cowboy girl

When my niece, Acy, came to visit a couple of weekends ago, we loaded her up in

the car with an emergency stack of Fruit Rollups and headed to the farm at Warren

Wilson. It is one of the most beautiful places in the world, I think.

 

When I was a freshman there, we had to go on a scavenger hunt during our orientation

to the school. The hunt was partially about learning about the school and partially

about learning about each other. With around 400 students at the time, we found

out about each other pretty quickly.

 

The farm. It was one of the things that drew me to that school because I had grown

up visiting dairy farms with my dad as he worked. And it was a comfort, a reminder

of home, that farm. I never worked on the farm, but I loved that it was there.

 

When my peer group and I made it around the corner from the math building, we could

see over the garden and the fields, all the way to the river and beyond to what

Betsy later named the "bowl" in the mountain ridge.

 

Alice pointed to one field where a herd of gigantic pigs roamed. They have some

gigantic pigs, no joke.

 

"Look at those weird looking cows," she said.

 

She grew up in D.C., she explained when we all started laughing.

 

So when Acy was here, we visited the gigantic "cows" with scrotums the

size of cantaloupes. We visited the barn where all the little piglets were eating

breakfast and walked the fields to see the cows and the chickens and the horse.

 

Even though she's only three, Acy is one of my True Friends. We bonded over the

chicken dance when she was a baby (I'd sing the tune and flap my arms and she would

laugh and laugh and laugh). Pat bonded with her when she was just one, when she

would pull him under her bed and the two of them would make fart noises. She is

smart and feisty and sweet and independent and creative, with just enough meanness

thrown in.

 

Who wouldn't love someone who found the chicken dance and fart noises hilarious?

 

When we were at the farm, we found her a "cowboy rope." She's in love

with cowboys, and what she calls cowboy girls. That's what she wants to be, she

said. So we found two pieces of frayed twine at the farm and pretended to lasso

posts and trees and Pat's legs. He became the horse we chased down and tied up.

Then Acy would tell him to run away, then she'd run like crazy after him. Every

once in a while he became a monster we'd chase.

 

So this is the beginning of my True Friend series. I know, I know. But what the

hell. Maybe it's all the cold medicine I'm on, but I'm feeling that I need to honor

all of you out there.

 

And I think it's from watching "In America" today in Day Three of The

Illness Redux. I've seen it at least four times, God love HBO. I just love that

movie and when Mateo yells at Johnny, "I love you. I love your beautiful woman.

I love your children. And I love YOUR ANGER!"

 

That made me love all of you.

Done