Category Archives: Tales

Bellowing At The Moon

It was a warm January evening in Williston. The Jenkins family was watching television in their living room. Shelby the family dog, was kicked back, enjoying his regular place at the end of the couch. Shelby was the only member who felt the low, rhythmic rumble, which was the only warning of the impending danger. He wandered from room to room, looking for the cause of the vibration as the rest of the family, engrossed in the T.V., hardly noticed his search.

As he climbed onto Jeremiah’s bed, to get a clear view of the side yard, Shelby saw the massive creature staring back at him through the glass. Being the well trained attack dog that he is, he sounded the alarm. Unfortunately, Shelby sounds the alarm quite often, he takes his job as family protector quite seriously and the rest of the family ignored his first warning, thinking that it was merely the killer rottweiler from across the street. Little did they know just how wrong they were.

Shelby glanced frantically towards the living room where the stares of the rest of the family were focused on the television. He changed the tone of his bark, he bounced on the bed, he yelled, “HELLO!”, but nothing worked.

It was then that the creature through the glass made his move around the front comer of the house and out into the front yard. Shelby countered by diving off the bed, doing a perfect somersault as he ran past the T.V. and rushing the front window while waving his front legs as if he were landing aircraft in the driveway.

This finally got the humans’ attention, but by this time Shelby was too out of breath to explain, so he simply pointed out the window. Jerimiah casually moved a curtain to peer out into the darkness. He, trying not to alarm his parents, in a voice sounding almost bored said, “Mom, there’s a cow in the front yard.” as if it were the most natural thing to have a cow staring in the front window.

Shelby was beside himself as well as in front, behind and on top of himself. The cow, which was actually a bull, was not impressed with the dog’s gymnastics and actually thought momentarily about testing the strength of the front wall of the house, as this had always been a secret fantasy of his but instead he settled for playing with the tailgate of the pick up in the driveway.

It is surprising how fast parents can gather when they realize that the absurd statement that was just made by their offspring might actually be true.

Well, I will not embarrass these fine people by explaining just how funny it looked to Shelby to see these humans running around trying to figure out what to do when your pick up is being attacked by a bull but just about the time they worked out a reasonable plan, the bull switched to the 5.0 Mustang parked in front of the pickup. This changed the plan drastically as Jesse, the father, and Jeremiah, the son, spearheaded an unarmed attack on the husky marauder. This proved to be futile as the bull decided that people might be fun to play with, too, hence proving that two full sized men can go through a normal sized doorway at once. No one is quite sure how many times these two brave souls proved this, but let’s just say, they have no doubts about it.

Much that comes next is merely a blur, so I will not try to do a play-by-play. I will, however, tell you that when called and informed of this dangerous beast, the Williston Police Department responded in a timely manner by calling the owner of the bull, who instantly sent his brother-in-law to subdue the wrong doer. This he accomplished by letting the bull play with his tailgate, (on his truck), whilst he led the beast home.

As difficult as it is to believe that this happened right here in our quiet little city of Williston, it is completely true. Okay, so it’s mostly true, I’m allowed to dress it up a little. There was a bull, there was a dog, there was a Jenkins family. I admit, the dog might have polished up his part a little but who can blame him?