Sunday, June 28, 2009

A NEW DAY

We left Mobridge at 8:00 A.M. CST and arrived at the fields in Timber Lake at 8:00 A.M. MST. What a difference a day makes when it comes to weather in these parts.

We were very hopeful that today would be the day to make headway with the haying. The temperature was around 70 degrees, sun shining and winds calm. The tractor was full of fuel and the mower sickel was lubed.

I stood on the dash board of the truck and watched as Jim started the Ford tractor and started mowing rows of grass. The little blue tractor was running beautifully, but it seemed to me the rake was uneven. The arm was raising and lowering and occasionally Jim had to stop and free accumulations that were caught in the blades. It was slow going and he turned around often, looking over his shoulder to monitor the production, which seemed to me to be low.

Finally, my husband gave me the thumbs down sign and then the broken sign, and he began to drive the equipment back up to bluff. He showed me an area where a pin had come out of a socket and the two sickel blade arms that had malfunctioned. Hay was stuck in the points of the cutters. The socket was too big for the pin. Jim removed the pin and one of the long metal cutting arms, and put it in the back of the truck. We would need a part, but this is Sunday, and the parts house is closed. We loaded up all of our portable stuff into the truck, and decided to head for the Little Morreau Park before heading back to Mobridge. There are bathrooms there and picnic tables and of course shade and water, all of the things we don't yet have on the land.

On the way to the dam, Jim spotted a very large snake in the road. He backed up and ran over it several times, thinking it was a rattle snake. He has never done that before. He has quite a bit of respect for living creatures, but out here, rattlers are dangerous and people try to keep their numbers down. It turned out to be a bull snake, which is not venemous. but the deed was done.

On the way back from the park, we saw our neighbor's tractor in their hay field. I was acutely aware of the difference in their equipment and ours. Theirs was much more high tech, and capable of multi tasking, while ours crippled along cutting unevenly, leaving hay laying flat in it's wake.

The tractor operator was Bob Schumaker's son, John, and he was driving a big enclosed rig, with a large Hydro-swing Mower attached.

A Hydro-swing could be thought of as a glorified swather. Like a swather, it has a sickel with a belt and rollers to put the cut grass in winrows, which eliminates the need for raking. The round baler just goes down the winrows and rolls the hay into huge round bales. Of course even the baler must be super sized to handle this work load.

The Hydro-swing has high tech features that are an improvement over swathers and they include a crimper which breaks up the stems to quicken the drying process. And, in addition, this mower has the enormous hydro-swing arm that swings from one side of the tractor to the other when the farmer comes to the end of a row and reverses direction.

The equipment moved along flawlessly, easily blowing the hay into large rows that were about twenty to thirty feet apart. What an eye opener for me. I can truely see why today's farmers feel compelled to purchase this expensive machinery.

We stopped out in the field at Quinn's place to see Jim's cousin, Frank. The mower is the only piece of equipment that was not purchased. It is an one that Frank doesn't use any more, and had lent to us.

Frank was mowing next to Kenny Quinn's farm. He too had a extra large, enclosed tractor and a huge, high tech hydro-swing mower that was making short work of the large fields of hay.
When I say short work, I don't mean that there wasn't a tremendous amount of work to do.I mean to say that this equipment handles large work loads very efficiently. Non-the-less, even with this excellent equipment, Frank, ever the hard worker, had been in the fields since 6:00 A.M. and had not yet stopped. It was now about 12:00 P.M.

When Frank climbed down from the tractor, it was all he could do to walk. He has been putting off knee surgery. He hobbled over to Jim and the two men talked for awhile before we started off for Mobridge again. Each trip we make out to Timber Lake in the truck costs about $15.00 in fuel, so parts problems cost us dearly.

Since this is Sunday, the parts store is closed, so we won't be able to go there until tomorrow morning. So. for today, Jim's plan is to mow the lawn here at the house, and then we will both go to work in Mother's garden.

It's hard not to feel discouraged at times like this. I don't know if any amount of repairs on Frank's old mower will keep it running in a productive fashion, and I don't know if it is wise to purchase a new mower. As it is, we're hoping to make half of what we paid for equipment back with the sale of the hay this year. We don't really need any more expenses. We also still have the well digging coming up. And that's another frustration. The well digger hasn't even called us back yet. We've heard that he is very busy, but really, he should give us some idea when he'll be out.

