When I was six years old, I was chased by a pig. It started out innocently enough - just your run-of-the-mill kindergarten field trip to a working farm. Fifteen kids huddled around the teacher and a large, sweaty man in overalls as they pointed out the cows, supervised the petting of the goat, and distributed small kernels of corn to feed the chickens. Growing up in rural Utah, I wasn't exactly awestruck by all the sights and smells. I remember exploring the barn and chicken coop with the fearless confidence of one who regularly stuck her hand through an electric fence to pet horses. Nothing, I thought, could be worse than brushing against the electric wire.
I was wrong.
I wonder at the reasoning behind letting five and six year old children eat sack lunches in the vicinity of pushy, obnoxious barnyard animals. And yet, that is exactly what we did. We spread out on hay bales, small step ladders, and the non-working tractor, and ate our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, apples, and twinkies. I say ate, but we mostly fed our lunch to the various animals crowding us. I remember very carefully breaking my sandwich into four pieces. One for me, one for the goose, one for the goat, and one for the little, pink piglet. You can't look at a baby pig and not want to hold it. The pale, wrinkled snout snuffed at my purple corduroy pants. The heavily lashed eyes looked like black marbles. I held out my apple and touched it's surprisingly soft ears as it munched away. I gingerly slipped two hands under its belly and lifted.
Did you know that pigs scream? Well, now you know.
The unearthly shriek pierced my ears and I immediately dropped the pig. It took off toward a small shed next to the barn. I gave chase. I remember hearing shouts of "Catch the pig!" and suddenly being surrounded by a herd of laughing children. It was my pig. I was going to catch it. I pinned my eyes on the curly pink tail and pumped my arms and legs, willing myself to run like the wind. Alas, the piglet was faster. So was that boy with the brown hair. He stopped outside the shed and peeked around the corner.
"Shhh!" He held a finger up to his lips.
Five kids came to a crashing stop.
"The mommy's in there," he whispered.
We craned our necks to catch a glimpse of mommy pig. It was bigger than a pony. Bigger than a cow. She was as big as a house. A huge, hulking beast, with pink skin and hooves the size of my desk at school. She rooted around in a trough of food scraps while four or five piglets scampered around her feet. Some sort of cage surrounded the pigs - dull red bars that seemed almost black against the paleness of the pigs' flesh. The little pig we had been chasing bolted under the bottom bar, squealing as it slid against the far wall. Mommy pig whirled around, snorting. What looked like half a head of cabbage slid out of her mouth and plopped to the floor. All of us squealed (rather like piglets) and shrank back. She turned her head and lowered it to the food trough again.
"It's okay," I whispered, "she can't get out." I pointed to the bars corralling her against one corner of the wall.
Brown haired boy and I inched forward, both of us determined to catch a pig. We eyed each other and then, at the same time, slipped our hands under the bar. I don't know whose piglet squealed first, mine or his, but we both fell backwards as mommy pig slammed against the bars. To my everlasting horror, the bars fell to the ground and mommy pig barreled out of her pen.
I remember blurs of color as I picked myself up and ran. Brown, blue, yellow, and green melded into a finger-paint landscape as I ran out of the door. I remember screaming and hearing the other children scream. The ground trembled and I could hear snorting and heavy breathing behind me. I risked a glance over my shoulder. The huge porcine mass of filled my vision, her hooves tearing up the ground, her head lowered, eyes pinned on me. She was going too fast to be simply running. She had wings. She flew. I ran faster, determined not to be trampled to death by a pig at age 6.
I remember tripping, falling to my hands and knees, and someone landing on my back. When I looked up, the giant farmer had effectively clipped the pig's wings with a forward tackle. He led her back into the shed, screaming something that I couldn't hear with all the noise I was making.
I made it home in one piece after a lecture from our teacher. And, somehow, managed to avoid a lifetime of grappling with swinophobia.
And yet, last month at the state fair, when I saw a sleeping mommy pig surrounded by adorable sleeping piglets, I felt a prickling between my shoulder blades. My sense of unease further escalated when I saw a woman reach her hand between the bars, grasp the back leg of a little pig, and give it a little jiggle.
"Wake up, little piggy," she said.
I took a step back and pulled out the camera, determined to document any mishap that was to follow.
"I want to pet the baby," my niece said, slipping closer to the bars.
"Or," I said brightly, envisioning terror and mayhem in all of it's swine-like glory, "we could go for another carnival ride!"
Lil' Sis snatched the niece's hand and whirled around. There may have been a smirk on her face, but I'm not sure. I was too busy backing away slowly from the pen, shaking my head in wonder at the fascinated audience. Let them be, people. Let sleeping pigs lie.
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