Darla

We rounded off Thanksgiving week by surprising David’s mom with a party for her 70th birthday.

His sister hosted a lovely party, complete with a game of Bunko.  Ever the good sport, David’s mom donned the bright blue bunko wig and posed for pictures with all of her grandsons and grandaughters.

And can we not all agree that life would be divine if we could all look that good at age 70?  Blue hair and all?

In my last post, I shamelessly boasted about how David, Jess, and I saved the life of a calf.

Calf 219 to be exact.

The calf was down in the mud and could not get up.  The dream team, pictured above, got her standing upright and watched her walk away and successfully become a living calf again.

We saw her walk.

We saw her eat.

We saw her pee.

What more could one ask for?

I checked on her later that night.

Fine.

Checked on her the next day.

Fine.

Checked on her the day after that.

Not fine.

With the help of HD and his skidsteering skills, we got her out of the mud and into a drier pig pen.

HD and I did our best, but we were not strong enough to do much after that point.  David and LD joined our team and we got her in the pig pen propped up with hay and a heat lamp.

That whole process took about two hours.

Lest you are confused, the animal on the right is Charlie the dog.  She is fine.  The animal surrounded by hay is the calf.  She is not fine.

We gave her a shot.  We tried to feed her gatoraid for cows.  We tried our best to warm her up, as she was a calfsickle.  And then. We went inside.  Because, what else can you do?

HD snapped this picture of me, and I must say I look fetching.

We all think she will die.

It’s true.

Yes, this is a bummer.  But we tried.  And I feel better knowing that we did what we could and I am thankful I found her so she didn’t just die all cold in the mud.

I texted Jess to update her on the sad news and asked Jess what we should name our dying calf, in case she might choose to live.

So, her name is Darla.

I came inside.  I had dinner.  I fell asleep for a couple of hours.  I woke up and went to check on her with a flashlight.

I yelled, “Moooooooo” and she lifted her head and looked at me like I had lost my mind.

So.

Maybe she will live?

One can only hope.