I hate to end this blog on a bad note. Hopefully, my next post will be more positive.

Addendum: I called Mother and told her to avoid feeling depressed, we needed to go to work in her garden, That way we'd be doing something constructive in our downtime.
So, we worked there planting bush beans and onion sets. Once again, I was a mud pie in the heat and humidity.When Jim announced that it was beer-thirty and set out to Gigg's shop, Yours Truely went into the house to see Mom and sister, Sherry and her two sons, Daniel and David. They travel from their Arizona home every summer to see mother, and to help her.

Sherry was steam cleaning a very dirty area of the carpet with a distressed look on her face. I am grateful that she is there helping Mother with a lot of very tough jobs, and I love my sister, but I burst out laughing as I saw that expression on her face. I guess I could identifty with her feelings of misery, No one enjoys a stinky job, and I was so glad that she had volunteered to do this one. Try to imagine this, Mary Cat, with a muddy face from sweat and garden dirt, cackling at the sight of Sherry laboring over a dog pee-peed rug, with quite a miserable little turned down mouth, Muahahahaha.

I stayed for hours there, alternately gardening and drinking coffee with Mother on the screened in front porch. It was just like the old days when I was growing up. one of my favorite thing to do has always been to just sit out in the cool breeze of the porch drinking coffee and chatting with my Mum.

By the time I left my mother and the house where I grew up, I was feeling much better.

Now, we're ready to face yet another new day, tomorrow, bright and early.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

WILD WEATHER ON HEIRLOOMS FARM

Today was to be a day of mowing, and for that matter, so was yesterday. Jim bought the rake
yesterday and brought it home hitched to the back of the truck. Since, it tends to trailer a little right of the truck, and is quite a monstrocity of wheel type rakes, he was concerned about crossing the Missouri River Bridge with it in tow, so Dennis Fischer went with him.

They got it towed out to the land without any problem and up to bluff where the mower and tractor are, and began to cut crested wheat grass. It's a little rocky on the bluff, but everything was going well until a part on the mower gave out. Mowing was finished for that day and on hold until the part could be secured.

It was agreed that I would go out to the land with Jim today, which was Saturday, and stay with him while he worked on machinery and then mowed.

He had to stop out at the farm implement store here in Mobridge fior the mower part first . Then, there was another stop at Stoick's Super Value grocery store for a picnic lunch, and the West Side Meat Market for salami and slice roast beef before we started out of town with the implement part, two dogs, a jug of ice water, thermos of coffee and even some of my childhood favorite bakery rolls. We called them Bismarks back then. They are still the same as I remember them. So many things here have not changed in all these years that we have been away.

So, there we were off and heading west out of town. We crossed the Missouri River AKA Lake Oahe as we drove out of Mobridge, and entered Corson County. We change counties when we cross the bridge, and time zones as well. Mobridge is on the East side of the bridge, on Central Standard Time in Walworth County, while the west side of the bridge is Corson County, which is on Mountain time.

Just a short distance beyond the bridge is a left turn for The Grand River Casino, and for The Sitting Bull Monument. Sacajawea's monument is close to Sitting Bull's final resting place on a bluff overlooking the Mighty Mo River/Oahe. I know this place well as we often went there during teen years.

Today we passed the monuments and continued down the road to pick up the bailer that Jim purchased. It was at Wjinches River Bottom Ranch. a beautiful place with a fabulous view of the water. It' s actually three miles from Mobridge as the crow flies across the river, but the drive across the bridge and down the road parallel to the river is over twenty miles. We met Ken Wjinches and his son, C.J. and nephew, and hooked the baler to the truck.

Ken was very helpful to Jim and offered help and advice. He discussed his own successful farming and haying business., advising that there is very good money in hay, and gave some good tips about selling it.

This piece of equipment was in West River country so we didn't have to tow it over the bridge, which is always good. We proceeded along to the land and put it up on the bluff with the other equipment.

