94 animal, vegetable, miracle
crept out of her room an hour later to revise the evaluation. “I didn’t really
mean that, Mama,” she sniffled. “I’m sorry. If I love my chickens six, I love
you seven.”
Oh, good. I’m not asking who’s a ten.
So I knew, in our discussions of poultry commerce, I needed to be re-
assuring. “They’ll be your chickens,” I told her. “You’re the boss. What you
sell is your decision.”
As weeks passed and her future on the farm began to take shape in her
mind, Lily asked if she’d also be able to have a horse. Her interest in
equines surpasses the standard little- girl passion of collecting plastic ones
with purple manes and tail; she’d lobbied for riding lessons before she
could ride a bike. I’d long assumed a horse was on our horizon. I just
hoped it could wait until Lily was tall enough to saddle it herself.
In the time- honored tradition of parents, I stalled. “With your egg
business, you can raise money for a horse yourself,” I told her. “I’ll even
match your funds—we’ll get a horse when you have half the money to
buy one.”
When I was a kid, I would have accepted these incalculable vagaries
without a second thought, understanding that maybe a horse was out
there for me but I’d just have to wait and see. The entrepreneurial gene
apparently skips generations. Lily got out her notebook and started asking
questions.
“How much does a horse cost?”
“Oh, it depends,” I hedged.
“Just a regular mare, or a gelding,” she insisted. When it comes to
mares and geldings, she knows the score. I’d recently overheard her ex-
plaining this to some of her friends. “A stallion is a boy that’s really fi erce
and bossy,” she told them. “But they can give them an operation that
makes them gentle and nice and helpful. You know. Like our daddies.”
Okay, then, this girl knew what she was looking for in horsefl esh. What
does an animal like that cost, she inquired? “Oh, about a thousand dol-
lars,” I said, wildly overestimating, pretty sure this huge number would
end the conversation.
Her eyes grew round.
“Yep,” I said. “You’ll have to earn half. Five hundred.”