It's been 6 years since we've had a Christmas tree in the house.

Why, are we Grinches or something?  Don't celebrate Christmas?

Well, no on both counts.

It's been more of a logistical issue.  We often travel for the holidays, and I don't like the thought of a live tree dying in the house while we're gone.  Fire hazard and all that.

And the cats.  Lots of cats to climb up or tear down the tree.

So we've just avoided it altogether.

But this year I wanted a tree.  And I wanted a tree that we got to choose and cut.

So when C-baby and her friend visited the weekend after Thanksgiving, I thought, "This is my chance!"

Friends recommended a local tree farm that was just over the ridge from us, and soon we were piled in the XUV and on our way.

After picking up the requisite equipment - namely a tarp for dragging the tree and a bow saw for cutting, we began our trek up the hill.

The trees were planted in sections by type.

We passed by all the short-needled spruce varieties.  We always had short-needled spruces when I was growing up.

They make lovely trees with lots of space for ornaments, but I wanted something different, something bushier, something a little longer-needled.

And then we spotted her down the aisle of Scotch Pines.

She was perfect.  Symmetrical in shape, full and bushy.  C-baby and I agreed immediately, we had to have her.

But Papa Bear wanted to keep looking.  We hadn't reached the top of the hill yet.

We debated leaving someone beside her just to keep the other shoppers away until we returned (as we knew we would).

But in the end we trudged up to the top of the hill only to find more short-needled pines.

An attempt was made to use the tarp to slide back down the hill, albeit unsuccessfully.

When we returned to the Scotch Pine row, she was still there.

{Whew!}

And so the cutting began.

There were gadgets at this tree farm that I have never seen before, like this one, which shakes the tree vigorously to dislodge snow and loose needles and such.

And this one, which reminded me of something the Grinch might use to stuff and steal Christmas trees from the Who village.

As Papa tethered the tree to the truck, we wandered around looking at things.

And breathing deeply.

Need a hand, Papa?

Even the drive home was lovely, with white snow and red barns peeking out here and there.

Stay tuned for trimming the tree!

Holiday Cheers -

Horses and buggies at the Little Farm auction in May, 2012

As I pulled into the gravel driveway next to the large, well-kept white farmhouse, I spied four boys I guessed were between the ages of 4 and 7 lingering near the open door of a big red barn.

I got out of the Suburban and headed towards the group, all eyes watching me closely.  All four boys were dressed alike in dark pants and bright blue/green shirts nearly obscured by dark coats. 

I was already enjoying myself, and we hadn't even exchanged a word yet.

"I'm here about some rabbits," I began tentatively, not sure how much of the farm's business I would be able to discuss with the youngsters if their father wasn't home. 

We had pretty much negotiated the entire purchase of our flock of lambs last spring from a different farmer's young son, so it was entirely possible these youngsters would be able to assist me today despite their age. 

At the very least, they probably knew as much or more about raising rabbits as their father - it was, I guessed, one of their regular chores.

"Yup, they're back there," the oldest one answered me, indicating the barn behind him. 

"Is David here?" I inquired.  I knew when I pulled in it was about 5:15pm.  David had told me a few days earlier that he would be home from his "outside" job around 5:00pm.

"Nope, not yet, he'll be home around 5:00," offered the same boy.  I guessed he was perhaps the oldest of the brothers, and seemed quite comfortable talking to me, while his siblings all hung back wordlessly, brown eyes staring wide at me.

"Well, it was just after five when I pulled in," I offered, wondering if the boy wasn't aware of the time.  Perhaps in his tender youth he was yet blissfully unaware of watching the clock.

"Yeah, 5:00 YOUR time!" he retorted with a sparkle in his eyes and a big grin.

"Ha - you've got me there!" I responded, laughing and following the group of boys through the big barn and across a barnyard to another building. 

He was of course referring to 5:00 "English" time, that is, time driven by man-made clocks and imposed by our rigid 8-5, time-clock-punching culture.

5:00 Amish time was a whole different barnyard.

