“Now you can’t get mad at me.”

Immediately, my guard went up. When the first thing your wife says to you as you are just waking up is for me not to be mad… well, how else should I react.

“What did you buy?”

She said she had not bought anything.

Yet.

That’s what I thought – YET.

Soon, she went into a “sales pitch” personality. Telling me they are so cute. They are a good, good reasonable price. It really did not matter what I did or did not say, I know when my wife’s mind is made up. Her mind was made up. Her sales pitch was just a stepping stone – a preliminary pas de deux – before her inevitable purchase. And, really, she has every right to buy whatever the heck she wants.

But GOATS!

That’s right. We have gone from collecting dogs, hatching and raising several different flavors of chickens, and picking out exotic-looking fish for our large, freshwater aquarium to GOATS! Nigerian Dwarf goats, to be exact. Little and furry pieces of fluff. With DNA which has to have some popcorn threads and strands in it, because they can’t seem to help themselves. They hop, hop, and hop from one spot to the next.

Yes, she bought them.

Two of them.

We named them Hemi (Hemingway) and Gelie (Gelhorn).

Their first night, they slept in the damn second-floor bathroom where, in the bathtub, resides eight chickie-peeps. Silkies. Maltese chickens. That’s what they look like when they are grown: like a Maltese puppy with a beak, and a twisted and puffy, punk-like hairdo.

Later, I would spend most of an afternoon getting our garage/shop ready for both chicken peeps and goats. Tools needing put away, the floor swept up from the debris and treasures the dogs feel compelled to bring in from the yards, and setting up an area in the back half of the building – an addition-space just right for the friendly livestock we are accumulating.

“We can start up our own little petting zoo,” I said.

“I know,” said Tara, “isn’t it great.”

Great.

Right.

I held back a laugh, but smiled at my girl, knowing she is happy. Sometimes happiness is as simple as acknowledging those you love feel complete… even if it takes goats and fishes and chickens and dogs.