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Books About Life on a Farm Written Especially for People Who Like to Read! "Highly recommended reading." The Midwest Book Review Reviews & Readers' Comments |
LeAnn R. Ralph Rural Route 2 Author E6689 970th Ave. Colfax, WI 54730 (715) 308-6336 |
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by LeAnn R. Ralph "You know," I said to my husband, Randy, one August afternoon as we helped my brother do a little bit of haying, "I don't know how my father stood it." "Stood what?" my husband asked as he grabbed a bale and stacked it on the wagon. "I don't know how my father ever stood to have two teenaged girls as his hired hands during haying season," I explained, reaching for the next bale coming out of the baler chute. For a few years when I was growing up, my best friend, Vickie, and I were the only help my father could round up during haying season. Not that we minded. We got to spend many afternoons together, and my best friend discovered a way to earn feed for her horse. Mom kept a tally of Vickie's hours, and then in the winter, when Vickie needed oats for her horse, Mom would subtract the cost of the oats from the hours worked. But just think about my father's position for a moment - having two teenaged girls around all afternoon. Do you know any teenaged girls? Not older, mature girls of sixteen or seventeen. But younger girls - thirteen or fourteen. What do you notice about them? That's right. They GIGGLE. Endlessly. As Randy and I stacked hay on the wagon, the memory came back sharp and clear from so many summers ago: my best friend and I staggering around, slipping backwards and forwards as we stacked hay - giggling and laughing with each and every bale we handled. Actually, there is something funny about trying to stack hay when you're baling on hilly fields. Our west central Wisconsin farm would probably be described as rolling, although some parts of it are steeper than others. When you are going uphill and then down, maintaining your balance on a hay rack slippery with chaff and polished by the constant wear of feet and hay bales becomes a comical ballet. You grab the bale out of the baler and start toward the back, just as the wagon takes a downhill turn. Then, even though you meant to go toward the back of the wagon, you find yourself sliding toward the front. You struggle to stack the bale, and then you go back for the next one, and then another one. By this time, the wagon is going uphill again. So now the front of the wagon is uphill, but the back slants downhill. Unfortunately, your muscles are prepared to carry the bale uphill. But of course, now you're really going downhill. You find yourself slipping toward the back faster than you intended. If you're not careful, you could heave the bale right over the top of the load. And if the bale lands on the ground, then you have to stop and pick it up. To some of you, this might sound like a dangerous situation rather than a comical one. But it's amazing how quickly you learn to balance - especially if you know the ground on either side of the wagon is hard and unforgiving. I imagine it's sort of like a sailor getting his sea legs. And through all of the uphill and downhill, the jerking and the sliding, my best friend and I giggled. And giggled. And laughed. And giggled. During the course of many hot summer afternoons, I'm surprised we didn't drive my father to distraction with all that laughing and giggling. But if we did get on Dad's nerves, he never showed it. My father just kept right on driving the tractor, the baler taking in windrow after windrow of hay. And we kept right on stacking - laughing our way through every load. If I close my eyes, I can picture my father driving his beloved 460 Farmall, the ever-present cap shading his face and hiding the expression in his eyes. A sort of pained and patient expression on his face, his lips pursed. I knew, however, the patient, pursed-lip expression meant my father was trying his best not to smile. After all, it would never do for his daughter and her best friend to think he was actually ENJOYING himself - with only two teenaged girls to help him, laughing and shrieking at the top of their lungs. Yes - it was a long cycle of hay bales, uphill and down, hot afternoons in the blazing sun. The sound of giggling rising above the sound of the tractor's engine and the rhythmic clacking of the hay baler... I really don't know how my father survived. How he ever managed to maintain his sanity with all that giggling and laughing in the background. But I'm glad he wanted us to help him hay, anyway. LeAnn R. Ralph is the author of the farm books: Christmas in Dairyland (True Stories from a Wisconsin Farm)(trade paperback; 2003), Give Me a Home Where the Dairy Cows Roam (trade paperback; 2004) and Preserve Your Family History (A Step-by-Step Guide for Interviewing Family Members and Writing Oral Histories) (e-book, 2004) |
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