THE DAY I SAVED THREE BABY GOATS AND FINALLY UNDERSTOOD MY MOTHER’S LAST WORDS
I never planned to stop at that roadside auction… I was just driving home from Mom’s old place—clearing out the last box of her sweaters, trying not to cry into the steering wheel—when I saw the sign: “FARM SALE – TODAY ONLY.” Something in me hit the brakes.
The place smelled like dust and diesel and old hay. I wasn’t looking to buy anything. But then I saw them—three tiny goats, huddled in a corner pen. One brown, one white, and one mottled like some half-drawn sketch. Shivering. Way too young to be separated from their mother.
The guy running the pen told me they were “unsold leftovers.” Meant for feed.
That word—leftovers—hit like a slap.
You see, the night before my mother passed, she’d looked at me through her oxygen mask and whispered something I couldn’t make sense of at the time:
“Don’t leave the soft things behind.”
I thought she meant memories. Or maybe her dog.
But standing in front of those three baby goats, barely more than a bundle of bones and trembling fur, I heard her voice like thunder in my head.
So I did something wild.
I scooped them up—literally, all three—and said, “I’ll take them.” I had no plan. No farm. No idea how to raise goats. Just a backseat full of blankets and a trunk full of grief.
And as they nuzzled into my arms, bleating like they already knew me, I realized what she meant.
“Don’t leave the soft things behind.”
She wasn’t talking about things. She meant moments like this. Lives like these.
I didn’t have a farm. But I had a chance.
So I drove home—with three baby goats and hope in the backseat.
That first night was wild.
I set them up in the laundry room with blankets and an old space heater. They cried. A lot. I stayed up with them, bottle-feeding them every few hours and Googling “how to take care of baby goats” like my life depended on it.
I named them Hazel, Maple, and Finn.
Within days, they started recognizing my voice. They followed me like little shadows, their tiny hooves tapping behind me across the kitchen floor.
And something began to shift inside me.
The sadness didn’t leave completely—but it softened. Just like my mom said it would.
I realized she wasn’t just giving me advice. She was giving me a map. A way back to feeling. A way back to living.
Because it’s not about goats.
It’s about choosing kindness. Choosing to care.
It’s about not turning away from small, gentle things—especially when the world feels cold and loud.
So now, every time I hear their little bleats echo through the yard, I smile.
Because I didn’t just rescue three baby goats that day.
I rescued a part of myself too.
And I finally understood what my mother meant:
“Don’t leave the soft things behind.”
Not ever.