When we arrived at the land, we were once again in awe of the beauty of the place. The sun was shining and the the grass was rolling in waves in the wind. As always, we gazed out at the miles of pastural views, and imagined sitting on the porch of a cabin in that very spot enjoying the beauty of it all.

I set up the picnic lunch on the back of the mower, made some sandwiches, and poured us each a cup of coffee. The wind was brisk and we used the baler as a combination wind break and buffet to hold our food. The dogs were having their own lunch below the baler as we have learned to bring their food and water dish along.

The sky began to turn dark just as we finished eating and Jim went to his repairs. I took him his coffee cup, and as I handed it to him, remarked, "looks like it's raining in Timber Lake".
He agreed and kept working.

By this time the wind was blowing very hard, and the sky above was black, so I quickly gathered up all of the food and thermoses from the baler and put everything back in the truck. The dogs were scared so they too went into the truck.

Jim commented that the storm was coming our way as he continued tightening bolts on
the mower. When I felt the first rain drop, I headed to the truck, but Jim stayed until he was in a full blown thunder storm. He came sliding into the truck just as it started to hail and the wind was trying to blow everything out of the truck through the open windows. We closed the windows and watched the storm. The hail looked to me to be about marble size, but was reported on the radio to be the size of quarters. We watched the hail fall and bounce up to what Jim estimated to be about a foot and a half on the new mown hay. The grand finale was some bigger hail pounding on the truck, and Jim said, "I don't like this."

Then it began to move off to the south east and we heard weather warnings and alerts for the towns in it's path. The high wind continued and the grass was wet, so we had to post pone the mowing until tomorrow morning.

We'll be up early tomorrow and on the road without any equipment to tow. The machinery is gassed up and ready to go.

Now if the fields are dry and the weather cooperates, we will make some very fine hay.
Jim had to repair the part on the mower, and then tighten some bolts? on the rake and grease it, then fill the tractor with gas before mowing. As it turned out, we had several boughts with wild wind, thunder storms, rain, and hail.We were up on the bluff, the highest point in the area, and Jim was out working on machinery

Friday, June 26, 2009

MY MOTHER'S GARDEN

When I told my Mother about our plans to plant organic produce on the land in Dewey County, she asked me to plant her garden.

"It's a beautiful garden, she said, "the soil is rich and soft, and I really have missed it since Dad died."

She went on to say that she especially misses the garden fresh salads she has grown to love over the many years she gardened with our father.

This year, for the first time since I moved to Seattle in 1966, we will be here in Mobridge all summer, and there is time for projects that make my mother happy.
Thus, the idea to replant the vegetable garden that my father had lovingly tended for many years, was spawned. There are also many flower gardens that Mother can no longer work, but that weeding will not begin until the main garden is under control.

I bought organic heirloom seed before we left Seattle with the idea that most of it would be planted in the country, but as it turned out, the majority was planted in the Hardcastle garden, the same garden that fed our family all the summers I was growing up in South Dakota.
It was prolific and our family of ten, eight children and our parents, enjoyed it's bounty every year.

As luck would have it, and due to other commitments, we got a late start in mother's garden,
and there was extensive preparation before we could start, much more than we expected.

It's only been a year since Dad's death, but the garden had suffered some during the last few years of his life. He valiantly tried and spent most of his waking hours slaving to keep it going, but after the age of ninety, all the resolve and determination in the world could not help him regain his once powerful strength. It was all he could do to crawl around out there, indiscriminately weeding everything and anything.
He needed prompting and help to rise to his feet and return to the house.

The last year of his life, Dad could no longer get to the garden, and so it lay fallow, with grass growing up over the bricks my parents had once so lovingly placed there for walkways and space definitions.

Several fruit trees had died and fallen over the high grass, turf covered brick, and old leaves. Even garden tools and metal objects lay hidden among the sod and grass, and we soon realized that we had a bigger task at hand than we originally thought.

Before we could do anything we had to cut up and haul out the dead trees. That occupied the whole first day, and half of the second.

My brother, Bill brought over his chain saw and cut up some of the branches and then Jim took over with the saw while Bill mowed Mother's yard and the back two lots behind the house, which are now his. There is enough work for all of us there, and we all contribute what we can.

