14 September 2025

We made quite the convoy heading off down the gravel road. I got to take the lead in the old truck with a seed tender on back. My husband followed in the tractor and drill. Kids brought up the rear in the pickup.

My job, one of my jobs was to watch the big hills as we went. Make sure there were no cars speeding up the other side who would then meet the tractor which took up the entire road, coming over a hill with disastrous effect. My other job was to get the truck over to the field so my husband could keep the drill full of wheat seed and get the field planted. Hopefully before the chance of predicted rain.

The seed truck is older than I am. It sits most of the year while mice crawl through it and make a filthy stinking mess of the whole thing. I had complained about it enough that they had cleaned the cab out pretty good while getting everything ready to plant. Luckily. I have never had to drive this before and would not have been willing in its usual stinky state. As it was though, as long as I didn’t look at the floor, it was just a nice old truck. Sitting in the driveway as we were about to head off I got my first experience with its clutch. It involved lots of rolling backwards as I struggled to find that sweet spot where clutch and gas meet to make it go forward smoothly. It was much pickier than the semis I had gotten used to. Finally finding it, we proceeded onward.

With only four speeds going through the gears wouldn’t be a problem. I can drive a stick shift. It’s been an extraordinarily useful skill to have in life. If you can drive one stick shift you can drive any stick shift! This one was just a little pickier than others. The semis are mostly easy. I can go up through the gears no problem, loving how cool I feel as I run through them without clutching. Until I have to slow down. Then nothing will do but for me to come to a complete stop and start over in first. Luckily I don’t drive down the highway.

Coming to the first up hill stretch in this old truck I discovered, quite happily, that this one I could downshift! Dropping one gear she was able to pull the hill.

As we plodded along, the tractors top speed under these circumstances was not quite 20 mph, I got bored with the ease of things and called my grandma. Might as well talk while we made the drive.

Chugging along at almost top gear, 4th gear but low range, we chatted away. With all the weight of the full load of seed on going up hill required going down a gear. Until we reached THE hill. It is a steep down hill, from this direction. Then the road we need to take Ts off to the north going straight back up. the combination of having to stop to make the turn and then the steep hill climb makes life interesting with any sort of a load on. I’ve gotten stuck here before. In much simpler vehicles. A pickup and trailer with a load of calves going to pasture stalled out at the base of THE hill once. It required backing the dead pickup downhill and around the corner in order to try a few more times before giving up. There’s also very limited to no phone reception there. No calling for help. I had to wait until my husband, in the semi with the mama cows realized we weren’t behind him any more.

In the seed truck I made the corner in third. It’s geared really low. And started the climb. Then I realized that I was not a very good driver. I was used to automatic pickups and semis loaded light enough that they could chug right through the hard pulls.

I had been warned that the seed truck ran great, as long as it was running, but would not start again while warm if it was shut off for any reason. Or if I killed it running in too low a gear or failing a down shift.

Phone propped on my shoulder I begged the truck to keep going. My grandma on the other end was listening to my pleading as I cut in and out wanting to know what in the world was going on?! Was I ok? Who was I talking to?? I ignored her for the moment focusing on the very important matters at hand. It was apparent I would need to down shift as the engine chugged hard. Pushing in the clutch the truck came to a complete stop. On the steep hill. My mind flashed back to highschool. To the stop light on the drive to school, on a hill, cars everywhere. This stop was just as terrifying, if the dangers were slightly different. My trusty old Toyota pickup had never quite rolled back into the car behind us. Maybe I could keep this old truck from dying too.

Jamming it into 2nd, 1st was iffy and I had been told not to worry about it, I floored the gas and let out on the clutch.

The engine roared, the clutch slipped, the truck lugged slowly up hill.

I did it! I down shifted 🤣

Such a silly thing to be such a huge deal. The excitement rushed through my veins. I was exultant in my victory! I could drive anything do anything. Good had won the battle over evil. My grandma was still talking in my ear. Her voice heard once again now that the battle was over. She was done talking to me. She’d had enough. But I had been battling the hill and the clutch! She would talk to me another time. Oh well, not everyone can appreciate a battle fought. The few seconds had felt like hours. Apparently they had felt like hours to her too.

Shortly after the hill we got to the field waiting to be planted. My husband got out of the tractor and greeted my with “You nearly lost it on that hill didn’t you” He had realized the battle being waged. He grinned at me. I grinned back. Then they put the first load of seed in the drill.

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9 September 2025

Privilege

My husband called as I was elbow deep in meal preparations. He needed a little help, could someone come out to the field please.

