For Those Women Just Learning To Wrestle Sheep

Since yesterday was uneventful, I decided to bring back an oldie but a goodie. This was one of the two most talked about posts that I ever put on my blog and if you haven't read it you should. It explains a lot about me. (Originally posted September 2, 2011)

           The next day, intent in re-sinking my feet in the mud after the Spokane experience, and working out some of my aggression at the Dear Farmer (we will call him DF for short, just because I like the look of it!) I forced the kids through many lessons with sheep and pigs. The forecast called for the mercury to hit 100 today, so it seemed more therapeutic than crazy to put everyone through their paces simply because I was breathing and snorting like a bull over yesterday. The only thing keeping me from grabbing a bulldozer and plowing through the wheat field where DF was working was the fact that Brett had his first high school football game tonight. I could not wait for that! I think I’ve been waiting for this day since that kid took his first breath.

            He, on the other hand, apparently had not. As he sat over his breakfast, pushing eggs apart as if he were setting up the Nighthawks first play against Pomeroy I decided to continue my uncanny ability to tick off the men in my house by once again opening my mouth when I shouldn’t.

            “What’s yer problem?” I said looking down at him.

            “Nothing,” he said, shaking his head and gritting his teeth in a manner completely juxtaposed to the word used. “I’m just not playing. That’s all.”

            Okay, let’s just leave that one alone. You don’t want to know what I said to him anymore than what he said back. Let’s just say it ended with his bedroom door slamming and my front door slamming. I was done with him for a while. Now, onto the next victim.

            Now, I’m not sexist. When I’m hurt or angry, I like to share the love with everyone. As one of my ex-bosses once told me: when Amy has a good day, everyone has a good day, but when Amy has a bad day…. I was mad at him for a week over that little observation.  Since then, I have come to understand he was right. However, Summer and I had plans to wash her sheep this morning. It had to be done. There was no getting out of it since her 4-H leader was coming to sheer them the next day in preparation for the fair. In addition to that, Summer had been feeling intimidated by the sheep for some time now, so I knew that I had to change my attitude – or at least suppress it in order to get this done, because there is one other rule that is true about me as well. If Amy falls apart, everyone falls apart, and I was not about to let that happen to a scared insecure little girl.

            Therefore,  at 9:00AM, I walked a very reluctant Summer down to the barn to wash her sheep, Dude and Diva. Dude, the male, is about 125 pounds, and Diva, the female, is about 105.

            Now, I love pigs, as you can tell from the name of my blog, but sheep have been a different story. Pigs love you, they want to play with you, please you. They loved to be scratched under the jowls, and when you come to the barn they somehow manage to get their enormous bodies up out of their self-made mud hole and start running around before you even have time to pull out the first marshmallow treat. When you hop the fence, they fight to be close to you, they nip at your heals, and stretch their heads up to you when you pet them. They practically bark like dogs! Now, I’ve heard many rumors about pigs killing their owners and leaving no evidence left that they had done so, but with our pigs, I just can’t imagine. I love pigs!!

            Now, sheep on the other hand are a different story.  Sheep owners of course would disagree wholeheartedly, but in the three months since we’ve had these beasts it has taken everything I have to get close to them. They do not like us. They do not take marshmallow treats, which is just beyond my realm of understanding, and frankly when I look in their eyes they look back as if they would certainly eat me for dinner, given the chance.

            Now, the idea here, in case you have never caught a sheep like myself, is to catch them, hook their lead ropes on their halters, and then take them outside their poop-filled pasture, onto the nice warm grass, and wash them with a hose, baby shampoo, and a potato scrubber. Not to mention, that at some point in time, I will have to take scissors and cut the poopy dreadlocks from their bums. Regardless of the stigma of how dirty and smelly pigs can be, I have NEVER had to do that with a pig. 

            I try to hold onto my good attitude about this and attempt to stay in character as the person “in charge,” simply because I know full well that if I lose it, Summer will give up and walk away completely.

            Unfortunately, I think I should have meditated harder on my attitude, because immediately, things turn bad, as I predict they would. All it took was Summer unlatching the chain from the fence and the little devils start freaking out as if we are here to butcher them right now! I take a deep breath and coax Summer in the fence instructing her on speaking slowly, softly, almost lovingly. I can see little brother Jack climbing up the fence to get a box seat for the main event, as he does every day.

