Memories of the Farm of my Childhood

Glinda writes:

When I was a little girl in the 1950s, I would go to the farm where my Aunt Louise, Uncle Russell, and Cousin Russell ("Junior") lived. I grew up in town. While they actually lived on 3 farms during this time, I remember most the farm just east of Sublette. Trips to the farm are among my most vivid and most treasured memories. Somehow, those little trips awakened my senses in a way town life never could or perhaps had dulled. As we moved to our own little farm almost 50 years later, memories of the farm of my childhood play like snippets of a slide show in my head and my heart. Here are some treasured frames:

• opening to warm jubilant country hugs
• riding on the tractor with its rhythmic sound and blue smoke clutching tight to Uncle or Cousin
• seeing the exuberance of cows ready for morning feed and morning milk
• feeding cows that aromatic mash and watching their gigantic tongues thrust robustly out of their mouths to eat it
• watching my Uncle and Cousin clamp cows into stanchions and on the other end push robustly at cows to get them in place
• wrapping my tenuous childhood fingers around the teats of the most gentle of the cows at the instruction of my Uncle and Cousin who knew everything
• watching the seemingly blue-white stream of milk and hearing the sound of milk spurt firmly into that cold metal bucket
• trying to shoot a stream of milk to the eager cats waiting nearby and giving way to my Cousin who did a far better job
• watching my Uncle and my Cousin gather milk into those big old cavernous milk cans
• watching my Uncle or my Cousin hoist those huge heavy milk cans into the water filled cooler or carry them down to the road
• chowing down on a breakfast Aunt Louise had magically prepared for us: soft scrambled yellow-orange eggs, vivid red ripe tomatoes, toast with butter dripping
• seeing that cream pitcher on the center of the table
• tumbling over the different taste and texture of farm milk in my mouth
• following my Uncle, Cousin, Aunt with awkward steps of a child of the city as they routinely completed chores
• wanting to help with everything
• sitting in the middle of a boarded place in the kennel, playing with and being consumed by wiggly Collie puppies while I rolled in childhood laughter
• looking at, touching, smelling flowers in the gardens Aunt Louise was so proud of
• sitting on the front lawn on a blanket having tea with my dolls and listening to the breezes blow through the cedars
• playing with the big Collie dogs and smiling jubilantly when they carefully obeyed my tenuous commands
• pumping water from the red pitcher pump in the kitchen
• seeing the rainbow colors of Aunt Louise's fiesta plates burst out of the knotty pine cupboards
• heading to the outhouse and spending as little time there as I could
• sleeping on the daybed next to the oil burner stove, occasionally rolling over to keep each side warm
• standing as close to that stove as I could get on those cold winter days without getting burnt
• feeling hot hot on one side and cold cold on the other; turning around
• listening to the rhythmic tapping of the keys as Aunt Louise pounded out words, letters and stories on her old typewriter with its magical keys
• singing those old Christian hymns with Aunt Louise at the top of our lungs while Aunt Louise pounded at the keys of that old upright piano which was then hers but had earlier been my Grandmother Ottie's while my legs swung from the piano bench because my feet could not reach the floor
• hearing the hum of summer sounds: the constant drone of bees, the buzz of flies, the big june bugs crashing into the light
• sitting in the rafters of the barn among the fresh hay, smelling it, itching from it
• meandering through the garden and seeing produce under every leaf
• gathering as much fresh produce as my small arms could carry and heading proudly to the house alongside Aunt Louise trying not to drop anything in my precious load
• tasting everything right in the garden
• seeing a gigantic worm on a tomato plant and running straight for the house
• heading to the dark and dank cellar and wandering among the dusty jars and shelves
• feeding the calves from buckets with nipples on them
• avoiding calves in the field stepping on my feet; other times not
• walking through dry grasses in the heat of summer on trips to and from the pond
• walking into that small house on that small farm at Thanksgiving and smelling the feast Aunt Louise had prepared for us
• leaving with big hugs (perhaps a little sadder this time) and loving words: "Don't stay away so long next time."

I cannot even imagine a childhood without memories of a farm. It should be against the rules. And so what, dear readers, are your memories of the farm?

Photos: Top: Me in about 1950 with Fido (the calf) and puppies when they lived in the Illinois Bend area. Bottom: Me with two of their beloved Collies (Duchess and puppy).