E-I-E-I-O No Neal Wooten
David Perea is an old friend from Fort Payne who I hung out with in our much younger and much wilder days. You may remember when his family owned Perea’s Carpet in town. David still installs carpet, hardwood, tiles, and other types of flooring, but he has another interest these days too. He, his wife, and sons own Red Boat Farm.
It is the quintessential small old-fashioned heritage farm with tractors, gardens, barns, and all the animals a farm svhould have: turkeys, pigs, cattle, Guineas, chickens, goats, ducks, and donkeys. They often post pictures and videos of their animals, who they have named, especially when they have some new babies. All of his friends love it.
Many times I have watched his videos and found myself smiling at the relationship they have with their animals. Soon I find myself thinking how wonderful it must be to live on a farm. That’s when my brain swings an imaginary hand, which smacks me on the back of my head, and I think, “Oh wait, I did live on a farm.”
We had 30 acres and about 20 of that was a hog pasture. At our peak we had about 100 hogs, but we only named the meanest and scariest ones, mostly for our protection. It was just easier to yell, “Here comes Meanie” than to yell, “Here comes that big sow who will try to bite your rear end off.” The rest I simply referred to by a variety of four-letter words.
I detested everything about raising pigs from castrating new males to ringing noses. I also came to realize that not only were they the most stubborn animal on the planet, they were quite possibly the smartest. As Cliff Clavin explained on Cheers, if pigs had thumbs you could train them to do manual labor, and after 30 years on the workforce, at their retirement dinner you could eat them.
But the battles that would scar me for life, both physically and psychologically, were not the ones with the swine, but rather the ones with the barbed-wire and electric fences. I got shocked so many times by that fence that to this day I cannot stand even the mildest of electrical currents. I once tried those muscle stimulator devices and screamed like I was sitting in the electric chair.
In fact, I had a date recently and the lady informed me that if I was to get out of line, she was packing both a gun and a Taser. I looked her in the eye and said, “I would never not be a gentleman, but in case that was to happen, please use the gun.”