Wolfie

My dog died today.  He was killed by coyotes.  His name was Wolfie.

I got Wolfie as a puppy in 2006.  He was my 4-H project and the first dog that was really my own.  We've had plenty of farm dogs, but Wolfie was mine.  He wasn't the best behaved dog and he liked to chase the cows when they didn't need to be chased.  Wolfie was scared of most things smaller than himself (I had to save him from an angry mouse this summer), but he would willingly take on any dog bigger than himself, so I had to watch him around other dogs.  

In spite of all of his faults, Wolfie could be pretty lovable.  He always came and sat in front of me when I called him and would sit with his head cocked to one side, giving me the cute puppy look until I petted him.  And he loved to play fetch.  Whether he was chasing a soccer ball or a tennis ball, he was always so enthusiastic about chasing whatever I threw for him.  Often times Wolfie would run so fast that he would be unable to stop at the ball and would skid on the grass or tumble head over heels before scrambling to his feet and going back to get the ball.

I lost Wolfie once.  We went away on vacation and left him at my uncle's farm.  The day we came home, he ran away, just hours before we went to pick him up.  I was crushed.  We drove all over the neighbourhood calling him and asking neighbours if they'd seen him.  When we finally got home, my uncle drove onto the yard with Wolfie in his truck.  He had wandered back to my uncle's farm after going who-knows-where on his adventure.  He never ran away again.

Wolfie, being a purebred blue heeler, was pretty small.  He didn't even come up to my knees.  Even so, my mom always said that if he wasn't our dog, she would be afraid to get out of the car when he was on the deck.  He was one powerful looking dog, but he always liked people.

This morning I went out to help my dad with chores.  When I got to the granary, my dad told me that Wolfie wasn't around.  Dad's dog, Bandit, was running around as always, but Wolfie wasn't around.  Since Wolfie was getting old, I figured he was sleeping in the doghouse or something.  But, when we fed the dogs later, he still didn't come.  When we headed out to feed hay, Bandit didn't want to come with us and he was acting skittish.  As we drove out to the pasture, we saw some magpies in the corral, pecking at something.  It was Wolfie.  The dogs have been chasing coyotes off the yard for the last several nights.  This night, the coyotes won.

There have been few times when I was mad enough to want to swear, but this was one of them.  I wanted to call those coyotes all manner of rude names, but I couldn't.  Coyotes have to eat, too, and they were just acting on instinct.  I can't really blame them for that.

One day I'll get a new dog, a puppy, when it's not winter out.  Then he can live outside and I'll train him as I did Wolfie.  For now, Bandit is on his own and will be getting plenty of attention.

Wolfie meeting Dad's new puppy, Bandit, this summer.

Decisions

I'm finally home for the Christmas break.  As usual, I've been helping my dad with chores, especially feeding the hay.  I do this every year.  I come home and spend the morning with my dad every few days as we feed enough hay to get the cows through in the cold.  As we drive out to the pasture in the tractor, we talk.  Usually Dad tells stories or drops bits of knowledge in my direction.  This year has been different, though.  This year we've been talking about the future of the farm.  My future.  My dad wants to know what I plan to do with the farm and how I want to proceed with actually buying the farm.  The decisions I need to make are starting to pile up and become overwhelming.

Some of the first decisions I need to make have to do with school.  I have three semesters left and I need to decide what classes to take in the last two.  Since I'm taking so many second-year courses this year, I will be able to take extra courses.  My friends who are in their second year of the program often talk about all of the interesting classes they've taken and I admit I want to take them all if I can.  I have so many options, though!  I could even take a second major.  Before I figure out which classes to take, though, I need to know what I want to do with the farm.  I could focus mainly on livestock.  After all, most of the land on the family farm is much better suited for livestock than for crops.  And I can't imagine getting rid of the cows completely.  Yet, neither can I imagine not having crops.  We do have good crop land in the area and I know that it's dangerous to rely only on cows or only on one crop for revenue.  I will likely do as my dad does, raising both crops and cows.  Unfortunately, that presents a bit of a problem for school.  You see, in the production major, second-years concentrate either on crops or livestock.  I'm a bit worried that I won't have the time to take all of the courses that I want to.  I suppose I'll see how it all works out in a few months when I sit down with my program advisor to figure out classes for next year.

