Dorchester and Goats are two words that don’t go together!

Dorchester and Goats are two words that don’t go together.

 In the early days, while I was still courting Debbie, we were out for dinner and talking about our future. We staaahhhhted talking about where we would buy our first house. Debbie says emphatically “I want to own a house with land where I can keep my horse.”  I replied “Ouch that sounds expensive.”. I thought having a horse in Dorchester would be kind of cool. No one has a horse in Dorchester except for the Mounted police.  This conversation was the beginning of powerstruggle, a tit for tat , a time to establish the boundaries and who was in chahge.  I then said “Well,  I want children!”  She stated “Ouch, That sounds expensive.”  Point Debbie!  So we purchased our 1^st house in a  town south of Boston in the country called Lakeville.  Eight acres where the only gunfire was not a drive by but a neighbor trying to get dinner.  Next thing I know I am building a barn for the horse(S) and am driving a tractor and my friends are calling me “The Concrete Cowboy.”    It was a tough adjustment for me, leaving the doors open at night and a comfortable feeling that in the morning when I wake up my car would still be there.

All seamed good on the McGillivray ranch. My wife had begun her froot loop career, the amount of animals in the house was at an acceptable level and I had Direct TV with every sports package available…I guess you can call that “Pain Management” ….until it happened. Like when Kennedy was shot or when some significant event in history happens, I remember exactly where I was when Debbie came to me and told me she wants to rescue goats. Here comes the gray hair!  She was ready to respond to the only look that I could give her. A look that said “Are you out of your frickin mind?”  She said, I know how difficult it is for you (Me, Mr. PB) to keep all this grass/brush on all this land under control. The goats will eat all the grass and brush and will allow me more time to focus on other things that she wanted me to do.   This is it, the vision is in my head and I say to her “‘listen, I really don’t care if you want to rescue goats.  “Still not sure what rescue goats are but what do I tell people? What do I say to my Dorchester friends when they ask why do you have goats? Not getting enough action at home?.   What is happening and how did this happen so fast? We have a frickin farm with horses, a tractor, a dog, multiple cats and NO kids….  Score: Debbie 38 – Scott 0.  Then G-Day comes.

G-Day = Goat day. Unbelievable, I guess there was a Goat rescue somewhere in Ma..(Probably  Southie)  Before we can rescue the goats they needed to come out to inspect our property and to interview us. “Cut the shit” are you kidding me? You own a “Goat Rescue” and the phone rings and someone wants to rescue the goats and you need to inspect the property and interrogate the prospective goat rescuers. I can’t imagine the phone ringing off the hook.   There I am answering questions under Oath. I think the interrogator was Ted Wells. So we answer the questions and it looks like we have been approved. Well, Let’s break out the wine.  The best pahht of all is that they charged us $100 per goat. Why am I writing a check so I can recue goats? Who thought this up and am I on Candid Camera?

After a few months, I realized that the goats weren’t eating any of the brush or grass because my caring wife decided to feed them top quality hay and grain. I wasn’t sure what the score was at that point but I was sure that I was getting my ass kicked!