Part 1: Grandpa's Wonderful Cows

GRANDPA'S WONDERFUL COWS

By sports like these are all their cares beguil'd,

The sports of children satisfy the child.

                                                                    ---Goldsmith

GRANDPA'S 160-ACRE rustic Oregon Coast Range

mountain-and-valley riverain farm in the early 1940s

accommodated the active waterwheel fed by Pollard Creek;

two mammoth weathered barns; one oversize, low-roofed

chicken coop; a woodshed; and a cramped double-bedroom

porchless gray cottage perched atop a natural prominence

approximately 80 yards east of my father's parents'

two-story master farmhouse---itself a commodious residence,

by my standards, that embraced a roofed-over front porch

and an enclosed one in back.

I spent my first five years in the cottage.

But no, that's not accurate. I lived in that abode chockablock

with the rest of my oft-frazzled nuclear-family cottagers,

but most of my non-nap time seemed to alight elsewhere.

For example, when I wasn't dropping in on the more

relaxed grandparents, I explored an immense out of doors---

that is, when my developing legs could lift me beyond

the petite maison's front threshold.

Trouty, glassy clear, deep, wide, and treacherous to

a post-toddler nonswimmer, Three Rivers streamed by in

a lickety-split westward-burbling, murmuring current about

half a dozen five-year-old shaver stone throws south

of the drafty little dwelling.

A thickly wooded hill flanking the home contained

a sunblocking, moss-draped, tangled rumble-bumble,

around and over a bewildering network of deer trails,

of maples, alders, and lush heterogeneous undergrowth,

both ground crawlies and small timber.

Faintly spooky even in broad daylight hours, it was

a grotesque, mystical area, perfect for becoming lost

in it and being alone, possibly to avoid for a time grownup

righteous wrath over something or other.

Until, that is, I could bear the disorienting eeriness

no longer and would decamp the gnarly maze downward

into open flats in a gutless frenzy, out of breath and spent,

my heart thumping, with fear chills lightning-striking

down my spine, nape hair spiking outward in a saluting

me-too! high tension, and tingling, flesh-eating goose

bumps invading parts of my arms.

(to be continued in Part 2)