Herman The Cow [LMU Short Story]

LMU B.A.Religious Studies – EN110: Language & Style – Essay #8 – Fall 1976

Notes and essays from my first college English course, much here is cringe-worthy. At the same time, I find it interesting where my mind would wander to when I was given deadlines. After getting positive responses from my professor, this was my first experience writing for an audience (of one). Enjoy (2023-11-16)

Thesis Statement: The child-like individual, though sometimes unconsciously, will be the victor.

In an undisturbed valley, below the west slope of the majestic…um… the towering…um …well, the quaint San Bernardino mountains, a small herd of cattle was grazing. Among the cattle v/as a bouncy young calf named Herman. Now while he was not one of the more intelligent of those in the herd, Herman nonetheless had learned to enjoy life and to bear with the pressures of its day to day routine.

It was a day like any other v/hen Herman ran into Sam, the snail. Herman had been feeding on tall slender blades of grass very contentedly, letting his taste-buds become involved with every inch of each green morsel, when his monstrous nose touched a small pebble like object. Thinking that it was just a pebble, or maybe even an unfortunate rubber ball left by some sojourner’s son, Herman began to playfully push the small hard object about the tall blades of grass. His fun, however, v/as soon interrupted by a loud — “Hey you! What do you think you’re doing?”

The startled Herman looked up to see who it was that was calling him. Finding nobody, Herman returned to his game, only to find that his “pebble” had grown feelers and a slimy body and was now yelling at him, “I said, what do you think you’re doing, you foolish cow!”

“Well, I… I…” Herman staggered to find the words, “I… I was just…”

“You were just what?! I’ll have you know that you’re not pushing around just any snail. I’m Sam, the wor…”

“Oh, hi Sam. I’m Herman.”

“Listen cow…”

“Herman, my name’s Herman.”

“Listen, HERMAN, you’d better watch what you’re doing. I’ll have you know that you’re talking to the winner of the hundred-meter dash in the I965 Olympics.”

“YOU!? No way!” Herman said while he shook his head like a little boy being forced to eat something that he didn’t want to.

“What do mean,’No. way’?”

“I mean no “way!” The two continued to argue for the better part of an hour. Finally Sam said, “Alright, I’ll prove it to you. I’ll race you from here to that barbed-wire fence over there. But you’re gonna have to give me a fifteen yard head-start.”

“Hum, I… Hey wait a minute, from here to there fifteen yards.”

“You can’t blame a guy for trying.”

“Huh?”

“Well if we’re going to race,” Sam continued, “we’ll have to decide what type of timing system we’ll need. Now we can use an electronic system or just stopwatches. I think’– no, but I — let’s see.” As Sam began to weigh the virtues of an electronic system over a stopwatch, Herman’s mind clouded as to what exactly it was that Sam wanted to prove. “…In the event of ah tie,” the snail continued, “we’ll need some sort of ah committee to make the final decision for who wins. Now let’s see should their tables be round or square. Hum—m, may-be we should form a committee to decide that too.” Sam got so involved with the planning stage that he forgot all about Herman, who was just about to fall asleep.

“Hum—m,” Sam began to devise loopholes in the rules that would assure him victory. In the meantime, Herman’s body began to sway because, you see, it’s hard for cows to sleep standing up. His swaying didn’t continue for long though. The bored cow was soon lying on his side in the tall green grass — the tall green grass that unfortunately hid the home of some very vicious red ants. The vicious beasts wasted no time in making Herman’s hide into a pin cushion. Just as Sam finished the final draft of the rules (he had written five different versions), the once dormant cow violently awoke, and aimlessly darted across the open field with a host of red carnivores falling off his back as he went.

As the dust began to settle over the once peaceful valley, the confused snail peered over the trampled grass that Herman had left in his wake. And just as he lost sight of the cow he shouted, ” I DIDN’T SAY GO !!”

Moral 1: The child-like individual, though sometimes unconsciously, will be the victor.

Moral 2: Don’t play with innocent looking pebbles or snails.

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