In the second building we entered I spotted two long rows of rabbit cages, their inhabitants planting soft noses against the mesh, no doubt inquiring as to the whereabouts of their dinners.

White rabbits with black ears and noses, white rabbits, even a cinnamon colored buck and a dark black doe, all New Zealand whites, the boy informed me.

I wasn't sure how many questions I should ask the boys, but as I walked along the cages the eldest followed close behind me, pointing out items of interest such as the baby bunnies in nesting boxes lined with their doe's fur, bodies so tiny entire litters would have fit in the palms of my two hands.

I asked if they were born with their eyes shut and he told me they were, adding the most fun time was when they came out of their boxes at about 4 weeks old and started hopping around.

The boy didn't know how many his father wanted sell and I didn't ask for a price.

Stalling for time, I asked if I could meet their Holstein calves who were licking up the last traces of their dinner from a trough across the barn.

They agreed and we all made our way over there.  One of the silent younger siblings decided to do some showing off and jumped into the feed trough walking back and forth in front of me as I offered my hand to the calves.

The calves were curious and delightful, trying to suck my fingers.  If I had been ready for a milk cow I might have asked the boys "how much?" for the nearly all-white one.

But I'm not ready for a cow.

Yet.

"Mama's coming," I was informed, and through the big barn I saw a short, slender figure leading a horse with one hand and holding an infant in the other.  Behind her trailed two more children, both girls, none of which could have been more than three years old.  She tied her horse to a stall and continued in our direction, asking if I'd been here long.

"Not too long," I reassured her.

We stepped back outside the barn to chat.  After scolding her boys for still being in their school clothes, she sent them off for chores and started talking about the rabbit business. She was very curious about how many rabbits I would buy and where I would sell them.

As I listened to her talk and answered her questions, I couldn't help but admire the view.

Their farm was perched along a ridge top with a view of rolling hills for miles.

The sun was about to set and had dropped below the cloud line, illuminating a pair of Belgium draft horses with an almost magical light.  Her oldest son had already explained to me the pair of horses was getting old and would soon need to be replaced.  But in the slanting evening sun he looked perfectly strong and beautiful.

Just then a one-horse cart came wheeling into the driveway. We all stepped off the road as David maneuvered his cart and horse to a stop.

"Sorry I'm late!" he yelled cheerfully, dismounting from the cart, grinning like his oldest son, but sporting a surprisingly bright red beard and looking ten years younger than me.

"Did you like what you saw?" he inquired.  I told him I was just in the "looking" stage right now, hadn't even measured the space the cages would need to go.  How many was he looking to sell?

He reiterated his wife's sentiments about wanting to keep them but not having buyers for them at present.  "No use butchering them if someone else could use them," he said to me.

He told me they had been large rabbit producers in Pennsylvania, at one time having more than 1100 rabbits under their care.  They wanted to raise rabbits here, too, but the only market they knew of had dried up.  He loved raising them he said, and his smile and sparkling eyes confirmed the truth of what he said.

David's wife then asked me, "You've never tried rabbit?" 

"No, not yet, but I'd like to," I added, trying not to sound too city-ish.  "How do you like to prepare them?"

David interjected that she liked to prepare them in the pressure cooker, then fry them.  "They're very good," they both assured me again.

I asked them how they liked their turkeys -  I could see several large white ones strutting around their yard near the house, could just make out their familiar trilling voices.

They told me they really enjoyed raising the birds, though they've been "fighting" lately - displaying their plumage at each other. My males did that on occasion also - though I'd hardly call it "fighting."

The sun slipped further towards the horizon, and I told them I'd need to get back in touch with them after I conferred with my husband tonight.  It was time to get home and do my own evening chores.

We said our good-byes and I walked back towards my vehicle, watching their oldest boy pull a wagon-load of firewood up the hill towards their house.
 
It is no surprise to me why people - farmers and non-farmers, English and Amish - are drawn to the idyllic images of the farm.

Red barns, bawling calves, mooing cows, plodding draft horses, scratching chickens, gobbling turkeys on the loose.

