THE
BLUE BOX (Recycled Ideas)
by Don Cox
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As I drive back and forth to town, I regularly take note
of the cattle that my neighbour Joan raises on her farm.
I think that cows are an overlooked group, we eat them regularly
without even getting to know them. I hope what is said here
will help people appreciate the quiet dignity of these wonderful
creatures. Cows are very gracious animals, and my neighbour
Joan has names for them that reflect this. She has Sally,
Georgie and Nora, but there are also Happy and Sweetie.
Names like Grumpy, Stupid or Dummy are unknown in the herd.
There is one definite down side to naming your cows. It's
somehow easier to send "the black and white one" to the
butcher than it is to send "Sweetie." It's disconcerting
to eat an animal after you've given it a name.
Perhaps most people don't know that a cow will climb stairs
but won't go down them. Years ago in UBC we found this out
when we got a calf up to the third floor of the physics
building. Getting it down the next day was a chore for the
unfortunate men in building maintenance. They rapidly learned
that cows don't like to go down in elevators either. We
were before our time as it turned out, I see in the Globe
that a certain Neil Steinberg has written a book called
"The Book of College Pranks" (St. Martin's Press, 1992)
In it he advises, "if at all possible involve a cow." We
knew that back in the '50s.
Cows are all over the news these days, I read that Buti
Tlhagale, a Catholic archbishop in South Africa has called
for animal sacrifices to be incorporated into church services.
There is a good precedent for this, it creates a pleasing
odor for the Lord (Lev. 1:9) If it's not pleasing to the
congregation I guess it will be necessary to smite them.
We have been seeing a lot about gender equity these days,
and evidently this is finding favour in the bovine world
as well. Bull fights are well enough known world wide, but
how many people know that in the Canton of Valais in Switzerland
there is an annual cow fight called the "Combats de Reines".
These special cows are rather pugnacious and have an instinct
for hierachry so I've read. The contestants are matched
in weight categories, and there's rarely anything worse
than a bloody nose. This is no surprise to me at all, when
I was a small boy we had an immense cow called Maybelle
who always was the leader in the herd, and insisted on having
the number one stall in the stable. She would have taken
the Combat de Reines hands down, and I would have given
her an extra shovelful of chopped turnips for it.
Somehow I can understand and even identify with a culture
that considers cows sacred. They are fine animals and if
I ran a market stall in an Indian market I would hand out
an occasional head of lettuce to the local cow, and not
consider it an imposition in any way. Even if the cow nicked
the occasional lettuce when my back was turned I wouldn't
be terribly upset, after all, an animal that always has
sweet smelling breath can be forgiven almost anything.
Bluebox ©2001 Don Cox
Website ©2001 OttawaWEB
