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. 

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 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 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.