The other major decisions piling up have to do with farm succession.  This is, I've heard, one of the most divisive events in farm families.  Essentially, the inheritance is being handed over while the parents are still alive.  The successor needs to have enough capital to survive as a farmer (that's a lot).  The parents need to be able to support themselves in retirement.  Other important people, like siblings who are leaving the farm, need to be considered to make sure everything is fair.  It's a delicate balancing act.  It's also really scaring me because all of sudden everything I've been working towards the last several years is starting to actually happen.  The part that's overwhelming (aside from realising that, hey, I'm a grown-up) is trying to sort through all of the different options:  Do I keep the south quarter?  Do I see if the neighbour will sell me his east quarter?  Do I build up my own herd or buy cows from Dad when he sells off his herd?  Do I buy the farm outright or work towards owning it?  Do I pay Dad directly or go through a bank?  How do I make sure my sister is treated fairly through all of this and that my parents don't just lose all they worked for?  It's a lot to think about.

I realise this is shorter than most of my other blogs, but I don't really have much more to say.  I have more questions than answers right now.  One day I'll look back and see how it all worked out, but for now, the future is a bit of a mystery.

What I Mean When I Say, "I Don't Need You"

I'm currently watching a movie, completely unhindered by thoughts of homework or studying.  Oh, it's glorious to be finished with my exams!  In the movie, two characters are arguing and the woman tells the man who was sent to protect her, "I don't need you."  I've seen this movie before.  She will be proven wrong rather soon.

I cannot begin to count the number of times I've said or thought those words, or words very similar to them.  And, like the woman in the movie, I am often proven wrong, whether the person I'm talking to is a man or not.  I'd like to talk about a few ways that I say, "I don't need you," and what I really mean when I say it.

1.  No Words
Often I'm afraid to ask to for help because I am either not comfortable with the people I'm around or I don't want to be that person that needs help all the time.  So, even though I don't really want to do whatever it is that needs doing, I just go ahead and do it myself.  With one of the volunteer activities that I do on a weekly basis, I usually need something from the top shelf of the church pantry.  I don't come close to reaching that shelf from the floor.  Even though there are generally at least one or two six-foot plus young men helping out, I almost always drag the rather rickety step stool over and get whatever I need myself.  The guys tell me they can do it for me, but by the time they realize what I'm up to it's usually too late.  I worry that sometimes I make them feel unneeded or unwanted.  That's not what I'm saying at all.
At the beginning of the semester my actions meant, "I don't know you well enough to ask for help."
Now my actions mean, "I don't want to take advantage of you."

2.  "No, no.  I've got it."
This is usually what I say when someone offers to help me do something completely normal, like my friends offering to help with the dishes when I have them over for supper.  This one's pretty simple.  I'm not so much saying that I don't need help as that I don't want help.  That sounds a bit rude, even to me, though, so I say, "No, no.  I've got it.  You just let me worry about that."
These words mean, "I've got a system and it's easier to do this without you."

3. "I can do it!"
This is usually said on a sob.  The best example I can give is when my dad asks me to close a gate or lift something or spread the harrows or back up to the trailer.  I get upset when I discover that I'm not tall or strong or skilled enough to complete the task.  When Dad comes to my rescue I get even more frustrated because I figure if Dad asked me to do it, I should be able to do it and he shouldn't have to do it for me.  In my frustration I choke back my tears of insecurity and take out my frustration on my dad (or whoever else is trying to help).  I shout, "I can do it!" and keep trying to complete the task until the rescuer either pries the thing out of my hands or orders me out of the truck or tractor.
When I yell, it means, "I'm embarrassed that I can't do this and I think I should be able to and I want to cry out of frustration, but that would be even more embarrassing and I don't know what to do about all this!"

4.  "I'm okay by myself"
I say this to my teachers a lot.  They see me working alone on a project or in a lab that's really best done in a group or with a partner and ask if I want them to find me someone to work with.  I'm 22 years old.  It gets a little embarrassing when the teacher feels the need to find me a group.  Because I take some first-year classes and some second-year classes, it has taken me longer than most of my classmates to get to know most of the people in my classes.  Being a rather shy individual, I generally don't ask anyone to work with me simply because I'm too chicken to ask.  So I work by myself and wish I had a group or partner because I really do like working with others.  It gets lonely at times.  This, I realize, is no one's fault but my own.
When I work by myself, it usually means, "I wouldn't mind having a partner, but I'm afraid of being turned down or becoming an annoyance, so it's easier to work on my own."

5. "I do NOT need a man!" 
I've said these words many, many times, but never in front of an actual man until earlier this year.  Usually I've said or thought it when someone tells me that I need a husband (because then he could do the farming and I could be the good wife that my neighbours tell me I could be).  Depending on how well I know and respect the person telling me this, I will either say or think, "I don't need a husband," very emphatically.  This fall I had a few friends over to my place for a meeting and I had just warned one of the guys to be careful of the chair he was sitting in because it was a bit tippy and I hadn't found the time to fix it yet.  The other girl in the room said something about me needing a man to do that for me and without thinking, I snapped, "I do NOT need a man!  I mean...no offense to you guys..."  They all looked a little surprised at my vehemence and I silently swore to myself that I would be guarding my tongue extra carefully in the future.  Now, I certainly wouldn't mind having a husband to do things like that for me, but the idea that I'm not capable of doing it myself rather irks me.  Catch me on a bad day, and I will snap at you.
When I say this, I mean, "I know it's easier for a man to do this and I would like very much to have a husband to do it for me, but I don't have a husband and I'm not about to throw myself on the mercy of some poor unsuspecting friend of mine who's just here for supper.  I'll do it myself because I'm pretty sure I can."

