After I get through two cycles of cows, Grimshaw shows up. Her job is to work with me, do what I do, and also give the cows grain as they come into the parlor. Angel keeps bustling in and out of the milking parlor, correcting what we’re doing, or telling Grimshaw to wash something. After half an hour, my back is about to break. My feet are cold and wet. My hands are numb, and I have a drip permanently established on the end of my nose which I can’t get rid of because my hands are covered with cow shit. I go out into the main barn to straighten up for a minute, and Angel rides into view on a little Ford tractor. It’s gray with red trim and a bucket on the front.

“I’m feeding out silage,” she explains. “With the new tractor you can feed out in, like, two scoops. This one takes about twenty. We’re not allowed to use the new one. Rack’s dad hides the keys.” She pats the fender. “I like this one, though. It’s so cute.”

“How many cows are there on this farm, again?” I ask her.

“I don’t know. Five hundred?”

“Did she really break up with Junior yesterday?”

Angel just looks at me and shakes her head, like there is so much I don’t know, why bother starting to explain.

I go back into the milking parlor. I get an udder folded in half in one of the suction cups and the cow does try to kick me. So I stop thinking about my feet and my back and my hands and the drip on the end of my nose. The rest of the world goes away. I am left with steam rising off the black and white backs, their sweet, grassy breath, the humming of the generator, the rhythmic thunk, thunk, thunk of the machines, the milk pulsing through the clear plastic tubing on its way to the bulk tank, the aluminum clang of the gates, and the swish of Grimshaw feeding out grain. I’m unhooking a cow when she lifts her tail and lets loose with a prodigious stream of liquid manure. It hits the cement floor and splashes up all over me. I’ve just wiped off my face when the one next to her lifts her tail and does the same thing. I look up at Grimshaw, and she’s laughing at me. She doesn’t have a speck on her. And then another one does it. She jumps back, but I’m too slow and I get covered. We both double over laughing. I wipe off my face with my sleeve. Then those cows leave and twelve more cows file in.