EARLY MORNINGS ON A FARM
I woke up on a farm this morning.
How many of you have had the pleasure?
It was foggy this morning, serving me with an early morning view of shrouded evergreens, misty sentinels standing guard over the pastures. Somewhere a rooster, the quintessential farming alarm clock, then two, then three, each one slight further in distance. Laying in bed, I strained my ears, discerning sounds I dare say are ignored by most on a Sunday morning, ignored or simply not heard, and that’s a shame.
A variety of birds, a chorus if you will, more beautiful than anything Pentatonix has emitted. Horses joined in, the bass section, perhaps, followed by the cellists, Mary had a little lamb, then two, then three, and listening closer still the chatter of squirrels, up and at it early, tons of work to be done before winter arrives, replacing the shroud, enveloping the area in the cold grip of nature’s coma.
There is no sleeping in on a farm, no matter the season, work to be done, chores to be finished, the to do list never-ending, and I had no sooner thought that than the tractor came to live, for animals need food, wild and domestic, and a farmer knows there is no higher calling than to treat your animals with respect.
I ate breakfast, never taking my eyes off of the pasture, watching as Mother Nature did her magic act, the fog slowly receding, some say lifting, but that’s not really the truth, for heat causes condensation, the science of it all as the morning sun snapped its fingers and the fog disappeared, and the evergreens changed from gray to forest green, a few hardwoods pushing limbs through, making the forest appear like a patchwork quilt as ground steam rose and the chatter and whistles and whinnying became louder, rising above the sound of the old John Deere, just the way it was back in the time of the pioneers, just the way it was for my grandparents, and just the way it will be for the future tenders of the fields.
A SALUTE TO LOCAL BUSINESSES
It should come as no surprise to anyone who follows my writings that I have a special place in my heart for local businesses. I understand why many choose to shop at WalMart and Costco, but the small, local shops are, to me, a vital link to our past, and an important cog in the local economy, and they will forever draw me through their doors.
I think this love affair of mine stems from the short time I spent, as a kid, in Charles City, Iowa, visiting grandparents. There was a special feeling to that town, a welcoming feeling, a feeling of community and friendship. The shops there were gathering places for the locals, everyone knew everyone’s names, and to a young child it felt like coming home.
I grew up close to the Proctor District in Tacoma, Washington, similar atmosphere as Charles City. My mother worked at the Proctor Dime Store. I learned to bowl at the Proctor Bowling Alley, and we went to movies at the Proctor Movie Theater. As a young teen I could walk through that district and store owners knew me, asked how I was doing, how was school going for me, and told me to tell my parents hello, and I defy you to find that kind of warm and fuzzy in a WalMart.
Which leads me to today, Bev and I in search of a product on a Sunday morning, walking into the Olympia Supply Company, founded in, get this, 1906, and that right there blows me away. One-hundred-and-seventeen years, three generations of the same family, the Beans, and ain’t that just a howdy-do and thank you very much?
Walked through the front doors and we were treated like long-lost friends, best friends, the proprietor and his helper couldn’t be nicer, and damn if they didn’t fawn over Maggie and Toby, can your dogs have treats, what beautiful pups, sure glad you folks stopped by, that sort of thing, you know, anti-Costco sort of friendliness.
And I’m reminded of our arriving in Campo, California, back in March, 2023, just before Bev began her fantastic voyage, and we went to the Campo Hardware Store, and I’ll be damned if that same sort of reception was not bestowed upon us, two complete strangers, stepping out of a shuttle bus, into a store we had never visited, and being treated like royalty.
Let me stop your complaint right now, the “yes, but it costs too much to shop at those small stores. They have to charge more to make ends meet, and money is tight for all of us, and there is no way I can afford to shop there.”
And I say this, with a straight face, as serious as I can be: I don’t think you can afford not to shop at small, local stores. None of us can. They need us, we need them, and I hope they are always available to our children and grandchildren for they are, and again I’m being serious, they are America.
P.S. Just visited an Ace Hardware in Ocean Shores. Nicest people you could want to meet. Stranger? There are no strangers in their store. Customers matter, period, end of discussion, and Maggie scored six treats in ten minutes by being her adorable self.
IT’S OKAY TO FEEL MELANCHOLY
I mentioned on Facebook today, in the midst of a particularly dreary day at Ocean Shores, that I wasn’t feeling very uplifting today, that there would be no positive vibes coming from my direction today.