Now that I've explained some of my basic vocabulary to you, I'm hoping you won't be using it against me.  Most of the time I don't even know what I'm saying or meaning until later, when I've had time to think it over.

Examinations

I just finished final exams for the semester.  The last one, livestock, was this morning.  Yesterday I wrote an exam for a course called "Survey of Agribusiness."  That's one of those classes that we all have to take, but we have no idea what the point of it is.  There is no real connecting point for all the stuff we learn in the class.  It covers such a wide range of material that it's hard to know what to focus on, especially come exam time.  Yesterday, while writing my answer to the last of five brutally long "medium answer" questions on the exam, I think I sort of figured it out.

Exam, as most people should know, is the shortened version of examination, which is what people used to call exams back when life was slower and they had time for the extra syllables.  The last question on that exam forced me to examine everything I had learned and figure out if my perception of the term "agribusiness" had changed.  I won't bore you with the page-long answer I wrote as my hand threatened to never uncurl from around the pen again, but suffice it to say that I had a bit of a breakthrough.  I figured out that everything we had learned in that class was supposed to broaden our worldviews to keep us from becoming as close-minded as we like to think that certain city folk are.  

Let me explain that.  As students of agriculture, we learn a lot about how to educate non-farmers about what really goes on at the farm level.  That's not to say that all city folk are ignorant.  It's just that there are some pretty interesting ideas about farming floating around out there.  Anyway, I think that sometimes we forget that we don't always have to be the educators.  There are actually some people that we can learn things from.  And so, this "Survey of Agribusiness" class is meant to open our minds to possibilities.  That doesn't mean we have to blindly accept everything, but we can at least listen.  I'm not about to get into farming if it means becoming a robot overlord in the near future, but I suppose I could be open to using some new technology.  This class has forced me to examine what I know and think I know about farming.

You know, the funny  thing about thinking and examining is that it usually leads to more thinking and examining.  I've been examining the way I live my life lately.  This year, as I was studying in the library one day, one of my friends pulled me over to a table where one of the guys we know from Bible study was studying.  More of the guys were going to be coming and everyone was going to study together.  A few hours later, we had two tables pushed together with nine people crowded around, most of us studying economics and waiting for our pizza lunch to arrive.  That was the first time I had really experienced group studying.  It's a strange experience.  We all get distracted really easily and at least half of the time spent "studying" has nothing to do with actually learning or reviewing the material.  Yet somehow we learn the stuff better because we quiz each other and we're all trying to look like we know what we're talking about.  When I studied with the group, I actually seemed to retain what was going into my head.

As the semester continued on towards its inevitable end, I found myself studying with that group of friends a few more times.  Other times I studied alone.  I've always been okay with being alone for significant periods of time and I have always studied alone and done a lot of my school work alone.  Even some group projects I've opted to do alone - mainly because I'm too chicken to ask anyone to be my partner.  I suppose I told myself that I spend so much time alone because I need to get used to being alone on the farm.  One day I'll go home and take over the farm and I'll be alone.  There are, of course, times in every farmer's life when there is a lot of alone time.  Most of that alone time is on the tractor.  But, I guess I expect that I'll be alone all the time.  And I've been preparing myself for that.  It was going well, too, until my friend pulled over to that table to study.  Now I'm beginning to realize that I'm not really okay with being alone all the time.  It seems my friends at school have rather ruined my happy lonely existence.

Now, I'm not about to become a social butterfly or anything, but I think I need to start re-examining how I’ve been living my life.  Maybe instead of preparing to be alone I should be working to make sure that I’m not alone.  Maybe it’s my responsibility to get out of my lonely little comfort zone and take a risk and make friends wherever I am.  I won’t always have time to be sociable, but that’s farm life and I’ve always known that.  Some seasons will be busier than others.  But that doesn’t mean I can just shut myself away from the world and blame on the lifestyle I've chosen.

I Had No Idea

There are things that farm kids don't really realize until they leave home and move to the city.  I know I have definitely learned a lot from living in the city and then in town for the past few years while I go to school.  I've also talked to some of my friends who have had similar revelations.  I'd like to share some words of wisdom for those farm kids who will soon be graduating from high school and moving to the city.  These insights come from my personal experiences and some are corroborated by various friends.


