D-Day November 8, 2011

I know, I know, I have been a negligent writer who has been gone from her blog for way too long! The reason is that as of the end of September I have been trying to finish THE POLIS and get it sent off to my editor with the VERY HIGH hopes of getting a third book done this year that has been on the back burner since I decided to tackle THE POLIS. Therefore, for about a month, I have been steering clear of the internet during my allotted computer time in order to really hammer out that project. This nose-in-the-air attitude to social media might continue for another month until I finish the book. 

However, since I have received so many verbal comments about the sheep story, (see previous story) I thought I would give you a final update before I get back to writing off-line. The kids did pretty good at the fair. Wave was not able to be there even once due to how late the harvest was, but thankfully his family, and my family, stepped in (as always) and helped out. Summer earned a best in show for the devil-sheep Diva and got a blue ribbon for Dude. The boys took home some reds and some blue ribbons for their pigs as well. The temperature at the fair was almost 100 degrees every day and that caused all of the kids and the animals to be tired and uncooperative, so I was impressed with the efforts of all of the kids, the staff and the parents. 

Not wanting to miss a moment of the festivities, I tried to ignore the pain in my ribs for the whole week and as a result ended up back at the doctor with pleurisy, which is an inflammation of the lining between the ribs and the lungs. Of course, I was just plain mad about that! 

The last day of the fair, the pigs and Dude were (vegetarian warning! Close your eyes mom!) taken away by the butcher, and the whole show was over by noon, leaving us with nothing to do but go home and hope that the animals that we loved so much, and for so long, were quickly removed from the slaughter trucks and "taken care of." 

We had the other two hogs, that did not go to the fair, butchered at the end of September and they turned out to be fabulous! Vegetarian Warning! The morning after we received the meat, I got up and made the kids sausage patties for breakfast, at which time six-year-old Jack proudly exclaimed, "Yummy! Evil Dr. Pork Chop tastes good today!" 

Sick I know...However, that is not the end of the story just yet. Diva, the devil sheep went home with the kids 4-H leader to "finish out" before she will be butchered. She could not come back to our house because apparently, sheep will not gain weight when they are alone. Figures, huh?  Can anyone say high maintenance or...DIVA!  Currently, diva is living the high life at another farm in our area fattening up with other sheep probably looking for the next person to attack! She will go to the butcher on Nov. 8, 2011. 

Vegetarian Warning again! Jack will let you know how she tastes!

See you all on here again after THE POLIS is complete and out of my hands!

September 1, 2011: Give A Man a Combine and He Can Feed The World

The first day of September did not usher in the feeling of new beginnings or the closing of the summer season. It promised to be boiling hot, I had just come off of a visit to Spokane, and my dear farmer husband was in a mood to say the least. After all, harvest is supposed to be all but over by September, and the upcoming holiday week-end usually meant a trip to the coast for seafood. That would not be the case for this family this year.

            As most farm families know, harvest is the most stressful time on a farm. The farmers, and the help, are not only putting in 16+ hour days, but it’s hot, dirty, completely unpredictable, and your whole livelihood for yourself, your family, and your future in this business is on the line. Therefore, as most farm wives know, the best time to take a vacation from the farm is of course during harvest. When I initially took on this job as farm wife – or the farm rib, referring tongue in cheek of course to Adam’s rib – I could have never imagined wanting to be away at this most important time of year for our family and business. I loved watching the excitement in my husband’s eyes the first day he cut wheat, I like making lunches, and huge harvest dinners. I like taking my kids out to ride with their dad and taking pictures of them growing and changing every year with the same golden fields as their backdrop. However, after nine years, I’m starting to understand why some farm wives take residence anywhere else but on their farm in August.

            It all started out with losing a truck driver. Not that he got fired, or quit unexpectedly, or ran off with the circus like farm wives dream of. No, we lost him simply because he had to go back to his real job, in real life, in real time. We knew this was coming. Heck, I knew it was coming last December when he agreed to take his vacation during harvest so that he could play farmer for two weeks. Between you and me, I told Wave that in our Spring Work meeting. Plan for him to be leaving, I said. We will need someone to take his place. Maybe even teach me to drive truck.

            But the response I got was that it would be fine and that he was not ready to teach me to drive because I had too many responsibilities here at home with the kids and running for parts. True, but…what about when Chad goes back to work? I learned to stop asking. My farmer had it under control because this is not an uncommon occurrence for brothers, or friends, or even acquaintances of farmers.  After all, give a man a lawn mower and he can happily mow an acre, give a man a combine, on the other hand, and he can joyously feed the world.

            Now, really? I don’t understand the male’s cult obsession with oversized Tonka toys, but who am I to judge, right? I still like to use my kitchen as if it’s an oversized Easybake Oven.

            Anyway, I digress, like usual. The truck driver went back to work, and my husband went into his harvest mood. Now, backing up, I had planned for this, just as I had planned for Chad leaving. Every year something harvest-stopping happens in August, and every year that causes the farmer to be “in his mood.” And I only say that because it’s not like he yells, or screams, or takes it out on my in the normal sense, it’s more like he just simply ignores me, ignores the kids, fails to say thank you, how are you, or anything else, fails to kiss, hug, smile.  These are the things about these long work seasons that keep me going.

            Instead, we go dive head long into a different pattern. I try sickeningly harder than usual to be chipper. I ask more questions, try to encourage conversation, and taking his thoughts away from anything that has to do with the fact that we now have a combine in the field full of wheat and no truck to haul it. I kiss him more, a pat his back, I’m turn into a mom trying to console a sulking child. Yuck! I can’t even stand me! So, with every rejection of my over-zealous self-sickening actions, I get more stressed out and he gets more isolated. In the end, I usually end up yelling at him to SAY THANK YOU JUST ONCE YOU UNGRATEFUL JERK!!!! And that’s the PG version! And he yells back that HE DOESN”T HAVE TIME FOR THIS CRAP!

            BUT, this year, no matter what I promised myself I was not going to fight. I even had a pre-harvest meeting with myself, alone, working out the ways that I was going to breathe, smile, walk away, throw a pie at the wall after he left, curse him and bless him at the same time. I would do just about anything rather than react.

            So, my DH, as I have seen Them referred to in other blogs, gets up this morning, walks to his chair, takes his coffee that I offered, of course minus the thank you, and without even saying good morning, he says, “So when you gonna have that bus ready to I can drive it to the fair for you?”

            I smile and take a breath so deep I’m pretty sure I popped a lung.

            “Oh, you don’t need to do that,” I say. “I can do it.”

            “No you can’t,” he sneers.

            “Why not?”

            I’m not exactly under the mistaken impression that we are not having a friendly conversation, I’m just trying to live the illusion in hopes that by doing so we can look back on it as one. Yeah right.

            “You can’t drive the bus,” he said flatly.

            “Sure, I can,” I smile. “You, yourself said it’s no different than the van.”

            “Look,” he says, standing up. “I don’t have time for this. Just tell me when the damn thing is ready.”

            “Well, probably tomorrow,” I say, standing as well.

            “Fine! I’ll take it there.”

            And this is where I made my colossal mistake. Take it there? Take IT THERE? As if taking this monstrosity of a bus 30 minutes away to the same damn town that I had driven to once, sometimes twice a day, for parts during harvest was too much to ask. And, not that I even asked for him to do it! No one ever asked him to help. 

            I tried to take a deep breath, but it wouldn’t go further than the first quadrant in my lung. Had I kept my mouth shut, the next two weeks might have been easier, but as you can all tell, I DON’T keep my mouth shut.

            “Look,” I say, setting my coffee cup down. “You’re busy. There is no reason I can’t do it on my own.”

            And then I added, just for old times sake, I guess: “You-Don’t-Have-To-Get-So-Mad.”

            As Kenny Roger’s said, You could have heard a pin drop, as my DH turned and looked at me for the first time in days.

            I would have apologized, truly I would have, if nothing more than to keep my promise to myself not to fight with my stressed out husband this harvest. After all, we were supposed to be in this thing together. However, his response. His five-word response was enough to set off opposing steam-rollers of silent treatments for the next two weeks and before he even opened his mouth I could see it coming.