It wasn't unusually hot that day but it was humid, and as Jim cut the wood and I hauled the branches, we were uncomfortably warm and sweaty. Bill was smart. He sported a big straw hat while he rode the mower, and it protected him from the sun, while we took breaks in the shade on the north side of the house to ease our discomfort.

We rented a rototiller and used it for some of the garden, but there were so many hidden bricks that I soon began to dig and lift them out with a pitch fork, ahead of the tiller; carrying them to a spot in another section of the yard and heaping the whole batch in a large pile.

There was one well defined walkway made of bricks that was just under the sod, that we left undisturbed with the intention of pressure washing and letting it's beauty and originality shine in our father's memory.

Dad's original garden concept was being unveiled as we went along, and it was good to know we could refurbish his original work. Some of my parent's garden projects were very creative and attractive, just cloaked and shielded by Mother Nature's minions of grasses and indigenous plants. She will undoubtedly reclaim this land again after we're all gone, but for now, we are here cultivating and sowing heirloom seed in this precious place.

After two hours, the rented rototiller began to show signs of strain, and we returned it and commenced to hand shoveling and shaking out the large grass clumps, then raking it all. There were still many bricks and other objects being unearthed.

I carried large branches and tree sections to a spot near the brick pile and created a huge mass of wood. It has the appearance of a ghostly dead tree zone, a Halloween like landscape which only needed pumpkins, a few eerie props, and lowered light to complete the image of All Hallows that was dancing in my head.

Whether we discard the wood or decide to save the fruit wood for flavoring meats on the outdoor barbecue grill, we will need to cut it into much smaller pieces. But, as the saying goes, "time is a wasten". We were eager to prepare the ground for planting, and so we put the wood aside and would deal with it later.

Our backs began to ache as the day wore on and I had a tender spot in the lower left quadrant of my pelvis which I have had before and was hoping would improve on it's own. It's kind of the ostrich with his head buried in the sand in denial concept. Refuse to accept reality and it will change.

On the third day of working in the garden, we began to make headway and the "vision" of the end result was beginning to form in our psyches. We had cleared enough land to plant the corn and tomatoes.

Corn was the first to be planted, and I had chosen organic Ashworth sweet corn, by Irish Eyes Garden Seeds. This was planted in blocks all across the main body of the garden, to enhance open pollination.

Ashworth corn has beautiful, golden yellow ears that are about 6 1/2 inches long with 12 rows of large plump kernels according to the package.

Early maturity and good soil emergence coupled with an extended harvest period makes
Ashworth an excellent open pollinated home garden corn. Quality holds reasonably well on the stalk with good flavor. We had rain the night the corn was planted, followed by warm sunny days and true to the seed company's claim, the kernels sprouted and germinated very quickly and are growing vigorously.

Mother warned us about damage from cut worms and advised putting tooth picks around the tender new shoots. We haven't done that yet, but we should go buy the wooden picks as she advised, because Mother is a wise old bird. We ran across many big , fat cut worms in the garden as we worked, and they were even bigger and plumper than I remembered them from childhood. Note to self: Don't procrastinate. Listen to the voice of experience, Mary Cat.
Your mother knows best.

In Western Washington, we didn't run across cut worms in our gardens. We had slugs and that was enough. They just tend to slime onto the plants where as cut worms cut off the stalk. So, our way of dealing with slugs would not work with cutworms.

We went on to plant several varieties of tomato plants purchased locally from Lind's hardware store and at that point, I felt like a mud pie. The combination of sweat and dirt on my face certainly gave me that appearance. The pain in my pelvis was not subsiding and I wondered, but didn't want to think chronic diverticulitis was flaring up again.

I didn't feel well, and we went home, I went straight to bed. Getting out of bed was difficult, and the pain was not allowing me to stand up straight. Jim was concerned and noticed that I had a fever during the night. Still in the morning, Jim and I drove the 100 miles to Aberdeen, S.D. to buy a high definition TV. Installation was scheduled for Tuesday to hook up television and internet and having been without either for several weeks, we were anxious to have access to both again. We left all of our television sets at home in Washington, so we had to buy one before installation.