It may still be one of the hardest ways to make a living, and often the most heart-breaking, but I would have to say, so far at least, it is also the most enjoyable enterprise I have ever attempted.

Cheers -

Hard to believe my C-baby is twenty-one-years-old today.

Twenty-One!

Today!

At 3:45pm.

Twenty one years ago she entered this world, sunny side up (that's "posterior," for those of you in the medical field), because she just couldn't wait to see her mama's face.

Or vice versa.

14 hours of back labor.

Four...

Teen...

Hours.

She did manage to sleep for the first 48 hours of her life after that.  In the hospital.  Awaking just in time for my mother to drive us three hours away to Buffalo (MN).

Multiple stops for a screaming baby and poopy diaper later, we arrived, exhausted, at my folks' house in Buffalo.  Bless my mother's heart for getting us there in once piece after all of that drama.

From that day on, she slept precisely 12 minutes total until she reached the age of eight months, when she decided that maybe just maybe she could learn how to sleep for realz.

She's been making up for those eight months ever since I think.

Infancy aside, she really was an easy-keeper.  If she were a squash, she'd be a spaghetti squash - still as good when you pull it out of the cellar in January as it was the day you put it in there in October.

I know you're not a squash sweetie, it's just a metaphor. 

Her first word was "hi."  I should have known this was a fore-shadowing, miss socialite extraordinaire.

Her first tooth was cut at age 8 months.  Her second tooth, at twelve months.  Which meant 4 months of snaggle-tooth grins.

But those snaggly-toothed grins were so, utterly adorable.

She grinned and said "hi" to everyone.  EVERYONE.  Probably explains how she could accrue 750 FB friends in 6 years while I have maybe 70.  All related to me.

As a toddler, she loved taking care of the "babies," any child at the day care younger than her.  She still loves babies. As a teenager she was already the Baby Whisperer.  Where was she when I needed a Baby Whisperer? 

Oh yeah, she was still a (screaming) baby.

But then she learned how to sleep and life was good.

We've had a heckuva ride, her and I (and Papa Bear, too). I'm working on getting those memories written down, before they all escape into the far recesses of my grey matter.

So that one day when she's rocking her own newborn baby, she can open up her book and begin... 'Once upon a time, a little girl was born sunny-side up..."

Happy Birthday sweetie. 

All my love & smootchies.

bbo!

My dog Harley came into my life at a time when everything I knew for sure was falling apart. The man I loved, who had swept me off my feet so passionately I thought our love could never wane, was leaving me. Not only that, the daughters he had brought into my life, the littlest one calling me "mom" and both of them acting like sisters with my own daughter, were going to be taken from me as well. It's one thing to lose your best friend, the man you thought you'd be spending the rest of your life with. I've had heartbreaks like those before. They hurt. But it's another thing altogether to lose children you've grown to love, children who have grown to love you in return. Into this impossible scene came Harley.

