I am sitting in the library at the University of Regina. Jill is across from me working on an essay for her english class. To say that I love coming here is an understatement. Its Saturday night but there are few places I would rather be. I am a nerd I guess. In a couple hours I will be heading to Regina airport and arriving from Zurich will be our good friend Anja. Calving season is amping up and our support crew is in the wings. Anja is a big part of that.
We have had a pretty good start to our season but not perfect. More than three weeks ago, while Russ and I were in Jamaica our cow named “Canada” birthed a pre-mature calf that didn’t live. Morgan started milking the cow. Every day since then the guys have kept her milk supply coming so that one day she might be able to adopt a calf. Today was the day. Our cow named “Ginger” gave birth to twins, she showed pretty quickly that she was not up to the challenge of caring for twins. Russ was able to take the second calf and bring it home to Canada, but not before naming the calf, “Little Saskatchewan.” Another calf last week did not survive its birth and Russ started milking its Mama so there was a while where Morgan and Russ were milking two cows. To deal with this we got a twin from the Paton ranch earlier this week, they raise Charolais. Our cow will raise their calf and at the end of the season we will give half of our earnings from “our” Charolais calf to the Patons. I believe we call that calf Donalee after the matriarch of their ranch. The end result of all this is that “Chester Fried Chicken” our very black cow has a very white calf and as of tonight there is no more milking duty for a while. Russ said he was praying for a set of twins, he was ready for that task to be over for a while.
This spring we upgraded our security camera situation. This meant that yesterday morning, as I was putting the finishing touches on a funeral service, I got a call from Morgan wondering if I could check on a cow in the pole shed, using the camera. I relocated my laptop to the kitchen counter where I could look up and see the camera display. This was thoroughly distracting. Despite my attention I missed the moment of birth. However the following twenty minutes where I got to watch the Mom and calf doing what instinct told them to do were heartwarming. They were a great pair. It was fascinating to watch the calf try to stand and fall over, and try again. It was inspiring really. Its all a miracle. The funeral service suffered a bit but my heart was warmed.
I am really blessed. I am halted in writing about my blessings by some worries. One of these is that I don’t want to give the impression that things are all sunshine and roses at our house because they aren’t. However I can’t really write about what the struggles are because of respect for the privacy of others. None of us in our family are living without struggles of one kind or another. We all have things we are trying to figure out. I can say this about myself….I find it humbling how much I am still trying to figure out about myself and life given that I am closer to 60 than 55. Given that is the truth I am sure glad the following things are happening.
Gina has now been in Toronto for over three years and is being recognized at work and in community theatre for her abilities with leadership, humor, teaching and horsemanship. I will be with her in a month to see the show that she is choreographer for. Yesterday Gina told us that one of the theatre board members encouraged her to consider directing and told her she loves her teaching style. Russ and I are so proud of her for venturing into territory where she is challenging herself and discovering all the gifts she has.
Jill has been accepted into the College of Education in Regina and we have just put an offer in on a condo that she can call home for the next years. I am thankful to think she will no longer be paying rent. I am thankful that she has discerned this path for herself after a year of general studies and I am thankful for her gifts. This week she just casually mentioned in the family chat that she got a $375 prize for getting the top mark in the music class she took in the fall. One of the things I am touched by in Jill’s life is that she is very creative. She just told me that she has achieved platinum membership status at Michael’s craft store. This earns her some discounts and reflects that her purchases have exceeded over $1000 in the last year. As she pondered this figure with me she reasoned that she doesn’t have alot of vices beyond yarn so its okay. I am with her in how she is reasoning this out!
Morgan is home and it is so good to have him back. He is a huge help to Russ as calving season gets going and I have noticed within myself a deep contentment at taking care of him a bit. He drops subtle or not so subtle hints about food he hopes I will make and I find it pretty darn easy to oblige. He is a grateful customer in our kitchen and that makes a big difference. Almost every day he has me wondering, “how did he think that up so fast?”, refering to some witty comment he throws into a conversation that seems to have taken him about .5 seconds to come up with. I enjoy this so much. If things go as he hopes he will be off to school in the fall so I am enjoying these days while they are here.
Time has passed……its now Thursday……..calving is now in the very serious stage, we are recording alot of births in a day and thankful for some beautiful weather this week. Currently we are holding our breath, there is a winter storm in Saskatchewan, we have wind and cold but no snow yet.
We had a super exciting morning on Tuesday when after being closely watched for a month Sadie had a baby. Sadie is a beautiful horse that belongs to our friend David and lives here with us. She had been bred to our donkey “Elton John”, and indeed, as expected, that colt arrived with long perky ears. Anja discovered the birth, she spotted it on the security camera and told me how she stole my rubber boots and hustled out to the corral for a close look. That will be a memorable part of her time in Canada this year.
I had a conversation with Gina I want to record because it made me laugh. We often talk while she is enroute home from work, this means the background noise of the city streets, the stores she stops in and the transit system is a normal part of our visits. This week one of our talks was paused while she paid for purchases at a convenience store somewhere. I am realizing that as I write this I have a total picture of the setting in my mind. I have concocted a scene from a movie, set in New York City, the store is long, narrow and dark, the till at the front is crowded with stuff and Gina is leaning in to hear the clerk. That is how I have imagined it. Chances are I am wrong. Anyways, while I listened to Gina interact with the clerk it was clear that he had make a mistake, he had not charged Gina for one of the things that was in her order. She was relaxed and forgiving as he apologized for making her do a second transaction and I just enjoyed listening to her interact with him. Afterward I told Gina that I enjoyed listening to her being easy with a person who seemed flustered, that I was proud of her for being someone who didn’t get put out when things aren’t perfect. She thanked me for the feedback and went on to say something about it being kind of ridiculous how some people can’t cope when things aren’t ideal, she described an experience where a group she was with got completely stalled in their effort to go out together because everyone had a different idea of where they wanted to eat. She then described what her inner voice was saying at that time, she did it with a really gravelly tone and it struck me so funny. She said, “we ALL have needs, get in the car!” This is not that funny and she was not trying to be funny. But it struck me funny. Why? I suspect it was because it was one of the truest things I had heard in a long time, coming from someone who spends her days sharing space with a multitude of people and animals and sorting out who needs what and what needs are pressing and what her own needs are and what she can push for. The fact is, at some point, we just all need to get in the car and make some movement, and do some compromising and friggin enjoy being in the car together, cause thats what we probably need more than the perfect dining experience. I think that is what I delighted in, it was the unexpected way that a very true statement rose up with gravelly conviction.
Well, the rest of life is calling me and as usual, I am getting long here. I don’t make it to the blog often enough but I sure do love writing once I get here.
Until next time.
Kathy
As Far As The Eye Can See 