I awoke around 5:30am this morning, carefully nudged one eye open and peered up at the sky through our bedroom window. Deciding whether I should leap out of bed (huge exageration) or snuggle up to my wife's warm body, I opted for Sarah. However, I'd no sooner put my arm around her warm body and was listening to her snoring (sounded like a Canadian Geese landing strip) when little Jessica emerged from her bedroom complaining about a nose bleed (nothing serious). After Sarah got up to check on the nose bleed, her warm body deserting me, I leapt out of bed (huge exageration), put on my old man's wool socks, which almost reach to my knobby knees, donned a short-sleeved red shirt to hide my monly chest (size of a B-cup bra) and then slid into my worn out faded pair of black jeans (gotta protect those short skinny lily-white legs). After running a comb through my dishevelled hair, which still looked dishevelled by the time I was finished, I tucked it under my sweat-stained, purplish coloured hat, fixed myself a cup of goldenrod herb tea (which we harvested last year near the end of summer from the back 40 acres) and a couple of slices of Sarah's yummy homemade multigrain bread. After I ate my toast, slid my feet into a pair of workboots that weigh about 50 pounds (huge exageration) tied the laces, which were long enough and strong enough to hold a 300 pound man kicking on the gallows (big exageration) talked to Jessica for a few minutes, I then stepped out the door into the front yard with a mug of tea. I was greeted by a slight mist, as soft as a maiden's first kiss and as I sucked in my breath and looked at the foggy ridge I said, "So good to be alive!"
Golden Unicorn Farm Wild Apple Tree
I'm sure Johnny Appleseed must have traipsed across Golden Unicorn Farm, across the whole countryside for that matter, planting apples because they appear to be growing everywhere, which I'm sure is a delight to the black bears in the summer and fall - a person has to be mighty careful where they step - could trip over a small hill of bear pooh (must be how Winnie the Pooh got his name). I pruned one of the wild apple trees that are interspersed throughout our 50 acres the other day - hoping to get another good crop of apples from it this summer, at least the ones that are reachable by ladder and climbing up into the higher branches. Although the apples don't look as red and perfectly formed as the apples all standing at attention in silent rows and shined up for your inspection at the local grocery store, they have the crunchy goodness and sweetness of any apple I've ever sunk my teeth into. Unfortunately, besides the bears, the birds and worms love 'em too, especially the worms but hey, they just add extra protein and flavour to the apple juice we made last year.
I returned to Glenn McLean's place yesterday morning to give him a hand cleaning up some of the mess Garry Clark and I left behind from dismantling his old barn, which had been leaning precariously into the wind to keep it from toppling over. While Sarah (home care's two days a week for his wife Edna who is feeling rather poorly) baked cookies and cleaned house for Glenn to sell at the Woodstock Farmer's Market, we ripped out a metal fence and posts that were well sunk into the earth, covered by fifty years of pig, cow and sheep shit. Glenn's cheerfully clucking chickens followed at our heels gobbling up the big juicy worms and other delectable insects we exposed with each shovel full of the richest soil in Canterbury, NB. Seargeant Major Rooster Red Head of course followed as well - I think he was jealous because his harem was spending more time with me than him - but I was wise to him. I kept a vigilant eye on that sneaky rooster as I dug away and it was a good thing too because as I caught sight of him in my peripheral vision ruffling up his long white neck feathers to make himself look larger and about to strike out at me with his long sharp spurs, he backed off as soon as I turned around and confronted him. I swear that rooster must have the brains of string bean to even think about attacking someone holding a sharp shovel - but hey, despite the shortage of brains - I have to give him an A for courage and being the best protector a little old rooster can be. Hmm, when our fifty chickens arrive this summer, several of them being roosters, I wonder if they'll have the brains to outflank and surround me or maybe, and this is what I'm hoping - they'll be too busy keeping an eye out for each other in case their allotted hens fancy one of their feathered competitors more.
I had big plans for today to work out side and I expect I'll continue on with some of them even though the gentle mist has turned into rain - think I'd rather contend with the rain drops more than flies - they should be arriving in droves any time now - make the kamikaze attack on Pearl Harbour in 1941 look like a wee battle . I've got a lot of inside stuff to do as well so there's no need to get soaked. Ah, the farmer's life, a lot different from the work I used to do - I kind of like it though, even if the work is a lot more physical. And hey, I'm not like many of the other farmers around here, who tend huge crops of potatoes, corn, other veggies and herds of cattle, I just have to manage a small garden and a few livestock - it's enough for this old man.
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