We Bought a Farm: My reality

 

I look at this picture, and I think: There's Wendi in the back of a four-wheeler trailer, holding a ram. 

But the reality of this "moment" was much more vivid.

The reality was that I woke up and remembered, nearly all at once, that we had a piano zoom appointment, a virtual karate lesson, and rams to catch. 

That reality became more evident when I realized, for like the five thousandth millionth time (number conjectured and exaggerated for effect) that my kids had put off getting their theory done until the day of their lesson.

So I'm sitting at the kitchen counter trying to do piano theory with three of my kids (which I loathe mind you. Piano theory is seriously one of my least favorite activities ever. Especially because 3/4 of my kids have passed up my knowledge of it.) 

(And one of these kids is Hannah who, if I'm being honest, isn't old enough to remember to do her theory and should have a Mama who reminds her to do her theory prior to the morning of the event, but the Mama keeps forgetting.)

Then I'm getting everything set up for piano which requires quiet children, a gym mat to block the sound, a phone and a charging cord and a chair that I can adjust so that we can get it the right height so that the kids can see their teacher and their teacher can see the kids heads and their piano heads. 

I'm rushing to get this all done because we have five rams to catch, and we need to catch them in-between this 8:30am piano lesson and a 10am karate session I have scheduled. (Yes. This was bad planning. And you'd think zoom vs. in-person would be easier, but I am starting to think I've just traded in one set of crazy for another.) 

I was crabby with the kids. Snippy with John. Tired. Frustrated. Catching rams is never the easiest thing. And when you are rotational farmers, the location of the rams plays a big part in how fun and successful your event is. If your rams are against a hard fence (which thank goodness this time they were) it's a tad easier. But if they are on a very steep hill (You guessed it -- they were) it can be super exhausting. 

You seriously don't know if it will take twenty minutes or three hours. It can go either way depending on how easy the sheep want to make it. 

(And I won't even get into Lavender the sheep right now. She's one of our best Mamas so we keep her around. So good, she actually raised triplets and adopted another lamb that a Mama rejected. But she is SO wary of people and is always the sheep leading the pack away from us.)

Jacob and JB were the catchers. Abigail and I were the "movers and the shakers." It's our job to push the sheep to the spot where the catchers are standing, pretending as if they aren't going to go diving for a ram's leg to take them to the processor. 

In the end, it took us about eight attempts to catch the five rams. This isn't bad. Each attempt means gathering all the rams and "scooting" them to the right spot in the paddock to go for the catch. This is a steep paddock so Abigail and I have to walk all the way down to the bottom and push them northward while the guy wait to jump on a ram (quite literally sometimes.) 

In the end, they only had space in the traveling kennels for four rams. And because Abigail is too small, John was driving the four-wheeler, and Jacob needed to stay to get some other work done with the sheep, I was the default sitting-in-the-back-of-the-trailer-and-hold-down-the-ram girl. 

I look happy in this picture. Content. Like this is the greatest life ever.

Listen: it's a great life. 

But it isn't easy. I'm filthy here. Like gross dirty with who-knows-what all over me. And I'm tired. And I've been arguing with my husband. And I didn't want to be there if I am being honest. 

And I HATE piano theory. 

We got back with ten minutes to spare on trying to get a karate call started. Of course, I realized only then, that my phone was tied up on the piano call. So I had to get the Kotysnki's phone and get the three boys started on karate ... and it was just a LOT. 

Some days, I don't want to be farmer. 

But when I climb into the trailer and they hand me a ram to hold down, I say to my husband: "Hey, snap a picture." 

Because I want to remember that I did this. I want to remember the hard and the dirty times. 

Because they are part of the beautiful times too.

That's reality.