Apprenticeship in Hard Work

I sorted seven Angus cows from the pen and quickly pushed them towards the alley. If my timing and positioning were right they’d hit the curve in the fence and funnel single file into the 40 foot alley where they’d receive their shots. I was in a hurry and in my eagerness to get them quickly loaded I got too close to the lead cow. Instead of turning gently into the alley she balked, spun on her hocks and ran back towards me. I hollered and jumped up and down frantically hoping to redirect them. It was no use. The six other cows followed suit, leaving me to repeat the job again. 

This was one of the day’s many miscues. We were behind schedule and running out of literal daylight. 

I was in undergrad helping with a Beef Cattle AI (artificial insemination, not intelligence)  research project. That day we needed to sort 300 cows from their calves and run them through a chute so we could assign them to one of three experiment treatments, give them two shots, and take a blood sample. Our crew of seven students and three ranch hands began the day at 8 am and expected to be finished by 3 or 4 in the afternoon. 

The ranch was owned by a university professor who was a reproductive physiologist whose brilliance was only exceeded by his frugality. Part of the reason he let his cattle be used for research projects was because of the free product and free labor that accompanied it. I was new to the ranching world but even my green eyes could recognize the poor shape of his corrals and facilities. His squeeze chute was rusted, had to be 40 years old, and would catch cattle 64% of the time. Most of the gates only swung one direction. And the main alley used to separate cows and calves had a gate that was five feet too short - thus requiring someone to fill that gap and completely obstruct the sorting process. 

A few hours into our day one of the cows jumped over a gate and knocked it off its hinges, mixing 70 cows with their calves that they had just been sorted from. The ranch manager sat on his horse as the disaster unfolded and unleashed a profanity laced tirade that would make Bobby Knight blush. 

Things only got worse. Cows got stuck in the alley. Grad students assigned cows to the wrong experimental treatment. Each mistake slowed us down. At three in the afternoon we’d processed 150 cows. And had 150 more to do. 

At 7:00 the evening light was almost gone. I kept waiting for the Graduate Student in charge to pull the plug on the deal. I tried to console myself...surely when it becomes pitch black we’ll have to stop? Nope - just pull out the headlamps and keep working. 

At this point in my life I wasn’t allergic to work ethic. I’d learned the grind of work ethic through four years of high school basketball practice. I’d worked for two summers at a guest ranch where our days would start at 5 in the morning. But both of those scenarios would always end predictably and on time.

This was something entirely different - we weren't bound to a three hour practice limit, a 10 hour work day, or even when the sun went down. My feet ached. My stomach churned. My head shook in disbelief that we were still working. 

At 10 pm we processed the last cow. I helped load up our supplies and expected a glowing speech of gratitude and praise from those in charge of the project. But they just sighed and said, 

“Never know what you’re going to run into on these deals.” 

As if this was par for the course. 

We drove an hour back to campus and spent three hours spinning the blood samples in a centrifuge and removing the serum so that hormone concentration tests could be run. I was as tired as I was in shock when I went to bed that days like that could even exist. 

That was a landmark day in my apprenticeship in work. It shattered my definition for what work was and what it required of us. I began learning that there are days when you must work only until you finish. 

There’s gratitude in remembering that day and some of what it formed in me. And there’s a haunting. If that was the day that I began my apprenticeship in hard work, when did my apprenticeship into ‘hard rest’ begin? When did I learn to rest in a way that was just as counterintuitive and crazy as it was for us to work cows till 10 pm and spin blood samples past midnight? When was I exposed to a quality of rest that shattered my definition of what real renewal is? 

When did I learn to participate in a Sabbath that is "not only about refraining from work, but about creating a restfulness that is also a celebration." (Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel) 

I’m guessing you have a story of learning hard work. But when have you learned hard rest?

Jesse French
Restoration Project Chief of Next Steps