Mountains

Aug 2019, Sichuan Province, China. 

I love mountain tops. Could spend my life there, I say.
Fresh air and freedom. Adrenaline from the ascent. Sun on skin.
Glorious

But mountain tops are not for dwelling.
When the sun has gone and the chill creeps in
They are brutal, exposed, lonely places.

What goes up must come down:
The village is where we live.
In the valley shadows are long. It is cramped and cold. It is mundane.

But in the village there are people.
Creativity and colour. Feuds and fiestas.
There is life.
Nobody mourns a mountain like they do a mother.

Mountains may be breath taking
The village is life-giving.
Though I dream of one
I am content with the other.
Though I love the peak
I need people.

at 5200m, Siguniang Mountain, 

Progress

Calvings* are my most favourite procedure in the entire veterinary world (hence I am currently a small animal vet??!!) - so I was stoked to be summoned to one last weekend.

It was a small hobby farm of one paddock and 5 cows. By the time I arrived at 830pm, this not-very-tame heifer had already broken through two sets of yards. Very coincidentally the owner also had a side business importing tranquilliser guns. We ended up using one to dart her, not once but twice, in order to get close and personal.

The calf had already gone to heaven; the cow probably felt closer to hell. I gloved up and tried to convince her I was her angel in disguise (as the devil, she must've thought).

Now I'm by no means an expert. There are many cattle gurus that I would love to sit at the feet of. But with 6 calving seasons under my belt I feel I've learnt a thing or two. Actually, maybe just two.
See, the rules of bovine obstetrics drummed into us by my lecturer were:
           1) Lube, lube and more lube. You can never have too much lubricant.
           2) If you aren't making progress in 10 minutes, try something else.
I can't actually remember rule number 3). Maybe I feel asleep at the feet of that guru. Or maybe there wasn't a third. Either way, I've never needed it because, as it turns out, the first two always sufficed. 

So, we all know what lube is, but what constitutes 'progress'? We talk about career progression, progress on a project, progressive parties, nations, societies.  We tick boxes, hit KPIs, stay late, get up early, do push ups, give speeches, perfect our profiles - lest we be labelled as 'static', or worse, 'regressive'.

But that crisp, starry night, with mud in my boots and foetal juices in my face, it occurred to me that, in bovine obstetrics,  'progress' was something quite different: 

There I was

pulling a 50kg calf

out of a 500kg cow, 

in the 120th minute, 

    yet one centimetre 

          was enough to keep going.


*that is, assisting a cow deliver a calf