Happy Trails to Cows

"I could dance with you till the cows come home. Better still, I'll dance with the cows and you come home."  Groucho Marx

In Chatham, Virginia, the county seat of Pittsylvania County, the cows dance home!  They look so happy, well, they look focused, calm and in charge of their path.  Tonight momma cow and her baby were alone in their vigil.  Their gait was a little hurried for cows.  The baby seemed to be double stepping to keep up with momma.  The field stretched out before them like a chenille bedspread, bumpy, yet flat.   Their trip looked long, but they didn't seem to mind. Momma focused on keeping the pace while baby fell in line behind her long tail.  Heads held high, there is no shame in being a cow on a hike for the barn.  I wondered how they know where to go and how long it will take, or do they worry about that?  They're not sniffers like dogs, who can find their way anywhere because they leave a trail of smells.  I know the cows came from the barn in the morning.  On hillsides you can see the trails they forge on their daily trek to and from the barn and their field assignment for the day.  Open land makes it a little harder to discern the trail.  I saw it as a dance.  It seems boring to me to be a cow, so I would want to dance my way back to the barn.  If cows aren't dancing, why do they call dancing "hoofing"!