But let me back up just a moment. Before everything had fallen completely apart, when I was still hanging onto the thinnest spider's thread of hope that things could, would, be salvaged, my love asked if we could take a trip together, to California, to visit his brother and niece. "One more try," he reassured me, to see if we could work things out. I had no idea what we were supposed to be "working out." As far as I knew, we were, should still be, truly, madly, deeply, in love. At least, I was. Although I didn't want to acknowledge it, I had been feeling that he had been distancing himself from me, although he never talked about it, never admitted it. So when he asked if we could make a visit to see his brother, I clung to the thought that if he were willing to make this journey with me, it would bring us back together again. So we set off for California, on my frequent flier miles, rented a convertible and drove into Merced with the top down despite a chilly 50 degree night. One of the first things we noticed the next day, while his brother was at work, were the dogs in the garage. I have known dogs my entire life and loved many. But I had never before met any like this pair. Harley, a Schnauzer mix, and Flicka, a Jack Russel mix, looking completely unkempt and disheveled, barked and growled at us, but when we tried to approach them, they cowered away from us. No matter how hard we tried to coax them over to sniff our hand, or offer a treat, they just stayed away. Over time we heard the story. Harley had been their first dog, and he went everywhere with them. He was their "baby." A few years later came Flicka, but shortly after that, they had had their own first child, and the dogs were suddenly banished from the house. Having no kennel for them to run and play outside, this meant they found themselves imprisoned in the garage, night and day. Feces and urine were scattered all over the cement floor. There was food and water for them, but it was clear the couple had grown tired of caring for their first "babies" and found them a complete inconvenience when faced with the needs of their own human child. The situation bothered us greatly. How could his brother, whom he adored and admired, who led countless church groups and was tirelessly religious, act in such an inhumane and unChristian way? After talking it over several times, my love decided to approach his brother about taking the dogs back to Minnesota with us. To do so we would need to get them in to see a vet, and get them kennels and plane tickets, all within a matter of a few short days. The first time we tried to load Harley into the kennel, he bit us. He had to wear a muzzle during the vet visit (and most vet visits thereafter). Several hundreds of dollars later (again on my tab, since my love was completely broke of course) we were headed back to Minnesota with the two dogs somewhere in the baggage compartment below us in the belly of the airplane. Our arrival back at my house in Duluth was greeted by a fair amount of excitement by my daughter, who could not believe the souvenirs I had procured for her in California. The first night in our house, I went downstairs to check on the dogs, which were corralled into our kitchen until we could ascertain their behaviors. I bent over Harley to give him a pat and an encouraging word and he promptly tried to bite me. We settled back into our routines, and my love, I mean ex, disappeared as quickly as he had come sweeping into our lives. With no place of his own to stay, the dogs defaulted to being mine. Consolation prizes perhaps for his bailing out without explanation or reason. The dogs were not well trained. Flicka was not even house broken yet. I had never had indoor dogs before, and didn't know what I was getting myself into. Harley was such a good jumper, on several occasions we discovered he was able to snatch entire loaves of bread off the counters next to the wall, bringing them down for he and Flicka to enjoy. It wasn't long after that we decided they needed to be kenneled at night and while we were out of the house. Getting Harley into a kennel, however, was another matter entirely, as he tended to bite anyone who tried to lay a hand on him. A treat thrown into the kennel finally did the trick, safely. I half-joked many times the first year, "Harley, if you were a big dog, you'd be dead. Nobody would tolerate you biting so much!" Luckily for him, his small mouth did not inflict much harm, but it sure didn't ingratiate him with me. Little dog with a big attitude. But despite the behaviors and inconvenience, the dogs also offered us something in return. As they slowly learned to trust us, they became a great solace to the empty, aching hole inside of us. As C-baby and I grieved our multiple losses, the dogs snuggled up to us on the couch, nestled their backs against our bellies and exuded comfort and companionship where emptiness and sorrow tried to rule. As we healed them with kindness and compassion, they healed us with loyalty and companionship. Their new life afforded them many pleasures. Loves and pets and pats and kind words. Freedom to go outside. Long walks around town and hikes in the woods. Harley would become so attached to me that he actually overcame first his fear of water, to learn how to ride the back of my kayak so he could accompany me on many of my paddles, and then later, to ride in a basket on my bike. He also accompanied me on many long hikes on the Superior Hiking Trail. He camped with us frequently, too, despite my constant fear of him being a tick magnet. New members were added to our pack over the years. I already owned one cat, a tabby that just went by "Kitty," who lived to be 19 years old. Papa Bear moved to MN from WY, bringing