I was sick on the way to Aberdeen, and the pain in my lower left pelvic quadrant was worsening. It was so severe, and the discomfort from nausea so intense that we hurried there and back as quickly as possible.

Back at home, I went to bed and Jim took care of me. I felt too sick to want anything, but he offered me food and drink and cancelled all plans to stay with me. He only left the house to take the dogs for walks. He contacted the kids, and Steph and Jamie and Jim all began to urge me to go to the doctor or Mobridge Hospital, but it was Sunday, so I waited until Monday morning to call for an appointment. By this time, I was retching in the sink and sweating all over and thinking, "how can I even go to the doctor like this?"

Fortunately, this is Mobridge, and the kind receptionist at the medical clinic agreed to fit me in to their very full schedule at 4:30 of the same day I called. That would probably never happen in the city, especially for a new patient. So, once again, we were blessed to be here,

I saw Dr. Malmberg and he concurred that the old diverticulosis had flared into a more acute condition, diverticulitis, and he prescribed an antibiotic for infection and a digestive aid called Allign, which is a pro biotic that puts friendly bacteria back into the intestines.

I was relieved to be under a doctor's care and had confidence in the physician I saw. Diverticulitis can be quite awful, and has made me very ill in the past, so, we anxiously filled the Rx just as the hospital pharmacy closed.

The garden would have to wait for a few days. Everything was on hold while the antibiotic cleared up the nasty infection in the diverticuli. It would take days for the fever induced headache, and the pelvic pain and nausea to subside.

But subside it did. partially, and we when we got back to the garden, the corn was up in rows and was looking very robust.

The first day back, I could only crawl around. Jim did the spading of the soil and I planted carrots, organic little finger and organic scarlet nantes, and then hills of pickling cucumbers., and sections of Yukon Gold potatoes with "eyes".

Once again we were drenched in sweat and had to get home and rest.

The next time we went over, we cleaned some of the flower beds and cleared and tilled the area along the fence. Pole beans were planted there probably in the same place Dad had put them in
in years past. It's the ideal spot with a nice strong fence for the beans to climb.
He did have some very good gardening ideas, and it was no accident that his produce was delicious year after year.

Our son, Jamie had advised us about companion planting, and based on that and a web site he provided, squash was planted among the corn plants, and soon more pole beans will be planted with the corn. They will grow up the corn stalks for support and provide elements to the soil that corn removes.

Corn is a heavy user of nitrogen and for that reason, it should not be planted in the same place year after year. It depletes the field of nitrogen, Beans on the other hand, have the ability to draw nitrogen from the air and fix it into the soil, and when they die back, they give nitrogen back to the earth, replacing the amount the corn used, So, now that the corn is up, we'll plant beans with each corn plant, and the squash will shade the under growth.

There is a big, round, brick enclosure in the flower garden where I planned to put a kitchen garden of lettuces and herbs, but decided to plant some of those in annuals in the beds outside the house we are renting before starting another project at Mother's house.
Since we are living here, I want it to look nice, so I have been watering the lawn and trees in front and we have cleared the front flower beds, and planted them in flowers and salad garden plants. More about that in another blog .

UPDATE: 2/26/2011
Upon returning to Washington state in the fall, I headed to Digestive Care Associates, the gastroenterologists that had cared for me in the past when diverticulitis was acute. After diagnostic tests were done, they wheeled me into a surgeon's office for consultation. A few days later we scheduled surgery for among other things, a Intestinal Resection, Left Colectomy and Splenetic Flexure Take Down, and a Prophylactic BSO.

It meant a seven day inpatient stay in St. Claire Hospital in Tacoma, and my biggest worry was
recovering in time to go on a much anticipated trip to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico the following month. My surgeon, Dr. Phillip Wright assured me that recovery lounging on the beaches of Mexico would not be a bad idea.

Surgery was on January 12, 2009, and they removed 18 inches of my infected colon. Recovery went well. Jim and daughter Stephany were there for the surgery and were the first faces I saw upon awakening. Jim was there for me the whole week I was in the hospital,which is right where I wanted him to be, and our children and grand children came to visit as often as they could.