After putting in almost a ten hour day, he had left the town job a little early so he could get home and plant some wheat. He and the kids had spent a large portion of the weekend getting machinery ready to go. Now during the work week he was getting started. No weekends or evenings off for him.

The kids had come home from school and were enjoying a bit of computer time. I ordered them out the door with only minimal, token complaints.

Cutting vegetables and finishing the meal I kept a watch out for them all, worried they’d be in and starving before I got the meal finished. No sign of them. Out to the garden to get it ready for the night and pick whatever was ripe and easy to serve alongside the meal, I heard the tractor in the distance. They were finally headed in.

Husband in tractor, one child on the drill, and the other following with the 4wheeler, they pulled into the yard to park for the night. It had been a long day. Watching the children work alongside their father I couldn’t have been happier. He is the hardest working man I know. Other than my father, and grandfather, and my brother. All the men in my family actually. Hard working men who give everything they have to take care of their families.

My dad took me out with him when I was young. Taught me a little about working on cars and even less about carpentry. But those weren’t the real lessons anyway. What I was actually learning was that I was valued, that he knew I was as capable as anyone else of working hard and getting the job done. My daughter spent a good deal of time over the weekend working on pivots with her father. He was teaching her the same lesson and it was wonderful later to hear her brag about the hard work she had been doing. The lesson was sinking in already.

It’s sad to see girls whose fathers don’t care about them the same way. Who never take the time or care to make their daughters, or sons even, go out and do the work with them. The privilege of knowing how to work hard and get the job done, of having a father who loves them enough to teach them that this hard work is what matters and will get them through life, that is the privilege my children have been born into.

At supper we talked about what they had been doing. How they learned what the dangerous parts of the planter were and how to carefully spread the wheat seed out to get the last bit of the field planted without adding too much seed and needing to clean it all out. Important lessons, but not the ones that matter.

 

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14 August 2025

My Trusty Green Mount

The 4-wheeler lurched then coasted to a stop.

I was a half mile from the pickup. In the middle of the pasture. The day was warm but not yet nearing the 100 degrees we had been promised. There were cows all around, but nothing too close. Now to figure out what to do.

My trusty and well loved green mount of Japanese breeding had been having issues. At first she would refuse to start without a battery charge once a month or so. Then weekly. Then she kindly started giving us warning she was having battery issues as all the lights on the dash would start blinking, we would rush her to her stable and hook her up to life support. Then finally she would blink at us briefly before dying. My husband had been stranded not far from home the week before now here I was out in the middle of the pasture.

I hated to leave her in the pasture. Cows love to chew and scratch on anything they can find, it gets hard on a 4-wheeler in otherwise, mostly, very good shape. We don’t hold this temporary sickness against her. No matter what I would be walking back to the pickup. At least I had boots on instead of my usual hot weather footwear of sandals. During my walk I called and made an appointment at the vet for my girl to get worked on. Soon she would be back to her normal dependable self. But for now I needed to figure out how to get my girl to safety. In order to get the running 4-wheeler loaded into the bed of the pickup I needed a bank, something to decrease the slope of the ramps. I am not brave enough to drive up there from ground level.

In order to get a non running 4-wheeler loaded I would need the perfect ramp. There was nothing like that in the gently rolling hills of the pasture/wheat field where she was currently stuck.

Coming back to the old girl with the pickup I thought maybe she would tow better backwards. The front wheels could turn freely to allow her to follow the pickup.

Nope. That sure didn’t work. It broke the old rope I had found amidst the other useful junk laying int he back of the pickup almost immediately.

So I hooked up to the front of the 4-wheeler.

That worked better as long as we were going straight very slowly. A few times I was able to send the pickup ahead without me, 1st gear low is a wonderful thing, as I ran back to do some steering. Then back to the pickup to get her back on the proper path. It was slow going but we made it to the gate out of the pasture. Now, even if I was unable to get her loaded, she would be safe from the cattle.

I had left my ramp at the place where I unloaded in the first place. It was a good place and I thought we would make use of it. But after the knowledge I gained from the experience of getting across the flat straight pasture it was clear that getting to that place would be impossible. It was on the other side of a steep draw with twists and turns. We could do straight. Anything else was out of the question.

Looking around, closer to the gate, I realized that the side of the road going into the draw might just be perfect. It was close, flat leading up to the possible point of loading, and close!

I unhooked the baling twine that had been serving as a tow rope, because of course baling twine! and backed the pickup up to the bank. It was great. Now I just needed to walk across the draw and get my ramp. Which was burning hot on my bare fingers. Back to the pickup for gloves, then after the ramp again. Then back to the 4-wheeler which in hind sight might have been nice to have pulled with the pickup to somewhere a bit closer to the loading site.