Those kinds of comments bother some people. They want to fix it. They want to put their arms around my shoulders and tell me how to make it all better, when in fact, there is nothing wrong. It is perfectly all right for me to have a gray day, and to feel that grayness, and to internalize that grayness. As I said to one person a little later on, every once in a while I need to lick my emotional wounds, much like a dog licks it’s physical injuries, so that the wounds don’t become infected.
Remember, I am a recovering alcoholic. Always will be. In the past, if I was feeling down, I would mask it, tell everyone I was feeling great, and then go drink. I won’t do that today. If I’m feeling down I announce it, share it, run it up the flagpole, and in doing that I begin the process of healing. I don’t need fixing, although it’s sweet of people to reach out, and I certainly don’t need anyone telling me what I should do, a rather presumptuous assertion which is borne from ignorance. No one knows what I should do, just as I have no clue what you should do. If you ask my opinion I will give it to you; if you ask for suggestions, I have them, too; but for me to just come out and tell you what you should do, well, my parents raised me better than that.
And yes, this all ties into the main theme of this blog and website. I want to meet people. I want to get to know people. I want to shake hands and learn about them, what makes them tick, how they handle this thing called life, but I in no way want to be a traveling preacher, telling people how to find the path to salvation. I’ll leave that to the other hucksters and snake oil salesmen out there.
Anyway, the skies are now clearing, my wounds have scabbed over once again, and all is well in my little corner of the world.
A WALK AT DUSK
I’ll just toss this out first thing, no pretense at all . . . there is something just a little unnerving about walking in a wooded area as the light fades and the darkness swallows the landscape. This may be the year 2023, but it very much feels like 1823, walking at dusk, my eyesight sorely limited by the gathering gloom. Can you imagine the joy when our first ancestor discovered/invented/somehow managed to create fire? Talk about a game-changer! Suddenly, in the blink of a discovery, their days did not end with the setting sun; their waking lives expanded; it is safe to say their entire approach to life was altered.
There is a primal respect, bordering on fear/apprehension, of the darkness and, in particular, the dark forest. Sight is stripped away from us, and with that stripping goes much of our courage.
Those were my thoughts as I took Maggie for her last walk of the day, the rains turned to drizzle, the official sunset of 6:54 having arrived, gray turning to black, and my confidence disappeared, to be replaced by my confidence in Maggie, for my girl sees far beyond my ability, day or night, and what she doesn’t see she smells, or hears, or all three in tandem, at which time she crouches, as she has always done, and takes one small step at a time, at the ready, every fiber of her being on guard. Which of course transfers to me.
On this particular dusk stroll we came across a mother and fawn, as is the norm on this peninsula, so plentiful the deer are, and I thought to earlier history lessons, back to the birth of this nation, and the incredible abundance of wild animals which roamed freely. Oregon pioneers talking about bison herds numbering in the millions, imagine if you can, a bison herd so large as to blot out the landscape as it passed, taking hours to pass by a wagon train. Imagine if you will elk and moose and grizzlies and deer, so large in numbers as to cover an entire river bank for miles, and eagles and hawks and pelicans and heron blotting out the sun as they migrated to and fro.
This was a land of plenty at one time, amazingly not that long ago, I say amazingly because ain’t it amazing how quickly man whittled those numbers down in our quest to head west and “settle” the land. “Go West young man, go West, and while you’re at it, slaughter everything you see.”
I saw a National Geographic program the other day, while in Olympia, and it talked about the giraffe approaching the danger levels as they head for possible extinction. The giraffe??? How is that possible? That’s like saying deer in Alaska will be extinct soon, right? Have we really come to this point, a point where animals we once thought would live forever, are now in danger of disappearing, only to appear in magazines and documentaries of life long ago?
Evidently we have and yes, I find that profoundly sad.
Which brings me to Bev and her PCT journey, and how she really didn’t see any animals worth being concerned about in almost 1,000 miles. Not one bear, only one rattlesnake, no cougars, right through the heart of some of the most pristine wilderness this country has to offer, and no National Geographic moments for my wife.
But she did mention how foreboding the forest is, in the wilderness, at night, so there you go. Some things never change, I guess. The forest, at night, fills me with the same sense of apprehension as swimming in the ocean does; there are things in the briny darkness we cannot see while swimming, things which have the ability to eat us, maim us, and otherwise ruin a fine afternoon. As does the forest at night.
Halloween is rapidly approaching. Stay away from the forest that night. Just sayin’
