Summary

The Cows

One of the longer short stories in the collection, this is a stream of consciousness observation about the narrator’s neighbor’s cows. There are three, initially, and then two of the cows have calves. The taller, older cow does not have a calf because she was too stubborn to get into the van to go to the bull to be bred. Then, when the neighbors decided she should go to the butcher, instead, they still couldn’t get her in the van, so she had just stayed…the farm’s matriarch.

The narrator discusses in detail the various ways in which she watches the cows and in all types of seasons, remembering one winter when the neighbor boys decided it would be great fun to throw snowballs at...