The kids push the 4-wheeler around all the time just for fun. I could push it the little ways across the flat to get to the ramp.

Being able to and enjoying the process are two different things. It was warming up quickly. Even flat isn’t ‘flat’. It took a while of huffing and puffing to get the 4-wheeler that short distance. Then there was the forward and back of getting it lined up just right with the ramps. My ‘perfect loading spot’ was perfect. It had a nice downhill slope to get to the slight up hill of the ramp. And if things weren’t lined up just right with the ramp before hitting that downhill it was going to be a wreck.

Finally deciding we were squarely on target I gave the past push over the edge of the hill from the handle bars, then jumped on. It was just a short hill, but it was as exciting as a roller coaster none the less. Just enough break to keep her going slow, not enough to ruin the momentum. Steering with a white knuckle grip and in a second or two the front tires were on the ramp! Where we stopped. If everything wasn’t lines up perfect I could injure my trust Japanese mount, and probably myself. So I dismounted to double check everything and pushed her the rest of the way in. It was done. She was loaded. I hadn’t died of heat stroke, or been run over. Floating high on the success I headed off through the pasture towards home. The rest of our days work would have to wait.

Sometimes I feel like an imposter. I’m not ranchy. My days are no longer spent horseback, checking cattle. Am I really even cowboy?

Then I spend a day wrangling my injured mount into the pickup like this and think I must be authentic after all. Never mind that my days are spent taking care of the cattle, working the horses, doing all the things, just usually done farmer style, instead of ranchy. Is there a farmer term alternative to ranchy? Instead of cowboy up do we farmer up? We’re definitely still getting western here sometimes. Just doing it farmer style.

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8 July 2024

The Aftermath

According to the radar we were on the edge of the storm. It looked like the ‘bad stuff’ was to the north of us. Right over our pasture and the bigger wheat fields. I was worried sick about my cows. My husband was mourning the loss of his wheat fields. Looking good this year and almost read for harvest.

We couldn’t get over to look until the next day, the storm came at dusk and it as dark by the time it finished.

Then my husband was busy with other work and couldn’t come at all. The kids and I headed over. By the time we got to the end of our neighbors field of corn, right next door, we had gotten out of the hail. The south end of the field was destroyed. The north end was untouched. I knew there had been hail by the pasture. I had seen video of it. But maybe not as awful as we had feared?

After a strip undamaged I came to another swath where everything had been destroyed. It was like mother nature had raked her finger nails across the earth. Strips that hadn’t been touched mixed with lines of destruction.

The cows fell in the untouched part and a couple small wheat fields.

Then bad again at the big wheat field. How bad? It’s hard to say. The wheat is still standing but the hard brittle stems, so painfully close to being ready to harvest had let loose their fruit. The ground is scattered with wheat broken loose and lost. Only the yield at harvest will let us know just how much was lost.

We were lucky though. The corn is battered, but still there. It might be early enough in the season that it can regrow? The garden looks rough. But all in all is doing alright.

Just a little farther east of us the storm got even worse. We had gotten much larger hail here on the south end of the storm and it kept getting bigger as it went. Our neighbors a mile east has trees down. Another couple miles on friends had entire fields stripped bare. Nothing left of corn or beans. Gardens beat down to bare dirt. We got lucky and are thankful for it.

My husband mourns the hard work, heart and soul, and effort that went into the crops. The money lost. The death of the crop and the love that went into it.

I mourn our swimming pool. The kids and I had spent the whole day just a couple days before this getting the spot ready and the pool set up and filled. Waiting for it to warm, we hadn’t even swam in it. The ping pong sized hail hurled at the ground had poked hole all the way around the inflatable top. We tried filling it with pool noodles. A hopeless but slightly entertaining attempt at salvaging our beloved pool. But they did nothing to stop the water from spilling over the edges. I forced the kids out to try to swim in it this weekend, resulting in the pool emptying half the water.

Oh well. We’ll need to empty it anyway.

We’ll miss that pool, it’s been a good one.

 

Category: Cows, Family, Farming | LEAVE A COMMENT
3 July 2024

Oh Hail

We had gotten lucky up until now. Bad storms everywhere around us, but we stayed between them. No rain, but no hail either.
Didn’t get so lucky this time. And we were towards the edge.
Hate to think what things are going to look like when we go out to look tomorrow. The pasture, my cows, was right in the middle of it.

 

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1 July 2024

Baling Ahead Of The Storm

We were rushing home from checking cows, trying to beat the storm. When we saw our neighbors out trying to get their hay in ahead of the storm. This is my version of their work.

