I sent my book to the printer this morning. I started writing it last March and it will be in my hands by the end of May. This past year has been a roller coaster of emotions as I relived some difficult times in my past in the hopes that my story will help others get through their own stories.
Throughout this journey, I’ve learned a lot about myself as well as the writing process. One thing I learned is that not everything in the first draft makes it to the final print copy. I ended up cutting one of my favorite childhood memories from the final copy because it hindered the flow of the book.
I decided to share that story with you here:
“One time, after we finished our homework, we decided we wanted to go play in what my dad called “the fill.” It was a fenced off section, separate from the pasture that was filled with dirt. We loved taking shovels and buckets there to play. This particular day the cows were in the pasture that we had to cross to get to the fill. I chickened out, one of the cows scared me. She was red and white and had a calf. I knew she wasn’t nice to begin with and with a calf, she wouldn’t take kindly to us invading her pasture.
Stefyni and Keeth were braver than I was and decided to risk it. They carefully climbed through the barbed-wire fence in to her pasture. That mean old cow was right between them and the fill. They walked slowly, but deliberately towards the fill, angling away from the cow. It didn’t matter though. When they got even with her, she charged them. Stefyni and Keeth turned toward each other hugging and screaming. That cow ran up to them and head butted my sister right on her rear end. Then she went to the other side of them and did the same thing to my brother. That cow kept doing that over and over. I laughed so hard. I thought it was hilarious! I didn’t think she was actually hurting them, because just before she hit them, she’d stop running, so I thought the head butts were probably more like nudges. My sides hurt from laughing. It was one of the funniest scenes I have ever had the pleasure to watch.
When they finally got away from her, they were completely irate with me. “How come you didn’t help us?” Stefyni demanded.
I was laughing so hard I couldn’t answer her.
“It’s not funny!” She screamed at me.
I had tears streaming down my cheeks, it was so funny!
“Stop laughing!” they yelled in unison. Then they both stomped away from me to the house.
When my dad heard about what happened, I was in trouble. He called me to the kitchen, asked me my version of the events and lectured me about how I was idiotic and useless. Shit-for-brains was another name thrown around that day. When he told me to assume the position I had a hard time not laughing at the memory of my brother and sister huddled together in the middle of the pasture with a crazy cow charging them and stopping just short and hitting them in their backsides. Once the first hit landed though, all laughing stopped. Each smack, left red marks on my legs and tears in my eyes. I really didn’t understand what I did wrong. He said it was because I didn’t go with them or do anything to help. I just watched it happen.
My mom picked us up a little after that episode and grounded me for two weeks for not keeping them safe. Grounded meant that I couldn’t go outside to play with friends, no television and I could only go to church with her. At my dad’s house, besides being beat with the stick I was also grounded. At his house that meant that I had to stay in one of the empty bedrooms when I wasn’t doing homework.”
I know this is not one of my siblings favorite stories, they hate when I bring it up, but it still makes me laugh every time I remember it. Hope you enjoyed it to.
Sharing it here made the cutting not so hard to do.
mishellwolff 