The Passing Bovine Guests

(This is my best understanding of a real life event.)

Late Monday evening, I opened my Facebook to see that my father had posted a photo of a few cows grazing our field beyond the grapevines.

But our family does not own any cows.

In fact, my family has a hay farm. The entire land is fenced in and surrounded by forests - with the exception of the 1/4 mile driveway that goes up past the house. My Nana, who lives with my father, began to investigate who owned the wandering bovines snacking in our field.

The time was ticking. These cows had to be home before it got too dark to see them.

Nana set off to see a neighbor she knew had dairy cows down the road. Neighbor A replied, "Nope, those aren't my cows. I only have black cows. Have you tried Neighbor B?" Nana sighed.

Neighbor B was a few farms away to the other side of Nana's house, so away she went down the gravel road to Neighbor B's house to inquire about their cow status. The family's son came out to greet my Nana and kindly informed her that these cows were not their cows either.

As it turned out, these same three cows had sauntered into their yard recently, eating up all of their fresh grass and trampling the yard. So the family of Neighbor B told my Nana to call Neighbor C, who lived a literal country mile away.

Taking this new information into account, she came back home to check on her four-legged guests. The cows were increasingly becoming disinterested, and Nana knew time was running out.

Traversing to Neighbor C's house, she thought about the possibility of the cows leaving her house before she could find the proper owner. Pulling into Neighbor C's driveway just as he came home, she introduced herself to their family. Nana chronicled her story of the wandering cattle and the man exclaimed, "Yes! Those are my cattle!"

The trio in question had been missing for close to a week, and they had a reputation for hatching excellent escape plans from their homestead. The Three Musketeers had apparently felt dissatisfied with their own grass and felt it was fitting to (quite literally) go to the greener grass on the other side of the fence. Property lines did not hinder their desire to travel and no enclosure had kept them from abandoning their fellow cow friends.

The man assured Nana that he would be over to our property soon to pick them up, so Nana went home and waited.

Only the man never came and the cows were threatening to leave the premises.

The itch to travel had not left the wanderers' minds so they began to leave much like they had come to Nana and Dad's house. She kept an eye on the cows, traveling alongside them until a passing man in a large pick-up truck waved down my Nana.

"Hello Ma'am, are those your cows by chance?" He inquired politely.

Nana admitted, "No, these are not my cows. I need to return them to [redacted road]." Immediately, the man's face lit up with understanding.

"I know exactly whose cows they are! No worries, ma'am." He reassured her, "I'll take care of them for you."

Thus, the man proceeded to follow the cows, using his loud and resounding truck horn to urge them in the right direction. Cutting through the fresh country air was the repeating sound of the reverberating horn as the three wandering cows traversed down the gravel road as the sky darkened into dusk.