bill and Watson get back in and follow in the Gator.

When they get there, Bill gets out of the Gator and tries to sneak up on the calf. Now, Bill is 6′ 5″ and heavy set. He’s hunched over, (to make himself smaller?) legs bent, sneaking slowly, his ring of keys jingling at every step. Hey, he gets points for trying, anyway.

So, that doesn’t work.

They get back in the Gator and Bill tries to cut between the cow and the calf. He’s successful at getting the calf on one side and the cow on the other, so Watson jumps out to distract the cow, while Bill grabs a leg of the calf and tries to get a better grip on it to tag it.

Now, normally, I’m the decoy, and I distract the cow while Watson tags the calf. It’s my job to make sure that Watson doesn’t have to worry about getting charged by the cow while he’s tagging it, even if that means I get clipped or worse by the mom.

So, Watson is not quite as stubbornly determined as I am, and when he realized the cow is charging him (again) he runs and jumps up on top of the liquid feeder.

The cow follows him up.

(I am not laughing.)

(Okay, that’s a lie.)

Watson needs his personal space, I guess, so he jumps from the top of the feeder to the top of the Gator. (I know. It would be hilarious if I could say ‘and the cow followed him.’ But, alas. No.) However, since Watson was treed, (snort) the cow set her sights on Bill, who was over by the fence, trying to get a better hold of the calf so he could tag it. She charges him and he’s not able to get away, and he’s unable to think fast enough to let go of the calf, so the cow ends up pinning him against the fence and digs her head into his stomach. (It’s a good think he’s tall and she’s short, I guess.)

Anyway, Bill lets go of the calf, Watson pulls over and chases the cow away with the Gator and Bill jumps in. They start out and see that the calf didn’t run far. Bill is able to open his door and grab the calf’s leg. The mom charges the door and slams it hard against Bill’s arm. He lets go of the calf. They drive around, switching places so Bill is driving. He’s able to get between the cow and calf again, with the calf on Watson’s side, so Watson opens the door and grabs the calf’s leg.

The mama cow lets out a bellow and jumps in Bill’s window.

Now, Bill is in the driver’s seat, so he could, potentially, drive away. But – and I have to say, I understand this completely because I could see myself doing the same thing – Bill is so disconcerted about the cow and being charged and now she has her head and shoulders in his window trying to get over him to get to her calf, which Watson is attempting to get in the Gator, that he is pushing as hard as he can on the brake AND the gas pedal.

So, yeah, they’re not going anywhere, the Gator engine is roaring like they’re going a hundred miles an hour, the mama cow’s feet are thrashing around beside Bill’s face while she bellows in his ear and Watson is saying, “I almost have it in, just hang on a second.”

I kinda feel like I could sell tickets to a show like that.

Anyway, Watson gets the calf in, Bill takes his foot off the brake and they take off with the calf on Watson’s lap.

Now, if I were writing this for a book, I would now say something like, ‘Watson reaches for the tagger, but it’s not there. They realize they lost it while they were running from the calf and when they go back to get it the calf escapes and they have to catch it again, etc’. Or, ‘they never find the tagger and end up letting the calf go with no tag.’ But, no.

They tag the calf, put it out far enough away from the mama that they feel safe (snort) but close enough that she can see it, and then they drive out of the field.

So, they park the Gator at the barn and as Bill walked to his pickup he was limping and rubbing his arm.

I have a feeling Bill isn’t going to be calling the girls scaredy-cats or sissies any more. : )

Also, just to give you an idea of the empathetic and compassionate person Watson is, when he told us the story, we could barely understand most of it because he was laughing so hard.

Alright, don’t forget to check out the stuff below. (And don’t forget to watch for my daily emails with “soup and cookies” in the subject line!)

Thanks so much for spending time with me today!

Hugs and love!

~Jessie

I wrote a devotion a couple of years ago, and I thought it might be fitting to put it in the newsletter today, so here it is:

Back when my kids were little, like elementary school age, one of my best friends and I put on the fall and spring Presentation Nights for our homeschool co-op. There were fifty families in it and homeschoolers usually have more than the average amount of kids (ha!).

