“Please, please record that.”
“It’s the same as milking a cow, and I know how to milk a cow.”
“Somehow, I have a feeling your goats are going to be less willing.”
“Then wish me luck.”
“Good luck! Don’t get kicked in the moneymaker.”
“I love you,” I said, laughing.
“I love you too, peanut. Talk soon.”
We said our goodbyes, and I was left alone in my quiet room, missing my old life. For the first time since I’d come home, I felt the pull back to New York. The life I’d had there felt far away, like another person in another time. The hustle of the city, the bustle of a demanding job. Everything felt important, every choice, big or small. My old friends and colleagues were too busy and wrapped up in their lives to do more than text, leaving me questioning the depths of my relationships.
But it was the life I’d known for a long time, longer than I’d lived here, as Jake had so graciously pointed out. That Olivia had a promising career in the best city in the world, a speeding train that was going somewhere big. This Olivia had a career ahead of her that would never make her rich, would never gain her power or accolades. This career was a sack race that stuck close to home.
But this job was maybe the most important job of my life. And while it wasn’t prestigious or elite, it was genuine. And the stakes were much, much higher. Decisions were a matter of survival, not only of mine, but that of the whole farm, human and animal alike.
When my laundry was put away, I grabbed the stack of custom-made pajamas I was going to put on the kids and headed out to the barn.
The goat pen was a hotbed of action. I’d bought five does and their kids, plus one buck for breeding, and all eight baby goats were leaping around the pen, chasing each other while I set up my phone to record. They stopped and rushed me when I stepped through the gate. Laughing, I took a seat on the stool and gave them a little love before picking one to put pajamas on.
“Look at you, Brenda,” I called as she bounced off, bleating.
Within a few minutes, the kids were zooming around the pen in their new pajamas while the adults watched on like they were crazy.
It was so cute—even cuter than I’d imagined when I bought them—I got a little choked up.
“Are they wearing … pajamas?”
I turned to the sound of Jake’s voice with a smile on my face, braced for a fight. “They sure are.”
His skeptical expression melted when one of the kids took off like it had just been tagged it, and the rest ran in the opposite direction.
And Jake laughed.
He laughed from deep down in his belly, that free, easy sound so foreign from his lips.
It took him a minute to compose himself. “That is ridiculous. Absolutely fucking ridiculous.”
“I know. I love it.”
“Color me unsurprised.”
“But do you know why it’s funny?”
“Because you put clothes on goats?”
“The reason we laugh at animals is because our subconscious imagines they’re human. Like, you see a baby goat in pajamas, but your brain secretly imagines a person in pajamas bouncing around a pen making goat noises.”
He gave me a dubious look.
I held my hands up. “Look it up.”
“Did you just come out here to dress up the kids for the internet?”
“First and foremost, I did it for myself.”
A chuckle.
“And no. I was going to try to milk one of the goats.”
“Then I’m right on time.” With a smirk, he leaned on the fence.
I paused. “So you’re just going to watch me?”
“It was part of the goat deal.”
“That was in regard to clipping their hooves. You’re not going to, I don’t know. Yell at me for putting clothes on the goats?”
“No, because that is hilarious.”
I shook my head. “I do not get you.”
“Plus, we’re working together, right? I figure I can trust you with pajamas.” Before I could ask him some version of what the hell, he said, “Have you clipped their hooves, by the way?”
“No. Do they need it?”
He almost walked through the gate but paused. “Would you mind if I helped?”
“Since you asked so nicely, come on in.”
With that little smirk on his face, he joined me. “I’m glad you didn’t try yet. I was gonna let you figure it out on your own, but I worried you’d get hurt. So I took the liberty of getting you set up. Most importantly, this.” He waved me to the fence that opened up to the yard, and in a space just beyond the barn stood a little platform with a wall on one side, two taller slats of wood that made a head catch, and a bucket on the other side.
“Is that a …”
“It’s a milking stand,” he said, hopping the fence.
When I started to climb over to join him, he grabbed me by the waist and picked me up without even bending his knees.
“Lemme show you how it works.”
I followed him to the device, which he explained to me in great detail. I was too busy puzzling over him to listen.
“All you have to do is slide this board over for her head to fit, then close it with this latch. And she can snack while you do what you need to. I made it a height that you should be able to reach her udder without hurting your back or anything.”
“You made it?”
“Well, yeah. You think I was gonna spend a hundred fifty bucks on something I could make myself?”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Well, when you put it that way …”
“I got you some clippers too. Couldn’t make those.”
“Who even are you?” I asked, smiling.
He rubbed the back of his neck. “I owed you. For … punishing you.”
“You didn’t owe me anything, but I appreciate it. Especially the help. I haven’t had time to YouTube hoof clipping, so I could use the advice.”
“Then come on and I’ll show you.”
Back in the pen, he went from goat to goat, lifting their hooves so he could get a look at them, finally finding one who needed attention. I walked her out with a lead and to the stand, which she climbed on willingly when she heard the plink of feed in the bucket. In went her head, closed went the catch, and she nibbled happily, unaware that she was about to get handled.
Clippers in hand, Jake stepped up to the goat and lifted her hoof to show me how to clean out the muck and where it could be clipped. She was fine until he used what looked like heavy-duty scissors to trim off the outer ring of her hoof.
He tightened his grip until she quit fighting, explaining all the while how to hold her and what to do. And the why of it—domesticated goats didn’t traverse the kind of terrain to wear down their hooves, and letting them grow over could change their gait and eventually cripple them. Or their hooves could get infected and make the goat sick. So he did the one, and then he passed the clippers to me.
I stared at the ass end of the jumpy goat, trying to hype myself up.
“You’ve got this,” he said. “Just hang on to her and don’t pick up her leg until you’re at her side.”
“All right.” I took a step closer, putting my hand on her rump to reassure her.