Confessions...Part 3

Do you know that a farm cannot be complete without the presence of animals and fowl, and the odour which each produces, along with the more material manifestations of their being?  In layman terms, a farm’s got to have animal smells, and chicken poop; crude, but to the point.

            And so, we acquired chickens, just three to begin with, for their eggs.  The fact that we approached a large egg producer in the area, who had thousands of laying hens, and asked if we could buy three, seems now to be totally ridiculous.  But this is what we did.  We did it without any planning ahead.  Boss got the chickens and was asked where he would put them to get them home.  A good question, as we had been out for a drive, and pulled into the egg farm on the spur of the moment, having nothing in the car to put the chickens in.  The family cat was also present.

            “Just throw them in the back”, Boss said, “As soon as we get the cat cornered and the kids settled down.”  The girls were not entirely thrilled with the idea of sharing the back of the car with three frightened hens.  One never knows what scared fowl will do, and the children or I, for that matter, were not looking forward to finding out.

            That was the easy part, getting them home.  Getting them from the car to the barn was the problem.  These chickens were really scared, but through perseverance we managed to get them settled, and within a few days they were presenting us with eggs.  They appeared to be quite happy in their roomy, almost palatial new quarters, for they were accustomed to small wire cages where they could not even turn around.  We had given them a new way of life and they repaid us with eggs and a constant supply of garden fertilizer.

            Our farm was growing.  We now had a cat, two rabbits, and three chickens.  Through the years, at various times, we had as part of our menagerie, upwards of fifteen broiler chickens, which are a story in themselves.  We have raised geese, ducks and two pigs.  With each addition came events which will forever be emblazoned on my mind, and which added their own stroke to the deterioration of my emotional and mental stability.  I will therefore afford each group their own section.

"Diary"..part 2

And so, hating and yet strangely enjoying the work, the garden became an obsession, a passion, and a constant pain in my back.  It was surely driving me mad, but more was in store for me.

We had a “farm”.  A very small holding, grant you, but a farm, a hobby farm, some would call it,
But I have yet to conclude exactly whose hobby it was, mine or Sir’s.  It was a farm because the children, when asked what line of work their father was in, would reply, “He’s a farmer, and he flies airplanes”, thus making their father’s occupation of secondary importance, even though his flying paid the bills and also helped to induce the madness that was creeping into my head.  I will show as this goes on, just how this occurs.

            For amateurs, our garden was fairly successful.  We had grown enough produce to supply ourselves, our relatives, and half the south mountain with vegetables, especially beans!  Boss’s rule of thumb was, “If it’s there, can it or freeze it,” no matter that you can’t use it all.  I became bogged down in the canning quicksand, with pickles and tomatoes, and the freezing mire with mountains of peas, beans and corn, not to mention all the berries that grew wild on our land, and because they were ‘there’, you canned them!

            Now, all this seems, on the outside, to be very ‘back to the landish’, and it is, except for one small item.  I had never canned anything, or made pickles, or cut corn from the cob to freeze the kernels, or blanched peas and beans.  But, you do what you must do, and so I did, but talk about frustration!  The vegetables were seasoned with the salt from the tears I shed, tears of utter hopelessness and futility.  I didn’t have a clue, and I detested every minute of the harvest.  It sure seemed to me that it was a lot easier to pick up frozen peas at the grocery store, than to sit for hours, shelling thousands of pods to get a few bags to set in your home freezer.  The jolly green giant does it much better, and faster, and he doesn’t have to pick up dropped peas for weeks after.

            The fact that four years later I am writing this attests to the realization that one can do what they must do, and survive, at least physically if not mentally.  Each year I do the same, and I must admit I can do it faster now.  I can not say better, or that I enjoy it, but I do it because it’s there to do.

            And so we shall leave the garden, and the canning, and though I should mention that I still do both and it has become a part of my life, that the transition is over, the harvest is a natural event that comes in its turn each year, and is accepted, if not greeted with anticipation.

CONFESSIONS OF A MAD HOUSEWIFE

Just thought I'd share this. Maybe you'll get a few laughs, and perhaps understand a bit more where I am coming from. This was written a long time ago......

