The Dairy Of Desire

Dairy - 1964

In the west, especially among ranchers, kids were commonly farmed out as labor for starvation wages and no wages at all. It
was common for a ranch experienced kid to spend nearly as much time growing up with neighbors, other ranches, perhaps to pay
back favors, as it was living at home. Kids were considered free labor, born to it. It was simply the way of growing up in
the ranch kid experience. It was not common, however, for this to happen to a farm work naive private religious schooled city
kid who was completely unpinned from any real farm experience or worldly raw life in general for that matter.

This particular young man, me, just eight days eighteen years old, had just graduated from parochial high school in a
ceremony the night before 100 miles north in the city. I was to be working a dairy job for the summer arranged by my
newspaper editor father who had farmed me, labor out, with his connections in agriculture. The wonder of it was why a dairy
farmer would need or could use a kid like me versus someone with experience. My dad must have had some real influence.

The trip end farewell at the dairy was unceremonious and brief. My father drove off leaving me with my heavy duffel bag in a
strange place looking forward to a hike up a lonely country road toward a single light burning about a half mile away. The
sun was getting low and the farmer's wife pointed me in the right direction. Off I trudged with my load toward a reluctant
goal up the gradual rise of a lonely shoulderless country road.

My dad and I had little to talk about during the 100 mile drive south and we normally had little to talk about anyway. We
were not close. He was an elderly father with an obsession for newspaper work and little time for me. At 37 years of age he'd
married an eighteen year old beauty, a farm girl, my mother, the daughter of a farm family well connected politically and by
my teen years he'd become a stern old very judgmental patriarch. I was the baby of the family.

I had developed caution growing up in his house because he was an arch journalist, a gatherer of strictly qualified facts,
good sources, and I was expected, as a kid, to back up everything I said with the same. I'd learned not to attempt to start a
conversation if I could avoid it. My battered self image was bleeding, already near death, but his was the old style of
family overlord rule. It was supposed to harden you against the vagaries of life. It hadn't, really. But it did make me
afraid of encounters with others. I was a bonafide seasoned introvert.

For a kid finding summer work was hard and this farm job was an opportunity to get away from a family which was pretty
overbearing and stymieing for my desire of freedom. I'd take my chances and I was scared, hopefully a minor delay in my
obsession to run away further by working at a dairy which I imagined as Bossy the well mannered cow and lots of clean milk.

It was a cool late May evening ending a warm clear sky day and not a single car passed by as I walked along the completely
deserted shoulder-less narrow road. I felt a bit like an abandoned kid who had been left with nothing but his thoughts and
not really having a clue about the present. Truth be known, I was far more life-naive than most kids my age and it would use
its leverage both for and against me.

But after introductions at the farm house the dairy man's young and imported German wife had taken me aside to explain
things. She was the only person who seemed to care how I might have had some inhibitions about my strange new surroundings
and seemed intent on describing the crew who inhabited the bunk house where I was headed. "They are sweet-gentle folk who
happen to be quite different and are borrowed help from a local state run school for the retarded, four men of various ages,
the intelligence of pre teens. They are very innocent and they are shy but you'll get used to them. Just remember they are
men but have little boy minds."

My attention stopped short on pondering men with little boy minds lurking in a place where I was going to be sleeping soon as
she explained how later I would get to meet one of the other help, a girl, "who is also very sweet and cute. You're going to
like her and she is very bright. We have lots of help and you are going to fit right in, just fine." Her eyes were focused on
mine, intently, almost questioning for a reaction to what she'd just told me. It was almost as if she expected me to react
negatively and I was too shy to train my gaze on her although she seemed so sincere. It kind of scared me, she, a stranger,
who seemed to be assuming my trust as if she already knew me. But she was quite beautiful.

As she talked, my father, the dairy owner and the agriculture extension agent who rode with us from the nearest town were off
discussing something, the three of them standing among the parked farm equipment filling what would have been a home's front
yard in a city setting. I stood by the house with the wife while balancing my duffel bag, listening to her, nervously
pondering my future as my only connection with home was getting ready to drive away. My last chance to bail out of this farm
job idea was drawing near and as I was gathering facts listening to the wife I was finding little reason to stay. I was lying
to myself like I was not more afraid, apprehensive about "sweet and gentle folks" with little boy minds in a bunk house where
I was bound with no formal introduction. Then again, I was by nature simply scared, as usual. And I knew if I did quit on the
summer job option so soon I'd have to shoulder my dad's scorn as I rode back to the city. I didn't want to be called a
quitter.