            “Let me do it, Mom,” he says. “I can get them.”

            “No Jack,” I croon. “They are scared. Not this time.”

            I step lightly and end up slipping sideways on a pile of dung. I curse softly about the pigs never leaving crap and realize that Summer has heard me.

            “Sorry,” I say, side stepping away from Summer so that we can box them in the corner. Immediately, the sheep turn and run, slamming their heads into the fence behind them. I take a deep breath as Summer rolls her eyes and gives me the “why-even-bother” look. I suppress the urge to tell her that she wanted to be different than her bothers. She wanted these stupid sheep.

            “Come on,” I say to Diva. “Come here, sweetie.”

             But, sheep are not like pigs, and no amount of coaxing is going to work here. They hate me, and I hate them. The façade of my liking them is shattering and we are now face to face with the reality of what is about to happen.

            A half hour later, I am sweating, the pigs are oinking like crazy from the pen behind me, Summer is almost in tears, and little bother Jack is whooping it up from atop the fence as if we are trying to herd cattle instead of ply a couple of angry sheep out of the fence.

            “Fine,” I say, throwing down the lead rope and gritting my teeth. “Fine. I’ve had enough. Summer, Do it.”

            “Do what?”

            She has a suddenly look of fear in her eyes.

            “Send her over,” I say, glaring hard at Diva. “Send her to me. I’m gonna catch her.”

            “You’re going to what-”

            “Do it!”

            Now, dear reader, you are really going to have to use your imagination on this one. There is a barn door up against my left arm and a gate up against my right. My feet are also braced against both. The idea is that she will run to me and then I will grab her around the neck with both arms and hold her tight. When I catch her – off-guard – she will freeze as these stupid animals always do and then I will call Summer over to put the lead rope on her and lead her out. Seems easy, right?

            I thought of my son, in his football uniform, standing across the line of scrimmage from his opponent, and crouched down into a catching position between barn door and gate. There is not even a hair’s width of room for her to get through. Summer slowly walks up behind Diva and I lean forward. Diva is staring at me, but I can see that she is monitoring Summer as well out of the corner of her bulging eye.

            “Push her button,” I say, referring to squeezing her tail and getting her to run forward.

            “You sure,” Summer asks.

            “Push it!”

            Summer does as she is told and Diva bolts for me.

            Now, I have always felt like I know what the pigs are thinking. I am NOT, nor will I ever profess to be, an animal person. Just ask anyone and they will tell you my rule: if you can’t eat it, it can’t be on this farm.  It’s a known fact that I am not a fan of taking care of poopy animals, but around here, it is also a well-known, and surprising fact that if there is a problem with the pigs that cannot be solved, I can usually solve it. I am not scared of them, they seem to like me as much as I like them, and somehow I seems to know their language without them even speaking. I’m like a pig-whisperer.

            Apparently, I should  have worked on that relationship more with the sheep before assuming that IT was a complete monotone idiot, and that it would just run into my arms and I would catch it.

            It only took me about 2 seconds, much less time than it takes for a bull rider to realize that he had made a big mistake, to learn the language of the sheep and realize that this animal was not as stupid as I had given it credit for. At some point between the button-pushing and reaching my arms, that sheep made an executive decision and I heard what it was thinking loud and clear.

            “I’m going to jump her!” It thought.

            For a moment I could see the truth about what was going to happen and I knew that there was nothing I could do.  And, for some reason that I cannot fathom, I was still hanging onto the stubborn notion that things might still go my way and my plan might work. It amazes me that you can think all of that in two seconds!

            All I remember are hoofs at my face, a warm body hitting my mid section, a gate rattling open, and the feel of two cinder blocks slamming into my back. It was then that I looked into the sheep’s eyes, just before it ran up and over the rest of me, and I realized that it was not only very smart, but very, very scared.

            The sheep was gone before I could even roll off the cinder blocks and frankly, I wished it would have kept on running. I could not breath, I could not move, and both of my children were staring stone-faced at me.

            Now, sometimes when people fall down, they will lay there for a moment and access the damage only to find out that they have had the wind knocked out of them and things were not as bad as they thought. That has happened to me on more than one occasion and I am always pleasantly surprised – especially after becoming a farm wife - to learn how much battering my body can actually take.

            I laid there for a moment, mentally scanning my body and attempting to breath, only to discover to my surprise that I really could not breath and I really could not move. Pain not withstanding, I went from amazement, to understanding, to downright fear as I heard my daughter say, “Amy, you okay?”