Written November 1978

 (This was written while in Shelburne.  It began as a letter to friends back in the valley.  I don’t recall if it was sent in full or not.  I don’t know whether to keep it or not, but will omit the first part.  I think it was supposed to funny, but rereading it, I don’t find it so.  I put myself down quite a bit.  I will just continue with the part where we begin farming.)

 Part 1

            Our married life has had its share of ups and downs, oohs and ahs, darns and I’m sorrys.  For the first eight or so years there were many changes. (We produced two off-spring and they always needed changing.)  We were like nomads, moving constantly it seemed, living in a different house every year, and sometimes moving twice in the same year.  But, in the spring of 1974 we finally settled in a place called Nicholsville, and here, dear reader is where the madness begins to make its mark.  It is here that I will begin a detailed description of the “Mad Housewife.”

            Our own home, our first home, this little house was really home, finally!  It meant comfort, warmth, relaxation……Ha!  Fat chance!  In the first few days, even before we actually had moved in, I had an inclination of just what was in store, and yet I ignored the treacherous thoughts that kept nagging at me.  This place is going to put calluses on your hands, bruises on your legs, paint on your pants, and hurt in your heart.  “I laughed it off.  No way, I said to myself.  This is heaven.

            As we moved in, a whole new way of life unfolded before me.  In fact a whole new Boss sprang out of the old one.  It was as if the mountain air produced a potion that transformed him into something alien.  He began to spend every waking hour working on the house, or outside.  His job flying became secondary, a means to an end, and in the changing process I began to realize that I too was slipping gradually, and not without a fight, slipping into the chasm with my husband.  It was then I knew that I had to be going completely mad!  I feared I would never be normal again.  To prove this thesis I will endeavor to report certain activities that will support this mad theory.

            We must go back a few years, to the beginning, before we moved in.  Back to the time when I found myself sitting under a great maple tree, at the edge of what my husband called a garden, but what appeared to me to be a farmers field.  Why, you might ask were we sitting under the tree?  For one thing, we were cutting potatoes to plant in “our garden”.

            We cut, we planted, and in so doing we sowed the seeds of country living into our hearts.  I became blood brother (or sister) to a potato, by slicing my finger and allowing the juice from the potato to mix with the blood from my finger, and I became mysteriously a part of the land.

            The day came when we moved in.  This followed days of lugging our belongings up the mountain, and across a gravel road to our new house.  The moving was a miracle in action, a truly weird sight to any onlookers, and I am sure to this day, that it implanted serious doubts about our rationality, in the minds of our new neighbours.  Picture, if you can, a beat-up, rusted old car, hauling a skidoo trailer loaded to the gills with cartons, mattresses, furniture, and then add to that a following truck, an ancient four wheel drive, ex paddy wagon, and also packed full of our belongings.

            Slowly, we crawled from the married quarters at the base, where we had existed for a month or two, along the middle mountain road, unpaved of course, then up the mountain to the top road, which was about to be paved, and was therefore blanketed with rocks the size of beach balls.  I was indeed a battle, weaving to avoid the larger rocks, and at the same time, not swerving hard enough to upset all the cartons on the trailer.  Finally, with beaded brow and racing pulse, and overflowing kidneys, we arrived with the last load, and became residents in our home.

            We decided that top priority was the garden, and I became a fast learner in the weed course.  I can remember closing my eyes at night and seeing weeds, weeds of every kind.  I’d shake my head in a futile attempt to dispel the vision, and it would be replaced with millions of carrot tops, popping through the ground.  Oh how I ached for peaceful sleep, without having to take the garden to bed with me.  Strange bedmates, strange indeed.

     Feeling better today, after all my whining.  I even had enought energy to do this -

     Heather brought me some fleece on the weekend, so I couldn't wait to dye some. Now, what shall I do with it? Lots!  Got me some 'sperimentin' to do. Thankful for a better day.

