I don't feel like myself without the goats. They have become as integral to my identity as my children.

Today a co-worker asked, "Well, how many goats do you have?"

"Forty or fifty."

Her jaw dropped open....There might be only 30-40, but I think it's probably above forty.

At least she didn't ask me why I have the goats...because that'd be a harder question for me to answer.

How can I explain how stressful it is for me to be surrounded by people, even perfectly nice people, all day long? To constantly have to stretch and strain my mind and conciousness to accomodate their patterns of thought, their ways of doing things? To hear them, smell them, see them, be seen by them, try not to bump into them or be inadvertently touched by them, and the list goes on.... If I'm already stressed or in pain then it takes even more effort to cope. I must be doing OK, because I haven't had any panic/anxiety attacks for a long time. Mostly I just feel very, very tired of people and exhausted.

The goats are the antidote, the counterbalance to all this. They don't care if I flap or talk to myself or hold entire conversations with them about my fantasies and daydreams and ideas. They don't care much what I look like, and they prefer my ordered routine for feeding and milking them. Not only do they not care that I'm different, but they seem more bonded with me and less flighty than around other people. We have a connection, we understand one another. I can go to them all stressed out, in tears, I can be at the point of breaking down entirely....and they pull me through, they calm me and the rest of the world fades away amid the calm cud chewing, amber eyed, familiar goaty faces. :-)