Moonlight on Cows

Word Count: 590 words

Amy tosses her stack of chipboard children’s books onto her bed. She has her favorites. Pictures are always the deciding factor. Some of the pictures are not realistic and look like something even she could draw with her box of crayons.

Mother comes into her room and stretches herself out on top of the bedspread.

“Which one are we going to read tonight, Pumpkin?”

“They are all boring,” whines Amy, flipping her hands through the pile.

“That’s because they are all in the Animal Genre,” said her mother.

“What’s a John Ray?”

Her mother hesitates. Why did she say that to a five-year-old? At eight o’clock at night? How to explain; when her head hurts and she still has two more chapters to write tonight?

“It’s a story that fits in a special box called a Genre.”

Her mother spreads the books out and shows Amy all her books are about animals.

“See, if we had three boxes, one for people, one for machines and one for animals, in which box would all of these books belong?”

Amy sighs. “I get it. They would all go in the Animal box.”

“But I like Animals,” declares Amy, holding up her favorite book, entitled MOONLIGHT ON COWS. She runs her fingers over the beautiful watercolor pictures.

Mommy wants to take the easy way out at this point and just read the silly book again for the umpteenth time. Instead she digs deep for the teachable moment and says, “But you know what? All the animal books could go in different boxes if the animals ‘moooved' out of the barnyard and went on different adventures.”

Amy giggled at her mother’s joke. She was beginning to catch on to adult jokes. Her mother hugged her and kissed the top of her head. Then tried to explain.

“Minerva the Cow could travel in a space ship to the moon to find out where the Moonlight comes from. Then the book would be in the Science Fiction Genre.”

“I know about SciFi, that’s Star Wars stuff and video games like Jason and Daddy play.”

“That’s right! You’re beginning to catch on.”

“What else can Minerva do?”

“She could fall in love with the Boy Bull in the next pasture and get married and have a baby.”

“That’s what your stories are about, isn’t it Mommy? I know what those are called! They are called Romance stories. Is that a genre?”

“Now you’ve getting it kid.”

Amy feels proud. “What other John Ray box could Minerva jump into?”

“She could see her friend fall in a hole and get her leg stuck. And she has to find the farmer fast and save her friend. That genre would be called Suspense, because it asks the question: Will Minerva be able to save her friend’s life?”

“Ohhh, that one sounds fun. I want to read that book. You need to write that book Mommy.”

“Maybe you should write that story yourself, tomorrow.”

Her mother looks at the bedside clock and says they have had their story time for tonight and it was called Genre. Amy agrees that she liked the Genre story and she wants to help Minerva save her friend’s life tomorrow.

As her mother walks down the hall into her computer room, thinking about those next two chapters she has to write before she can go to bed, she hopes Minerva the Cow is never the main character in a Horror genre, headed for the slaughter house. Some Genres aren’t suitable for five-year-olds.