Wary -- it was just how I was expected to confront on my own these strange and "sweet" men.

"It's hard to explain" she continued, "but you won't have any trouble understanding once you get used to the boys and the
other help; you're going to love them." Loving them seemed to be a bit assuming.

She smiled at me standing closer with a definite air of expectation as though I was understanding what she meant. I wasn't,
hardly at all. It was all way out of my league and parochial kids used the term "retarded" to mock each other. I nodded my
head, a jerky yes and smile, timidly I'm sure backed by a helping of fright. I was trying desperately to cling to a youthful
retreating and inexperienced male macho and I stepped back clumsily grabbing at a falling duffel bag in an effort to back
away from her advances as she kept trying to insert herself in my circle of comfort.

She was giving me just a little warning to both create and ease my fears. She seemed to enjoy the telling as if she might be
anticipating my scared response with a hint of teasing. Yet she seemed like a cheer leader giving a pep talk as if she
sincerely didn't want me to leave and go home. She read my anxiety intuitively by understanding my nervous fears and I sensed
her overzealous desire to see me stay. It was an odd thing since we'd only just met. She shouldn't have cared or known
anything about me and she was hard to comprehend with what I assumed was a broken English German accent.

I sensed the situation was at odds with itself and it was confusing. I was a painfully shy nerdy city kid who had suddenly
been dropped into what seemed like wild vastly human non populated country only to have her attempts at soothing words not
really console what already seemed frightening. With at best very little idea about what she was trying to explain and
attempting to understand her accent I was about to step off on my own to spend a night sleeping with complete strangers who
apparently were not ordinary, but "sweet and gentle", supposedly. I would have to trust what she was telling me as the truth
about the safety of the situation.

As I noted what gave me pause about the slightly odd although attractive appearance of the wife I watched my father and the
extension agent climb back into his Ford, to guide the car back out through the farm equipment on to the county road and
drive away leaving me with my new employer, a man who didn't seem to have two words or thoughts to share with me. As they
drove away the farmer gave me a once over blank look, came close and circled while examining, then turned and signaled his
wife, nodding at her to follow as they walked into the house leaving me standing all alone on my own.

I had very little connection to the soil in my city experience but because of extended family farmers I wasn't totally naive
about farm work. But I really had little idea what I was getting into by being labor on a dairy. I knew what a cow was
because of the steers my grandfather raised but milk cows were another concept of the four legged beasts. Luckily, I really
liked milk.

Ahead of my walk a light burned out front, road side to a large building complex rising up square cornered, flat roofed in
the dimming sunset west. Its silhouette stood structure stark square on the round of a rise, not quite a hill. Completely
alone as far as the eye could see it looked very uninviting quite unlike the romantic image I held of a quaint New England
hip roof dairy barn adorning a picturesque post card. It just felt oddly wrong for some reason. Dairy farms were supposed to
be cute and quaint; this was just plain ugly and cold like a dirty factory.

The dairy buildings housed everything the operation included and were surrounded by wide open hay fields spreading out
descending east behind my walk's direction to what seemed like the very base of the tall huge famous snow clad mountain, a
sleeping volcano dominating the cascading mountain range. The whole scene surrounding me was totally amazing and yet the
scared kid in me was more concerned about walking west to confront the "sweet - gentle folk" who lurked in a bunk house with
little boy minds.

As I got closer to the building complex I knew the bunk house doors entered just under the single lit bulb. Large weathered
concrete stairs led up to the top of a loading dock where the doors cocked ill fit with weird light leaking through cracks
here and there. The dirty, some broken, pane windows out front were blacked out with sagging-dirty threadbare drapes inside.
I didn't want to go in but what choice was there short of sleeping out in the cold in a place now growing dark, well after
sunset. My dad, my ride, long gone on the 100 mile trip back home, I was now committed to stay.

I heard a coyote cry in the distance but didn't have the experience to understand what the weird sound was. It just seemed to
add to the ambiance of the lonely dismal place so far away from home. I thought about my graduation the night before and how
I'd just made it through senior requirements with a weak 'C' average. School was a bore. I'd not made much of it. I felt my
life vacuum creeping up on me as I walked into an empty, scary but ripe-rich tangy smell cow poop future.

To describe myself at 18 as shy is a huge understatement. This type of confrontation, meeting strangers, was the one thing in
life I feared most. I always loathed presenting myself in a strange place situated in the city let alone far away in the
wilds of back country, sunlight getting dim, cold and mysterious, smelling intensely bad like being bathed in overwhelming
ripe cow manure juice you could actually taste. I was going to share a big open room with strangers and I would have to drop
my pants among them. The overwhelming sense of all of this was a rush of bewilderment.