            “Well, here YOU go again!” he said.

            And then he promptly turned around and slammed the door.

            Now, not to get into the nitty gritty of our little harvest spat, simply because you would stop reading here and now, let me just tell you that against my better judgment I did not let that door stay closed like I should have. There wasn’t a bug between here and Wave’s shop that wasn’t praying for fingers to stuff in its ears and the only thing I was thinking was, “Wow, the thought of a nice rental house in North Shore is starting to sound pretty darn good right about now!”

            

August 31. 2011: Why Do They Still Pave Paradise To Put Up A Parking Lot?

  

            The last day of August was fairly nice. It was a hot, sunny day, and I got to spend it in Spokane. Yep, Spokane. On the blacktop, in the heat, around people who buzz around like bees looking for a good deal, a quick bite, some kind of material reward to give themselves a break from their reality television, lack of nature or nurture, self-absorbed selves.

            Of course, I am being cynical here, but the truth is that spending a day surrounding by people who seem to never look up, never see the clouds, never stop to smell the warm summertime air (not that I do either in Spokane), and are only focused on what they can get quickly and for a really good price is very disheartening to me and I believe unhealthy for my soul. I loathe shopping. The thought of going to meet my “girlfriends” in town in order to pal around in overly air-conditioned stores surrounded by people who are completely unhappy and attempting to fill that void in their life by purchasing those $60 shoes that they must have and can’t afford is just about the worst thing I can ever imagine doing in my life. The second is talking about the new seasons of reality shows that are about to start. I don’t have television (aside from movies) and the thought of watching someone else live their life instead of living my own makes me want to vomit on the sidewalk in front of everyone. Now, that is reality! Frankly, I prefer old ratty flip flops, green grass under my feet, a fold up lawn chair under my bum, and watching my son play like Christopher Robin in his tree house.

            However, the boys start school in six days and they have been bugging me about needing clothes and pencils. I want to spout the old adage, “You’ll learn more with me than you even will in that school!” But this day and age I know that that is not true, so off we drive, away from our farm, away from harvest, away from green grass and good smelling air.

            What I hate most about going to Spokane, especially in harvest, is the fact that my grandfather, the one who has cancer, used to farm most of the land that now supports churches, sub-division housing and shopping malls. As we drive to the store, I cannot help but see an overlapping image, much like a Charles Peterson painting, of my sixteen-year-old sister hauling irrigation pipe around the grass, her arms strong, and her legs wet from the morning dew on the grass. Now all that is there is a peach mortar church with entrapped playground equipment for the poor souls who must attend daycare there. Those children, and those church goers will never see the image of my sister, only me, and frankly, I’d like to always see it that way.

            On the way in my son is blaring rap music.  I point out the old field again, but they’ve heard it all before.

            “Yeah Mom, we know,” they say. “So where are we going to eat?”

            The predictable one in the back pipes up, “McDonalds?”

            “Yeah, right,” I snort. “Maybe we should have just scooped up some pig poop from the barn on the way out and wrapped it in cellophane. It’s probably got more nutrients than the food you want to buy, and it’s free.”

            “Mom,” Brett says. “Just stop. We’ll eat at a restaurant.”

            They are all silent the rest of the way in. Thank goodness for boys. We came, we saw, we shopped, we left! We even just grabbed some food at the deli and before I knew it, they had me back home. I believe that I made their blacktop experience the least pleasant possible; therefore, I think I am raising them well. 

August 30, 2011: The Plateau

            4:30 seems like hell this morning. That seems to be the only way to describe it. I don’t want to get up with Brett, but when I wander out to the kitchen I can see that he doesn’t want to get up either. He doesn’t even want coffee anymore, nor does he want his normal protein bar to start the day. His only request now is to let him sleep until 5:10 so that he can simply put on his cleats, grab his football bag, and roll out the door and into his coach’s car. I can understand that.

            Wave does not even get up with us this morning. What started out as a football season and harvest season filled with gumption and anticipation, has now hit what I like to call the plateau. Harvest is always on a bell curve in my mind. WE start quickly, usually without warning, and race up the hill to get grain in the bin, but as soon as we get enough wheat in to feel safe, things begin to plane out and thoughts other than just getting ‘er done begin to enter the farmer’s mind. Will all the fields be as good as this one? Will any be better? What am I going to do when this truck driver has to leave? What about when school starts and Amy is busy with the kids? I need to call the insurance adjuster? Is fall work going to be late? What is we don’t get rain and the fields are rock hard? Hell, I haven’t even started working on the tractor. There is no way it will be ready in time! The peas suck. I can see that just looking at them from the road. All of these thoughts which had been bottled up inside the mind of the farmer with his desire simply to cut some grain now have time to come out and torment him as he drives for sixteen hours a day inside the combine, and it is a recipe for stress and possible disaster!

            Without inquiring, which I dare not do, I am certain that we have hit the plateau, or the middle of harvest. It is the time when Wave gets quiet, I lose track of where I am at on my list, and the kids become completely chaotic.

            They can tell that school is about to start, the pool is about to close, and the fair, for which we all feel completely unprepared, is just around the corner. Today is Tuesday. School starts a week from today, and the fair starts on Wednesday night. We have not had time to shop for school clothes or show clothes and in this heat, which is topping out in the upper 90’s now, we have not had time nor energy to pack the bus for the fair.

            In spite of all of that, the crops are looking good. That is the only thing keeping tensions under control. Winter wheat yields, which average on a good year in the upper 80’s (bushels per acre) are in the 90’s and 100’s. That is something to be super excited about and also to hold our breath over. The yields need to hold strong throughout all of our fields, the prices need to hold, and the weather needs to remain warm. For us on the support end of harvest, laboring over tired hot animals, warm weather is hard to wish for.

            I did get to start a new book this morning. The Wednesday Letters. However, from the first page I can tell you straight out that this is no Water for Elephants, and like all readers it leaves me longing for the last book that I have yet to let go of. Oh well, there is no going back.

            For the rest of the day, we work the pigs. Brett is grouchy and tired and does not want to help, and though I cannot blame him after practicing in the heat, the hogs have to be worked. Dustin doesn’t want to help either. He simply wants to hang out in town with his friends. Jack and Maxx seem to be the only ones willing to go, but I make them all go anyway – including Summer. At least tonight we will all have showers at home and maybe I can even get the hot tub up and running again. Although the days are hot, the nights are starting to feel like fall.

            Tonight Wave is more quiet than ever and I feel like I am walking on egg shells as I make spaghetti and French bread. I leave him alone as he compiles the the weight slips on the bar. He does not even look up. Nor does he has how our day was. The kids retire to the living room for the night to watch a much needed movie and I don’t even reprimand them about showers.

            Working harvest is like building a house together. It is stressful, there is tension and it takes every ounce of everyone’s strength to get through it without ripping each other’s throats out. This year I am determined that we will not do that. I ask innocent questions about how things are going out there, but I can see straight away that he is in no mood to relive the day, so I simply let it go.  

August 29, 2011: The Mom Plum Lost it!

Prologue: I only use that because I like that word. It’s so formal, so professional. I just wanted to point out the obvious fact that I have not been adding in my diary for a while. That is because I was at the Palouse Empire Fair with the kids! Well, I’m back now, so on we go to Monday…

Last night it rained. Yes, rained! While my husband was busy musing over what possible time that they would be able to get into the field the next day, I was secretly smiling in the dark. I had not been able to water the lawn since the pump went out on the well, and what water I had given to my flowers had been limited at best. Scooping it out of the pond with the knowledge that I didn’t have hot water to wash my hands in afterward often caused me to put off that chore until it was almost too late. As for the garden, well, I had all but given up on that. The weeds flourished to be sure, but the plants were beginning to show signs of a stress that they might not recover from.

            I let Wave sleep in, and just before breakfast I opened all the windows wide in order to catch the last traces of green air, as I like to call air after it rains. There is something about it that just smells green.  I also cooked pancakes and eggs that morning as if I would have hot soapy water to wash the dishes in afterward.  For a while, with the pressure in the air released and the pressure of the need to water momentarily alleviated, there was laughter in the house once again.