Care by physicians and nurses was excellent, and I even had a private room.
My doctor, Phil Wright, delighted me one day when he spotted a beautiful Amaryllis plant in my room was drooping over, and fashioned a splint, held together by surgical tape. The plant and I both did well under his care, and I would highly recommend him to anyone contemplating surgery.

Upon arriving home, at our house in Puyallup, WA., we were met by our grieving dog, Oliver, who had been sitting at the top of the steps watching for my return the entire week. Son, Jamie arrived shortly there-after and provided love and support.

It was good to be home and in my own bed under the care of a loving family,
Jim, my soul mate, took excellent care of me during the next few weeks, and then.......

WE FLEW TO MEXICO on February 20th, 2009, for a wonderful tropical vacation!

Arriving home, rested and relaxed, we knew we could begin preparations for the next part of the move to South Dakota, reassured that would be no peritonitis or intestinal emergency striking out in the prairies.

Mother's garden was in need of care that year, but went fallow again with all that was going on.
Now, in 2011, fully recovered, maybe we'll try again early in the spring. Maybe this time, having learned from earlier mistakes, we'll plant a better garden for Mother. We'll see, we don't have the green thumb that Dad had.








Thursday, June 25, 2009

THE BUCKET LIST


Jim and I, and our children for that matter, have always wanted to live close to the land, and to work and play on acres of meadow.

For a long time, when we lived in Seattle and worked for hourly pay, there seemed to be no end in sight to the routine of getting the children and ourselves up and out of the house and each of us to our respective schools and jobs. We wouldn't see each other again until evening when we were all tired and emotionally drained. Then, it was time to prepare for the next day.

It was only when I was alone in traffic, inching along in grid lock that I had the time to dream of another way of life, a rural, agricultural, family and home centered lifestyle, and that is how I passed the time during those days. Planning and dreaming and trying to find a way to do what is important to us occupied many hours of what would have been wasted time.

And likewise for Jim. Throughout all the years of our married life, Jim has been looking at tractors. He loves old tractors and has always wanted one. On leisurely drives through the western Washington countryside, if there was an old rusting hulk of a tractor for sale on the side of the road, he had to stop and get out and look it over. And when he discovered Craig's list on the internet, he spent hours scrolling through and searching for farm equipment and land.

During the days when we were both working full time at our Seattle area jobs and living in a rambler in Sea-Tac, Washington, there was no possible use for a tractor and certainly no place to put such a thing. But, Jim had a dream, and both of us, even though we didn't know it then, had a bucket list.

Jim always told his mother, Mary Elizabeth (Crain) Brockamp that he would like first option to buy the quarter of land next to the twin buttes out side of their old home town in Timber lake, South Dakota. The land had been owned by Mary E's father, William Crain and then passed down to her.

During the years when Jim was growing up, that quarter and the Butte quarter next to it was farmed/ranched by Jim's parent's, Mary and Julius (Butch) Brockamp, who with seven children, lived on another farm that Mary lovingly called "the homeplace".

The children, James Lawrence Brockamp. (Jim) included, spent many hours there and at the Little Morreau Dam Park which is nearby. Working on the farm and later cooling off, playing and and enjoying picnics at the Little Morreau , was part of the fabric of life for the family during the 1950's era when J.L. Brockamp was a child.

One of Jim's fondest memories is of saddling up his horse Flicka after his chores on the "home place" were done, and preparing for a ride to the Little Morreau Dam. His mother, Mary would pack him a lunch, and he would roll up a blanket for a "bedroll" (just like the in the old western movies) he has always loved, and pack it across Flicka's rump. Then he with his grub and canteen, he would start the ride down to the dam. He passed the road to the butte property on the way to Little Morreau, and then began the long winding trek by horseback down the heavily treed "breaks" in Little Morreau Park.

There were choke cherries and a type of blueberries along the way and he enjoyed stopping and throwing hand fulls of the berries into his mouth and eating them fresh from the trees and vines. When he arrived at the water's edge, he would take out his bedroll and spread it out in the grass, Then he would eat his lunch and have a short rest before starting the ride home.

