The day ended with me limping, but that doesn’t begin to describe what happened.
My daughter and son-in-law live about a quarter of a mile away from me on the other side of my little pasture. And they are foster parents.
On the morning of the adventure, two little boys arrived at their house for the weekend.
At my hobby farm, my rule is “Why do one thing when you can do four?”
Which explains why I had a new batch of baby chicks under a heat lamp plus some dairy goats in the pasture ready to give birth. That was only two things, so I added an invitation for the boys to meet my animals.
They loved the chicks. The goats. The barn cats. The farm dog. My special zoo.
I drove into town (about five miles away) for lunch with some old friends. While I was catching up with them, I noticed texts from my daughter.
The first one said, “Call me before you go home.” Next she texted, “Let me know when you’re coming home.” Then, “Check with me before you come back home.”
This made me think that maybe she needed me.
So I left lunch early. I hadn’t even backed out of my parking spot before she called.
“Can you pick up an order in town?” she said.
In the background, I could hear a mother goat screaming. “Is that what I think it is?” I said.
“Aurora is giving birth. I’m in the pasture with her. And the social worker is coming any time now.” My daughter had more than four things going, and I wasn’t sure she thought much of my rule.
I decided not to pick up the order. I got home in time for the last baby goat to be delivered and shooed my daughter home just as the social worker pulled into their driveway.
The boys stayed. Baby chicks in the morning, baby goats in the afternoon. This was better than cartoons.
Then they raced across the pasture to drag the social worker out to meet the newborns.
I finally tucked Aurora and her babies in the barn. Afterward, I drove back to town for my daughter’s order.
Then, because I had lost count of the number of things I’d done in the day, I decided to work out in my home gym. I do some weightlifting a couple of times a week.
All was well until I adjusted weights on a leg machine and tossed a fifty-pound weight plate onto the floor. It bounced, twirled, and dive-bombed onto my foot.
I did more than four things that day. And I was limping at the end of it.