It served as a Christmas program, speech credit requirement, recital for instruments and voice, graduation (in the spring), end-of-school party, and pretty much anything else that public schools might do in their auditorium, we did at Presentation Night.

My friend has the opposite personality from me – she’s outgoing and vivacious, loves to socialize and talks non-stop. I’m pretty much the boring rock behind her. It has always fascinated me how opposite personalities complement each other – when they can get along. Ha.

She and I have never fought. We’ve never even argued. And we’ve put on some pretty big events. Anyone who’s ever planned anything like that knows exactly what I’m talking about – we had to pick a date and announce it, do sign up sheets for participation and refreshments, secure a location (since we were a homeschool group, we didn’t have an auditorium at our disposal, but usually someone’s church would let us use their facility), make sure everything everyone needed for their performances was there, if not, figure out how to get it, deal with cancellations and additions, programs, line-ups, emcee volunteers (and if there were no volunteers, ha, we got to do it – or, most of the time, we made our kids do it, lol) and the other tons of details that pop up during these things. We’d get there early to set up and of course we got to clean the sanctuary, foyer, fellowship hall and bathrooms after it was over.

A few years we put on musicals in addition to the Presentation Nights. She’d direct and I’d help with lines and play the piano. We made costumes and props together and somehow got all the pieces lined up in order.

Neither one of us were in it for the applause, we were never trying to one-up the other and we discussed everything, even though both of us had our areas. I was sitting here trying to think of a single time during any of the couple dozen performances we coordinated that we had some kind of major problem, and I can’t think of a thing, even though my oldest didn’t get along with her oldest. We just laughed about that because they were too much alike, which is why they didn’t get along.

I just loved standing to the side on the evenings of Presentation Night, seeing all the proud parents, the beaming (and nervous, lol) kids, the happy smiles, the excited siblings, the secret preparations and the laughter and fellowship when it was over and they all stood around, holding their plates of yummy food and laughing and talking about how things went.

What a feeling of satisfaction as all of your hard work came to fruition in the smiles of the people that you did it for.

People have often commented on how well my friend and I worked together and I always really believed it was because beneath our extremely different personalities was the servant’s mentality that we shared, and because we saw the good in each other and were always considerate – I wouldn’t have dreamed of lifting a finger without checking with her first, and if it didn’t work for her, it didn’t work for me. End of discussion.

I guess she must have felt the same, because I always felt like she valued my opinion and my presence. Even though I have a tendency to hang back, she never walked on without me. I’m not even sure how she knew I needed it, or maybe it’s just her personality, but she pulled me with her, which I always appreciated, since it made me feel like she wanted me. The idea that one of us would do something without the other’s input never crossed our minds.

I was thinking about that because this week I read in Acts 15 where Paul and Barnabas had such sharp contention between them that they split up and chose other partners to continue the mission work.

Now, some of that might have been God’s plan. After all, two teams of Godly men can accomplish more and go more places than one team, right?

But this has always been kind of a puzzle to me because, come on, Paul wrote most of the books in the New Testament. He is arguably one of the most saintly men to ever live. How can someone not get along with him???

Ha.

I don’t have any scriptural answers to that. To me it just shows that even the most saintly among us sometimes have disagreements and deal with human flaws and faults.

No one is perfect. Not your spouse (lol), not your siblings, your friends, parents, and not even your pastor. We’re all humans with a sin nature. We’re all in need of God’s grace, and we’re all called upon to extend that same grace to others.

I love that in Acts, despite the “sharp” contention, neither Paul nor Barnabas say anything bad about the other. (Can I do that? Can I disagree with someone, even have “sharp” contention and never say a bad word about them? Boy, that’s my goal for someday!) They just agreed to disagree, and they moved on.

The Bible never really tells us that Paul and Barnabas reconciled, but Paul does talk about Barnabas and also about Mark (over whom they had their contention), so I think it’s safe to say they put the past behind them and walked forward with their eyes on Jesus.

I think the best way to get along with some people is to just keep our eyes on Jesus.

We should want what we do – EVERYTHING we do – to bring honor and glory to Him, as much as humanly possible.

