Knock, Knock, KNOCK! I hear as I’m sitting in my cozy office working on Ebay at my computer. With a start, I move down the stairs thinking someone must have run out of the organic brown eggs we sell. I open the door with a wide smile of welcome only to come face to face with a LaPorte County sheriff’s deputy who is not smiling back (never a good sign!). My mind reflexively fills in the gaps, now what did No. 1 son do, Superfarmer Chad forget or (only as an afterthought) was there an accident and is everyone OK?
As we continue this dance, the first thing he asks is, “Do you own a donkey?” I think, “Oh no … Dunkay broke loose? And if he is loose, then where is Sparky and the Tank and the goats and the chickens…?!?” I quickly scan the field and start a head count … one, two, three … where’s Sparky? Heart drops.Sparky is the one animal not to have free due to a WHOO-HOO bye-bye stubbornness! The deputy continues with “There is a donkey running down the road, all gray,” and in relief I sigh “Whew ,,. mine is spotted.”
However, I still don’t see Sparky, and I ask the deputy whether he is sure it’s a donkey and not a mini-horse? With narrowing and increasingly fixed glare, he assures me it’s a donkey and he can tell the difference between the two. Another look in the field, and Sparky comes into sight … double whew! I don’t see Lincoln so I ask him another simple question, “Are you sure it’s not an Alpaca … he’s all brown and stands this tall (my hand motions up to the top of my head) and he’s…”
CUT OFF by the rolling of his eyes, teeth beginning to clench, he states firmly without a word spoken that he can tell the difference between a donkey and an Alpaca. In this moment, I look to make sure his hand isn’t on the gun with this crazy lady asking him if he knows the difference between donkeys, horses and Llamas and unwittingly bent on obstructing a police investigation! At this point, I realize, that somebody else for a change is chasing a large animal down the road and it is NOT one of ours! HALLELUJAH!
Like an angelic visitation, as quickly as he had come, the deputy vanished. Shaken, I decide to walk the fence just to make sure they don’t get any bright ideas if they had seen the transgressing donkey cousin running past our house. We later found out a neighbor down the road had reported a stray donkey and with certainty figured it came from Addie Acres.
