Jerry, The Bull

It's interesting to me that the older I get the more memories seem to pop up in my mind with little to no prompting. I was just posting one of my children's stories this morning and all of a sudden I thought of Jerry. Jerry was the biggest meanest bull ever, or so I thought when I was a little girl.

As I have said, we walked about a quarter of a mile to the highway where we caught the bus. I am beginning to think that I was a little wimp when I think back to those days.  I was afraid of mice, wasps in the outhouse but most especially Jerry.
Jerry was a Hereford bull. He had a white face and a red body and the meanest eyes this little girl had ever seen. He was big. Jerry would come running to the fence to greet us when we were walking down the driveway. In my little girl estimation it was not a greeting of "Hello, I am so glad to see you." It was more like, "Hey, you kids. If you get close enough I am going to eat you."

One day my dad came in the house and told mom that Jerry had gotten out of the fence. We needed to stay in the house until he and the neighbor man could get him back in the field. He was in a terrible hurry to not only get him back in the pasture, but to get the fence fixed. In my grownup mind our fences weren't the best. I can remember fence posts being tree limbs mixed in with regular posts.

Like most of my stories, they end up well. They got Jerry back in the pasture where he belonged, but here is the kicker. My dad said he needed help mending fences. My mom was way too busy baking for the grocery store and taking care of my little brother and probably a hundred other things, so dad took me along to hand him these little "U" shaped things that fastened the fencing to the posts. Yes, Jerry was watching our every move planning his next escape. I was terrified and kept telling my daddy that the fence was fixed good enough and that we should go back to the house.

I just Googled the proper name for those U shaped nails. They are called Fencing Staples. There are even YouTube videos explaining the correct way to use them. Nowadays they have a battery operated tool that farmers use instead of a hammer that often times missed the staple and hit my dad's thumb.That would have tickled my dad because he loved to invent things even up into his sixties.

Where Jerry got his name I will never know. We didn't know anyone named Jerry, but as time went by as it always does a baby Hereford calf came to live on an acreage that my husband Wally and I owned. I had gone to an auction. It was an adventure for me. He was a bottle baby that hated milk. I bought him for two dollars. He would drink milk replacer, but he never grew any taller than a mini horse. Of course, we named him Jerry after his fierce ancestor or as it was his mean namesake, because he too, was an escape artist and was often found in the house yard.

One day a Sears repair man had come out to do a maintenance check on my washer. Jerry, the little bull was very interested in the tools and parts in the back end of the van the technician was getting out. I saw what was happening and I said, "Jerry, get out of there. How many times do I have to take you back to the pasture?" The technician straightened up and there was Jerry; A Sears technician I worked with. We had a good laugh that day.
 Oh the memories continue to pop up. I'll probably see you soon with another.
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The picture of the bull is a Wiki picture, but in my mind's eye it resembles Jerry to a T.