Sitting on my back porch early in the morning while the sun rises over the trees once a few days ago bare and now covered in small bright green tender leaves, I can hear the two ducks who have made their home on our lake quacking as the fish jump in the tepid water. All seems so quiet and serene, calm, and unflustered in the beginnings of the day before everything wakes up and sets in motion.
The sound I readily hear is the movement and mooing of the back heifers and their calves as they are led and urged through the squeeze chute for vaccinating. Usually at this same time we pull the bigger calves off the mamas to take to the cattle sale or to begin life as a breed heifer. The sounds that are made then are always so pitiful and heartbreaking as the mamas call for their babies.
This predictable and expected procedure is one of the first habits that a “waking-up” farm does in the early spring of each year. The next would be checking, tuning, and servicing the big green tractors for the opening of our work year here on our farm. And then, the haying season will kick off. The grass has been brown and dried out for so many months and last year’s crop of hay is beginning to run short, but the new tender grasses are quickly filling our pastures and is plentiful.
I realize that in a few days as I enjoy my outside porch, I will hear the big John Deeres as they crank and begin to blow the big puffs of smoke out the top as they move into the dense pasture lands.
As I ponder about this happening it’s something that has been passed down from generation to generation, certainly not a new experience at all. In my lifeline there were some farmers but not on the measure that we farm. My grandaddy was a brick mason and had one cow, a milk cow. My Dad’s daddy was a farmer, a cotton farmer. My husband’s daddy was a small truck farmer and his grandaddy the same. My husband has always been a retail grocer in body but a cattle farmer in spirit and heart. We began with a forty-acre farm and twenty cows many years ago and I have tried since then to acclimate myself into a farmer’s wife.
My family often talks about what will happen to our much loved and enjoyable acres out here in the years to come and I always envision this piece of land being Circle S Farms for as long as the earth remains. We are beginning to age, gracefully, and are not physically adept to continue as we have for many years, so we have “passed the torch” to one of our grandsons who really feels like his Pawpaw, the land is a treasure, and he loves the big black cows and all the work that goes with this profession and responsibility. This makes my heart happy to know that this too will pass to another generation.
This is one of my favorite tasting cakes to make and it stays so moist. I’m making for Easter.
1 box of Pineapple Supreme Cake mix, 4 eggs, 1 package of cream cheese pudding mix, 1/3 cup of vegetable oil, ½ cup of sour cream, 1 cup of sweetened coconut, 1 can of heavy syrup crushed pineapple. Mix all well and pour into a well-greased 9 x 13-inch pan. Drizzle store bought cream cheese icing on top. Make your own if you are industrious.
