We all serve a purpose. For some of us, it’s something dignified, like, you’re the voice of reason in a family crisis. You don’t take sides. Or you’re the one who gives out advice on retirement in your family without having to consult the aloof bank people. Or you’re a healer of sorts, with your special teas and ointments. Whatever it may be. 

For ages, people called me when they saw horse loose within a ten mile radius of my house. Everybody knew I had horses because I was forever out front riding them. Those days, for the most part, have passed. 

Then came the confusing phone calls from friends who had too much to drink and knew I was home, sober, tight in my bed, because I had a job that required my presence early in the morning. I was the responsible, dependable one for a long time.

Then came the calls that I was paid to take, not really expected, mind you, but the ones with true emergencies: car wrecks, fires, seizures. Lord, at the seizures. 

I had a friend who called me once, freaking out because her baby was coming early. I was at a loss, no checklist chart in front of me, instead, enjoying a sunny summer afternoon tending my flowerbeds. But I got her through it, talked her down as she drove her panicked self to the hospital.  Not two years later, that same friend, needing me early one morning while I stood in my kitchen making pancakes. Her daddy had died. I dropped to my knees. Any time she calls me now, my stomach plummets.

These days, I take calls of a different manner. Three in the last year, that I can count without thinking about it. 

“Amy? You got a way of gittin’ ahold of John? His cows are out.”

“Amy, will you let Ira know his new Charlois cow is out again? It’s at the neighbors.”

“Amy? That guy that I bush hogged for last year or whenever it was, did he get cattle? Or the feller that bought that property next to him?”

“No, it’s the guy next to him.”

“Well, he’s got cattle out, they’re a-runnin’ up the middle of Mutton Holler. Can you get ahold of him?”

Whether I be standing behind the counter at high noon, selling fertilizer & grass seed, or home at six in the evening making peanut butter cookies, the calls come. I am information central. 

And really, it’s pretty comical when you think about it. Moo.