How Buttons became Buttons - Part 2

When we had originally talked about the calf we really hoped it was going to be a heifer. Since it was due around President’s Day we decided we’d name her First Lady. We hoped she would be our first in a long line of show cattle and it would be a good way to make a name “theme” for all of them. We’d continue to name all of our cattle after Presidents and their wives. Of course 4 years of infertility has still taught us nothing – things don’t always work out like we plan. The calf was born a bull about a week after Presidents Day so we just couldn’t make sense out of naming him George or Abraham. We didn’t have a name.

Normally Jay wouldn’t have been concerned about this. He had only named cattle out of necessity for their registration papers. In day to day life they were only referred to as the Show Bull or the Show Heifer. Of course that wasn’t going to work for me. I like to name my animals. Mostly I prefer real names like – Charlie, Sadie, Jacie, PJ, etc. but I knew we needed a “cool” name for the bull. We thought and thought and had nothing. Finally Sharon came up with the name we put on his registrations papers – Anticipation.
Considering that we had wrapped almost 2 years of our lives into this, made numerous phone calls back and forth and Sharon called the vet twice about it – it was a very fitting name.

Jay and I were all set with Anticipation, until Jay discovered something else about the bull. Once he discovered this, he chose not to tell me about it for a few days – which was probably smart. Since Buttons was bred from Polled Hereford stock I never gave any thought to the thing being born with horns. But, our calf had horns , which if you are unaware is a RECESSIVE gene. Of course I was concerned. I’ve watched 8 Seconds I’ve seen horns on bulls and I was not happy about the thought of my little boy showing a large bull with spikes shooting out of its head. My first question or maybe it was more statement was “we’ll dehorn him, right!!!” That’s when I was told that it was “tradition” to show cows with horns if that’s the way they were born. But Jay assured me that Buttons’ horns would never get that long and definitely wouldn’t be long while Cade was showing him. I’m still not sure if Jay was blowing smoke to make me feel better or what, but as it turns out it’s not something we had to worry about.

So Cade loved looking at his calf and talking about his calf. One day Cade and Papa Jim were discussing his horns. Papa Jim told him that when the horns are little nubs they are called….I bet you’ll never guess….Buttons. That’s how Buttons became Buttons. Jay loves the name. In fact if you see Jay you should ask him about his vision of Cade leading a bull that weighs 1300 who goes by the name Buttons into an arena. He loves talking about Buttons’ name.

The other thing that makes it even funny is to hear Cade say Buttons. It sounds like two different words put together with the emphasis on tons..But Tons. And even funnier was Cade went around telling everyone his name. Cade knows no stranger and always gives out way too much information to anyone – Jay’s students and parents, the checker at Wal-Mart, anyone at church, etc. So anyone who was “fresh meat” in Cade’s eyes got the story – I have a baby bull at Memo and Papa Jim’s. His real name is An pis i tation but I call him But Tons. He’d reverse the p and t in anticipation and accent every syllable exactly the way I typed it. Yes, it did sound like he said a bad word…everytime.

He’s finally learned how to say anticipation so the story isn’t quite as funny but it’s still being told a lot. Mom and Dad took him to SDC on Monday and he told the cashier all about his bull. Dad was trying to hurry him along, because there were 10 people behind him in line but Cade wasn’t budging until his story was finished.

The day after we had him dehorned Jay and Cade had to take me to work (it was during the car incident). Jay said something to Cade about changing his name since he no longer had buttons, which didn’t go over well. I made a joke and said we could call him Buttonholes. For some reason I was the only one laughing….