* Please note – slight dramatization for this post and this post only.*
This session started like most of my sessions … all smiles, happy faces & greetings of “how are you? Nice to meet you!” etc.
We arrived at the farm where the session was to take place, smiled as we looked around the glorious country side, sighed a big sigh and listened to the sweet birds sing. How nice it was to get away from the city, one of the family members mentioned. Yes, indeed. Country life is the best, right?
Then … the barn doors opened and out came … the cows – a large, restless herd of black cows …
“Oh, don’t worry about them,” said the sweet older farmer, as he sat on his front porch, the least bit worried. “They won’t hurt you – just stay away from that big one – the bull.”
The bull?! A herd of cows AND a bull? Seriously?! I looked at Dana (my client and winner of the most easy going momma so far!) and shrugged.
“You afraid of cows??” I asked, trying to look easy, calm, cool and collected. I mean, I’m not afraid of cows, but a bull in the mix kinda changes things.
“Naww, it’s all good. We wanted photos that take us back to our rural roots,” she smiled, politely, and took her little son’s hand tightly in hers, as she eyed the black cloud of cows in the distance.
She smiled. I smiled. Let’s do it, we agreed.
So off we went … opened the gate and the six of us began to cross through the cow field … while the herd of 50 black Angus beef cows eyed us up suspiciously from about 30 feet away … one of the cows snorted … a puff of cow steam blasted from his wet nose. Snot dripped from his nostrils. His eyes flared red and I swear he pawed at the dusty ground.
Okay, so that was the boss. The bull. The head honcho. The one to run from. We hustled a bit faster.
We walked, gingerly & quickly along the edge of the pathway, as far from the cows as we could go… all of us, trying to be calm and laugh it off, but all the while still knowing we were certainly easy targets for a herd of angry, mad cows if they so choose to chase us.
Finally, we reached the gate, opened it and scurried inside to the other side of the field – cow free at last. Thank you, sweet Lord.
So the session began … smiles, happy happy joy joy, tickles, cuddles, kisses, laughter … but the cows – angry and irritated with us – have now lined the fence along side where we were shooting the images and they were NOT impressed. Every two seconds you could hear one moo – or cry or moan or something. Not sure what it was, but they certainly were not happy and were making sounds that let us know we were not welcome to have a photo party in their field.
“There’s the bull,” said the dad, pointing towards the biggest, tallest, meanest and scariest look cow in the bunch. “I don’t think he’s too happy …”
But I kept shooting, slightly oblivious to how loud the cows were becoming …
Dana, don’t worry. We have good shots of you three – without the speech bubbles and the angry cow. Like this one.
And this one.
After after about 1/2 an hour, I realized the cows were NOT going to settle down with us there beside them, and I think it might have been scaring their little guy, Ethan, so we decided to switch fields …
.. where I had set up a delicate, summer tea party for their family …
You see, Dana is the owner of Tea Time Treats, in which she creates all sorts of delicious-ness and goodies …
… but it wasn’t long into the second part our session when we realized that we weren’t alone …
… those cows had made their way into a corrider that led straight to our field …
Did we have time for more cuddles & photos?
Nope! We decided this was our signal to depart …. as the cows sped up and approached the field, we quickly gathered up what we could … and THAT is when we realized the gate at the end of the corridor was really wide open (we weren’t sure up until that point!) and the cows most certainly KNEW their way directly into the field where we were having our tea party …. led by the mad, glaring bull, the herd of dark cows rumbled on towards us …
“Quick, you run Ethan to the car,” I yelled to Fraser, the dad, as I frantically grabbed teacups, cupcakes and lace tabeclothes into my arms, while juggling my camera on my shoulder and a vase of fresh peonies pressed against my six month pregnant belly … Dana quickly scooped up her treats while her older daughter grabbed what she could and ran back as fast as they could to the cars … Amber, her darling 12 year old daughter, eyed the gate – “They’re getting closer” she yelled ….
“QUICK, go run and close the gate before they get here!!!” Dana said, as we continued to gather up our supplies and props all while keeping an eye on how close the cows were getting …”RUN, AMBERRRRRRRRR< RUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
In all our 12 year old speed, Amber raced to the gate with only 40 feet between her & the herd of angry bovines … but much to our dismay and her fear (poor thing!), she couldn’t get the gate unwedged from the muddy ground … “It… won’t… shut!” she yelled at the top of her lungs!
“FORGET THE GATE!!!!!!!!” I screamed back to her. “RUN!!!!!! Run for the car! RUN for your LIIIIIIIIIFE!!!!!!!!”
So run she did. And run we did. As fast as we could while cupcakes smushed together and a tableclothes slipped frm my arms … and then whoooosh …… a gush of water … straight down my front and onto my skirt as I accidentally tipped the vase of peonies all over myself…. Dana turned to me …. her eyes, wide with fright and worry …
“YOUR WATER JUUUUUUUUUUUUST BROKE!!!!!!!!!” she gasped.
By this point, I couldn’t tell if I was peeing my pants with fright or laughter …. the cows are charging, her daughter is whipping across the poopy field as fast as she could, dad has slipped and fallen on a giant cow paddie taking their little guy down in the process and I was standing there, my arms full of camera, teacups, chandelier and chairs and was laughing. so. very. hard. “Not my water – the peonies spilled …!” I gasped, trying to fumble all my props back into place in my full arms and run on to exit the field.
And on we ran …. we jumped the rickety wooden fence and threw over the chairs and tables and landed on the other side with a HUGE sigh of relief … we were safe. Dirty. Wet. Sweaty. And laughing.
I couldn’t apologize enough to Dana and her family – cow pooh, a mad bull, herds of charging cows and endangering her daughter’s life. What kind of photographer was I?! Thankfully, Dana and her family just laughed as hard as I was laughing and graciously wiped the cow poo off their shoes and shins and said it was no problem … they actually said … they had FUN.
Seriously. Best clients EVER. And one session location I will be more cautious with in the future.
by Gigi
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