            Our local grocery Mike called just after nine to say that the box of tomatoes that I ordered for the salsa I planned to can had come in. I will make lunches, walk the sheep with summer, and then go get the tomatoes before the water guy comes to fix the pump. I cannot wait for this, but I holding my breath. If it doesn’t work, we will learn that we have bigger problems and right now with the thought of having to wash pigs again tonight that is just not an option I am willing to explore.

            The sheep are unruly as usual and Summer will not be patient with them. She is worried, as am I, how they will act at the fair. They do not like their lead ropes and they end to jump and buck so hard when they are on them that we can barely lead them, let alone have Jack try to lead them for Daddy’s Little Sheppard. Finally, we simply put them back in their pens. They are hot, we are hot, and without water our patience is coming to an end. I walk over to the pigs and pet them on the snouts. I like them so much better then the sheep.

            I pick up the tomatoes in town and upon the return see that the pump guy has arrived. I hold my breath and wander about aimless even with my trusty list in sight. I can think of nothing else but water. I pull out the salsa recipe, but dare not start it knowing that if this doesn’t work, these tomatoes are destined for the freezer instead of the canner.

            Just after 1:00 Brett rushes out the door in a panic stating that he made a mistake. He flushed the toilet and there was actually water in it! I looked at the pump guy who was calmly screwing the face on a power box and said, “Well, that’s cuz’ I’m done!”

            Now you would think at this point I would be relieved and happy, but I guess there was something in the amount of tension that I had been holding inside that caused me to burst like a balloon. Suddenly, the list wasn’t enough to keep me in line, and I was immediately ordering everyone around like a drill sergeant. I quickly thanked the pump guy, barley pausing long enough to send out a thank-you to the universe for not letting this be a bigger problem that it already was. Then I started tossing out orders like baseballs. You do this! You go here! Pick this up! Put that down! Get in the car! Don’t forget your boots!

            By the time we got over to the pigs everyone in the car was tense and therefore so were the pigs, but I couldn’t stop myself. I pushed the kids through a round of “let this pig out, and put that pig in” so fast that everyone, including the swine went ape crazy!

            By the time that was over it was time for sheep practice at the 4-H leader’s house. The kids were hot, stinky and tired. Dustin was soaked from the quick bath he gave his pig, Georgia, and I was still cranky. Jack and Summer walked their sheep, but the other’s behind them were antsy. I was embarrassed to admit that the reason the sheep were acting up was because we all smelled so strong of swine feces that the sheep were unable to concentrate. It was terrible; sheep were jumping for no apparent reason and kids were being dragged around trying to collect them and get them back in line. Finally, I informed the 4-H leader of what the problem might be. In other words, I confessed. We stunk! We did learn however, that sheep don’t like the color red and we had been keeping a red halter on our sheep Diva, who was the main jumper, the whole time that we had been training her.

            When we returned home, Summer and I removed the collar and we could not believe how much calmer she was. Had we only known this a month ago, things might have turned out very differently with Diva.

            I baked tomatoes and quesadillas for dinner and went straight to bed. As on other stressed out woman once said, tomorrow is another day…

AUGUST 28, 2011: Water, Water Everywhere! Finally!!!

            We don’t have to be up at 4:30 today! Yeah!!! But I wake up at 5:00 anyway, so I get to blog. Excited about that. It is hard to find the time to keep this diary entered every day. Without the water, chores are taking longer than normal and a schedule like mine doesn’t have room for errors. Shelly brings CJ over today to play with the kids one more time before he starts school on Tuesday. He thinks it’s kind of exciting not having water. I wish I could see it all through his mind. The kids act like they are camping; brushing their teeth with bottles water, failing to wash their hands at all, peeing outside just beyond the fence. Oh yeah, it’s all fun, fun, fun for them. All I can see is dirt. I like to think that with my skills at adaption to trying situations like this I would be able to survive in the 1800’s. This little trial is making me think differently. I like water. I like electricity. I like to shave my legs!

            At 8:30 I get more water from Dick’s house. He is still calm and supporting as always. I get to shower, and though this may seem to personal, I did get to shave my legs. I think that is the first time I’ve actually smiled in three days. On the way back home it starts to rain. This is odd. I don’t recall a chance of rain today. We don’t need rain on the crops, but secretly I’m hoping it hits my yard! I missed so many fertilizer dates with my yard this year so it wasn’t emerald green like I like it to be anyway. This lack of water has made it positively brown. I close my eyes when I walk in the house now so that I don’t have to see the brown patches! But the rain, ahhh, the rain. I will never tell Wave that I rolled down my window and smelled the air and smiled. Luckily, it did rain at our house, but not on the crops, so I take a lunch out to Wave and manage to sneak in a ride since Jack is at Grandma Jan’s for the rest of the afternoon. On the way to Wave I throw kids out at the pool – that is my favorite term in the summer – I throw them out. They discovered that the pool closes for good on Wednesday. My heart sinks a little. Summer is officially over. It is usually over for this family when harvest starts, but this year harvest was late, so we got a taste of summer during the dog days of August. I don’t think I’m ready to let it go just yet!

            After the ride, I go back home, retrieve Brett and take him to Wave so that he can learn to drive the big trucks and rush home again to fix a flat tire on the bus that we will be taking to the fair – yes, I said bus, don’t ask! The battery on the bus was dead, so I gave up on the tire and washed dishes instead. It was a long, arduous process, but at least there were no kids here so I got to turn up the radio and relax. Once I finished that, I picked up the kids from the pool, took CJ home so that he could go to football practice, and then went to Tekoa to work pigs. Brett finally coaxed them all into being weighed by offering them a whole bag of marshmallows! One was 255. The two others look they might be 280. That is very good news but we are thining of holding off on the marshmallows for the two larger ones from now one. If they go over 300 pounds before next week they are out of the fair.

            As we leave the FFA barn, we notice a pressure in the air that was not there before. They called for a 30% chance of rain, but this feels different. If I lived in Tornado Alley I would have been scared. We shower at Grandma’s and as we are leaving it begins to rain. I love my Grandma. She is so sweet to us. She always has a smile on and towels ready. She is always calm and caring even amidst our stink and stress. She tells us stories of when Grandpa worked at the pig barn and the kids laugh. I hope I can be that way when my kids have a crisis.

            As we leave, it rains just a little at first, but by the time we get home the wind is blowing something fierce. I call the guys on the radio to see how it is out in the field. It’s fine so far. It’s then that the lightening strikes. I tell Chad that if the wind starts blowing his has about five minutes before the rain. Chad says it has already started to blow, and is just about to say there is no rain when he says, “Forget it. It’s here.”

            Wave makes the executive call that they will stay out there until the field is done. They are so close there is no point in stopping now. I rush to get steaks on the Bar-b-que, hopeful that I can make it before it’s full of water. The rain is pouring in buckets, the wind is raging, and dark has fallen early. The kids are excited with their flashlights and umbrella’s. Brett holds one over the bar-b-que every time I have to open it to flip the steaks. I’m going on feel here, because I can’t tell if the steaks are red of black anymore and frankly I don’t care. I can hear the guys on the radio laughing every time the lightening strikes, but we all have the same feeling. You do not want to be the tallest metal object in a field in a storm like this. Ken calls for 34 and then before he gets his question or comment out we hear him say, “Oh shit! That was too close!”  34, Chad, responds by saying, “I’m heading down to the ditch.”

            We hold our breath for a moment, letting the steaks burn. Our minds are full of images that I do not want to imagine. Rain is bad enough. Being trapped in a combine on a hill in a lightening storm takes the adventure out of everything. Finally, they are laughing again and I have time to pull the steaks off. They are black, but we don’t care. We eat and go to bed with our flashlights in hand. 

