I don’t know if you have ever stopped by the road to say hello to cows, I do it all the time. I am fond of cows, they are gentle, curious and peaceful creatures, unlike most humans. They always come up to me, stare me in the eyes, look at my camera, wait patiently for me to explain myself.

I say hello and talk to them a bit. Dairy cows are used to humans, they are often around humans and at least on small farms, are often loved. Unlike most animals, they don’t know to run from humans, we rarely come with good bearings for animals. When small farmers owned dairy farms, cows lived about 12 years, on big farms they usually live three or four years.

They are replaced as soon as  younger cows who can produce more milk come available. This is the nature of things, cows have never been pets, really, they always been bred to feed humans one way or the other, and they are getting less intelligent as they are bred more for more production than anything else.

When I pull up to say hello to a cow, all I have to do is nothing. They come drifting over, check me out and wait. It is a meditation, a moment between human and animals, a sweet part of my life. I see cows every single day of my life, I would greatly miss them – they are soulful creatures – if they were gone.