Cows & Hearts

Last Sunday I was reading my favorite teacher's blog, Easy Street. (I know- sounds like I'm brown nosing) She quoted, "To have a child is to have your heart go walking around outside your body--forever." I've thought about that line a thousand times this week.

February 4th, son #1(age- almost 22) left for the National Outdoor Learning School (NOLS) in Lander, Wyoming. Here he would learn how to survive in various wilderness environments. For this he would gain 14 credits toward one of his bachelor's degrees, the one in youth ministry w/an emphasis in outdoor adventures (or something like that, he created it- the boy lives outside the box). The first 3-week course required telemarking across mountains by day in temperatures averaging 15 degrees F and sleeping on a bed of ice at night. Outside the Box wanted to do this so desperately, he actually paid money to do it. His father and I did not make him do it- to build character or anything like that.

Each day of those initial three weeks, random chills rushed up and down my spine emanating from those snowskiing pieces of my heart. Subsequent sections of coursework included canyon hiking and rock-climbing; both involved maps, a compass, de-hydrated food, sleeping under the stars and my favorite, no restroom. Not even a pit toilet.

Last night, I.T.-ologist and I, filled with excitement, drove five hours to Indianapolis to retrieve Outside the Box from the airport accommodating the cheapest way home. On our way we came upon a tourist attraction that we could not resist. Pictures of cows painted on large, cylindrical milk tanks had been offering fresh cheese and ice cream for miles. But it was the last one that got us- a billboard displaying a young girl with text that read: "...and I got to see a baby cow being born." Really?

We'd make a pit stop to see what that meant. I imagined a calf birthing simulator of some sort. I.T.-ologist guessed it would be a wax museum. Either way, picturing this being portrayed in an acceptable way for classrooms of school children to view... well, we had to see it. We walked briskly to the get-your-tickets-here barn. I questioned the salesgirl without hesitation, "you don't have real cows giving birth here, right?" She surprised me. They did, "There might even be one being born right now!" Amused by our shock, she didn't ask us to pay. She slipped entrance wristbands on each of our forearms and told us to hurry to the birthing barn. Quickly we made our way past a talking cow in a dress, who was wearing eyeshadow and earrings. She was sitting on a swing above our heads telling how milk makes its way from the dairy into home refrigerators. Videos of the process played on either side of the pathway. We spied the birthing barn and picked up the pace. The sign there said, "Sh-h-h, quiet, birth in process." Inside the door, what did we see...

...a floor to ceiling glass enclosure, an enormous fishbowl, with two gigantic live cows inside. Two slimy calves covered in mucus rested on thick beds of straw next to each mother. One mom even had afterbirth gunk hanging out of her....(um, sorry). We had just missed it. Concrete bleachers faced the encapsulated stage. I slowly climbed the steps, mouth hanging open, eyes on the birthday calves. I was astonished!

The adjoining room housed four calves, all born that day according to the signs on their individual pens. Some were still wet. No cows in sight there. Mothers were gone. Separated from their babies, when? minutes? hours? after giving birth?? Very different from pieces of a mother's heart walking around the earth is her entire heart being ripped from its aorta.

Outside the Box is home now; my heart is restored. Temporarily. See, I have this other son, 19 year old Pilgrim. This is what he said to I.T.-ologist and me two weeks ago:

"Mom, dad, I'm taking a Greyhound bus to the west coast. I'll live with Friend- Who -Already- Went and...."

That's all I heard before I hit the floor.

Below is a picture of what happens with teenaged calves who tell their cow mothers the same thing Pilgrim told me. I hope my son finds equal enjoyment in his venture, even as my heart flips each time I think about where these pieces will be walking around.

Piece Out-
Heidi