Cow Season - Officially Over

A season of our life has come to an end.  We are no longer raising cows.  I never thought of the cows as a form of bondage.  They weren't.  I loved them.  Everyone did.  We even had garbage men stopping at the side of the road, taking out their cell phone, and then taking a picture.  The cows were like a tourist attraction!  And I loved the meat.  It wasn't free, of course, but it kind of felt that way.  My freezer was often fully-stocked with whatever kind of beef I wanted.  I loved that.  And I knew it was so good for me.  It was low in fat and cholesterol, high in protein, hormone-free, antibiotic-free, free range, grass fed.  It was awesome!  But I never looked at it from my husband and sons' perspective....

They had to work hard to keep those cows alive and sometimes they weren't staying alive.  We had several cows die over the nearly 7 years we had them for one reason or another.  No one's fault, but it would happen.  Last summer we nearly all lost our minds as the cows got out nearly every night, as well as during the day, and suddenly I was stuck with being the one to put them in.  They had broken the fencing and RM was working full-time. He didn't know how or when he could find the time to fix it.  But our neighbours were coming to report a cow sighting or even hearing a cow nearby and it was getting not just funny, but bad!  I say "funny" because occasionally at night we would be lying there in bed and one of us would say, "Did you hear that?  Was that a cow?  Outside our window?!"  Then, the next morning, we would see "evidence" of them having walked all over the property, near our house, around the playground, everywhere!  They would seem to go on these nightly trips, knowing we were in bed, and then show up the next morning as if everything was ok.  I wish we could have had a cow cam.

Somehow we got the fencing fixed, but it was a stressful time.  More stressful for RM than me.  He also had to grow a lot of hay to feed those guys.  I hadn't really thought of that.  We were doing hay anyway, what was the big deal?  To him, it was hay he could have sold, but instead it was money being eaten that we could have used.   Ohhhhhhh.  Then it was the boys.  They had to get up early to feed them every morning.  Fine.  Again, no big deal, except that now, with work and school, no one was around early to do it anymore.  Everyone was gone!  RM was starting to make these arguments to me regularly, but I was attached to these animals, which is funny, because I hardly ever did anything for them and I didn't go visit them regularly.  I just found them comforting to have on the farm, because, after all, we were, uh, a farm.  To have them go seemed like we were giving up on farming and I hated that!

I don't remember how I prayed, but I know I was praying, all the time, for my husband, his work, his well-being and I knew he wanted to get out of cows.  Fast.  Then, the miracle happened.

He saw an ad on kijiji looking for a herd of highland cows.  That's just what we have.  Who looks on-line for a herd of cows...locally, no less?  My husband got in touch with the guy and told him what we had and there was a little bit of back and forth for awhile, but then we never heard from him.  At least a couple of weeks went by.  Then, this past weekend, on Saturday, we got an email from the guy again making us an amazing offer!  We emailed back right away and by Sunday, he had come, paid, picked up and they were gone, in less than 24 hours!  Completely problem-free, hassle-free....no issues, no safety concerns, all pick-ups went smoothly. (I had people praying!)

This was NOT how it went when we bought the cows.  It was a huge ordeal, full of problems, a nightmare basically.  I think RM felt like that was going to happen all over again, but it didn't, not by a long shot.  Again, I had never considered them a form of bondage, but suddenly when they were gone, as sad as I was, I felt, and especially RM felt, a HUGE burden lifted.  I did find it interesting to note that it was in the 7th year that God ended the cow season as that is the number in the Bible that talks about the year a slave can go free.  We were in a form of bondage to the cows, at least RM was.  And now he was free.  He was so happy.  We have one bull left, but he will go in the freezer soon.  He's huge, so he'll last us a while.

My son who is now nearly 12, got the cows on his 5th birthday.  He was a little sad to see them go.  And it isn't to say we won't get a different animal to replace the cows someday, just not now.  With so much work going on in the house, it is a lot to deal with.  Now my husband can focus on the house without thinking about the cows.

It occurred to me that the things that hold us in bondage are being cleared away one thing at a time.  God doesn't always take away the whole gamut (I looked up the spelling for that word....not what I expected!) all at once, though I wish he would.  Yet, He FAITHFULLY takes one burden at a time.  He knows, better than I do, which burden is heavier.  I didn't think it was the cows, until they were gone.  Now I see it.  Now I understand the pressure my husband had been under.  More than I realized.  When I drove in the last few days to the driveway, I didn't see the cows anymore and at first I was sad, but the next thing that entered my head was, "The farm looks cleaner!"  Cows make a lot of mess.  It will be nice to clean the farm up a bit.

I have been writing in the homeschool mom digest each week about praying for our husbands.  I have been trying to practice what I preach and really praying every morning for RM.  I'm seeing some really neat things happen and I completely attribute it to the prayers of a praying wife.

So, do I need to worry about my husband?  Never.  I am becoming his greatest prayer warrior.  And I have no war room, no prayer room, per se.  I simply stand at the kitchen sink, in front of the washing machine, in the car, and I pray whenever I can, for him, for the kids, and I just stand back in amazement, nearly daily, as the miracles (and clothes)  unfold around me.