Coming to Terms

Thank you for all of the nice emails you’ve sent me. It means a lot to receive your kindness and understanding.

I have been doing a lot of thinking the past couple of days, and also questioning what I want to do, why I want to do it, and how I will get there.

Of course, the biggest question is will I continue to increase my herd at the risk of having this happen again? I also ask myself how I will handle having to slaughter or cull a goat that is either raised for meat, or not an immediate “means” to my end business goals?

One thing I have come to terms with is the concept of death of the animals. I think that humans grieve over death for basically three reasons:

1. We look at what could have been. If a person dies in the prime of their lives, we think about what they missed, and what they should have experienced in life.
2. We feel a void where that person was. We miss them and their impact on our lives.
3. We grieve for their suffering.

As a farmer, I think my number one goal is to raise healthy, happy animals. Livestock that is loved on and given great care and much attention will likely produce more or better product. So I think that there is the trade off that I am going to have to be willing to accept.

When one dotes on their animals, it is inevitable that the animal’s absence will leave a void, and I can see the probability for grief. But there is no reason to think about “what could have been” with an animal. If they live 9 months or 9 years, and they die having lived a happy life, that is fulfillment, in my opinion. Also, if you are any kind of farmer, you ensure that your animals are well cared for and happy. So, in a perfect world, one minute your animals are happy, and the next minute they are dead. They never knew any pain.

I feel sadness about Bert’s passing for a couple of reasons. First, there is some void there. I do miss him, but I am not distraught about that. He did, however, suffer with his pain during the last days, and his death was not a peaceful one. He aspirated his vomit, and basically suffocated. There was nothing I could have done, even “goat CPR” would not have helped the pneumonia, or the resulting infection that he would most certainly have contracted from the stomach contents in his lungs. The last few moments of his life were quite distressing. And that is really the root cause of my sadness and questioning.

At this point, I have decided to move forward. Ernie will be a good companion for a buck, since bucks can’t hang with the herd for the bulk of the year. He can hold his own with a sassy buck. B and I have already started scouting the websites for potential breeding stock.

I have also learned that there are other medications that I need to keep on hand, and the next few weeks will be spent collecting the supplies that may prove to be invaluable in the future.

Speaking of spending money, we just diid our taxes, and filed the Schedule F. I think we are official farmers now! We did lose a good sum of money this year, though, and hope to turn it around next year. I expect it will take a few years to get in the black, however.