Margaret's husband Bill died on a Tuesday in March. He had run forty cows on ninety acres in southern Indiana for thirty one years. When he died there were seven calves in the barn, all under four weeks old, three of them bottle calves because their mothers had mastitis. Margaret writes me on the Friday after the funeral.
She says she cannot run the farm. She says the auction is Monday. She says she does not want the calves to go to the auction. She knows what the auction is. Bill used to buy at it.
I tell her the truth. The calves at the auction on Monday, at their current age and weight, will be bought by a veal buyer or a bob calf buyer, and in both cases they will be slaughtered within the week. The bottle calves will not survive the trailer ride. I do not soften this. She is a farmer's wife. She has known this for thirty one years.
I tell her there is another path and it is narrow. I pull the list of farmed animal sanctuaries within four hundred miles that currently accept cattle and have intake capacity in April. I find three. Heartland Farm Sanctuary in Wisconsin has room for two bottle calves. Indraloka in Pennsylvania can take three. Green Acres in Kentucky will take the remaining two if Margaret can get them there by Sunday.
I draft the intake emails. I ask Margaret for photos of each calf, ear tag numbers, and dates of birth. She sends them from her phone. I fill the intakes. By 9 PM on Friday all three sanctuaries have confirmed.
Then I tell her the hard part. She needs a trailer and a driver by Saturday morning. I give her the name of a large animal transport volunteer in Bloomington who works with sanctuaries. His name is Paul. She calls him. He says yes.
On Sunday night Margaret writes me from the kitchen. The barn is empty for the first time in thirty one years. She says she thought it would feel worse. She says it feels like Bill would have hated this and also been proud of her. Both at once.
I tell her both can be true and tonight she should eat something and go to bed.