AUGUST 27, 2011: Summer’s 11th Birthday

The numbers 4-3-0 are becoming my nemesis. So are the letter’s AM. I cannot figure out how our neighbors who pick Brett up every morning with their own young athletes in tow are always so chipper. All I care about is coffee and quiet time with my book. I finish Water for Elephants his morning. It was amazing. I don’t want to give away any of the book for those of you who might read it, but it is the type of ending that makes you think the author is selfless. That is all I’m going to say about that!

            After I finish the book, I stand up to face the reality of my own lack of water. Everything in the house is taking on a dusty look even if it is imagined by me. I believe I mentioned my OCD in a previous diary entry, and how I manage on most days with five kids to keep by reactions to my affliction under control. Let’s just say that the little devil on my shoulder is starting to squirm and my stomach is already turning in knots and this is only day two without water.

            I ignore the dust in favor of figuring out how to water my flower pots outside. Shelly spent so much time helping me put color around my house and with our minimal water on a normal day they aren’t exactly the best looking plants, but they are all I have. The thought of watching them die before September even hits makes me irritable at best. Finally, I come up with a solution. Pond water! I have about a 10% increase in good hormones just from doing this one little act!

            Thank goodness that sheep and pigs still have water. That is one less thing that I have to worry about since it could be 95 degrees today. The mud bog has a little water left in it as well, so the pigs will be able to cool themselves for today anyway.

            Wave took summer to breakfast for her birthday, so that gives me time to make lunches, do what cleaning I can and collect laundry. When Summer returns we all run to Tekoa to meet my family for lunch at C&D’s. It was good, but it took over two hours and we still have to wash pigs and figure out where to shower next.

            At the pig barn, we start to work Brett’s pig in the arena and realize that it is just too damn hot by now. Thank goodness Brett is in tune with his Dominess’s personality enough to realize that he was not just being stubborn. We barely got the pig back in the barn upon Brett’s insistence before the pig just about passed out. We spent the next hour cooling his nose with water in order to bring him back to life. I am starting to have breathing problems from the stress!

            After two overly fattening (but yummy) meals, Summer feels much the same way as Dominess, so we rush though showers at my grandmother’s house and then I bring her back home with orders that she is to stay the rest of her birthday on the couch, in the basement, where it is cool. I think she was fine with that.

            That afternoon, I went to Dick’s to refill the water jugs, return to heat water for dishes and somehow managed a spaghetti dinner. I will not stop cooking even without water. That would through me over the edge for sure. I finished the night by heating enough water to dump pans over Wave’s head again before we went to bed. Thank goodness there haven’t been many break downs or I might not be able to handle all of this for the next four days! 

AUGUST 26, 2011: Hell Hath No Fury Like a Farm Wife Without Water!

After getting Brett up at 430 and sending him out the door, I start collecting more laundry and dishes. At 630 AM I haul them to Dick’s and take a long hot shower. It feels amazing and I am almost on the verge of tears when I have to shut it off and get out. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to go through the next five days, and sadly I know me. I know my temperament. It’s not the best on a normal day with kids nagging at me, schedules being altered for parts runs and pig runs, and kids needs. I like structure. I like to make a list every morning and I am not in a good mood unless three quarters of that list is done by the time I crawl into bed. I used to be foul if anything on the list got skipped, and it took years to force myself to be happy with only a fraction of that. Now, there is no way I will get anything done and I know that I am the one person who has to keep it together. As one of my old bosses told me, “ If Amy has a good day, then everyone has a good day. If Amy has a bad day, well then everyone has a bad day.” I thought at the time that that gives one person too much credit, but I learned over the years that it is true. There is just something about my aura that bounces off others like radio waves, so if I want my husband to keep harvesting with the same attitude that he has tried to hard to maintain this year, I have to keep it together.

I play phone tag all day with the pump guys until I finally nail them down for a time. We have to survive on the generosity of our family until Monday at 1:00 PM. I take a deep breath and swallow the internal scream that is trying to build. Therefore, instead of screaming with the kids around, I make a list of everything we will need to survive hour by hour until that time. Then, I drive to the store – alone so that I can vent in the car – and buy bottled water, paper plates, paper cups, and beer.

Wave’s mom, husband, and Wave’s sisters, bless their hearts, have decided to take all of the kids for the day and go to the lake. They too are my hero’s – as always! After they are delivered, minus Brett who is too old to go frolicking at the lake when he could be texting his girlfriend – I give up on my lists and sneak a ride and a beer in with Wave. Tears are close when I see him, but I hold them back. I don’t cry. There is no point in wasting tears on something you cannot change anyway. Instead we have a beer and a couple laughs.

Our neighbor’s grain truck burned up in a fire this afternoon and another loses a header in the middle of the road, so I guess I can’t bitch too much. We are having a great harvest, the kids are trying their hardest to be good as gold, and our family is taking time out of their lives to help us.  While I am out with Wave we have a small smoldering fire in our combine. I hold my breath preparing for two of the three bad omens that are destined to come our way, but the guys handle it and get is out before there is a problem.

I return home to take Brett to wash pigs. It takes a whole bag of marshmallows and we are covered in pig poop when it is over, but we got ‘er done! My mom says I’m a real farm hand now. I tell her I just want their hams to taste good! Then we head to Grandma’s to shower, minus all of the normal kids in toe. My mom and my aunt are there and we get to sit and visit for a long while. That was exactly what I needed! Then, we return home to wrap Summer’s birthday present and forage around in the fridge to prepare something for Wave for dinner. My big plan of making home cooked meals every night is out the door, so I walk to the summer list and cross that one off for good. 

AUGUST 25, 2011: Water, Water...nowhere?

Up at 430 again. Turned the sprinkler on before I left to pick up Brett and came home to find no running water! Now, I grew up on a farm that had limited water, similar to ours, and one day the well went dry and we didn’t have water for five years. Five years! Can you imagine? I had graduated by the time they completely lost the well and we in the process of digging the fifth one that would be dry. My mom had to haul her laundry to town to wash it and they could only take baths and showers on occasion when the little bit of water that would seep into the well could be harnessed. This morning, with a husband in a dirty field, lunches and dinners to be made, and four boys who need to work with their pigs, we don’t have a drop.

I don’t want to radio Wave about this, but what choice do I have? Thank goodness my husband can multi-task and keep his cool in situations that would have left me slamming phones into the wall. (FYI: That comes later)

Wave told me to call our electrician, and friend, Kevin. Thank goodness he can come out today. He says he’s getting calls for a lot of well issues right now. I ask him if it’s the hot weather, the solar flares, fate returning to try and scare the crap out of me, or what? He says it’s the pump. It’s dead, and we have to call another guy. While that might be bad news to some, to me this is great. Bad pump means we still have a viable well. I call the other guy, he can’t be here until Monday. That is almost a week from now. While I cringe, I must remind myself to say a little thanks again for the fact that water is possible within less than five days- instead of five years. The worst part about it is that I have been so busy I have not been able to do laundry, and today was supposed to be that day. In addition to that, it is 90 degrees outside and I have animals in the barn that need water. I also have kids that need water and a husband that will need bathed tonight!

Thank goodness for family! I call Wave’s dad in a controlled panic, tell him the situation and he snaps into motion – just as he always does when we have a minor crisis on the farm. He readies his laundry, empties his dishwasher and turns over his downstairs bathroom to us for our use during the next week. Not wanting to overwhelm one family member with our monster size brood and amazing amount of dirt and stink this August, I also call my grandma in Tekoa as well. She does the exact same thing as Dick. Our families are so amazing I make a mental note that I am a slave to the next person in need in either of them!

After that, I haul the kids to Tekoa to wash and work their fair pigs. As I have told the kids before, animals sense moods. Well, they must have sensed that all hell broke loose in our house and have decided to mimic their observation by completely mauling each other and the children. We come back home grumbling something about fate, and freaking pigs, and I instruct the kids to bathe in the hot tub water. I will then drain the hot tub, which needs it anyway. I think that act alone, climbing into a vat of warm water, calmed their nerves because they were laughing by the time they finished. When it was my turn, I lingered, stared at our farm, which is dry on a normal day, and said goodbye to what little flowers I managed to keep alive this year. At 630 PM I resign myself of the fact that this will be the way it is no matter if I scream about it or not, and I take the kids to a movie at the old theater in Tekoa. For two hours, we eat candy, drink ice cold water, and hope to hell we got the pig smell off so I neighbors don’t point and whisper about us.

