The Committee

It is always Cows week here.

Poppy and I visit this small group of cattle most mornings.

They are always gathered near the gate. This may be their morning briefing but I like to think they are a committee.

One or two look interested. there are always some chewing the cud and paying little attention. There is often one taking the piss. Best of all, you cannot tell from the picture but they are a load of bullocks. Is this a committee or what?

Cattle have an endearing habit of always gathering around the gate, which quickly develops into a latrine. They may simply be waiting for their next meal but I think they like to see who is going past. Cattle seem to be quite intellingent animals.

This gate habit means that cattle fields always have a very distinctive smell. It is not an unpleasant smell and is a real memory trigger for me.

For the first ten years of my life I lived in the small village of Old Park. A track ran past our house and twice a day a large herd of cows would walk past going to or coming from the milking parlour. If my Grandma was visiting she was terrified by these cows. She had lived all her life in West Bromwich, a town not know for its cattle. My Gran would run and hide in our outside toilet. We still had a good old bucket lavatory in a shed at the end of our yard. Is this what they mean by bucolic?