 

No rain drops yet.The clouds were getting darker to the west. Starting our white, fluffy towers in the distance they changed to grey, then purple.  Having been able to hear the thunder for some time now, the lighting was starting to hit the ground not around us, but getting closer.

The hay lay in neat windrows across the field. A good cutting for a year that was starting to turn dry. It had made it through the wind of the last couple of days. Heavy enough not to get tossed in the breeze. Now the rain was coming. It was earlier than expected. Even great and terrible storms have routines. They blow up during the hot afternoons and strike towards evening. It was barely afternoon and here it was already.

The hot sun was blotted out by roiling dark purple clouds. The orange of it still shown through the other side in a few places, striped by lines of rain. The wind turned cool and crisp. Quickly turning arms that had been damp from sweat to arms spotted by goosebumps. The movement of the open tractor cooled her further. The breeze chased her with chaff as she raked along with it. Just because the chaff and dirt was no longer sticking to sweat didn’t make the job any less filthy.

If the rain would hold off a bit longer they could almost get the field finished. The could just almost get the hay in without it being rained on.

It was a delicate balance between saving the hay, having good food for the cows all winter, and the lightening that was touching down closer and closer. It was still just far enough away. She could surely get a few more rounds raked. He dad was behind her in a tractor, one with a cab lucky guy, baling the hay. Between tractor problems, wind, and storms, this cutting had been a battle to get in from the beginning. She would fight out this last round. That made her laugh a little to herself as she turned to make one more round around the field. The lighting was just far enough off, it wasn’t chasing her off her tractor seat yet. After all, there were no rain drops yet.

 

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3 October 2023

School Visitor

As far as I’m concerned there are nothing but advantages to a small rural school. Small classes, individual attention, and the focus on the agricultural community are great benefits to offer the children. A lot of the kids are from town but even those get their fair share of farming knowledge. Whether they want it or not.

I recently read that no matter how you raise your children, the environment you chose to raise them in will have a stronger effect on them than what you do. It made me happy to be raising ours where we are.

Yesterday my husband called, excited to tell me about a visitor to the school. Our local John Deere dealer, and by local I mean regional, had called the school asking if they could bring their educational trailer around and talk to the kids. By trailer I mean one pulled behind a large pickup, not an intro to a movie. The school had given permission to bring it that day and it was impressive. John Deere has their flaws and are down right evil when it comes to proprietary software and right to repair. But, even a stopped clock is right twice a day and they got this one right big time.

All the classes from fifth grade up got to go spend one class period outside on a beautiful fall day learning about STEM. The guy talked about GPS, how it works and why we use it with a GPS driven lawn mower that gave a lucky few rides around the lawn. Drones, again how and why, with each child getting to watch through the camera on the drone through a headset as it flew crazily about the school yard. Inside, the trailer was equipped with all sorts of gadgets and toys, all interactive for the kids to get their hands into and really see what was going on.

The guy talked about job opportunities and gave examples of the end results, uses, of the things they were learning in school.

That seeing reason for what they are being taught is such an important thing. I often look at my child’s homework and think how stupid and completely pointless the lessons are. I have never in my life had to know the difference between a line and a line segment. Much less how to name them. It seems so pointless fighting to make sure homework gets done when there is no conceivable point to the home work. Although I will remain convinced that 99.9 % of the people in the word will never need to know those things, it is great to have examples like this of cool, real world applications of so many of the things that seem so abstract and pointless to many of the children.

The thought of our die hard farmer son missing out on this broke my heart. I thought he would be devastated to hear about it afterwards and have missed out. So, we snuck him out of class and brought him to join in with one of the older classes as they went through. As usual with this school, the kids welcomed him. His friends int he much older group talked to him and hung out with him. He loved it as much as the older kids did. Maybe more. He did have to stay after school to make up the work he missed, but he said it was well worth it.

All lessons are learned more easily and quickly through the use of play. This great playday for the older kids made it fun and will stick with them longer than any boring classroom lecture.

A huge shout out to 21st Century equipment. Loved their educational trailer and sincerely hope the school will have them back again. Maybe for some more in depth lessons next time. The guy doing the talking said they had barely begun to scratch the surface of what could be offered.

Category: 8, Farming | LEAVE A COMMENT
2 October 2023

First Day Of October

I had things I wanted to get done. It’s October! Time to decorate everything with Pumpkins and corn. These things should have been done already.

We spent the first part of the weekend hauling hay and getting some posts set so they’ll be ready when I fix fence next spring. Today was going to be the day I cut corn stalks and covered our house.