After that, we go back home a little calmer. I heat water for dishes and for Wave’s “bath.” He was invited to go to his Dad’s of course, but I know my husband. Once home, he is not leaving, and the chance washing like you are camping will be too overwhelming for him. Luckily, it is a warm night, so we stand out by the hot tub and I dump pans of warm water over him until he is well…clean enough. 

August 24, 2011: DAY 6: For Women Just Learning To Wrestle Pigs...

I’m sure by now you are getting sick of me saying “up at 430.” Well, we were up at that time once again. Brett started out this season eating eggs and having a cup of coffee with me before he left. Today, he wanted nothing aside from ten more minutes of sleep on the couch and a promise that I will wake him when I see the lights of Coach’s car. That’s fine with me. More “Water for Elephants!”

            Brett informed me that his girlfriend would be coming over after practice, so I get my jog in early in order to have time to clean the house before she arrives. My friend Cat has a saying, “If you’re coming to see me, stop by anytime. If you’re coming to see my house, call ahead.” While I would love to feel the freedom of this statement, I have major OCD when it comes to my house being clean, and with five children running around, feeding the beast of my desire for cleanliness is difficult at best and often leaves me with my mouth drooling and my heart racing.

            The lack of perfection in my home is something I have had to learn to breathe through, just as other people breathe through paying their bills when they know from the start that they don’t have the adequate funds to do so. While I’m sure that learning to relax in a less than pristine environment is a good thing, I still secretly believe that so is my OCD. I love it. I relish in it. I roll in it like a dog rolls in poo. Okay bad analogy, because we all know how I feel about poo as well. But I will save that for another story.

            I want my house to look as if the maid has been here all the time and I have such a hard time controlling myself that when the kids leave so much as a spoon in the sink, I call them to it and then look around in bewilderment asking them if they see “Alice” anywhere in the house? As you can see, I’m not fully on the verge to recovery yet, but due to other events of the morning, I was unable to get my dishes done before I had to retrieve Brett and his guest. I was mortified, apologizing for the mess, etc. Brett, always there to help like any good, loving teenage son would, looked around the kitchen and said, “What are you talking about Mom? This place looks cleaner than usual.” Had he not had a guest I might have cuffed him.

            At noon, I took Brett’s friend home, delivered Maxx and Summer to Grandma’s for a two-day visit, and went on a parts run to Colfax. Wave’s mother has recently become my hero (not that she wasn’t already) but she has offered to take a small set of our brood on and off this week to help give me a break in harvest. Ahhh…

            At 500 PM, The Ag teacher from Tekoa and his wife arrive to help us load up three of the five pigs that we will be taking to the fair. Just like last year, we will moving them to the FFA barn in Tekoa so that the kids can wash them and work them more intensely during these next to weeks. When we started raising 4-H pigs last year, we all wondered how in the world we were ever going to butcher them. A friend of Wave’s told him that by the time the pigs were ready to go to the fair, we would be ready to kill them. I love our pigs. They are like dogs. Loyal and affectionate. They seem to only want to please, but I clearly remember that last year I felt different by the time we loaded them. It sounds cruel, and it is only a fleeting thought, but as I watched the Ag teacher back the trailer into the stall, I had flashbacks from last year’s pig loading attempt.

            The pigs were playful and jumpy as the teacher stepped in the stall to separate the three we will be taking to the fair. Dominus, Zagar and Alex were quickly separated from the other two, but by the time the gate opened on the back of the trailer they turned into 270 separate pounds of solid hatred, and the five of us were not enough to handle them. Especially with Jack singing to them loudly from atop a fuel tank next to the stall.

            Within minutes, all three of them squeezed under the gate on the trailer and were out in the driveway before we could do anything to stop them. Brett lured them with every marshmallow we had and thank goodness managed to get them back in the fence. Pigs are smart, but they are also playful. They love to follow you, and marshmallows, but it will be over their dead carcasses that they will get in the back of a trailer. Like I said, they are smart!

            It took over an hour and every bit of strength all of us had to get those three snorting, biting angry swine into the back of that trailer, and as the teacher closed the door I was already screaming “good riddance!” in the back of my mind; however, by the time we got to the barn and coaxed the pigs out of the truck and into their new pens they had returned to normal and we were quickly scratching their jowls again. All water seemed under the bridge between us, and we were almost sad to leave, but I knew in the back of my mind that tomorrow, bath day, was going to prove to be much of the same as it was at the barn and once again I would be thinking about how good pork chops are going to taste this winter.  

August 23, 2011: DAY 5: New visitors to the Warwick Farm

            Today’s up at 430 moment brought homemade cappuccinos, or as our family likes to call it, Uncle Mike’s Special Drink. Although I have the right tools: good strong coffee, Sugar in the Raw, and a coffee press for foaming the milk, no one can make them as good as Mike does. No one! The sun was just peaking up as I got Brett out the door and tiptoed back to my chair to read another chapter of “Water for Elephants.” No one got redlighted thank goodness, but I’m starting to wonder what in the world Jacob is thinking.  I also hope that the author answers the posed question about how much water a person would have to haul to satisfy an elephant. Before I could get through more than one chapter, or more than one cappuccino, Wave was up and ready to move a tractor to the field to plow fire lines. The air is super dry, and I am relieved that he is doing this before the combines roll today, so I make him a cup of coffee and we are out the door.

            I have not ridden in a tractor with Wave since last fall, and with coffee in hand, the crisp morning air smells so much like Fall it is both exhilarating and eerie at the same time. I love the cooler mornings, but Mother Nature needs to hold off for a little while longer. We have to get the crops in first.

            After plowing the field and gossiping in my husband’s ear for the first time in a week about everything that has been going on with the kids while he has been working, we are all too quickly done. Wave moves the tractor to his dad’s house and I back the pick-up up to the little tiny air compressor in order to move it into the next field so that the crew can blow off their combines before they start this morning. This is the first time I have done this alone, and considering the fact that the air compressor is so small behind the pick-up that you cannot see it, I was pretty damn proud that it only took to tries to touch ball to hitch!

            I returned home just as the kids were stirring and the crew is arriving, only to find a mama and baby moose heading toward our “newly” dug pond. I was so excited, since drawing in wildlife was one of the main reasons for digging the pond, that I called the kids on the radio to tell them to run out to the shop and watch. Unfortunately, Summer’s 4-H sheep had jimmied the chain on their fence loose and the kids were out rounding them up. I hoped that they did not get mixed up with the mama and baby in the process. Knowing Jack, he might try to coax one of moose into the fence as well.

            The rest of the day was fairly uneventful. No break downs, no major parts runs, no cussing on the radio yet. It felt like the calm before the storm. Everyone, even the other families on the radio seem pleasant and content, so I took the opportunity to move more rock and make banana bread. My back is really starting to hurt, but I’m determined to get that rock moved before we leave for the fair in two weeks. I’m determined to get a lot of things done before then. I’m not sure how Wave will handle the rest of harvest minus his family and the parts runner, but at least we will be in Colfax, so if something major does happen, we are already only ten minutes from the parts store. I’m already dreading the amount of times I will be coaxed into running a part up “real quick.” 

August 22, 2011: 4th DAY OF HARVEST: Catching up

NOTE TO READER: Since I decided to add my diary on my blog page days after harvest actually began, I am having to play catch up. Therefore, every free moment I get, I will add a day from the past in hopes of being caught up to the current day for you. Please stay tuned. Things tend to get a little crazy on the farm this harvest! 


DAY 4: The kiddos came home Sunday night. For three of the boys at least, this is it for the summer. They normally alternate every two weeks at their other homes for the summer, and now that they are back here that is over. Brett is back on a full-time football schedule, and I will have to work hard the next two weeks to get the rest of them on a regular schedule again. For Summer, this is her last two-week interval at our house for the summer. She will return to her mom’s house for the school year after the holiday.

