January 11, 2011
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Callie.
I had a most interesting conversation with one of my students last week.
My first half dozen encounters with her she was a little shit to me. I was covering for a History Class after the teacher’s mother died and she would give me attitude about doing her work and treated me as though I had an extra chromosome. She would walk out of class, or curse while in there, or just be loud and obnoxious. I had no idea that she was a senior.
My next real encounter with her was these little escapades she was having with a sophomore boy who, all in all, is really excited to be making out with a senior. This boy is definitely going to be a great kid, even though he screws up from time to time now (like when he pretends to be a foreign exchange student from the Sudan and has an interpreter the whole class). But they would wander the halls together holding hands and then disgustingly snog before walking in their respective classes. I saw her as a hindrance.
I was doing some reading in the library one day last week and this same girl approaches me, and starts telling me all about her life and asks me about mine. A very forgiving gesture. It also turns out she has a very interesting life, education and career choice.
This student told me about the love her life, and no it wasn’t that stupid little sophomore she loves playing tonsil hockey with. The love of her life is named Callie and she weighs 747 lbs. Callie is a Heifer. This girl received Callie for Christmas this past year. She fell in love with her at a 4H competition and wanted nothing more than to care for her.
This girl is a bit of a tomboy, she likes playing sports and dresses pretty casual. With her hair in a loose ponytail, she curses like a sailor and feels way too ready for college. But when she talks about her Callie she gets gooey-eyed. She talks about her as if they will be together forever. Quitting the basketball team wasn’t exactly ideal for her, she loves the game, but she has to get to the farm to feed Callie. If that isn’t love, I don’t know what is.
Just the fact that a city girl can have such an affection really boggled my thoughts at first. But I thought it was so touching and beautiful. The closest I ever came to falling in love with livestock was one of the goats I worked with at the Petting Zoo @ Green Hill Park: Zoe and I would play ram for hours, where she would charge me and I would kick her head. Over and over and over and over until we were both wheezing and then I’d feed her oats, which is crack to goats. That was just for two of the three summers I worked there though. My student loves Callie, and I think that’s pretty fucking awesome.
