Swine: Part One

One year, my husband bought a pig. It was supposed to run and play in our backyard and bring us joy. It did none of that. It was supposed to be one of those Vietnamese pot-bellied breeds. It was none of that. What it did do, was eat all our dog food and scratch itself against tree trunks. What is was, was fat and crabby. (I don't believe it had ever set hoof in Vietnam or that they knew anything about it.)

My husband had always wanted one of these pot-bellied pigs, but they were too expensive for people monitoring their discretionary spending. So, the day Allen spotted a "farmer" on the side of the road selling piglets for fifty bucks, he bought one and toted her home in a towel. She was black with spiky, come-hither lashes, and the first thing she did was gouge Allen's arm with a flailing hoof. From the start, she didn't seem to enjoy attention or people, but to all that my husband was blind.

We named her "Ruby", and she spent her days squealing through the house and hiding under our bed. It is also where she urinated her noxious pig's urine. Allen would return from work daily to inquire about her progress, believing the best, but though he was a faithful animal husbandmen, Ruby loved only vittles. She was tossed in the backyard as soon as she was big enough to fend for herself - much like our children, and I would watch from the house muttering, "Her life is just one giant bid for food."

My niece, Alyssa, was very young in the days of Ruby, and referred to her as "The bite-me pig"; Ben felt we were playing the biggest prank in the land the day Ruby indiscriminately consumed a left-over pig's tongue from a barbecue contest; And Luke related a story to me about a pig who played dead in the street to alert passing drivers that his owner was having a heart attack. I informed him Ruby would wait for us to die, then eat us.

She grew so enormous living on dog food that I would catch the children riding her back. Ben was just the right size for a lengthy run, but Ruby always tattle-taled with ear-splitting squeals. She commandeered the "dogloo", prompting its name change to the "pigloo", and Luke composed the following ode to Ruby after watching her attempts to avoid affection:

"Ruuuubeeee, bolts o' lightnin'! Reeee!  Reee!" - We sing it still, because it's gold.

 Always foraging for additional foodstuff, Ruby rooted up the yard with her snout. Once, Luke confiscated a find of hers - and ate it himself. (This is why he got yelled at a lot.) One afternoon, while we were away, Ruby bullied a fifty-pound bag of dog food to the ground, and proceeded to eat the entire contents over a six-hour period - then spent the evening throwing up.

Allen dug Ruby a mud-wallow, and wallowing is what she did in it, floppingly and gruntingly. With half-closed lids, she openly, repeatedly, shamelessly, and wantonly scratched her sides against the crab apple tree. Sometimes we had to look away. It was from the same tree that she gorged on crab apples - then spent the evening throwing up - much like young Allie.

Ruby did not wish to be petted or tended, never growing accustomed to touch. Except when Ben and Allie offered to rub her giant sow's belly. This she would tolerate for a time. And when Ruby was done with you, she squealed. In fact, she squealed brattily from the day Allen brought her home to the day two strangers drug her out of our yard on an old piece of carpet.


To be continued.....