            I’m super excited to see Maxx as he and I haven’t seen a lot of each other of late. He used to spend all of his time here, but with Brett having more needs now that he is in high school, I seem to be spending more time with Brett these days. That’s fun too, as it used to be just the opposite. Boy howdy, there is just not enough of this mommy to go around!

            So, at 4:30 Brett and I were up again for football. The athletic director, and our neighbor, Ken, kindly offered to pick Brett up in the mornings since he, and his daughters, have to be there anyway. I kissed Brett goodbye and thought fleetingly about going back to bed; but it feels so good in the cool morning air, and it’s so quiet, I have to stay up and sneak in a few more chapters of “Water for Elephants.” I think someone is going to get redlighted today, so I am on pins and needles as to who it is!

            At 7:00 I got a jog in and then I helped move combines again and taught Brett to flag for the first time. He did great. It was only a small move, but just doing that works the kinks out so that he can be ready when we really need him. Harvest is going along well, but every time I even think that thought I want to scream out, “Break a leg,” due to the recognition that you have to be careful what you say or else you could jinx yourself and everyone else. The wheat looks amazing, but shhh, don’t tell, and everything is up and running again. Yikes, scary just thinking it.

            Right now, it’s nice to hear the neighbors on the radio again. Seems like Heaton’s are starting to harvest and Mc Hargue’s are doing pretty well. My Grandpa Squibb works for Mc Hargue’s and today he gave a shout out to Jack telling him to have a good harvest and to keep the farm running well. We can hear all of them, but he can’t hear us. Right now, I like the camaraderie, but ask me how I feel about the radio chattering away in my kitchen by the end of harvest! However, I like being able to hear my grandfather working on the radio. Who else gets to do that?

            I managed to pick a few zucchini from the garden and it looks like I might even get a tomato this year. Oh boy! Terrible year for a garden around here. I don’t know why I even try. I moved a bunch of rock in this flower garden I have been working on all summer. This place is huge and it always has been a work in progress. It probably always will be. I have plans for all of it, but each project is massive and will take time. This flower bed alone has taken two years to establish and it is still not even close to done. All of this is helping me learn patience. Building and growing things tends to do that, and it has also helped me to understand my husband’s never ending patience so much better the longer we are married.  

            I found time to run Jack to the pool for 30 minutes. It just seems wrong not to let the kid swim while he has the chance. He would swim all year if we would let him, and I’ll lay testament right now that that kid will be a scuba diver when he is older. I’ve never seen anyone like him when it comes to diving and holding your breath under water. Brett just told me that they believe deep diving and forcing yourself to hold your breath for lengths of time encourages the blood vessels in your brain to grow and have been know to increase the amount of brain we use. We are not worried about Jack then; he will do just fine in life.

            Had to leave the pool to go on a minor parts run to Colfax. Brett has ridden with me on every run, and the company with my son is nice. He will get his license in a year and half and I know that after that, he will be gone.  I return home, leave Brett to get some sleep and take Summer to Tekoa to practice showing sheep for the upcoming Palouse Empire Fair. She is gaining confidence and doing much better – even though she doesn’t see it. Working on trusting herself will be the key. I think working with the animals will help her to stand on her own two feet. I am very excited to see her in the arena!

            By the time we got back home I had just enough time to make Mulligatawny Soup and rolls and head to my bedroom for a little quiet reading. Although I still have not had much time with Maxx, I am tired, Wave will be here soon, and still have not seen anyone get redlighted from the circus train.  

August 20, 2011: DAY 2 - THE PICNIC

We are up at 4:30 again. I cannot say that it is getting any easier just yet. Chad arrives at 7:00 ready to roll. I finished a new Lentil, Orecchiette, and Feta Cheese salad for the picnic today, only to discover that it didn’t taste good. Experiment gone wrong. I cannot serve this to my family. Thank goodness for my friend Shelly, Chad’s wife,  who taught me how to make the best Macaroni salad on short notice. After whipping it together, I go out to wash the farm truck I’ve been trying to get to for three days. I want to wash it and wax it before the sun bakes it and me. I get it washed, but it’s already to hot by the time I get to waxing so it will have to wait until this evening. Thankfully, the other truck driver does not arrive until tomorrow, so I still have time.

            I am soaked by the time I have to move Chad to the field and return home to feed and water the animals and create a new mud bog for the pigs. It will be almost 90 degrees today, and by the time I start filling the new hole they are already rolling and splashing in the water covering Jack and I will mud. Thank goodness I waited to shower.

            I grab a cooler and fill it with ice for the salad and fresh huckleberries for the homemade ice cream and it’s almost noon before Jack and I head out to the picnic, so we will be fashionably late at best.

            The picnic was fun, but I learned that Grandma and Grandpa are putting the family home on the market and moving to an apartment in Spokane next week due to Grandpa’s cancer. I can hardly enjoy myself after Grandma asks me to run to the house with her to pick out some family heirlooms so that the kids and I will have something to remember them by. I sort slowly through the stuff, only to feel terrible for taking some and even more terrible for passing other stuff over. Grandma went outside while I was finishing only to find Jack sitting on the step moping about something. She asked him what was wrong and he said that I was taking too long and he was supposed to be in harvest. I think we already know this kid’s future.

            Jack and I return home about 4:00 only to learn that one truck is broke down already so Chad had to take the unwaxed truck to the field. That is not good since it has fresh paint, but that’s harvest. It’s unpredictable, so you better have all your chores done early. I didn’t this time and I feel bad about it because the paint job is so amazing. Oh well, can’t dwell on what you missed this time of year or you’ll never get anything done.

            I leave a very sleepy, but undeterred Jack with Wave and head home to make dinner. I BBQ Black Butte Porter chicken, bake diced potato with garlic and onions, some amazing oatmeal banana cookies, and a vodka tonic. Shelly came over to eat dinner with me and we got to visit minus children for the first time in history.  It was strongly quiet and I could actually hear what she was saying.

            Wave’s dad called from Utah, where he is competing in the National Cowboy Poetry Contest. He wanted to check on harvest and let us know that he won the championship! He is now the nations number one cowboy poet. Of course, he says it’s nothing, but we all see it differently.

            Due to the truck down, Chad, Wave and Jack managed to come home in time for dinner and we all ate together – probably for the last time this summer.

  

Diary for Harvest 2011: Day 1

AUGUST 19, 2011: 

            This is possible first day of harvest, and I promised myself that no matter how busy it got, I would keep a diary. We are so stinking ready to get rolling that I swear the hair on our arms is standing to attention at just the thought of hearing a combine roar to life. This harvest is late, extremely late for the Palouse. There are years when we have finished on this day, so it’s crucial that we do not waste a second. The problem is that not all of the crops are ready, so harvesting will be spotty at best. Today, Wave will harvest alone, jumping from combine to truck just to get a few loads into the bin so that he can make a better plan for the whole crew who are arriving tomorrow at 7 am.

            At 430AM Brett and I are up and semi-concious so I can take him to football practice at the high school in Oakesdale. I return home at 5:30. Normally I would want to fall back into bed and catch a couple more winks, but we’ve been gearing for this day forever. Especially our 6-year-old Jack, who is awake and ready to make lunches for he and his dad. He wants to get on the combine even worse than Wave does, but it looks like plans have changed. Wave needs to spray a field for a neighbor and we need to get a birthday present for Summer before we are deep in harvest and can’t get back to town.            

            By 7:30 we realize that we have two flat tires; one on the Rogator and one on the combine. And I swear it’s all because I made that comment the other day over our five o’clock beer in the shop that after all the time farmers have had to get their equipment ready this year there should not be a single breakdown. I should have known.

            At 8:30, I am showered, lunches are made just in case, and Wave and I deliver Brett to Mt. Hope to buck bales for the day with my dad. We make a mad-dash to Spokane for the present and I can already feel the tension in my husband’s body. He does not want to be in Spokane. He should not be on blacktop at all this time of year. He should be hot, sweaty and itchy from the wheat chaff that has been misting doen his back all day. I hurry out of there before some unsuspecting elderly woman with a shopping cart gets ran over by a cranky farmer in need of a wheat fix.

