Northern Farmer

This has been a day behind the steering wheel. The steering wheel of the newer tractor we have. Had it in the John Deere shop at the county seat this week to get a gasket replaced. Now normally I’d attempt a gasket job myself but on these newer ones, well, no. A tad bit too complicated. So after morning chores this morning it was on my mind to call the JD shop up and see if it was done with, and it was. But speaking of chores, morning chores to be exact, I figure I can cover that subject a bit before going onto the tractor subject. Now yesterday the first “official” calf was born here. We had a few from what I call unwed mothers, but now the main herd is deciding to populate the world. The herd spends its day mostly in the neighbor’s corn stubble field that’s directly north of our house. This morning all the cows came home for a taste of silage and I seen the calf didn’t come with and this was good news cause I didn’t get to eartag it yesterday. So as the cows came to the cow lot to have their bit of silage it was time to mount the Honda four wheeler and get out in the neighbor’s corn field and tag that calf. I had an idea abouts where it was and yup, there it was close to our yard. Now this field has only a single wire electric fence around it because of the extremely temporary time these cows will be on the field. Back to the calf, a day old calf and a feller couldn’t even get within ten feet of it as it was laying down, curled up so nice. That little brown whiteface calf took off like a shot! Under the fence at an incredible speed, through my yard, across the township road and slammed straight into the net wire fence we have on the land on the other side. The tagger was temporarily delayed because the electric wire had to be dropped while it was hot, drive the Honda over it and put the fence back up. A quarter mile away the calf was finally caught by pinning her between the fourwheeler and the net wire fence. Then the little rascal let out a beller and mama came running from the cow lot full steam, steamed! But luckily there was a netwire fence with to barb wires on top, plus an electric hot wire for good measure that dissuaded her from crashing across the gravel road to where tagger and balling calf were. And once the deed of tagging the calf was over with the only was to get her back to mother was to carry that little kicking ball of dynamite across the road, down the other ditch and lift her over the fence and try and gently drop her on the ground by mama. It got done and that’s that for that!

After that was all said and done, as I said we were heading to the county seat to drop me off so I could drive the tractor home, a journey that takes an hour and forty five minutes. Not a bad drive, driving about a third of the way alongside the Mississippi River on a beautiful tar county road where I only met one car the entire ways. But the other county roads had plenty of Saturday morning traffic but no big deal. One thing stuck me today, almost everyone I met on the drive with the tractor did a hearty midwestern wave! And I tell you, it made me feel good! Of course when your from an area like this your kinda used to everyone waving, but on this slow trip with the tractor it did my heart good. Got me to thinking too, the difference between the city/suburbs and the real folks from the heartland! It is different here! And I like it and appreciate it!

Of course I was listening to the radio all the way home on the tractor, had me a country station on, one of those that plays old or classic country. Funny how when those folks were waving the songs were about the same thing, about the good country life where folks are friendly and life is good. Works for me! Then this afternoon I decided to haul manure now that the manure hauling tractor was home and was hauling it to the south place about two miles south of here and met plenty of Saturday afternoon drivers and one goofy skunk that stayed on the township road most of the afternoon. Every single one waved and I’m sure if I’da lingered around that not so bright skunk it would have waved too, but I didn’t want that!

This brought back memories of the big city trip a few short weeks ago, All those people, masses of humanity, and no interaction between anyone. Everyone just going there own way like they were alone on this earth. I’ll take the country every time over the city or burbs! This is the place to be for me! Around here if you see someone who ain’t waving either they are driving through from the city or are so wrapped up in the modern ways that they’re doing that disconnect that city folks do and bottle themselves up in a little shell. Alone, passing through but making no connection with the humanity around them.

Maybe I’m dreaming. And being that this is not a scientific study funded by a multi million dollar government grant I could be off a bit, but I doubt it. Country folk are much more friendly, much more neighborly, even to those who ain’t their neighbor. Reminds me of riding in that over crowded bus in Minneapolis a few weeks ago. If that would’a been out here the noise level would have been at a roar, everyone talking to everyone else. There, silence. Everyone staring straight ahead! No talking except for some low stuff between close friends who created their own little bubble. A feller couldn’t even strike up a conversation about the weather with these folks and it made me wonder, do they even realize there is weather that affects everything else? Weather is always a conversation opener in the midwest, (excluding cities), a general language style that is accepted in all rural areas by millions of folks.

I tell you, just give me the heartland and I’m a happy feller!

This entry was posted on Saturday, April 18th, 2009 at 6:25 pm and is filed under Northern Farmer. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.