Warning: Steer Clear of Bad Deeds

Elizabeth Cady Coyote has lost most of her luxurious winter coat, but the summer sun on her back slows her down to a moderate pace. She’s hunting alone in the High Country as her mate watches the new litter gambol around the front of their summer quarters in the hills north of Jamestown, ten miles west of Boulder.

Some time ago, My Old Man, her mate, found the long-abandoned one-room cabin after an unfortunate encounter with a skunk. Of the options of fleeing or fighting an imposing alpha male coyote, the skunk, obviously an alpha skunk had chosen the latter option and covered My Old Man in stink. When he returned to their summer den, Cady had hustled the pups inside and refused him entrance until the smell wore off.

He figured he’d just wait out the stink some place else and went searching for another den when he found the cabin. It was perfect, set into the side of a hill with a small cliff behind it and with aspen virtually hiding both sides and most of the front. The roof had caved in but most of the walls still stood. The floor was mostly intact although rotten and splintered by icefall in places. There had been a root cellar under the floor that made a perfect den. When he was once again socially acceptable, he brought his family to the cabin. They loved the cabin and had summered there with their new pups ever since.

When pups are young, Cady and My Old Man trade off hunting and foraging, with one staying behind and one hunting. In winter they live in the foothills above north Boulder and on their nightly excursions they hunt small animals and occasionally forage from dumpsters and garbage cans. But in summer, unless they can find an unguarded campsite for foraging, they survive by going out twice a day and hunting smaller animals.

They also understand that in the mountains, they need to be a good deal more cautious because they are no longer at the top of the food chain, a position occupied by mountain lions and bears. And unlike most of Boulder bipeds, the mountain people are often armed and not fans of coyotes, who they allege kill lambs and calves.

Admittedly My Old Man and Cady have culled the herd on occasion but have not made a habit of it because of a reasonable fear of being shot by sheep herder or rancher.

So it was with a certain amount of concern that Cady approached a meadow where an assortment of thirty or forty unkempt cows stood around doing pretty much nothing. These weren’t exactly “show quality” cows or even “companion quality” cows such as those insufferable light brown cows in Switzerland with absolutely clean coats and brown bells hanging from their necks. These were just a bunch of scruffy, raggedy-looking cows covered with brambles, their butts matted with shit, and their eyes bloodshot.

This brute with a line of drool hanging out of his mouth was standing next to the trail.

“What you looking at?” he asks.

“Who’s asking?” Cady counters.

“Donald Trump.”

“That’s your name?”

“Yeah, what of it?” says the steer.

“That can’t be your name. Donald Trump was a very stable genius who totally botched the job of President. Twice. Besides that, how did you learn to talk?”

“You’re talking, why can’t I?”

“Meaning no disrespect, but cows aren’t exactly leading the list of intelligent mammals.”

“And coyotes are?”

“Of course—the smartest and most adaptable mammals on this blue planet.”

“More like calf and small pet killers.”

“Total lies from the International Cattle Cartel,” Cady continues, “But I don’t believe you are the same Donald Trump. He would have at least come back as a jackass.”

“How about if I am George W. Bush?”

“No way, he must have come back as a bag of rocks. You are just a steer.”

“Great, you don’t even know me and you’re making fun of my sexual orientation.” He says and starts to walk away.

“Wait, wait, wait,” she says, “So who are you really? And how did you end up as a steer?”

“Okay, so my real name is Frederick Winslow Gekko. I’m here because I invented the Master of Business Administration degree.”

“Wow, tell me more.”

“It’s not a pretty story.”

“So how did you come up with the idea?”

“There were these entitled, legacy, but definitely average kids at Harvard, not smart enough to be lawyers, accountants, or horse thieves, even though they thought they knew everything. We needed to offer an easy curriculum so we could keep them in school and keep their parents donating to the endowment.”

“Yeah, that sort of makes sense,” Cady says.

“We knew that we had to put their arrogance to work so we started telling them that they could become masters of the universe if they would apply a few easy-to-remember principles to their work.”

“Yeah? let me guess what the principles were.”

“Okay, give it a try,” says the steer.

“You taught them that optimizing profit, notwithstanding logic, ethics, or the long term health of an enterprise, was their sole reason for existence.”

“Right. You could have been a lawyer,” says the steer.

“You taught them that lowering the quality of a product, demanding greater productivity from the workers, and thinking only of short-term gain were all roads to success.”

“You got it.”

“And you taught them to treat all their colleagues with sarcastic contempt as if their ideas were useless.”

“You could have been an accountant.”

“Wow, that’s amazing. And for developing the MBA, God turned you into steer? Cady asks.

“Yup, she did.”

What about all these other cows? They’re just cows aren’t they?

“Nope,” he said looking around, “They were all professionals at one time or another.

“You’re kidding?”

“Not kidding. See the steer over there with the really short legs?”

“Yeah, he’s a weird looking cow,” Cady says.

“That’s Steven from Seattle, he was the engineer for Boeing who designed seats for commercial planes.”

“Wow, and who was that cow over there who looks like he has lost most of his hair?”

“Oh that’s Sam. God gave him a permanent lice infection.”

“What did he do?”

“He was the insurance executive who came up with preexisting conditions, but he might have been in charge of policy cancellations too,” says the steer.

“What about the cow with particularly big ears and eyes?”

“That’s Darryl, who came up with playing three-minute ads inserted into movies. I could go on and on.”

“Please do,” says Cady.

“Okay, the steer over there with the really big tongue, he got here for his work on industrial tomatoes. And the steer who looks like a pig and has really ripped-up looking ears used to be a senator.”

“You’d better explain,” Cady says.

“Earmarks,” says the steer.

“And the cow who is sitting down and doing nothing?’ she asks, “Let me guess.”

“Go for it.”

“Okay, I’d bet he had something to do with starting public employee unions.”

“Good” says the steer, “Take another guess. How about the steer who is moving his hooves all over his own body?”

“Easy,” she says, “He obviously invented TSA screeners.”

“More?” asks the steer.

“Yeah, who is the cow up to his neck in a huge puddle of his own shit?”

“He was a partner at Goldman Sachs,” said the steer. “Any other questions?”

“No, I get the picture. What profession is most represented in this herd?”

“I was mistaken,” says the steer, “You’re not smart enough to be a car thief. Any fool would know that most of these cows were lawyers in previous lives.”

“Oh, yeah, right. How could I forget that?” Cady asks. “What about women? This herd is all steers from what I can see.”

“God doesn’t turn professional women into cows,” said the steer.

“But there are a good number of professional women doing dumb stuff.”

“Professional courtesy,” says the steer who then ambles off.

END

Writer’s Note. This is the seventh installment of Elizabeth Cady Coyote. Earlier chapters are available in the paid section of mountainpassages@substack.com Not to worry, there are some other good essays there for free.

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