Working with goats was a new one for me

That title isn't mine - it's a headline, and it was one of a selection of headlines given to the writers' circle as our September activity prompt. We were given 40 minutes to write - and I started with not a clue what I was going to write, only the headline. And I started and this is what happened. I think you can tell that I was running out of time as the focus of the story is on character build, and there are several gaping holes in story development (such as the wife, and farm life in more detail), but I enjoyed writing it. I may get around to editing and doing a re-write, but for now here we go:  

So on Facebook there’s this image of a kookaburra, and the caption is ‘bird or goat?’. Well I can only see the bird, so either I’m missing something, or someone is having a laugh and I don’t get it. You see, I thought if it was a goat picture, I might have noticed. After all – well, hang on. I’m getting ahead of myself. You see, I think I  need to explain about me and goats.

So just imagine some wavy lines around the frame, the picture fogging and some mirror chimes to simulate a flashback, eh?

I’m 16. I’m tall for my age (six foot three), actually I’m tall for any age. But put it like this, I don’t get picked on at school ‘cos I could simply just tread on them. Oh yeah, I’m heavy too. But not fat heavy, even as a teen, it was muscle heavy. Not that I worked out at a gym or anything, but I lived on a farm. And hefting around great bales of straw, shovelling manure and other delightful manual jobs did tend to hone the frame, even of a bendy youngster.

So picture this – I’m at school, in my black and red uniform (I know, awful huh?), and I’m sitting in the maths class looking out the window. The teacher is muttering something that I don’t understand, and my best pal Jimmy is writing secret messages to the girl he is convinced he is in lust with. Its spring, and there are green leaves on the willows, and the birds are getting noisy with excitement. I’d rather be out there than listening to…

Whap! Maths Master Maitland wasn’t against a bit of physical intervention to ensure attention, and the board rubber (a sort of wood and felt brick) slammed into my desk sending a cloud of white dust into my face. “SMITH! What did I just say?” Well I hadn’t a bloody clue, so I muttered a “Sorry sir” and he repeated his diatribe that had something to do with logs. I knew about logs – got a huge wood yard at home – but then he spoiled it all by mentioning sines and their cousins, so I switched off again (but kept looking at him so he at least thought I was listening).

At the end of the class Jimmy went off with that girl, don’t even know her name (actually I don’t think I know the names of any of the girls in our class), so at break time I left him to it. I reckon they were off looking for somewhere private to snog.

If this were a TV show we’d flip back to ‘now’, with the music and wobbly picture and all, and you’d see Jimmy now, a grey haired man even though he’s only in his 40s, with the blonde (bottle blonde these days) and four kids in tow. I guess it could be a happy picture, but I don’t know, you’d have to ask him. But this is not TV, so back to school days.

I went to the bike sheds  hoping that Jimmy wasn’t there. Nope – but the usual gang and the gritty grass where a couple of the other lads, and one girl, sat smoking. They jumped when I first appeared – I guess being tall they thought I might be a teacher. Marky, a snide little spot-faced rat of a boy in the year below me, sneered. But he did offer me a fag. I took it with disdain, no thanks. I think perhaps he was a little scared of me, that’s why he made out he was so hard. I sat down a bit apart from them, and the girl turned to look at me. “Are you Smith?” I nodded. “I’ve heard of you.” Well I should think so – we’d been in the same school for four years. Maybe I was supposed to answer something that showed I knew who she was, but I didn’t, so I stayed silent. The strong, silent type image was working for me. Got me free fags, after all.

Next class was Social Studies, so after grinding out the fag end on the edge of the grass, and nodding briefly to the kids, I headed for the school gates. No one would notice, and it was the last class of the day.

Picture this, tall iron railings around a low brick and concrete school with grey tarmac scarred with faded paint that pretended to mark out games courts. A large iron gate, with the school name in ironwork, and out onto a quiet street in the outskirts of a town that was boasting by calling itself such. It was an overgrown village really, but we had a cop shop, so I guess that made it important enough. It needed it too – there were some right scallys in our area.

