The Wives were talking and laughing about all the "emergencies" they have (respectively) had on farms this year. The laughing was a sign that all the "emergencies" turned out well. In a sense you live from one "emergency" to the next. The down-time is just getting yourself prepared for the next "emergency"...and you anticipate it will be bigger than the last, otherwise you wonder if it was an "emergency" at all.
This morning the Wife and Farmer's Daughter nearly passed Dear Farmer and a neighbor on the side of the road. Thinking it was a neighborly chat, the Wife slowed the vehicle down to wave, and found the two men were corralling a bull-calf that had escaped the paddock. The Wife did what the Wife has been taught to do: slow vehicle down and put on hazards, following behind the farmers so that the bull-calf wouldn't back-track. The Farmer's Daughter jumped out of the vehicle and was the presence on the opposite side of the road, and the neighbor's wife ran around opening and closing gates as needed. It was a team effort, and the bull-calf was back inside the pen all safe. Dear Farmer assured the neighbor this was nothing, "I had all the steers and bulls out the other night at my place. You should come over for coffee!"(See Country Hospitality Examples C & B) The neighbor dropped by some cheese curds as a thank you...they were amazing!
Usually, in farming, what is an "emergency" to one isn't to another...there's nothing new to farmers. We're doing the same thing that was done at the beginning of time: raising animals, being stewards of the earth God created, and training the next generation to do the same.
It does seem at little odd, however, that this breed of person...farmers...who seem so dull and slow...they live for the excitement, the thrill, the "emergency"!
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