These idyllic memories of a little boy and his horse on summer days in rural South Dakota, have never left him. And it's my feeling that he has always wanted to reclaim a few of those moments. If he could save time in a bottle, surely those times would be captured and revisited.


Although, Jim Brockamp grew up and left home, entering the U.S. Air Force at the age of seventeen, just after graduation from Timber lake High School, and later settled into married and family life in Seattle he always remembered those summer days and that cherished time and place when he could be free to ride Flicka for miles without seeing another person.

There were and are many blessings that came to us in Seattle, but Jim and I and our children have always dreamed of living in the country.

You could say that living in the country, and for Jim having a tractor was on our bucket list.

Imagine how blessed we felt when Jim's mother, Mary, transferred the 160 acres next to the Buttes to him before she died. She managed to save enough to leave and give cash to six of her children, and to Jim, the third of the seven, she gave the land, and some cash as compensation for the college education provided to the rest of the children that he never had. Jim never felt he was owed a college education. He chose to go into the military, and he was happy with his choice, but he was grateful to his dear old mother for lovingly providing for all of her children in life and in death.

And further, imagine our excitement in coming back to love and nurture and work this quarter section in our retirement years. We arrived here around the 3rd of June and are in awe of the beauty of the place.

And------ Are you ready for this?? Jim bought a tractor this week! Oh My God! A real tractor.
He and Alan Nelson took it out to the country yesterday. The purchase of a rake and baler are in the works as we speak. Cousin Frank Quinn, who is an organic farmer in Timber Lake has been a mentor, and Dennis Fischer and Alan Nelson and their friends are all such blessings to us in this farming endeavor.

Two very big items on our bucket list can be crossed off. Even if we kick the proverbial bucket tomorrow, we can say we lived to see this day. Jim just walks from one end of the property to another and cherishes it. We both take the truck up to the top of bluff and imagine having a cabin there with a porch overlooking miles of prairie and breaks. We know where the barn will be, and the location of the pond for wild life.

Right now it's haying season and the alfalfa and crested wheat grass have never been so lush and green. Jim is getting the haying equipment there today.

Kenny Quinn was injured by a bull yesterday and he will be off work for a few days so Jim is undoubtedly helping Frank today too. But happily so, he's doing what he loves to do.

I only hope that Mother Mary Brockamp can know of the joy and peace this has brought her son and his family.




Sunday, June 21, 2009

Labor of Love

As children, we don't always appreciate what our parents have sacrificed for us.

All the years I was growing up in Mobridge. South Dakota we had big garden to help nurture our large family.

Only now do I realize what a labor of love this garden and it's fruition really was. My parents labored long hours there, Dad in the vegetable section and Mother in the flower gardens, and as a result, we eight children dined on wonderful summer produce, and experienced the beauty and fragrance of old fashioned flower gardens.

Dad was an avid hunter and fisherman, and we often had pheasant and grouse dinners, not to mention many varieties of fish caught in the river and local lakes.

At the time, Carol and I were totally unappreciative of all of this bounty, preferring instead to head down the street to Krause's Drive Inn for a malt and burger. Our younger brothers, and baby sisters probably were more enthusiastic about the full meat and potato dinners and fresh produce, but we were totally oblivious to these blessings. We were thin then, very thin, and maybe that was why.

All of these years later, Dad has passed on, and Mother is no longer able to work in the garden. We are no longer "whisps of girls", but I, for one, appreciate all that they did, and suffered for us, especially now that natural, uncontaminated food is no longer readily available in many grocery stores. How could we have known when we were young, that the day would come when
the food on the store shelves would be largely unlabeled genetically modified versions of produce, and that the meat would come from Confined Animal Feeding Facilities.

Now more than ever, we need to work to plant heirloom seeds and reap the bounty of pure and natural foods for our families, and somehow, instill these homespun values in future generations. They, like we were, are preoccupied with frivolities and their peer group, but they need to be involved in grass roots efforts to preserve our natural food supply, GMO free, even if it takes hard work and dedication to the cause.