Sometimes that means giving grace and overlooking someone else’s sin, their inconsideration or their outright lies.

Sometimes that means stepping back and allowing the spotlight to shine on someone else, even if we feel we deserve it. It might mean making a lot of preparations and doing an insane amount of work so that other people can shine. Being a servant, forgetting about ourselves so God can work though us.

Sometimes that means we need to remember we’re not perfect ourselves and we need to give as much (or more) grace than we receive. Maybe that means ignoring their political statements or their insults about your religion or about the crazy things your family does. I know if I keep my eyes on Jesus, God will handle things much better than I ever could.

After all, in light of eternity, what do insults matter? Does it matter if I don’t get my way? When I step into Heaven, will I really be glad I “won” an argument? That I came out “on top”? That everyone realized I was right?

I know, it’s hard to give up our way, hard to allow people to think we’re wrong (when we’re really not!), hard to lift our fingers up and give up our “rights” to tell everyone else about how awful someone is. Hard to overlook someone’s faults or really irritating behavior and really hard to pass by a chance to huddle with other people and complain about them.

But God wants us to Do all things without murmurings and disputings. That means that not only are we supposed to get along, we’re supposed to not engage in malicious gossip about people who are impossible. We’re supposed to “esteem” others better than ourselves.

I guess I find that mostly easy to do with people who are nice to me, but, just being real here, I struggle, and struggle hard, to do that with people who are unkind. I don’t want to lift up someone who isn’t nice to me. I don’t want to help them, encourage them, or give them anything but my back.

But as Christians, God calls us to a higher standard than what our natural human inclinations would have us do. Not just keeping our mouths shut, but actually being kind to people who are unkind to us seems like it might be pretty close to impossible, but through the power of the Holy Spirit which resides in us as Christians, we can do anything – nothing is impossible – including being kind.

I’m not perfect at this – FAR from it! My knee-jerk reaction is always to defend myself and to walk away, but God doesn’t want us to fight and he doesn’t even want us to walk away – he wants us to choose to show love, engage in kindness, give ourselves in ways that people don’t expect.

The whole time I’ve been writing this, I’ve been thinking of Christ and the evening He was arrested, his trial, his crucifixion.

He asked his friends to join him in prayer, but they went to sleep instead.

He was accused, but he didn’t defend himself.

He allowed everyone in the room to think he was wrong, because arguing would not have brought glory to God.

His “friends” deserted him, even denied him, but he loved them anyway, and went on to do the kindest thing anyone has ever done for another living soul. He did that for his enemies as well, even the people who were putting him to death.

If Jesus can be kind – can die – for the very people who are killing him (He was kind – he died – for people who profane his name, who kill babies, who worship Satan, who spit in His face and do their best to turn the world against him, who use Him to further their own causes, who lie and cheat and steal and sin over and over without remorse and without trying to change) it’s nothing for him to expect me to be nice to someone who might have simply said something unkind, maybe even unintentionally.

As Christians, we’re called to be like Jesus. Folks, that’s radically different than what we have come to expect, even from Christians.

We have such low standards for ourselves. Most of the time we don’t even consider trying to make ourselves do something a little uncomfortable, like doing something nice for someone who has been even a little unkind to us, let alone to be kind to someone who has deliberately maligned us.

Can we keep our mouths shut? Can we choose to show love and kindness rather than defend ourselves? Can we take meanness and return it with kindnesses? Can we show love to people everyone else considers unlovable and can we have “sharp contention” and never say an unkind word, but walk on together in love with our eyes on Jesus?

This is definitely an area where God has been challenging me, and, I admit, I’ve stumbled and fallen a lot in the past few months. I want to do better. I want to be the kind of person who loves and is kind to everyone and I don’t even notice what they do or don’t do or are or aren’t to me. I want to throw love and kindness out like confetti – like Jesus – with my eyes on my Savior and not on what other people are doing.

As Christians, every day, our goal is to be like Jesus. How are we doing?

Alright, have a beautiful and blessed Resurrection Sunday! After all, the empty tomb is the whole point.

Hugs and blessings, my friends!