            I moved my head to the side and attempted to say, yes, but not much came out but a croak of air.

            This was strange. I realized that I might actually be hurt an the only thing I could even think about was the list of crap I had to do today and the football game I wanted to go to.

            I could see Diva out of the corner of my eye, she was huffing and puffing ans staring stone faced back at me. Poor thing, I thought, as I rolled off the cinder blocks. My second thought was that she was going to taste really good on my bar-b-que later that fall.

            No, just kidding. It turns out that for the second time in my nine plus years here, I was actually, truly hurt. Now, when I was working for the man, years ago, I would have relished an injury like this to put me on sick leave and get me out of that air-conditioned office and onto some much needed downtime. Since being here, working on the farm, raising kids, and writing, I have never once wanted downtime. I loathe it. I don’t want to miss a day of this, and I wouldn’t have time to anyway. After all, Alice doesn’t live here, so there is no one else to get my chores done, and these chores don’t wait for Monday. Peoples lives and bellies depend of what I do; therefore, as I rolled over and tried to get up, I started scanning my mental list in my head for what I could put off and what I couldn’t.

            By the time I got up, Summer had already sent Jack to the house to get the angry football player, and possibly an ambulance.

            It turns out I cracked a rib and bruised my lung and kidney. I didn’t tell my DF of course. Cranky as he was, it was none of his business. I was not about to end this silent treatment over something as little as internal injuries. No way. There was a point to be made here, and I was not about to let it go. I have a self-impossed rule on my farm, as my sister does on hers. If Caroline Ingall could do it, so can we!

            So, cracked rib, bruised lung, and bruised kidney, I showed my girl how it’s done on a farm and we caught that damn sheep and we washed them both. I even cut their butt-locks! That afternoon I dropped Brett off with his team and took the other boys over to wash the pigs. I never cried like a girl. I never called the ambulance or my husband. If Caroline Ingalls could cut into her own leg to let out an infection with a hot knife and the bible without Charles’s help, then by-goodness I could certainly continue my chores with internal injuries!

            That night, I carefully…very, very carefully went to Brett’s first football game. Wave was still on the combine, so Wave’s family came to the game as well. It only took one look from his mother, and expert in accessing my stubbornness, to figure out that I was in fact truly injured this time. I argued against it, but being equally as stubborn as I, she informed me that she WAS moving in tomorrow until the fair was over. No if’s, and’s or butts about it. And for the first time all year, I didn’t have the strength to argue. 

DAY 2: I Suck!

I’ve never been told that I suck by a boss. Never. Not once. Not even on the day that I dumped the narcotics all over the ground in the pharmacy, or the day that I tripped over the leg of the fork lift and went sliding through the warehouse on my hands and face. It’s not to say that they didn’t want to say that on occasion, or that I was always that best one of the job, it’s just that none of them were ever close enough to me personally to tell say that I sucked at something to my face.

Day 2 on the job here, I got told just that.

You see, I was glad for day 2. I had been looking forward to day 2. The reason: I was not going to be on the tractor and further embarrassing myself. I was going to Moses Lake with my children, and some good friends, to get pigs from an auction for the boys’ 4-H project. If any of you have read my previous posts you will not that you did not see the word SHEEP in here. No, you didn’t. And you won’t.
The day was sunny and bright, and I knew that it would only be better the further we got into the middle of Washington state. The only problem was that the Boss’s (I like capitalizing his name. The Boss, The Farmer, DH, Husband, etc.) other help, aka his dad, was away for the day as well, leaving the Boss without any one to help him move or run for parts. However, there was nothing I could do about that. I had informed the Boss of this scheduling problem before he hired me, and there was nothing I could do to change it.

So, off we go, with one excited young man, one grudging and complaining young man who didn’t think it was fair that he should have to get out of bed for his pig, and one missing man. One of my sons had another commitment and since that commitment was school, and future career, related, he was given a hall pass with the promise that we - the pig purchasers - would pick him out a nice, cute, orange pig. I would not tell you that part, but it matters later.

8:00 A.M. with lunches made, Farmer off, the kid with the hall pass gone, the two older boys in truck to get pigs, and coffee in hand, we were all of the road.

