The sun came out and the cut hay dried beautifully. Brian couldn't make it yesterday to rake and bale but promised to be here this afternoon. We were so happy at the thick stand of hay, so nice and leafy. I was trying to keep from counting all the bales we would potentially sell. Don't count your chickens before they hatch!
We washed many loads of clothes today and hung them out to dry. Swept floors. Swept barn. Kept an eye on the internet weather.
The forecast predicted a nice day with rain coming around 8pm.
Brian got here around 5 and got the field raked by 6:30.
We ate our supper, the kids dashed off to an evening activity. I continued my afternoon task of organizing the home school materials. All the books got pulled off the shelves. Papers sorted. Notebooks sorted. Books and papers and materials organized according to subject and grade. The mess grew immense.
I paused and headed out to the barn, wondering why we were not loading bales onto the trailer.
The baler was broken. Three men worked on trying to fix an impossible situation.
Clouds build.
The drama builds.
That baler is not going to be fixed tonight.
I return to a mess that I can control.
Sort papers. Line up books neatly. Ahhh.
At precisely 8 pm the raindrops begin to fall. Heavy rain drops.
Soaking raindrops. Fill up the pond kind of raindrops.
Brian is frustrated and mad. Philip goes to pick up Patrick from 4H. I sort papers and clean up my mess.
Life on the farm. I am sorry for Brian who has a big problem to fix. He needs the money he will earn from us for his labor baling the hay. We have a good bit of hay in the barn already. Enough to feed lots and lots of animals for many months.
We aren't in a shortage. I won't cry. For us, anyway. We have a whole other field that is ready for a second cutting and the rain doesn't hurt it one bit. But I am sad for Brian and the problems associated with heavy equipment ownership. This is why we are paying someone else to cut and bale our hay instead of spend lots of money on big equipment that occasionally breaks down and then has to be repaired. We will say a prayer for Brian tonight, for the problem to be an easy, not too expensive one that can be readily repaired. And for God to comfort him and give him a hug. He could use one about now.
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2 comments:
My husband spends as much time fixing equipment as he does in the fields. It's just part of farming, unfortunately.
I find it interesting that all the rosy, glowing depictions of farm life rarely take into account dying animals and how to bury them, broken equipment and how to fix it! What a learning curve! I think I better send the boys (and maybe the girls) to tractor mechanic school.
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