Getting a little better

  Wow. January has been quite a month, and I don't mean in a good way. Everything seemed frazzled, even the weather, warm one day and snow the next. A couple of storms ago, it looked like this.

and this

The sky had a weird haze to it. I can't remember when I have seen it so foggy immediately following a snow storm.



     It has been a sad time on the mountain as well. A friend in a neighbouring community lost her son in a tragic skiing accident. It was just so unbelievable, so overwhelming. He was a wonderful, talented son, husband and father and our communities are highly impacted by his passing.
     I have just come through a couple of weeks of ups and downs, mostly downs. My fibromyalgia is driving me a little bonkers. No energy, legs hurt, lower back pains, headaches every day, and that's the good news. The bad news is my blood pressure is up, and I've been having problems with my eye pressure, and have had laser treatment on one, and one to go. Oh well, one day at a time. Sometimes, one hour, or one minute at a time.

     I have been doing some painting. More of my "what is it?" kind of painting.

                     I tend to do these weird things when my mood is down. Does it show?

Well, tomorrow is another day, and the beginning of another month, oh, and possibly another snow storm. Hopefully, this will be the week I climb out of the valley, and at least get part way up the mountain, figuratively speaking of course. I'm reminded of a line from a song our choir sang: "When I'm low in spirit, I cry, Lord lift me up."

Evening, getting on toward bedtime, and I'm a little weary. I had quite a workout at excercise today, and I am feeling it now. It was a good workout, as I raised my heart rate which is supposed to be a good thing. That's what I keep telling my back....it's a good thing,....it is a good thing.

I had laser treatment on my right eye yesterday.Very weird. It's supposed to keep the pressure down in the eye. I thought I was going to have the left one done, but when my eyes were checked the right one was worse, so it was zapped several times. Pressure check the first of Feb., then I imagine the left one will need the treatment.

I have to put a drop in my eye four times a day. They didn't say why and I didn't ask.  The little plastic thing they give you with the drops in needs a major squeeze to get the drop out. I look up to the ceiling, find my eye, grit my teeth and squeeze with all my mini might and hope that I am exerting enough pressure to get the diddly drop out, since I'm really not sure, can't really tell if any came out. The gal at the doctor's said to use it until it is all gone. At this rate, I may be using it until February, or March.

I have a to-do list, and have managed to check one thing off it today.....clean the stove and oven. That's always fun. When I bend over and stick my head in, I always think of Hansel and Gretel, and then check behind me. I wouldn't be very tastey anyway.

the cover of my Christmas Poems Booklet

I have a couple of wooden plaques to paint as well as a WINS pin. I've actually started on the pattern for the wood. I haven't picked up a felting needle in about ten days....but I'm starting to get itchy fingers. I will be strong. I will be strong. I will do my painting orders first.......maybe.

Take this fibro and shove it...

     I just finished putting the Christmas decorations away for another year. Thank heaven Christmas only comes once a year.  The decorations go in the attic, and of course the roof has a slant to it, meaning that I can not stand upright. Putting the boxes away is agonizing. The longer I stay bent over the more it hurts, and pausing doesn't help much, so I keep at it until it is done. Then it really hurts, and the pain moves to my legs, and the next thing I know, I have a headache.
     Most days I get by and the fibromyalgia doesn't rear its ugly head too much. I manage up and down stairs, and other things that don't necessitate bending over, or walking great distances, but, oh my, when it flares up it's a doozy.
     After a while, and a bit of rest, the pain recedes, and I am set to go again.  Even now I can feel it easing off, so I guess I shouldn't complain too much.
      My mood hasn't been that great for the last little while, and the fibro doesn't help that any. Sometimes I can't seem to think straight. Is it fibro-fog?  Lapse of memory can be blamed on either the fibro or senility. I chose to believe it is the fibro.
     The day is dreary and it is raining off and on.  It's January 2nd, and the grass is green, with not even a hint of snow. I am anxious for regular routine to start up again, so that I have things to do on a regular basis.  I can do a pretty good job at wasting time, which is not a good thing when you are my age. However, I have accepted the idea that writing this blog is not wasteful, it is therapeutic.