Charlie

I grew up on a farm. Being that there were so many animals around, I had lots of pets. I had dogs, goldfish, and a bird named Max who could talk but he only said one thing “Max is a pretty boy.” There were a couple of cats hanging around that didn’t like to be petted. We had chickens. Once, for a very short time, we had an emu, and I must say right now that is quite possibly the ugliest creature on Earth. But mainly we had cows because that is my dad’s thing and the largest pet I ever had was a 1,000 pound bull named Charlie.
Charlie was a family favorite. Really he was my dad’s pet because cows are his thing. But everybody loved Charlie because he was surprising gentle for a thousand pound testosterone laden male. First he was tame. Most people think that just because an animal is on a farm that is already tame. But some cows never really overcome their fear of humans so they don’t let you get too close, even if you feed them everyday and they recognize you as the food bringer. But Charlie loved people and actually begged to be petted. He would shove his giant head under your arm and look at you with big brown eyes and wait for you to stroke his nose. He was very sweet.
I’m not even sure why we had Charlie because my dad didn’t really keep bulls. He didn’t need them because all of his cows were artificially inseminated. Dad went to school to learn how to inseminate cows and he had a tank filled with liquid nitrogen where he kept the sperm of prize winning bulls. All of that is a post in and of itself, maybe two or three posts and I’ll have to write about it some other time.
So anyway, Dad never really kept bulls. He always sold them once they started to get big. But there was something about Charlie. At first he just had the makings of a good looking bull, so we held onto him for a while. But Charlie grew and grew and grew until he was the largest animal on the place and still we kept him.
Everyone who came to look at cows oohed and aahhed over Charlie. Several people offered to buy him. Every cattleman in the area wanted Charlie for his herd. Every child wanted to pet him and some even wanted to ride him. While we never dared put a child on his back, I have no doubt the gentle Charlie would have been okay with it.
Eventually Charlie had to go. He was huge. It cost a lot to feed him. He led the herd and it wouldn’t be long before he got testy about his cows. So Charlie was sold to a preacher who promptly ground him into hamburger. As everything else was just right with Charlie, I have no doubt that he made the perfect supper.