So maybe you have a picture of me, and maybe it’s right, maybe it isn’t. Maybe there seem to be some things that don’t quite feel right, like how I talk, how I think. Well, maybe I pissed away my time at school, but I did get to Uni and that sharpened up some of those farm lad edges into something that was so mixed up my dad used to call me Poshy. But you know, those school days were important, because having to go to school every day (even if I didn’t stay there all day) is what made me who I am. Yeah, the farm played a big part of course, but at school I learned things like, well, being tall was important. Being strong was important. Being distant actually got you more attention from the girls than chasing them like Jimmy and rat-boy did.

So I’ve left the school by the gates, and I’m heading down the lane towards the bus stop. The bus goes past the farm gate, so I’m lucky – it’s easy to get to and from school. But I don’t want to appear at home too early, so I get the bus and get off half-way home. It’s just outside the town, and before the countryside really takes over, so there’s houses every so often, and lots more ground. I get off the bus and look around, right next to the stop in a huge garden with a  brown picket fence is a goat. It’s a huge goat! Long floppy ears, and it has weird eyes. They look like an octopuses, I think. I only know that as we did octopuses (or is it octopi?) in science last week. They’re a bit scary. But I’m a big lad, so I look it in the eye and say “Hello goat.” And, of course, it says hello back. Like no shit, the goat said “Hello”. The bus had gone so I couldn’t retreat that way. And though it made me jump, I didn’t really want to run away. I’d never had a conversation with a goat before, and I didn’t have much else to do until I was expected home.

The goat continued looking at me, so I figured it was expecting me to say something next.

“What you doing?” I swear the goat made a huffing noise before replying with

“Eating bloody grass, what do you think a goat would be doing in a field?”

Touch goat it seemed! “You could have been thinking,” I said “about something really important, maybe.” This mollified the animal and, if a goat could smile I think it would have, it tossed its head and flapped its big ears. “I was, actually, I was thinking how come you are not at school, but then again I was also thinking you are way too big for a child. So – what are you?”

“I’m a kid,” I replied, and realised that may not have been the best choice of words when the goat replied

“Nope. You’re human, I know plenty of them, and you’re a big one.”  At this point I was watching the goat’s mouth really closely because, like, they don’t have vocal boxes, or lips, to make words like us humans. And, of course, as that’s what was on my mind, that’s what I said. “How come you can talk?”

“I can’t talk,” said the goat, “but I can make you hear what I am saying.” Well that had me flummoxed, but as I didn’t want to get too technical, I just shrugged and said OK. I leaned my back against the fence to wait for the next bus, and the goat put his head over the fence and says “You could go far, you know. Especially with goats. Thought about working with goats?” Well, I hadn’t. I lived on an arable farm, and I told him so. This actually seemed to please the goat, and he asked me all about our crops, the farm and the family. We were just getting really chatty when the bus arrived. I headed for the bus and the goat said “Think about it” but I didn’t reply, didn’t want to look bonkers saying ‘bye to a goat.

Wavy lines time again – and here we are, back with me as a fully grown man (stayed at six foot three, but put on a bit more weight I admit).

I’m on the family farm; dad still calls me Poshy, and drives the tractor even though he can barely see. I do all the heavy work, but we expanded when dad brought me in to the business and put my name with his and mum’s on the tenancy. Now, as well as farming arable, we have a specialist goat’s milk and cheese production unit. They say my goat’s cheese is the best in the country and we’ve won all sorts of foody awards. I usually send mum and dad to all the county fairs in the summer – keeps them out of my hair and gets us new customers for the cheese.

My wife, who is not even from this town, loves the farm. She’s suspicious of the goats though. People ask me what the secret is to our amazing cheese. Well, between you and me its because I ask the goat’s nicely. I treat them well, I chat with them, I ask them what they want and they tell me. They understand that I need the milk, and in return they get a nice life. It works. I don’t think I’d have thought of goats at all if it hadn’t been for that afternoon skive.

The photo is the 'bird or goat' I started with - and I could only see the bird until I did a web search and found a version with the 'goat' outlined. I have no idea where it comes from to credit, so apologies to the original owner of the photo. And the goat - I just liked this Nubian goat from Pinterest, so once again I can't credit the photographer. Cute though, eh!

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