Now I feel very privileged indeed to have a family cattle
farm 2.5 hours away from Sydney in the Upper Hunter Valley that I can escape to
on the odd weekend when I need to visit the parentals and enjoy a home cooked
meal.
I have always prided myself on being a bit of a farm girl. I
was born in Orange, I spent school holidays at the grandparent’s farm in
Grenfell and heck I even dated one of the Farmers from ‘Farmer Wants A Wife’.
So I feel like I have the qualifications.. you know!?
Well it was this last weekend that I came to the harsh
realisation, that no, I am in fact, not cut out for the country. I had driven
up for a weekend of R&R. All I wanted to do was laze by the pool, work on
the tan, read a good book and enjoy my recent purchase of a few bottles of Helm’s
Riesling.
I should add a disclaimer here, I may have said I enjoyed
going to the farm, but it really doesn’t consist of actual farm work.
So it was on this recent weekend that I was visiting a
friends neighbouring farm when I got a text from my mum asking me to come home
and help her with a sick calf that had been abandoned by its mother. Envisioning
my inner McLeod’s Daughter, I raced home to help mum as my step dad was away
this weekend.
I arrive at the Dairy to find the most precious little calf
lying on the ground with my mum trying to bottle feed it, but the poor thing
was so dehydrated and malnurished he just wanted to sleep. So I took over
bottle feeding duty while my mum tried to lift the calf up to keep it awake.
Now let me tell you, calves are not light! The thing weighed a tonne!
After some gentle cajoling we managed to get the little calf
to drink some bottle mix and were feeling quite proud of ourselves. So down we
plodded to the dairy every couple of hours to feed this precious being. It was
at 1am in the morning looking half asleep (yet fabulous in our pj’s and
gumboots) that we decided to let the calf sleep and we were sure that by
morning we would come down and he would be up and walking.
Sadly this was not the case.
By morning little calfie had passed
away. I was devastated. How do Farmers do this on a daily basis I pondered?? It
sure gave me a new found respect for Farmers (excluding my ex who was a
douche!). Nothing like a wakeup call to
realise how precious life is and that we should all make the most of it!