It has only been a few generations back that all food was local or home-made. In a future blog, I will detail my Grandmother, Erma Juelfs hard work in getting food on the table, (from scratch) during the Great Depression in South Dakota. Despite the incredibly labor intensive
food preparation processes, people knew the source of their food and clothing in the past, because they raised it, grew it, collected it or made it with their own hands.

We need to return to Local Foods.

Thank you Mother, Dad, Grandma Erma, and all of your predecessors for your hard work and devotion, and thank you for helping us form home grown values.


Tuesday, June 16, 2009

THE MOVE TO SOUTH DAKOTA

The sorting was the hard part of preparing to move to South Dakota. I say that because it is a temporary move for a stay of around five months and we still have the house in Puyallup.
The Washington house is in the care of family, so it is in good hands, but the delema was what to take and what to leave for the caretakers.

We plan to stay here in South Dakota from June through October, and that is a good chunk of time. If something essential is overlooked in the packing, it has to be replaced on this end.
For some reason, I prioritized my office stuff over everything else. Maybe I have some miserable need to surround myself in clutter, (here we go, peddling around that issue again).

At any rate, we had to limit our possessions to the confines of the same three horse slant trailer that we used on the first trip to S.D. in April. On that trip we brought furniture for two bedrooms, and living room and kitchen, and felt very comfortable with what we had. This time however, with a longer stay in mind, we brought a few things for a downstairs family room, and most of my office files, and of course this Mac that I love so dearly, and Jim's computer desk and hutch, lamps and so forth.

What stayed in Washington was the good office furniture. There is not room enough for it in this house. And there are other things that stayed, because that house is more deserving of them than this one. All of the yard furniture stayed because this place doesn't have a yard.

This is a transitionary time for us. We are trying to decide what we really want.

We were lucky to have family here in Mobridge that helped us find this house, which has a beautiful view of the water, and a reasonable rent with option to buy, but the house has one issue that I can't overlook. The elderly (now deceased) owner sold at least half of the back yard to the next door neighbor. Now his three sons own the house and have used it as a rental property since their father's death.

Now, there are two ways to look at this. The first is that we have the acreage in Dewey County, and we don't really need a back yard here in town. The second is the outrageous situation of seeing the lot split and cut off from alley access. Some one else's garden is in the back yard that should be part of this property. and their garage has a back door that opens onto what used to be this yard.

Jim is comfortable here, but I don't want some else's trouble. What about resale? What do you think?

So, we will rent this house for a year, and my plan is and always has been to live out on the property in Dewey County. It is beautiful, especially now. We had two more inches of rain last night and everything is green. We have also heard from FSA office that one of our projects, the wildlife conservation plan has been approved. And that is exciting. I have been ill this week but we need to go back over and discuss it further.

But, I'm getting off the subject of the move itself. We left Puyallup in the truck with two dogs and a cockatiel, and pulling the horse trailer with our furnishings. Jim commented that all we needed to complete the picture was granny in a rocking chair strapped on top of the cab.

One of the dogs is our silver poodle, Oliver and the other is a little "foster dog" which belongs to my nephew Casey Fischer, who is deployed with the Navy. This little white fur ball goes by the name of Grover, and he is a mixed toy breed, maybe poodle and yorkshire terrier or maltese. Grover has been under the care of our daughter Steph and family, but came with us on the move. He is cheerfully waiting for Casey's return from sea. and has attached to me with all his little heart and soul until then. I actually enjoy grooming him with a little slicker brush, and telling him how pretty he is.

Because we have virtually no yard here, the dogs must be walked on leash several times a day. They look forward to these outings and I wish I could say that we feel the same.

We drove straight through from Washington to S.D. with a stop for a nap at a road side rest stop, as we didn't want to stop with a load full of critters.

We arrived in Mobridge just in time to unload the furniture, and then left for Rapid City for a family wedding at the Baker ranch. We experienced the joy and festivity of the wedding on Saturday, June 6th, and then returned for a funeral of another family member, baby Graycen, who lived only 48 hours, and was as beautiful as an angel.

We feel blessed to be able to be here with our families during times of joy and sorrow. That's what life is all about, wouldn't you say?

The first project we started when we returned from Rapid City/Buffalo Gap, S.D. area was my mother's garden, and what a project it is, but that is a separate blog.