I am ready, until one of the two older boys who was awakened to purchase his pig starts complaining right out of the shoot that it is not fair that he has to get up on his day off and pick out his pig when I am going to pick out a pig for the kid on the school field trip.

Now, as most of you know, I’m a fairly nice mom. Even my kids have accidentally alluded to that on occasion. But, as they know all too well, there are three things that I do not allow: bitching, complaining, and not taking responsibility for your self – especially when it comes to something you, yourself, asked to do. Therefore, we are not yet 100 feet from the driveway when I just about opened the door and booted his non-coffee drinking butt out and said no pig for you! Instead, I rolled my eyes and talked happily with the other one.

One thing I have noticed with the varying ages of my children; maturity comes with drinking coffee. It’s really that simple. Those who drink coffee in the morning, know that the only time their lips should he parted around the others drinking coffee is when they themselves have a sip betwixt the cup and the lip. This young man had yet to take up the habit, and therefore, had yet to learn the rule, so I told him simply to zip it. Don’t start. We had a long way to go. Wisely, he did.

However, we ended up just the other side of Steptoe Butte (about 10 miles from home) when the first question popped out from the backseat.

“How long ‘till we get there?”

“About 2 hours,” I say, and then quickly add to avoid any finger pointing if I was wrong about the exact minute of our arrival. “Maybe a little more.”

“What?” the non-coffee drinker exclaimed. “You never said we were going that far! God, this isn’t fair!”

Now, Dear Reader, I could bore you with that conversation for a long time, but I don’t need to. Most of you have kids, so I think you can use your imagination on how I responded. The day I had been so looking forward too, was already on the verge of being ruined.

We made it just to the other side of the town of Steptoe before the question was asked again. I seriously wished I wore a baseball cap like other people so I would have something to lean over the back of the seat and smack him on the head with!

In addition that that, the coffee-drinking son had decided that since he was now the driver, and I stupidly applied the rule years ago that the driver got to pick the music, that he would put some rap on to get us revved up for the morning. Let me tell you, “Hell no! Double Hell no! No way! No how. Not for 2 more hours!”

So, still not wanting to part my mouth for more than my sip of coffee, I simply reach forward and pull the plug on his iPod/Phone/Thingy to stop the madness! Now, Dear Reader, just so you know, I’ve done this before. Many times. It’s kind of a game with us. He puts crap on, and I take it off, until we find a compromise – which we usually do.

“Put it back on,” he says sternly.

“No way,” I say.

“Do it,” he says again.

“Not on your life.”

I can see a smile cross his lips and I am just about to plug it back in and start pushing buttons through the worst of his music to get to something I can stand, while still allowing him to have his music, since I did instill that stupid rule, when the non-coffee drinker pops his head through the seats like Donkey in the movie Shrek and decides to defend his brother by throwing the rule in my face.

“You said the driver picks the music,” he said, crappily.

“Not this time,” I say, still smiling over at the driver.

“But that’s not fair,” he sneers. “You said. You made the rule and you can’t just break it when it fits your needs.”

By this time my coffee is gone, and so is my patience. I turn around and say, “That’s enough.”

“But!”

“Enough!”

“No,” he said. “You made the rule, now you have to live by it.”

“I don’t have to live by anything. This is my car.”

“I don’t care,” he said. “You make us live by your rules, so you have to too.”

Never in my life have I had a kid continue to argue with me that didn’t know when to quit. Usually it simply takes a stare down, or a change in my tone, or something that subtle to let the child know that they have crossed the line from funny into disrespectful. This child had apparently not learned when that line was crossed. It took me practically leaning over the backseat and changing my voice into Gandalf the Gray in order for him to get the point.

“Your voice shall not pass over this seat again!”

That worked again for a while, right up until we reached Sprague, which is about 45 minutes away. This kid clearly wanted a fight.

“So,” he said. “Is this Moses Lake?”

I wasn’t even going to answer. You see, there is another rule that I have in my life, and my kids – especially the non-coffee drinkers – know it all too well. If you ask a question and I don’t answer it, you know that it was a stupid question. While in school there may not be stupid questions, between children and parents there are. And they are usually asked just to piss a parent off. And boy howdy, had he finally succeeded. I was like Papa Smurf yelling at his smurfings by that point!

“HAS IT BEEN TWO HOURS YET!!!!!!!!!!”

By the time we reached the first rest area five miles out of Sprague I got the first text from the Boss. No one was there to help him and he needed help.

