Cured from Chewing Strings

As a young child, I liked to chew things. For example, I used to chew the collar on the front of my t-shirts. Dad was always telling me to stop chewing my shirt. He would rub cayenne pepper on my shirt collars to get me to stop chewing/sucking on them because I did not like the taste. 

In the winter, I wore a winter coat with a hood that had strings to tie under the chin. I liked to chew on the strings. I would chew the string on one side for a while then change to chew the string from the other side. Because it was often colder than freezing outside, the wet string would harden and freeze after I chewed on it. So it was fun to go back to chew on the now frozen string from the other side. As with my chewing on my shirt front, Dad frequently told me to stop chewing on my strings. 

To finish this story, I have to tell you another story. 

Up until I was about five years old, we had milk cows. My memory is that we had about 20 - 30 cows we milked. We used the Surge milking system. I found this video on YouTube that gives an example of a Surge milking machine in action. 

video of a Surge milking machine

Notice the belt that is around the cow that is used to suspend the milking machine under the cow while the milker is running. This belt is called a surcingle. The surcingle was a strap with holes like a belt that was attached to a metal bar called a spring rod. One the end of the spring rod was inserted into one of the holes to complete the loop around the cow. Then you can suspend the bucket from the spring rod. 

surcingle belt holding a Surge milking machine
Image Credit: Hambly Dairy Supply

While we were always careful to keep the surcingles clean, over time the spring rod would rust a bit and get drug through the cow "pucky" a little. After we sold the milk cows and stopped milking, Dad hung our old surcingles from the rafters in the tack stall in the horse barn. 

I told you that little bit of history about milking cows so you would have the right backstory for the rest of my other story. 

One winter day, Cade and I were working with Dad in the horse barn. Dad decided that one of the horses needed some additional education about how to get into the right stall and behave in the barn. Dad sent us into the tack stall to watch while he had a conversation with the horse. 

While we were watching, I leaned to the side with my chin and used my tongue to pick up the string from my coat to chew. Unfortunately, Cade and I were standing next to the place where the surcingles were hanging from the rafters AND instead of catching the string from my coat hood to chew, I actually got the spring rod end of the surcingle in my mouth. 

The combination of rust, dust, cow pucky, etc. on the spring rod was not very tasty. In my mind, all I could think about was the times I had witnessed the spring rod getting in the cow pucky in the cow barn. I couldn't believe that I now had that rod in my mouth. I spit it out quickly.

I never chewed my strings again after that experience.