Counting Cows

When I was young we’d go to visit my mother’s sister and her family sometimes.   Or we’d go to visit my father’s mother.   Both trips had us going through long, country roads on the way.   Today those roads are likely still there, but they’ve been outdated by faster highways with more direct routing.

What I remember for both trips was a game we would play to pass the time: Counting Cows.   You would pick a side of the car and when cows came up on your side you would count them.   The first one to ten cows would win the round.

On any given trip we could easily play the game multiple times.  There were farms that had only a few cows so you had to keep a lookout to see most of the time.   There were also an occasional pasture with many cows, effectively ending the game with a quick win, but mostly the rounds took a while.

There were other things that gave points too.   An abandoned building was something like five points (each cow was a single point).   I remember the number one thing for points was a burned down house with only the chimney remaining.   Surprisingly, there were a number of these around.

We had fun playing Counting Cows.   Sometimes we’d stop if the view was particularly nice.   I vaguely remember (or have a memory of a memory) of a huge field of yellow daisies.   It was on a slight incline from the road so you couldn’t see the end of the field of daisies and it looked like it went on forever.

We got out of the car to pick a few.   My mother put one in her hair and my father took a picture of us, with my mother in her 1970’s hair style and clothing from the time.   It’s a beautiful picture with the field of daisies in the background.

We don’t get to see farmland on our trips much anymore, or count cows.   We’ll have to come up with a more modern version of the game to play when we go on trips today.

The Big Boy Update:  My son was saying or doing something in the tub and talking to his sister tonight.   I overheard him say, “I’ve done that like a million times.   It’s easy to impress parents.”

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  We had an event at my son’s school today.   My daughter didn’t want to go, complaining, “it’s not my school”.  I told her it had been her school for multiple years and that maybe we’d see her teachers, Anne and Susan at the event.   What she said next was interesting, giving me an insight into how she perceives her world.   She said, “what does Anne sound like?  I can’t remember.”