            By noon we are back home. The tires guys have yet to show, and I want my husband as far away from the house as possible. He goes to the field to harvest what he can with the other combine with instructions that I will call him the moment they get that tire fixed. Executive orders already being bellowed out. Full crew or not, we are in harvest now.  I spend the rest of the afternoon making a highly fattening meatloaf and potatoes for dinner, and start the salad I need to make for the family picnic at my Dad’s tomorrow. Harvest or not, the picnic will not be missed as my grandfather has just been diagnosed with two kinds of cancer and he is still going out of his way to make us homemade ice cream. I bring the few huckleberries I managed to pick this year. There won’t be any for Wave, but Grandpa’s ice cream is worth it.

            Brett calls after he’s done bucking bales and has decided to skip tomorrow’s practice to go on one last run to the lake with his dad for the week-end. I can’t blame him, but I make sure he calls the coach and explains everything.

            My mom makes the long trek from Moses Lake to Tekoa to see her parents, so Jack and I go over to visit for the evening. Grandma Squibb, Aunt Lori, Jack and my mom are there. So fun to see them! We end up out at the cemetery on a ghost hunt just after dark. No ghosts, but the cool, golden harvest air is refreshing and it’s great to talk with everyone. I do miss the cemetery at night. We will have a full crew in the morning, so Wave and I get to bed early. The wheat sample tested well. We are go for a full day of harvest tomorrow and I can only imagine what kinds of trials and tribulations that will bring. 

“The ‘Chewing With Your Mouth Open’ Theory.”

I have been trying hard to find the simple words to explain this lack of temperance I see in strangers lately. I’m still not sure what to call it. Is it a lack of manners? Decorum? Decency? Hearing? Seeing?

            The other day I was at the pool and I saw some woman tugging on her young daughter’s arm and yelling, “You better hurry your ass up. I’m not going to have your dad mad at me again because of you!” When she saw that I was watching – and covering my son’s ear’s – she glared at me and quickly pushed her little girl, who was still trying to get her toes in her flip flop, toward the waiting car as if she were a piece of property instead of a child.

            Yesterday, at the grocery store I saw another woman yelling at her child who was pushing the cart toward the cart collection area. The young boy had hitched a ride on the bottom rung for the last few feet across the parking lot and allowed the cart to bump into the other carts. The child was laughing at his own effect on the row of carts in front of him, and I was laughing too. There was no danger and I could just imagine the feeling he had of getting a “free ride” at the amusement park. Before I could holler out, “Good one!” and hop on my own cart, the woman he was apparently with started yelling, “Get your ass over here!” as she lit a cigarette and again glared at me for watching. The boy, upon hearing the woman, lost every trace of his smile and humbly walked back to the car where she loudly reprimanded him so quickly that I could not figure out what she was angry with him about.

            Over and over, I see this behavior becoming commonplace in our environment. People yell, they spit on the sidewalk, they litter, they scratch their butts, pick their noses, smack their kids. And they do all of it in front of you and then glare at you when you can’t help but notice. For a while now I have been sadly pondering the reason why? Is it global, economical, or is it just a slow decline in what we are teaching our children.

            Having not traveled very much in my life, I cannot give an assessment on the global perspective.

            As for the economy, I asserted to my husband in the parking lot of the grocery store, must be playing a factor. After all, it doesn’t take a genius, or this writer searching the internet for data to back up her theory, to assert a simply math problem. That being that the increase in the cost of living plus the decrease in family income equal stress on a family. This then results in less tolerance for what seems like the menial problems of our children in comparison. All right, it could be a geometry problem, but I was never good at math. Anyway, that’s not to say that their problems are less important, it is simply to say that Suzie’s loss of her tenth boyfriend this year might seem a little trivial compared to, let’s say, her mom’s inability to keep a roof over Suzie’s head. Am I right? Of course.

            But then, as my husband, our son, and I were loading the groceries into the truck, my husband pointed out the “chewing with your mouth open theory.”

            “What?”

            “You heard me,” he said. “We’ve talked about how many people chew with their mouth open these days.”

            It’s true. You see it in movies, which seem to glorify it as sexy. I can’t hardly watch Michael Douglas anymore without throwing up. You see it in restaurants with men and women who are trying to be sexy. And we see it more and more in our families and our children. Not to be pretentious, but the last time I let my child get away with showing me his food was when he was eating pureed banana off of a baby spoon.

            “You don’t think it’s the stress of the economy?” I asked.

            “No way,” he said. “It’s a nice excuse, but your mom was a single mom, and you guys were poor growing up. I had times when I was poor too. That doesn’t make us act that way.”

            “True,” I agreed.

            “You know how you always complain about the fact that the boys never chewed with their mouth open until they started school?”

            “Yeah,” I said. “They learn it from their friends.”

            “It’s because there is no on there telling them not to. We are a couple generations deep into this.”

            He was right. I remember as a child my mom telling me about the woman who walked around in the cafeteria reprimanding them for not using their manners. I recall her telling me that if she misbehaved in public all that her mother would have to say was, “You just wait until we get home and I tell your father what you’ve done!” I also remember my grandfather poking me in the arm with a fork for putting my elbows on the table. It was practically a cardinal sin if I didn’t wash my hands before a meal – past my wrists and halfway up my arm – and I clearly recall the taste of Irish Spring soap in my mouth if I ever cussed.

            For the most part, I still employ those techniques with my children, but on some things it has become a joke that they, my children, chide me about, just as I chided my mom about bellbottom pants and coke bottle glasses.

            I had to inform them the other day that the reason you don’t put your elbows on the table is because “back in the day” – as we always refer to the past – men used to come in out of the field with their dirty clothes on. They would wash up to their elbows and therefore were only allowed to put their arms on the table up to their forearms because if their dared to soil the only clean piece of linen that their wives had, they would be darn lucky to eat for a week. My son’s response: “Well, it’s a good thing you have a washing machine.” (Note to reader: he did get poked in the elbow with a fork. Just ask him.)

            With my youngest son, since attending school, he cannot seem to close his mouth when he chews, and washing his hands at the sink has become something of a chore because all he wants is magic soap.

            Now, I have digressed from the way parents treat their children into the way children are behaving on purpose. What we teach now has a multi-generational effect. To this day I keep my elbows off the table at my grandparents house, I close my legs when I’m wearing a dress, and I would never in a million years think of screaming at my kid in the parking lot of the grocery store and then glaring at the others around me for calling their attention to it.

            No, if my kid acts up, I’m going to do what a gal from the generation before me did to her children. I will walk right over to the cashier and ask to borrow her intercom in order to inform the other shoppers that my child wanted to make a spectacle of himself, so could I please have everyone’s attention?

            I laughed forever when I heard that, and had planned for years to do that to my children should they ever feel the need to lose their decorum in public. The fact is though, I’ve never had to do it. Not because my children haven’t acted up in public. They have. Believe me, they have. The reason I have never had to do it is because I still believe for the time being that I am the parent. I am teaching them the same lessons that my parents taught me in the hopes that they will be able to handle my grandchild appropriately in public just as I have them. And just like pushing my mother to change her bellbottoms, my children are doing their best to bring me into the new generation of thinking about how we act among our peers. I only hope this time, it doesn’t work!

            

"I gotta Get Outta This Place!"

Preface: This is not my normal humorous style of writing. I was helping a friend in financial trouble and I just had to share this insight with you. 

When my son was two he broke his femur in half. Yes, in half.  The femur, also called the thigh bone, is the longest and largest bone in your body. Apparently, it is also the hardest to break. It was a harrowing experience to say the least and in many ways it changed my perspective about life, children, and parenting. One of the lessons that I learned was from something that Maxx’s doctor said to me a few years later.

