My whole family went to the Reynolds Beef Farm to pick out my calf. It would be my first year showing a steer in the Wabash County 4-H Fair, and I was excited, even though my older brothers, Derrick and Darren, had warned me not to get too attached. “It’s not a dog,” they’d said. I’d nodded and agreed as I thought up possible names for my calf. I had a two-page list of them on yellow legal-pad paper, which I kept folded in my big World Book Dictionary.
We rode in the used station wagon Dad had bought with money he’d made working overtime at the ceiling-tile factory. It was 1978, and at the age of ten I could barely contain my glee at the idea of having my own animal to raise and dote on. Derrick and Darren had already found theirs, but mine would come from a farm two counties over and require a delivery. The Crandells participated in 4-H the way we did everything: bargain hunting, doing odd jobs, and keeping costs and desires to a minimum. I’d saved some money, and my dad had matched it, helping me track my balance in a credit-union bankbook. One hundred and seventy-five dollars seemed to me the kind of money a man would have when he asked a woman to marry him.