Hmmm…let me see…I’ll just drop the kids here, turn around real quick and get right on that. Stupid question, so therefore, no answer.

To make a long day, short, I will say that we got to Moses Lake and it was warm! That was the best part. The worst part: the non-coffee drinker said, “Why should we have to pick out my brother’s pig. You said we all had to come. I had to come, even though it was my day to sleep in, so I don’t think we should have to help him at all.”

Not wanting anyone from whom I was purchasing a pig to think that I might be abusive in anyway, I walked off again mumbling something about spoiled rotten, ungrateful, unhelpful, non-coffee drinking little…. And wondering if these people, who were rednecks like myself, were serving alcohol at this little shindig. No such luck.

Let’s just move on to say that we purchased the pigs and, aside from the warmth, that was the only other highlight of my day. On the way back home, pigs in pick-up, both kids finally laughing because those pigs were so damn cute they could put anyone in a good mood, the texts start coming in from the boss again. Thankfully, I was back by Steptoe Butte when I got the first text.

I’m ready to move, and I’m sitting here waiting.

Timing is everything.

Great, I text back, feeling pretty darn smug at the fact that I could be there for him when he needed me. I’ll drop the pigs and the kids at the barn, flip up the OVERSIZED load on the truck, and be off to help you in two shakes of a…

No…no sheep, or lamb, references. I was barely surviving as it was. By the time I booted the kids and pigs out at the barn, the texts were coming in with exclamation points.

I went ahead and moved the truck while I waited for someone to get here, and now it’s stuck. Bring a chain and some fuel, ‘cuz I’m going to need some soon too, because no one has been here to bring me that either.

No problem, I text.

I’m just so darn proud that I pulled into the driveway when I did. If this had happened an hour ago, I would have had to pull over on the side of the road in order to safely answer the litany of texts I would be getting about abandoning him during Spring Work. (Which, I do want to say I really, really did feel bad about. Anyone married to a farmer feels bad about that.)

So, I proudly find the chain and he fuel, and drive it all out to the field. Half way out I get more texts. Can someone please tell me why I have a cell phone? These texts are from the kids at the barn. The pigs are too small, they keep hopping through the fence and running all over the road.

Okay, now I’m just laughing. I’m laughing so hard I am putting other drivers in danger. I can just picture them; my two oldest boys, and my daughter who is now there too, whooping and hollering and chasing pigs all over the gravel road. I am still laughing, while their freaked out, exclamation point texts keep beeping in, and I’m hauling-ass in this loud rattling service truck to the Boss who is counting seconds, so I only have time to text back two words.

Handle it!

Fast-forward to the boss who is still waiting, and now you will understand why it is that I suck! Not because the pigs or out and I wasn’t there, or because everyone in the world seems to need my help because they – pardon my French – need to take the tit out of the mouth for a change - but because I have to drive the stuck water truck out of the mud bog that it is slurped down in while being pulled out by the Rogator, which for those of you that don’t know, is a sprayer that is so tall that it looks like an Autobot on steroids.

I get in, and the Boss says to push the brake off and turn the wheels so that we end up back on the road. I push the square deeley-bob brake-thingy and listen for the hiss that indicates the brakes are off, then I turn the wheels. This maneuver in my mind is akin to parallel parking, if you can imagine that. Turn the wheel to the right, and the bum of your water truck will move to the right as well. Simple, right? I am glad that I am here to help. Me, with my great insight into backing up.

So I turn, and he pulls, and pulls and pulls, and my bum moves the other way, further into the mud and possibly – no certainly – a foot deeper. I see the Roagator stop, the Boss get out, and slam down the stairs, so I climb out to meet him.

“Did you take the brake off?” he asks.
He’s still being patient, but I can see that his patience is going to have it’s limits and all I can feel is the blonde hair standing out like a sore thumb on my head.

“Yeah,” I say, pointing up to the square deeley-bob brake-thingy.

“Well, it’s on,” he says.

“Well, I pushed it,” I say shortly. “It hissed.”

“Try again,” he says, stomping back to the Rogator.

I got back in, slammed my hand into the square thing, and gave the signal to move. We do, I turn, and again we go the wrong way. The Boss doesn’t even give it another try. He gets out, and slams the door with that look I am all too familiar with. The one that says, Do I have to do everything myself!