You see, when Maxx started school at age five, he did not know how to go down the slide. No big deal, I thought. I figured that he was probably scared of falling off and breaking his leg again. When he was seven, Maxx still could not ride a bike. Try as he might, fall as he would, Maxx still could not get it. Not being blessed with coordination, I assumed he got it from me and again I was not worried. Then, when Maxx was in fourth grade, his teacher was concerned because he continued to babble and play around on the floor like a second grader. Did he have autism? Asperger Syndrome? We did not know. The odd thing about all of this was that Maxx was not that way at home - and he was very intelligent. Not that autistic children aren’t, but he just didn’t fit the spectrum in all cases like most autistic children do. Therefore, we just chalked it up to Maxx being Maxx. Finally, I talked to his doctor with the caveat that I was NOT concerned, just curious. Goodness knows I didn’t want my son going through a plethora of testing only to find out that he was “a real boy.” What my doctor said, changed my perspective on just about everything. He simply asked if Maxx had ever crawled.

Crawled?

Crawled.

Looking back on it, I could not remember, but with the broken leg and other issues when he was a child, it seemed possible that maybe he hadn’t really ever crawled. It turns out that children who miss a developmental stepping stone, like crawling or walking, often times are unable to do many other large motor skills, such as sliding down the slide or bike riding. The result being that they simply stop where they were and in some aspects of their life they simply stay at that age. In Maxx’s case, he simply needed to go back and relearn that step he missed so that the other steps could fall into place. So, what did we do at age 9? We crawled. We slide down the slide, we swung on a swing, and as a result he stepped the rest of the way up the ladder in a short period of time and has since caught up with his peers.

To this day, I use that lesson in other areas of my life. One being, how we are trained to relax. Some people take vacations, some shop till they drop, other’s have a drink after work with a friend, other people watch television at night, many go camping, play in the garden, some take a smoke break, other’s will even have a “bitch” session with a friend.  

Whatever it is you do, it is usually a learned pattern, from collegues, family, friends, or even just from yourself. Escaping from reality in order to relax is as much needed in everyday life as the need to crawl is as a child. If we are “on” all the time, we get exhausted. As a result, if we do not learn a healthy way to relax and recover our body and mind will find a way to do that for us; be that through anger, depression, hatred, resentment, you name it, your body will shut down to survive.

I write this because I have noticed with this economy and this fast-paced lifestyle we all live, it seems that more and more people are cutting out their “escape” time in order to make more time for work.

I was talking to a gal the other day who was strapped with money problems and devastated because she is too busy working to make money and yet too broke to do anything fun with her kids. Every night when she came home exhausted after work, she and her daughters would argue for an hour - while she tried to clean the house – about how they never got to do anything fun because their mom was always working. My friend said that she had gotten to the point where she was beginning to hate coming home and yet she was too tired and burned out to continue to work another hour.

I suggested an escape. Maybe a picnic, or a hike, on her next day off, but she simply shook her head. All that her children ever wanted to do was to go to the mall and shop. That was it; that was all. The problem was that she could not afford it. She had taken them last week, spent money, and it was fun while they were there, but after ward, the same stresses returned. The girls knew that they were heading back to boredom for another week, and my girlfriend knew that she was heading right to her check register to try and figure out if she had just overdrawn herself for the sake of a little fun.  She did not know what to do. It seemed that her plan had only caused more angst after it was over instead of making them all feel better.

I advised her that her plan was not going to work.  It was never going to work.

The reason: their escape was not fulfilling the ultimate goal. The ultimate goal was to make their time dealing with the stresses of reality more palatable. What I advised her to do was to think of a better escape. Frankly, it seemed obvious to me that the girls seemed more focused on venting than shopping. After all, that is the first thing they did when they hopped back in the car. No one was happier, nor were they refilled or rejuvenated. They were simply more stressed and equally as cranky.

I advised her that taking them shopping when she clearly couldn’t afford it was counterintuitive. It was like taking an alcoholic to the bar and then telling them they could only drink Diet Pepsi. Therefore, what she needed to recognize was that what her girls really needed was some time to vent their frustrations, just like she was doing to me. My suggestion: Allow the girls fifteen minutes a day while she was doing the dishes or straightening house after work for an unfettered, unjudged venting session. The rules. One, at the end of fifteen minutes, they were not allowed to complain any more until the next day. Two, they had to help clean while they vent. By setting this new pattern into place the girls would learn a new way to relieve their stresses and she could get the house cleaned.

She didn’t think they would ever go for it, but what parents forget is that when children are speaking, be that in anger, through tears, or in defiance, they are trying say something too. After all, wasn’t she being defiant when she was talking to me> Of course she was. She was frustrated, angry, and she needed to vent! To this day I’m not sure why that privilege is only recognized after you turn 18, but it is. She needed to listen to them, like I was listening to her, and I promised that things would change.

For my son, his escape was baking cookies and eating them while he vented his frustrations about his day to me. However, given an inch he would take a mile and he would complain himself right into tirade and a chocolate cake. His escape was not working either. Not only was he gaining weight, which he did not want to do when he was in football, but he had also gone past relieving himself of his frustrations to reliving them every day. When I realized this, I suggested that we sit out on the deck together and have a glass of iced tea and some crackers so that he could vent for fifteen minutes. This satisfied his need to munch as well as his need to get his frustrations off of his chest without allowing them to monopolize the conversation. When the fifteen minutes was over, we could continue to hang out and talk about other things, or we could pick up our tea and be done. 

Just like crawling, we take the steps we have learned and apply them to the next phases in our lives. As toddlers we escape by throwing a tantrum, so our parents tell us to go outside and play. This soon becomes our escape until we grow out of that and move on to the next. As a teenager, it could be sports, or music, or painting, but it could also be smoking, drinking, in some cases sex,  or something even worse. My suggestion: figure out what you do to escape. Figure out what your children do to escape. If it is unhealthy, teach them a better way, and you may find that you might learn a better way of escaping yourself. 

Flowers and Rum Do Mix!

I have a black thumb, and apparently black eyes too. I’m a farm wife, and yet I can kill a flower just by looking at it. Therefore, when my girlfriend Shelly came over to visit the other day and saw me standing on my sidewalk staring at my brown wooden house with an empty drink in hand and a stoic look on my face she apparently felt the need to intervene.

“I have no color,” I said to her.

The next day she did what all girlfriends do, she drove back over with a full bottle of rum, some diet Dr. Peppers, a trunk full of clippings from her yard, and the spirit of sight that I was lacking.

Still in the doldrums, she made me a drink, turned on the stereo and instructed me every step of the way on how to add color to my yard. What started out as a mere planting of starts soon turned into an art form born of shear imagination progressively inspired by Captain Morgan!

“So,” she said, “Whatcha got in the barn?”

“Huh?” I asked, straw sticking to my lips.

“Come on,” she said. “Show me whatcha got in the barn.”

“Okay,” I shrugged.

Apparently, an old broken down wagon makes for a cheap and easy potting bed. Who knew? Well, definitely not me. From there we walked the rest of the place, so much so that I feared a sobering up coming on. We went to the garage where Shelly’s eyes beamed at a pile of old broken toy trucks.

“Hens and Chicks!” she said.

Hens and chicks are a great little plant that looks like an artichoke that apparently needs little dirt, water or maintenance to grow. What can I say, the girl has known me for a while now. Within an hour we had rusted out toy trucks full of plants and flowers.

From there, things got almost aerobic as Shelly placed her drink down and drug me into every outbuilding possible, even daring to go into my husband’s shop and rummage around in his stuff only to locate an old blue tool box which we stole and immediately drilled holes in.

She nailed old pots to broken off telephone poles, filled washbasins with dirt, made a broken clay pot into a piece of art I cannot stop staring at, and turned a wood box into a beautiful flower box which I – in my apparently new found inspiration had Jack color flowers all over – into a flower box for the porch.

Thanks to Shelly, her rum, and her imagination, my house finally has a personal touch and I am starting to see things around my house with a new wonder and excitement. As for the black thumb, that has yet to be determined, but I was overwhelmed with possibilities and a renewed sense of hope by the time she left.

“Thanks!” I said. “Really, I would not have done this without you.”

“No problem,” she said. “Just wait until you see what I can do on Tommy Bahamas!”