Holy Cow

21 LET’S GO: TURKEY

Finally I had my route to the city plotted out. Jerry, I mean Shalom, was a pain in the tuchus, but he was proving to be pretty helpful with logistics. I have to admit, Shalom is pretty smart. One night, about three days before Jerry and I were gonna make a break for it, I was just standing, thinking about life in India and how much fun it would be to be worshipped as a god, when I heard a very strange noise by the barn door, a kind of shuffling and a gargling sound, like somebody was simultaneously trying to swallow a bunch of marbles while saying the word marble. Certain sections of the barn were lit where the windows let the moon in, and whatever it was was walking, or maybe strutting is a better word, to a spot on the ground where I could see who it was. A turkey.

Now, we cows don’t know the turkeys well at all. They are kind of kept in an area away from us. Sometimes we pass them on the way out to pasture, but we rarely talk. They’ve always struck me as really nervous, the kind of nervous that wears out your sympathy and just ends up making you nervous too, so you avoid it, and them. But I couldn’t avoid this turkey ’cause he was walking right at me.

TURKEY

Are you Q, the cow formerly known as Elsie Bovary?

ELSIE

Who wants to know?

TURKEY

The name is Turkey, Tom Turkey.

Now, he said this the way “Bond, James Bond” says it, so I really had to stifle a laugh. I acted like I had a chicken feather in my throat.

TOM

Meleagris gallopavo, Mama-san. Not to be confused with Numida meleagris, the helmeted guinea fowl. You okay there, little lady? ’Cause I totally know the Heimlich maneuver.

ELSIE

No, no, I’m good, I’m good.

(As he got closer, I could tell this turkey didn’t take care of himself. He was rail-thin and his feathers were all uncombed, flying off in every direction. Even so, he seemed a bit vain and impressed with himself, and walked with the confident strut of a pimp from a ’70s blaxploitation movie.)

TOM

I guess right about now, you’re asking yourself, “Self, what is that gorgeous hunk of turkey man all about and why is he pimp-rollin’ my lucky way?”

ELSIE

No. Not even close.

TOM

C’mon, baby, let’s be real.

ELSIE

I was wondering when was the last time that little flightless bird had a meal. Boy oh boy, you are thin.

TOM

Thank you for noticing.

ELSIE

I’ve got some slop here the pigs left and some chicken feed the chickens didn’t finish.

And with that, the natural nerves of the turkey overwhelmed him, and he lost all semblance of pimp-roll bravado, reacting to the food the way Dracula does to a cross.

TOM

Keep that food away from me! Are you insane?

ELSIE

What? You just looked like you could use a meal, is all. You look terrible.

TOM

I’m all muscle, baby girl. All muscle, gristle, and bone.

TOM struck a muscleman pose, the “archer.”

ELSIE

You should eat. And don’t call me “baby girl.”

TOM

I can’t eat.

ELSIE

Why not?

TOM

’Cause I’ll get fat.

ELSIE

Oh, you’re one of those anorexics! I’ve heard about that. Or bulimic. Or body dysmorphic disorder. Are you a duck trapped in a chicken trapped in a turkey’s body? A turducken? Which is it now?

TOM

None of that! I’m totally compos mentis in the cabeza. You got it all wrong; I’m not a jive turkey. November is just a few months away!

ELSIE

And what happens in November, you fly south and wanna look good in your mankini? Oh wait, you can’t fly…

TOM

Do I have to spell it out for you? The fourth Thursday of every November-Thanksgiving!!! Everyone in America, we are talking millions of people, will eat a turkey. Millions of us get slaughtered every year on one black day!!!

ELSIE

That sucks, but at least it’s only one day.

TOM

That’s why I’m all skinny. I’m hoping they’ll look at me and think, “That ain’t no drumstick.”

ELSIE

Good plan. Good luck with that.

TOM

I need more than luck. And I have an actual plan.

ELSIE

Oh geez… here we go…

TOM

I hear you have a map.

You try keeping a secret on a farm. Impossible. They don’t say “gossiping like hens” for nothing. I shoved the map over to the bird. He unrolled it with his beak. I was impressed with his dexterity.

TOM

Right here.

I looked where he was beaking-seemed like around the Middle East again. Seemed like everything always led back to the Middle East.

ELSIE

Iraq?

TOM

Not Iraq. Turkey!!!

ELSIE

Yes, that’s right, Turkey is the name of a country.

TOM

Yes, and do you think for a moment that they are going to eat the thing their country is named after? That’s my country, those are my peeps. I’ll be like royalty over there-instead of being on a hero, I will be a hero! They may make me king. My name is on all the money. I’ll be rich as Croesus. I gotta get to Turkey!! And, just as an aside, however we get there, can we not go through that country called Hungary? It sounds like a nightmare for all of us. Just the name makes me shiver: Hungary. And all the scary, hungry Hungaryarians that live there.

ELSIE

Okay, I concede you have a point, Turkey, but I’m already traveling heavy with a pig at my side that I gotta get to Israel. A bird is just gonna slow me down even more, and what’s more, you’re a flightless bird. You’re a bird that can’t fly. You’re an oxymoron.

TOM

Hurtful. Calling me a moron.

ELSIE

I said “oxymoron.”

TOM

Any kind of moron. Just hurtful.

ELSIE

I got no time for niceties.

TOM

Okay, but what if I added value to the enterprise, rather than subtracted? Because that’s what I’m all about-being additive, not subtractatative…

ELSIE

What are you getting at?

And I didn’t know where he pulled it out from, ’cause turkeys don’t have any pockets, but in the slivered moonlight, he was pushing toward me what was clearly a cellular phone, exactly the thing I’d been coveting for the journey.

ELSIE

Impressive. But it’s of no use to me. I can’t work it with these hooves and neither can Jerry, er, Shalom.

TOM

Check it.

I swear that cheeky turkey was winking at me. And with that, he began pecking at the phone like a high school girl at 3:01. He had the weather, he had On-Star, Uber, even Siri was at his whim. I swallowed a gasp, tried to cover my glee, and said-

ELSIE

You’re in.