Jessie

I have a farm story below. It’s one that some of you have read before, but I have a new story I want to tell you next week and you need the background from this one to fully appreciate it. So, farm story below – read at your own risk! : )

I didn’t mention it at the time, but Watson and I and the girls made a quick trip to Tennessee
before Christmas. Watson was supposed to go to an Akaushi farm and check out a couple of
bulls for a buddy, and I was curious as to what the place looked like, so we set up a meeting
with the farm manager, whom we had talked to earlier last year.

Well, when Watson and I were there, the manager, I’ll call him Adam, stood and talked to us
about growing embryos in a Petri dish and dehorning and weaning and other things cattle guys are interested in.

So, I don’t know if you all remember the story I told about Julia and I on the four-wheeler and
the Akaushi mama who ran along side of us, creeping me out, until I stopped suddenly, just
before she cut across and we ended up stopped with her standing right in front of us. I’d had
the feeling then that if I hadn’t stopped, she would have been on our laps.

That seemed like a crazy idea at the time and I kinda chalked it up to me having an over-active imagination.

Well, we’d taken our three Akaushi cows to be “flushed” which means that we bring them into
heat artificially with some extra hormones to make them release multiple eggs, breed them,
and then “flush” the embryos out.

The vet had mentioned about one of our cows being crazy, and it was the same cow who had
stopped in front of the four-wheeler.

So in the course of the conversation with Adam, Watson mentioned about the vet and our crazy cow and Adam kinda grinned.

“Some of them are,” he said.

Well.

I was definitely interested in hearing more about that, since I’m the one who usually deals with the crazy killers while Watson is tagging and banding them.

So, Adam proceeded to tell us, “We quit using four-wheelers after the insane mamas tipped the third one over.”

Well.

And WELL.

(I’m thinking of Loretta and how she’d been running beside me, and how I’d stopped just as she swerved, and I wonder if Julia and I were seconds away from Loretta tipping the four wheeler over on us.

I think of God’s hand of protection and how I’d stopped without a real reason. Just did it.

Anyway, Adam kept talking, saying that they’d used a gator (which is like a four wheeler with a cab and doors) only the ones they had the doors opened from the front side.

Adam shoved a lazy hand in his pocket. “It took too long to open the doors and when we left
them open, it was too hard to run around the gator to get away from the charging cows.” He
nodded at a gator sitting about twenty feet away. “So we took the doors off.”

Watson and I share a look. They’re really running from cows if they can’t get the doors open.
Adam crosses his arms over his chest and leans back against the holding pen fence. “Gotta be careful now. Just last week we ran to get away from a new mama, jumped in the gator and she jumped in the gator right behind us.”

Okay. Now, I’ve been around truck drivers most of my married life and they tell stories like
fishermen do. Slightly, or mostly, exaggeration.

I’m not sure I believe Adam, although I had judged him as a straight-shooter and I’d liked him,
too.

The hired hand who’d been standing with us spoke up. “Two weeks ago we were chasing a
heifer down the aisle. She turned around and came back for the two four-wheelers we had
lined up behind her. I stepped in the small space between them, thinking she’d go a different
direction. She charged the gap, hooked me with her head and threw me back ten feet. Knocked me out and gave me a concussion.”

Adam told one more story about his wife. She’s a cattle girl, grew up on a farm, and is used to
Angus. Well, the Akaushi are a little different and when she visited the farm one day, she
climbed the holding pen fence and stepped into the pen with about twenty Akaushi steers.

Adam told her to be careful, that the Akaushi weren’t Angus and maybe she ought to get out.
She was pretty confident around cows (I can relate) and told him she’d be fine. That was the

last thing she said before a steer head-butted her, knocked her down and trampled over her
legs. She managed to roll under the fence, and nothing was broken, but her leg was pretty
much black for a week or so and she walked with a limp for a while.

I think the guys are being serious, and I left the farm that day wondering what we’d gotten
ourselves into.

Anyway, this past Sunday night, Watson and I drove to Lynchburg to meet a truck driver who
was bringing us three more Akaushi cows from Texas.

We’d picked them out after watching videos and Dave, the farm manager in Texas, told us that one of the ones we’d chosen was the calmest cow in their herd. I was pretty happy to hear that.

