Neighbors

The golden rule of purchasing any kind of real estate is “Location, location, location”. When we did our mini-tour of the Greenville-to-Clinton “golden mile”, we looked at homes from the “downtown” area to the “unibomber” area in the countryside. When we narrowed the search to basically one house, it came down to the location. We were in what we had read was a good school district (realizing that “good” is a relative term in South Carolina since the state ranks pretty low on the scale of education, and by low I mean we’re #1 and not in a good way) and the house was backed up to acres and acres of farmland. Although the lot size was not really what I had in mind, the fact that we didn’t have a backyard that looked into the back windows of someone else’s house, it was a good thing for us and made the location better than just about anything else we had seen.

The acres of farmland aren’t for growing crops (or making moonshine….as far as we know), it’s for raising cattle. Not dairy cattle but the cattle that ends up on my plate and tastes delicious when cooked properly. I don’t know if it is Angus beef but I suspect it’s not Kobe beef since I have yet to see anyone massaging the cows. Living next to the cattle farm has it’s pros and cons.

On the pro side;
· We have a good view out of the back of the house. No looking into the neighbor’s house and no neighbors looking into our house.

On the con side;
· Something we should have figured out on our own but we didn’t consider it when purchasing the home. Cows have a certain, how should we say it, odor that isn’t really the most pleasant smell in the world. Now I am sure for the farmer, it is the smell of money but for us….it’s the smell of poo (to steal the word from Mike Rowe).
· The morning cow alarm. I never realized how much noise the cows make but they seem to feel that it is their job to ensure everyone is awake by 7:30am. No rooster….no problem. They decide it’s time for them to “Moo” and do it rather loudly. Oddly enough there is a lot of different ways that this is done.
o There is the cow the sounds like a train coming “MMooooooOOOOOO”
o There is the cow that just stubbed his toe (and for the record, yes I know they don’t have toes) “MMMMMMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAHHHHHH!”
o There is the small squeaky cow, “mmmOOOOoooo”
o The Barry White cow, “m-m-m-o-o-o(baby)”
o The baby cow, “moo” (short and sweet)
o The hungry cow “MmMmMmOoOoOo”
o The cow alarm, “moo……moo…..moooo”

Don’t get me wrong, we enjoy the house and having our neighbors but there are times when they get on your nerves. Now they do make up for the cons with the baby cows running around and playing together and watching them “run” to the farmer’s truck whenever he drives out to the field to drop something off.

There is one other situation that makes one a little nervous about the bovines in the backyard. In the early morning hours, when it’s a little foggy outside one cannot help but think about Stephen King when you hear the echoes of the cows grazing in the pasture and mooing as they find just the right spot to settle down for breakfast.

They just appear out of the haze and start to do what they do but you just get the feeling on those days that the cows are about to hop the electrified fence and come charging through the home on a murderous rampage. They just stand there, chewing the grass, staring at you but you can envision their eyes turning red as they continue to advance towards the house. Quick kids in the car! Oh No, someone has pulled the distributor cap from the engine (looking out the back window you see a cow chewing on the wires like a patch of nice tall grass). “Cooking steak will ya!?! Eat this t-bone!!!! How about another serving?” I don’t know, maybe it’s just me reading too many Stephen King novels. I am certain there is something that could come from this, Cattle of the Corn, Steak through the Heart, Stampede….

Anyhow, I digressed a little. It’s no different than 100 decisions we make every day in life but when purchasing a home, you’ve got to think much longer term and it’s so much more money there is a lot more pressure to get it right. If you can ensure that the Pros outweigh the Cons, chances are that you’ll get along fine (as long as you know the cons beforehand). We’re happy where we are but we wish the cows would give us another 30-60 minutes to sleep in on the weekends. I’ve put steaks on the grill with them watching to send a message but I don’t think that cows are necessarily the smartest animals on the planet and are able to put together that the sizzle and smell in the air is Maybelle who took a ride yesterday and hasn’t come back yet (she must be on vacation in Florida). Stupid cows!

I guess the bottom line is that I’ll take a bunch of smelly and noisy cows as my backyard neighbors instead of a family of clean and hygienic people. Now what does that say about me?