I get out, recalling my first days on jobs elsewhere, knowing that I need to keep my mouth shut and listen, and he has me come stand by him so that I can get a better view of the trouble I have been causing. I walk over to him, careful to keep a safe employee distance and nod my head. Yep, the Boss is right, the truck is not going the right direction.

“What do I need to do?” I ask him.

“Your in the mud,” he says, pointing at the truck. “I am pulling you backwards. You need to turn the opposite direction that you are.”

“Oh,” I say.

Yeah, like I should just know that. That, I want to tell him, comes from being a boy and spending most of your high school career purposefully stuck in the mud with other boys. Girls don’t do that. We just don’t. We are not that…Well, anyway…

Trying to lighten the mood, I accidentally, for a moment, slip back into being his wife. This is more dangerous for me than him because if I have to look at him as my husband and he is still looking at me as an employee, and he is mean – or even just honest with me - things are going to be bad at home tonight. Real bad. I won’t forgive him. He knows that, and so do I, but I’m tired, and after having the non-coffee drinker picking on me all day, I stupidly reach out for a little comfort.

“I suck, don’t I?” I ask pitifully.

“Yeah,” he says, uncrossing his arms and walking away. “You do.”

Let’s just leave it there for the day…and hope that Day 3 is better.

Spring has Sprung!

I know, it's not a very catchy blog title! I just thought I would pop in and update ya'll on where I am at on writing, farming, raising kids, and pigs, and a husband...two dogs and a billy goat. No just kidding.

As farmers we take the winter off, which means that I spend the winter writing - which I did. I finished THE POLIS and will go to The Wenatchee Writer's Conference in May to try and sell it to an agent. This was a difficult book to write for me because it was in a different genre. This is a Young Adult adventure book instead of my usual Women's Fiction. Thankfully, it is done and put away, knot-tied on the binding until May.

In addition to writing, this winter Wave and I did a fair amount of fishing for Steelhead, winter camping, game playing, and hot tubbing. We did not get to do a lot of sledding or igloo building with the kids so that was a bummer. We took the kids to Disneyland for Christmas and then we went to Kauai in February. For those of you that did not hear, once again we had plane trouble over the Pacific and had to be returned to Hawaii which once again resulted in free plane tickets. Last year they had engine problems, this year the windshield "shattered" half way over the ocean. Most people think we are nuts if we attempt to go back to Hawaii again. As I have said though, we always get there, it's the making it back that seems to be a problem for us!

Since then, I have been working on my third book, which some of you know the title to, and others might not. For those you don't, I am keeping it a secret from the internet world. The title is too good, too yummy, and too leading. I don't want anyone else to have it - greedy me! It is once again a women's fiction book and it has caused a lot of "laughter through tears" as I have been working with my good friend and accomplice Mary in the character planning process. We are actually gaining stomach muscle from all of the gut-holding giggling we have been doing while plotting out this nasty little gem.

Yesterday was Easter, and I just wanted you all to know that we ate some DIVA! If you don't know who Diva is, read the last blog. She is the devil who tried to kill me last September. Therefore, we ate her. And, I have to admit that she was fairly good. Wave was a master chef, especially for someone who never cooked lamb before. My problem was my imagination. All I could see were the poop covered dreadlocks that I had to trim off of her "roast" area last Fall. I only had a bite because I could not get over that image for anything. That being said, master chef at the grill or not, lamb will not be my favorite meat. We did have some more "Evil Dr. Pork Chop" as well, in the form of a shank ham, and it was divine! I can eat that because - as I said before - I never had to clean a pigs butt, or trim their poop from their hind end. Never. Not once.

As for pigs, we are off to Moses Lake with another 4-H family next week-end to start the whole project rolling once again. Yeah!! I love this time of year! It means more time out doors and more blogs about farming with a pack of young un's, a yard full o' animals, a stressed out tired farmer, and a hot headed farm wife. I love this time of year...no really, I do.

FYI: You should see these pigs though, they are said to be grand champions boars, but they look more like a bull dog/rhinoceros mix. They are monsters and I think they come with their own weight lifting sets and boxing gloves. They might scare me worse than Diva, if that is possible.

Summer and Jack will not be doing sheep this year - most likely because I said, "Hell No!" Instead, they are raising bunnies. They each got one for Easter. They are a mini Lionhead mix and they are so super stinking cute!

Well, happy Spring and back to writing!

Amy

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 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.