When we talked to the truck driver, he said one of the cows on the trailer was absolutely nuts – she charged the side of the trailer anytime someone walked by it.

There were five other cows on the trailer other than our three, and Watson and I were hoping
that the crazy cow wasn’t ours.

We backed our trailers end-to-end and ran our cows off of his and onto ours with little trouble
and drove home.

Watson backed up to the gate, I opened it and stood holding it, while he opened the back of the trailer. Now, there was a gap between the back of the trailer and the fence and usually Watson opens the end-gate on the trailer and lets it fly open while he stands in the gap. For some reason – maybe because it was after ten and he was tired – he walked the gate open, leaving the gap.

So, when the first cow ran off the trailer, she turned, and rather than running into the pasture
field, she ran through the gap and out on our driveway.

Ha.

Watson moves to the gap and the other two run right into the field.

I have the flashlight, so I hold it on the cow who was on the driveway, while Watson moves up
along the fence to get around her and bring her back down. I go stand between the front of the truck and the fence on the other side, closing that gap, so the cow will turn and go into the
field.

That was the plan, anyway.

I’m wearing my sliders because I wasn’t expecting to chase cattle, and I’m still thinking this is
going to be a simple turn-the-cow-and-she-goes-where-we-want. After all, all my experience
with cows (except for #16) says that they’re more afraid of you than you are of them, and they
only get aggressive when they have a calf to protect, which none of these did.

So, yeah, I was kinda surprised when the cow comes my way, never even turning her head to
look at the open gate. I wave my hands and, rather than turning like I expect, she lowers her
head and runs straight toward me.

I was not expecting that.

She’s fifteen feet away, running at me. I shout at her, wave my hands and, honest to goodness, she runs faster. So, I’m between the pickup and the fence, and I make a snap decision to stop trying to turn the cow and start trying to get out of her way. I can see Watson in the beam of my flashlight, just standing there watching.

So, I just want to stop here for a second and say, I know it’s a thing with “modern” women that
they want to save themselves, and they don’t need a man, and all that bunk. That’s not me. I’m totally fine with being saved. In fact, I prefer it, to be honest.

I think Watson and I have a small communication failure in our marriage that possibly needs
addressed, because he was clearly expecting me to save myself. Gah. I hate it when that
happens.

So, yeah. I run toward the pickup and she swerves with me. I cut and run for the fence (because the pickup is facing me and I’m too short to climb up on the hood, or that’s where I would have been and idc about the dents, etc. Sorry.)

The cow is an arm length away, I’m straight-arming her, swinging the flashlight at her (it’s all I
have) and run out of my shoe trying to get away. I decide I’d rather not be slammed against the fence, so I stop before I get to it and she’s right with me, head down, and wanting to eat me, I guess. I’m not real sure about that part. We didn’t talk much.

Her head is lowered and she’s followed me as I turned and cut and I’m seriously thinking she’s not going to stop until I’m in a puddle on the ground or she’s flattened me against the fence.

She’s backed me up to the point where I really don’t have any other place to go. I definitely
don’t have time to turn and climb over it. And I’m pretty sure I can’t outrun her.

Anyway, if you’ve ever watched bull riding at a rodeo and have seen the rodeo clowns, they can kind of distract the bulls with a wave or a cloth or something and then run down the side of

them. And that’s what I did – I slapped the flashlight on her head as hard as I could, and while
she was shaking her head, a little dazed, I guess, I ran toward her and past her side.

Thankfully, she didn’t turn to chase me but ran past me, up the driveway.

Watson was annoyed with me that I let her get away. I’m shaking and thinking about
emergency rooms and how I’m super glad I’m not on my way to one right now. (Although I
think Watson would wait to take me until he got the cow in.)

So, it’s late, like after ten, but I call Julia because this cow is going toward the house, and we
need to get her in a pasture. At this point, I’m thinking that she was just scared and confused
and probably didn’t really mean to act like she normally had a snack of author before bed. So, I don’t mention to Julia that this cow is nuts.

Julia and my youngest come out of the house and the noise they make turns the cow around.
Watson and I have moved the truck down the driveway and parked it in front of the lower gate.