But first there were a few things that needed done.

We forced the kids to come with. They had spent too much time sitting at the computers while their father and I worked at jobs that would have meant them sitting around if we had made them come with. Might as well let them have fun instead.

Today there were things they could participate in. First, to secure the cables on out internet tower. The wind over the last couple of years had been hard on the straps. We’d like to keep getting internet. So some preventive maintenance was called for. And the bucket of the payloader. The wind was blowing but was supposed to get worse. My husband wanted to get to it before that happened.

The four of us loaded up and went to work. Son and husband in the bucket. I got to drive. I gave our daughter my phone and told her to take pictures.

I lifted the boys up. Fortunately the ladder wasn’t needed. They strapped the cables back down securely. The pole was waving in the wind. Watching it sway back and forth made me happy they weren’t up in the bucket truck and that we didn’t wait until the wind got worse.

Then it was off to fix the pivot.

It was a major repair, or attempted repair. We all got to lend a hand. The kids climbed, the tower, and the 4wheelers. They laughed and played, and worked. Then they conspired. Grabbing him by the hood of his sweatshirt, I heard my sweet daughter tell her brother that “this would be a lot more enjoyable if you cooperate.” Then she whispered in his ear. They giggled, looked at us, and ran away. Apparently it had occurred to her that they could escape this dreaded work we were forcing on them if they left. Home was a little under a mile away.

They thought they were being devious. I thought they were being darling. They had done their work. No reason they couldn’t get the exercise that walking home would give them, then go do their own thing.

The work part is what they’ll remember. How they got to climb the pivot tower and ride up high in the bucket of the payloader. How we did things together. How they outsmarted us by running home.

It was a good day. Much better than decorating for Halloween even. Sometimes it’s the things you don’t plan on that are the best.

 

Category: 8, Farming, Goblin Child | LEAVE A COMMENT
31 July 2023

Crop Dusting

They’re flying, spraying the corn today. Corn root worm beetles are eating the silks. The spraying isn’t done lightly or often. It’s expensive. I hate to see it. No one ‘wants’ to do it.
I also can’t stand to stay in the house while they’re flying.
It’s part terror. I grew up watching La Bamba. I’m always sure a plan is going to crash on my head, or my house. I have to know where they are, so I can run away.
And partially fascination. Those guys are crazy. He’s going UNDER the power lines! It’s amazing to watch that skill level. Going under or over, he misses the lines by a foot or two.
Sometimes they don’t miss. I have good reason to be afraid as they fly over our house.

 

Category: Family, Farming, Horses | LEAVE A COMMENT
5 May 2023

Hail Like Snow

My dad has been here visiting for the last few days. It’s been great.

But I’m glad he left. Or at least glad he left when he did.

Mid afternoon clouds began to build. Thunder rumbled in the distance. It started sprinkling lightly. No big deal. I went out and played with horses. The laundry even finished drying.

Then the lightning started for real. We sat outside and watched. The lightening was coming to the ground, it looked like just over the hill. Then it started to rain for real. The kids blew bubbles and chased them in the rain. Giggling and wet. Then they shrieked with joy as a few hail stones pelted them.

The joy occasionally turned to pain as large stones hurt!

Eventually the fun wore out. It had been hailing for a long time. Some of the stones were big! And still it hailed. It would come in sheets, heavy and hard. Luckily there was no wind even though the clouds circled and swirled overhead. I stood and watched, texting friends, taking pictures. Fascinated by the storm. Then I realized my feet were getting wet. The water rushing down the road like a river was also filling our door step. Hail stones splashed in the river that was our road.

The sprayer kept fertilizing. He had been going all day. The fertilizer needed watered in anyway. In the beginning we hoped the rain would be enough to soak it in we now hoped wouldn’t wash it away. He came flying through the yard once. I thought he was giving up. But no. He was just moving on to the next field. A little hail wasn’t going to slow him down. Not until he finished the job.

Once the rain and hail stopped for a few minutes 8 and I went out to explore. We looked at the cows, then saw white hills in the distance. They were white, looked like they were covered in snow. We saw the water flooding through the corrals, coming down from the white hills in the distance. We drove over to see the snow. Needed 4wheel drive to get through the inches of hail covering the road. Stopped to look at the waterfall of water rushing over the road.

We had been lucky to miss the worst of the hail. As bad as it had been at home I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like so close but so much worse than we got. Our first real rain of the year and what a rain it was. Outside it’s still coming down. At least it isn’t hailing any more.

 

Category: Family, Farming | 1 Comment on Hail Like Snow