his cat Remington along. After both of those cats died, along came Mojo, then Kali. Harley learned to accept them all. And there wasn't much Harley wouldn't do with, and for, his new family. But he always did have an attitude. We butted heads many, many times. Flicka would eventually be given to one of my closest friends, who had three small children at home and a lot more time and love for a dog that really just needed a lap to climb into. She would live out her days in the country, romping beside the kids and running freely through the pastures. We didn't dare give Harley away, despite the many times I had considered it. It seemed too dangerous as he was still too unreliable when it came to anything that required handling. Many years after adopting Harley I came across a book by Jan Fennell, the Dog Listener. Jan's work would unlock many of the behaviors I had struggled with around Harley. He thought he was alpha. We couldn't pick him up. He wouldn't heel or mind on our walks. He would bark a lot if we left the room (or house). I found out the majority of his anxieties had to do with his mistaken belief that as the alpha, he thought he was in charge of us, his pack, and when we didn't behave as we should, he needed to put us in our places. Jan's book shed light on so many things, I immediately put many of them to work with Harley, with great success. It added many more years of enjoyment to our time together. But, I still wasn't exactly in love with this dog the way I have been with other dogs, or with my cats for that matter. I loved him and hated him, sometimes simultaneously. Perhaps it was only because in some small way in the back of my mind, he reminded me of being used and dumped. How stupid I was, how taken advantage I had let myself be. His constant daily presence was a subtle reminder of this negative, painful chapter in my life. Or maybe it was because he was a lot more work than the outdoor dogs we had while growing up (and now I know why they were all outdoor dogs). Harley never once indicated he had to go outside, so for his ten years with us, we had to be the ones to remember to put him out several times a day. We also had to be careful how we fed all of the animals, so that he couldn't gobble up all of the cat food. Our daughter learned the hard way when we first brought them home that hiding her Advent calendar (with a piece of chocolate behind every window) under her bed was no deterrent to a small dog capable of crawling around under a bed to retrieve it. Thankfully, there was no bad reaction to the chocolate, or this story might have been a lot shorter one. Or maybe it was his bad attitude, his never acknowledging me completely as Head of Household, rather, giving me the suspicious eye and wondering when I, as alpha, would fail so he could resume his post as Superior. Whatever the reason, or reasons, Harley became the ultimate test of faith and patience for me. I had agreed to take on the life and care of this sometimes vexing creature, and I wasn't one to break my promises. I wasn't going to be the person my ex had been, leaving all of us for better weather elsewhere. Harley was 5 when we adopted him, and he lived with us for another ten glorious years. By the time he turned 15, he had no teeth (they had all been pulled - small dogs teeth often rot faster than big dogs). His bark was, quite literally, worse than his bite. His eyes and ears were failing, and he had to wear a doggy diaper at all times in the house and be put outside even more frequently. We brought him in for a vet visit when he was having some breathing issues and learned he had congestive heart failure. We were given meds to prolong his life and make breathing easier, but were told there was no cure. The heart meds made him even more incontinent. Not only that, but his anxiety began to rise like never before, to the point where at night he would bark incessantly, even if we were in the room right beside him. We had to start giving him sedatives so he, and we, could sleep at night. As much as I thought I despised this dog and the memories of hurt he carried with him, my heart was breaking with the decision in front of me. During the day, he seemed OK. But I wasn't OK with drugging him to sleep every night. And I knew he was slowly drowning in his own fluids. After 5 nights of sedatives, I called the vet. It was the same vet who helped deliver Brigid when she was born at the farm. He came to the house and there, surrounded by the people Harley loved, he was gently, compassionately, and painlessly given back to the universe from which he had come. That was Jan. 5, 2010. It has taken me over a year to write this story. There is something about the story of Harley and I that is so intertwined and deeply personal I couldn't face the pain of putting it all down in words. Until tonight. To be hurt by the ones you love most, to be betrayed, abused, abandoned, neglected... to fight back, to bite, to persevere, to never give up... To learn to let go of the pain of the past, to learn to trust again, to love again, and then to lick, and wrestle, and wiggle, and bite, and hurt, and make amends, and forgive, and to lead, and follow, and play, and protect... Harley is the metaphor for all of our lives, all of our struggles, our pain, and our ability to rise up from the ashes and learn to love once again. Such a small dog, such a short life, yet so many lessons. I have heard it said that we don't choose our animals; they, choose us, for the lessons we have yet to learn from them. I thank Harley for those lessons, for showing us the will to survive and for never giving up. And for learning how to trust again even though everything he knew for sure was falling apart. I love you Harley, and I miss you.