He has the flashlight and gets out, standing in the gap to turn the cow.

I admit, I’m a little slower. I did manage to find my shoe and I have them both on, but there
aren’t too many cows that get past me and the fact that this one did – by chasing me until I was running from her – makes me a little less confident and a little more cautious.

I’ve honestly never seen a cow act the way that one did, and I’m remembering Adam’s stories
and thinking maybe he wasn’t exaggerating after all. Maybe he was as understated as I’d
thought to begin with and the stories were much worse.

Watson wasn’t scared and he’s standing right in front of her as she comes back up the drive. He waves his hands and shouts to turn her into the open gate and the lower pasture field.

I’m not quite as surprised this time as she lowers her head and charges Watson.

I had left the pickup door on my side open – just a hunch based on Adam’s stories – and I duck around it, standing there, ready to jump in. I look through the window as Watson runs
backward, the cow so close to him, he’s able to hit her on the head (as I did) with the flashlight.

He half-turns to run, and she head-butts his side, knocking his phone out of the holder.
She almost has him cornered in the fence where it comes out and there’s no place for him to
run, other than past the cow. She swipes her had at him a few more times, following him as he jigs and jags in front of her.

I come out from behind the pickup door, unsure what I’m going to be able to do to help. I yell,
thinking to draw her attention to me, and the cow, thankfully, turns the other way and runs
back toward our house.

By this time the girls are out and I’m pretty sure they don’t realize that we’re not dealing with
the normal kind of cow and they’ll be trying to turn her around.

Yeah, they’re coming toward her, so I yell, “No! Don’t! Don’t try to turn her! Get behind the
tree. GET BEHIND THE TREE!!!” They hear me the second time and they turn just as the cow lowers her head to charge them. They’re able to get to the tree and keep it between
themselves and the cow, so I look at Watson.

Ha. He looks a little shell-shocked. “I lost my phone,” he says. We find it (since the girls are
relatively safe behind the tree, with the cow staring at them from the other side of it).

My youngest daughter, who is at the age where she has more bravery than brains, climbs over the fence behind the tree and opens the gate to the side pasture beside the house. We’re able to get the cow in the side pasture – she ran in, ran straight across the field and straight into the fence on the other side. Thankfully, it held.

So, yeah.

We decide to quit trying to move her and to just let her in there for the night. She’s due to
freshen in six weeks and we don’t want to upset her any more than we have to.

We decide to shut the gates on the driveway, which pretty much means that she’ll be on our
property in the morning, even if she breaks the boards in that field, and call it a night. It’s
almost eleven, and I turn into a pumpkin at nine. (Maybe that’s why I couldn’t get away from
that cow.)

After the gate is closed and tightly locked, Julia walks over to me and puts her arm around me.

She’s trembling. “I don’t want to have to chase any more Akaushi cows. Ever. I’ve never been so scared in my life.”

I put my arm around her, but I can’t resist the teaching moment. “She made spiders look not-
too-bad, didn’t she?”

Julia was close to crying, but she laughs at that, and, to my surprise, she agrees with me. “I’d
take a spider any day over being trapped behind a tree by a cow who wants to eat me!”

The next morning – yesterday morning – when we go out at daylight, it’s snowing and the small pasture field by the house is empty. Ha.

So, Watson takes the four-wheeler and finds her in the trail pasture with our fall herd. She
broke through the fence after we’d gone inside, apparently.

She’s still acting skittish, so he decides to leave her there. In the meantime, Watson gets close enough to see the number branded on her hip and looks up the videos on his phone to see which of the three she is.

He comes back up to the house and walks into the room where I’m working and says, “I have
good news and bad news.”

I look up.

“The good news is that the other two cows we brought home are still in the pasture where we
put them.” He pauses. For effect, I’m sure, and I’m bracing myself. Bad news can be really,
really bad around here. “And the bad news is…the cow that attacked us last night is the cow
that Dave said was the calmest one in their herd.”

Oh, boy. I have a feeling that 2022 might be the year of newsletter stories involving Jessie and her new running program.

Ha. Thanks so much for spending time with me this week!

Hugs and blessings,

Jessie