I love telling animal stories, I think it is one of the few things I am good at and I am always surprised by which ones touch people. Lulu’s Dilemma has struck a chord among animal lovers, who are generally very loving people and they identify with any animal in any kind of trouble and want to make it better. A lot of people are worrying about her.  As many of you know, I’ve had a struggle figuring out how to cope with one of the Internet’s curious stepchildren, unwanted advice. I have never really liked  advice, sometimes to my detriment. I like to figure things out myself, and I was always taught never to give advice unless it was asked for. I’ve always learned that fools don’t take advice and smart people don’t need it.

Sometimes, it is good to be wrong, that is just as important as being right, and it often teaches me even more. So I must know a lot by now.

Just a day ago, I announced that I was going to stop grumbling about all of the advice I get and accept it in the gracious spirit in which it is offered. This might have been one of those ideas I could have kept to myself.  I opened the floodgates (no pun intended) to a wave of unsolicited advice for me about Lulu. I don’t actually need advice, I am confident that Maria and I can solve this small farm problem ourselves. Next week a 20 foot tube and some gravel will replace the bog growing by the gate and Lulu can come over and so can we. Red loves leaping back and forth over the water like Rin Tin Tin and so do the sheep and Simon. Fanny crosses gingerly, Lulu is having none of it.

Any advice that begins with the words. “why don’t you just..” or “can’t you simply…” is not going to work for me. They don’t come from farmers or people with farms, there is nothing simple, cheap or easy here. And, of course, they don’t come from people who are anywhere near our flooded gate or rushing small stream. One reader was exasperated with my bovine confusion and asked me why I didn’t “just dump a bale of hay over the water” so Lulu would cross. A bale of hay would mix comfortably with mud and a running stream and either blog the flow or join and crate an even mushier mess than we now have. A hundred bales of hay wouldn’t soak up a running stream or make a bridge strong enough for a donkey, not to mention that hay bales cost $5 apiece and many things are cheaper, like gravel that lets the water run through it and can support great weight.

A number of others asked why I couldn’t “just move the gate.” Moving the gate involves pulling up deep fence posts, re-working the electric cables and attachments, and moving the fences and wires that are connected to the gate. Just moving the gate involves tractors, trucks, Todd Mason and a helper and a lot more money than a tube and some stones.

Others suggested enticing Lulu with grain or apples or my favorite, “just put a few planks down..” It would take a moored bridge to cross that water, and that is not a few planks nor a few bucks. It is a few thousand dollars at least if one is going to get a truck or tractor over it, which we will need to do. Lulu is not the only problem.

America is a curious country when it comes to problems, we think there are simple and easy solutions to everything, including illness, life and death and getting a donkey across some water. And there is this idea that if you write about your life on the Internet, then you are opening yourself up to advice. I see that is true, but I personally would not dream of offering advice to any stranger, especially one who had not asked for any. I wonder what it is about me that suggests I am too dumb to think of moving a gate or putting a few planks down. My great teacher, my farm, also knows that I am a dummy and scoffs at me all the time whenever I announced that fixing something here is simple and cheap. Maria is already wise to this curious construct. It is never simple. When you are on a farm and you have a problem involving animals, water, mud and fencing, you better stop and think about it and talk to people who know what they are doing, or you will really be in a pickle.

I’m sticking to my resolution to stop whining about advice, it is well-meaning, and whining won’t stop it.  I assure you that within a week or so Lulu, the donkeys and the sheep will be having a fine old time in our new pasture, devouring shrubs, leaves and tall, fresh grass.

I will keep you posted. It is, after all, what I do, and one reader pointed out that no matter what happens, I get a story out of it. Yes!