1. Winter is hard.
I can hear every reader saying, "Well, duh," to the screen right now, but hear me out.  On the farm we tramp through snow to do chores, shoveling out the troughs before we feed grain.  We have to go out in the cold to check the calves to make sure they don't freeze at night.  When we go sledding in the pasture, we have to be careful not to hit a frozen patty.  Worst of all, we have to plow our ridiculously long driveways every time it snows lest we be blocked into our own homes.  Yes, winter is hard.  But on the farm, that's all just part of life.  When you get to the city, it really gets bad.  Let me give a few examples.  In the city:

• there are no tractors; you have to shovel everything by hand or face a fine from the city.  (Hint: Never live on a corner lot; it'll double the amount of shoveling you have to do.)
• if the ice builds up on your sidewalk, you have to remove it or face a fine.  That's a lot harder than it sounds.  Also, ice builds up a lot faster than you might expect.  I mean, you step on a patch of snow, come back an hour later, and it's ice.  
• residential areas get plowed last (okay, so do country roads), and none of the neighbours have tractors to do it themselves.
• the snow doesn't stay white.  It gets all brown and nasty (sounds like the corrals, but it's not like that at all) and slushy, so instead of a winter wonderland, you end up with a winter yuckyland.
• some houses don't have a garage, so you have to park outside on the street.  Then, if you want to go anywhere, you have to brush the snow off your car and scrape off the frost, too.  Every time.

2. You don't need a vehicle.

Let that blow your mind for a moment.  We farm kids have all grown up driving, operating equipment from the time we can reach the pedals, and "helping" our dads steer before that.  But in the city or town, most things you need are in walking distance.  If they aren't, you can take public transit or a taxi.  Seriously, there are city people who never learn to drive.  Is your mind blown yet? 

3. Everything is concrete.

I mean everything.  It's ridiculous.  Even when there are patches of grass, you often aren't allowed to walk on them.  It's awful.  I don't understand how city people don't all have serious problems with their backs and knees from walking on the stuff all the time.

4. You actually have to exercise.

This more applies to students.  There are no cows to chase after or feed in the city.  There are no crops to go check.  There are no machines or grain bins to climb onto.  You just sit and walk between classes all day.  They have these things called gyms here, with all this fancy equipment.  There are weights to lift and bars to pull yourself up on and treadmills so you can run in place.  If you want to stay reasonably fit, you have to go to the gym and use the equipment.  Or shovel snow for all the neighbours.  It's weird.

5. Stars don't show up real well.

They call it light pollution.  You know how you can see where your neighbour's yard is at night, even if it's behind the trees, just because you can see the glow of the yard light several meters into the night sky?  Imagine thousands of yard lights all doing that at once all in a concentrated area.  The light blocks the light of stars, just like the sun does during the day.  Oh, you can usually see a couple of particularly bright stars on a clear night, but it's just not the same.

6. You can't see anything.

There are buildings upon buildings and sometimes you have to look straight up just to see the sky.  Back home (unless you live near the mountains) you can usually see the horizon.  Even in the bush, there's always something to see.  But in the city (not so much in small towns), there's just man-made stuff everywhere.  There's so little of God's creation to see that you almost don't notice it at all.  I actually didn't realize that there were trees in the city until a friend of mine (who grew up in the city) was talking one day about how he likes to drive around and look at all the trees along the streets.  Actually, if you have a friend who grew up in the city, they can point out a lot of interesting things that we can't even see until they do.  

7. Things change really fast.

You can live in an area for months while you go to school, go home for the summer, come back and barely even recognize the area.  The people of the city are always building and updating stuff.  Back home, it's big news when a neighbour knocks down a patch of bush or plows up a pasture.  In the city, change is just normal.  I don't know if that's good or bad.  Maybe it just is what it is.

8. There's almost always something to do.

We've all seen the movies where some city slicker comes to visit relatives on the farm and complains because "there's nothing to do."  We also all know that there's always something to do on the farm; but that's usually work.  In the the city, and even in town, there are endless ways to entertain oneself if you have the desire to do so.  You can usually find someone nearby to hang out with.  There's mini golf, bowling, swimming, movies, plays, concerts, and stuff I don't even know about.  What I'm trying to say is that social activities aren't restricted to church and community hall suppers (not that there's anything wrong with those - some of my favourite events are the community hall suppers).

Well, I think 8 insights is enough for now.  I realize it sounds like I'm complaining about the city/town in a lot of those.  I suppose I am.  I prefer to live in the country, but life's not all bad here.  It's just different and takes some getting used to.