Encounter with a cow

The Drive Home

I have always been keen on sharing driving on long trips if at all possible, so once we had driven an hour or so out of Auckland I suggested that Margaret take over the driving. I moved into the back seat and let the young ladies chat in the front. I even dropped off to sleep.

 

Between Warkworth and Wellsford there was a dark, winding section of highway, where Margaret was travelling fairly carefully. Suddenly she turned a bend and there in  the headlights was a black shape. Before she had recognised it as a young cow, the car had hit it and we stopped quickly. I woke and we all hopped out of the car.

 

As Margaret and I were moving close to the cow to see if it was dead or alive, it suddenly jumped up and ran away into the grass at the side of the road, giving us a great fright. We clutched each other for support, and have stayed that way almost ever since.

 

We found a nearby farm with lights still on (it was after midnight) and the farmer grabbed his rifle and drove us in his landrover to find the cow. It was nowhere to be seen. He explained that there was a farmer who did not keep his fences in repair and it was a not uncommon event for cows to be on the road at night.

 

He agreed to have the car towed in the morning to the nearest garage, and to take us all to the bus stop in Wellsford to enable us to catch the bus for Kawakawa. This was the Herald bus that brought newspapers to the far north leaving Auckland about 1 30am.

 

We reached Kawakawa in daylight about 7, and Margaret kindly gave us all breakfast at her flat in the township. Then we went to school to teach for the day!

 

(We travelled down to Wellsford to tow the car back to a repairer in Kawakawa the next Saturday morning. Margaret had agreed I could use her car to travel from Paihia and back.)

 

My head was in a whirl! On the Thursday I had an optician's appointment in Whangarei, and before going back to school I visited a jeweller and bought a diamond ring.

 

The Friday was my birthday, so I invited Margaret to a birthday meal at the local restaurant, and after the meal I asked her to marry me. I was not about to waste time!

 

Margaret naturally enough asked for time to think. However, we did become an "item" as they say more recently.

 

Highlight of the rest of the school year was the College prizegiving, where we danced all the evening to ABBA singing "Dancing Queen" which was at that time the No 1 track.