My prying eyes were reluctant to pry too hard, to see the resident strangers in the interior of my new home although my
youthful curiosity was a mind rush. I was really wanting to know who I was going to be living with but I also didn't want to
have to speak to anyone. No spoken confrontation with sweet and gentle folks, not just yet please.

My mind flashed back to my youthful obsession with the black and white TV cowboys during the early days of television. The
Lone Ranger and Cisco Kid knew "The Bunk House" was a happy place made up in a rustic southwest California ranch style. What
lay before me in my sundown approach was a cracked concrete monolith with a dirty rundown institutional look, an abandoned
factory, slums, not the least bit homey or inviting. Its constitution was bad enough to really wondered if there actually was
anybody inside.

I stopped at the top of the steps on the loading dock landing in front of the double doors and noted more decay which
reaffirmed the fact this place was pretty awful. I took a deep breath and opened one door. Curious, I realized a soft
phosphorescent light inside was not only the single light source in the room but was also from an old black and white
television. I stepped in.

A quick scan around saw four figures scattered in the big shadowy bay sitting and laying on old hard mattress surplus World
War Two metal army beds. The people seemed not to notice me at all as I placed my belongings on the only bed left unoccupied
and thankfully the one closest to the doors. I sat down waiting for my eyes to adjust and trying to casually observe who was
with me in my new home while the occupants continued to ignore my entrance and presence.

I knew the type of mattress well as I sat on it because it was war surplus like the beds at my grandparents home, ones we boy
cousins used to sleep on. They are not as hard as rocks but were a fairly good representation of concrete with buttons and
cord tying the mattress together. Those buttons came loose and gave the night perspective. They stuck out to poke at the
sleeper and you wound your body between them in search of comfort. I'd spent a lot of summer nights on just such mattresses
to wake up and look for two pronged spider bites the following morning. I found little comfort to hinge on in this bit of
familiarity doused in a cow poop odor rich environment. At least my grandparents house didn't smell like crap.

I recognized the old television at the far end of the room, one like we'd had at home years before and it was a Sylvania
Halo, a bit more familiarity which tried to win me over from my anxious arrival. The TV was a big heavy wood box built like
an ancient Magnavox record player console. This one had glass in front of the TV tube, the deluxe model. It was storing up
dead flies now deep enough to obscure about a fifth of bottom viewing portion. Behind the flies played a local wrestling
match which originated in the nearest city. I'd watched those matches as a kid years before. It might have been comforting in
some sense except the person sitting immediately in front of the TV was cooing oddly, rocking back and forth rhythmically,
perhaps even masturbating in a slowing pall as evidenced by well placed hand action. That didn't make me comfortable and used
denial to let it bother me more.

Then, my next realization. My eyes had adjusted to note the bunk house was a shambles of habitation with total disarray and
frankly, filth. There was no particular order to the beds and only one light straight overhead was hanging on bare wires in
the middle of the ceiling and maybe didn't work anyway. The walls were covered in a combination of browning faded coverings
partially peeling away in spots. Nobody seemed to care enough to rip away the loose tails as they lay pendant hanging from
the bottoms of large rips. The floor was littered and dirty concrete visually combining all the earthy tone with a permeating
odor of fresh cow manure. It seemed to be everywhere. I was now home in a very foreign environment experience. I
instinctively tucked in my arms to avoid getting anything on me. I'd seldom, if ever, been in a place so uniquely dirty and
now I was going to have to sleep in it with strangers who were ignoring my existence and were mentally deficient.

It was no warmer inside than it was outside and I didn't ponder taking any clothes off in the chill. The evening following a
warm Spring day had turned pretty cold. I had thrown the two available old army blankets over me, my clothes and shoes left
on, all to guard against my fears and ick. I kept my watch in the direction of my closest bunk mate with my glasses on,
something I'd never ponder doing if I was still at home.

I glanced back to the lone awake figure who was watching television and for a moment blinked to recognize a gender. Unable to
determine it, because of apparent softness of features, I assumed nothing to keep my thoughts to myself, to wait until
morning for a new day.

Surrounded with filth, tangy odors of shit, and individuals whose spirits were those of little boys, I somehow fell asleep,
amazingly. But it was a very short sleep. An old clock radio went off at 3 A.M. frequency set between too distant stations
waving in and out volleying for presence and never making any sense. People began to rise out of bed without saying a word as
the radio kept up its banter of noise and nobody attempted to tune it in, out or off.