Danger Lane, a Gated Community

Our little bit of heaven is a five acre lot enclosed by a structurally sound pig fence - not the most aesthetic piece of architecture, but it generally keeps the good things in and the bad things out.

The single entry to our property is a 16 foot wide double gate in the center of the south fence line. We like to say we live in our own version of a "gated community". Although the gate can be easily opened by anyone with a brain, the latch is a bit tricky and has a tendency to inflict flesh wounds upon anyone not accustomed to how it operates. But, I think this is an unintended security feature that could provide the CSI with potential forensic evidence in the event we are ever subject to home invasion and the police are called in to investigate (always gotta look on the sunny side of life).

The first year on the property, we always left the gate open, mostly out of convenience (a nice way of saying we were just plain too lazy to close it). We have since learned the error of this practice.

Recently, Pam and I had our usual date night that included a rousing visit to the local farm n’ feed and hardware establishment with a stop over for dinner at Sonic (Pam's favorite place). As usual, we had left the gate open so we were able to drive right into Danger Lane, which at the time, however, was not called Danger Lane since little Jackson Danger had not yet been conceived or reckoned into existence. We didn’t really have a name for the driveway at the time, we just simply called it “the driveway” – don’t ask me why, ‘cause I don’t know. We thought of giving a name to our property, but could never really agree on what to call it. Pam always wanted some girly sounding name like “Lavender Falls” or “Daisy Chain” or something like that, and I always wanted something that sounded a bit more rugged, like “Smoke n’ Oakum Woods” or “Flat Bottoms”.

But, I digress.

As we entered the property after our date night, we noticed a large dark object in the middle of the east field. Upon closer examination, we realized that the object was self mobile, in a lumbering sort of way, and that it was in fact a large cow. Being self mobile, and apparently instigated by our presence, it began to mobilize itself toward the north field.

Old habits returned to my mind and I began acting from experiences of years gone by. When I was younger I had numerous frustrating encounters with stray cows being where they were not supposed to be, and it was contingent upon me to escort said cows back to where they belonged. This nearly-forgotten habit motivated me to attempt to escort this particular cow out of my property, so I followed the bovine as it proceeded to the north field with the intent of driving it back south and out the gate.

As stated previously, it was nighttime and darkness had set in and there was no moon. I could only see shadows of things, not their reality, and this included the cow. Cautiously avoiding what could have been cow pies, I attempted to get in front of the cow before it lumbered into the north fence - I did not succeed. The cow met the fence at a walk, stopped short, and began searching for a path away from me and through the fence. It became a bit excited and trotted eastbound along the fence line, with me in lukewarm pursuit (I was not very interested in being run over by a cow in the dark and leaving Pam with the embarrassing task of having to explain things to the life insurance adjuster).

At this moment, as if a veil had been lifted from my consciousness, a radical thought came to my mind: "What the heck am I doing out here in the middle of a field trying to catch a cow in the dark?" And I realized just how needless and stupid it was for me to bother with this nonsense. After all, the cow came into the property of its own volition, it could leave on its own. Anyway, it was probably safer for the night inside our fenced area than it would be wandering around out on the road.

And so, I decided to tolerate the cow’s presence until daylight and headed back to the house.

But, for some reason, something startled the cow. She suddenly mooed loudly and bolted in my generally direction like a run-away southbound bus on I-35, not directly for me, but close enough to cause me alarm. I zigged to avoid the onrush, but the cow zagged, this time putting me right in harms way. So I did what any self-preserving red neck would do in this situation, I yelled an obscenity. This got the cow's attention and it stopped advancing. I moved to the cow's right flank and uttered another obscenity at the cow (which was apparently understood) and it moved off at a trot, directly toward the gate at the south end of the property.

Well, the cow trotted out the gate and onto the road, headed west and turned north into the next un-gated drive at a fast clip.

Congratulating myself on a job well done, I closed the gate for the night.

Next day was normal and I went to work, leaving the gate open as usual.

Later that morning, I received a call from Pam. The cow was back on the property, and this time had brought an offspring. Pam reported that the cattle belonged to a neighbor who had hired some cowboys to wrangle their cows, and at that very moment the cowboys were on horseback doing their thing in our north field.

Now, I was rather taken aback at this revelation - I did not know that in this age of space travel and computer technology one could still hire cowboys on horseback to come to the farmage and round up stray cattle with nothing more high-tech than a piece of rope. Apparently, at fifty dollars per cow, a rural homeowner could hire these young rustic entrepreneurs to do the work I did as a youngster for free.

And I wonder why I can't make money with a home business.

Well, the horsemen lassoed the cow, but the calf escaped capture by jumping our north fence and proceeding into a rather thickly wooded area north of our property. The cowboys worked for a couple of hours in a vain attempt to apprehend the calf, but the fugitive bovine evaded capture for two days before it was finally brought into custody.

We now keep the gate closed pretty much all the time, especially since adopting Bailey da Hound Dawg – fewer cars are damaged if Bailey is not out in the road trying to catch them.

It's nice living in a gated community, especially if you and your spouse are the only ones within that community. And as for potential home invasions, the only invasions we have been subjected to so far have been from a couple of stray cows, some stray dogs, and some roadrunners – not of the MOPAR variety, but just about as interesting.