Farms and Fingers

We are up a car again....after looking at hundreds of listings, praying, and making lots of calls and emails, we finally made a purchase to replace the vehicle that is near death.  We actually have one more purchase to make after that to replace my husband's truck, but for now, we have at least two working vehicles, including my daughter's.  Of course, I hoped for a free one, but that didn't happen.  However, we did get a fantastic price on the car we did buy and it's probably the nicest car I've had in our whole marriage.  Get this, all the windows work and ALL the doors open!  See what I mean?  That is exciting stuff!!!  My kids will have funny stories about our cars.  It seems as soon as we buy one certain things start going, like clockwork...first the a/c, then the windows, then the doors, not to mention the engine!  But we're grateful at how long our last vehicle took us.  We hope to sell it as-is and to my shock and awe we're already getting offers.  Incredible that someone will purchase it in such rough shape!

My new funny farm story of the week happened yesterday.  All I know is that I am happy to have my fingers still, though I might add that I am typing with one less digit.  It is still on my hand, but it is very tender.  It starts with another story.  I had made two big roasts on the weekend to celebrate a birthday of our "other family" whose daughter turned 17.  I had made enough to have for leftovers the next day.  However, my dog had other plans for the leftovers.  Silly me left it out at lunch without the lid on.  I went upstairs and came down a few minutes later to see it all gone, every last drop.  I was so sad to say the last.  It also ruined my dinner plans!  I had to come up with plan B. 

I had made a meal plan and had shopped for it, I'm happy to say, but I just hadn't pre-made it.  I was going to make split-pea soup.  I looked in all my bulk containers and couldn't find where I had put the peas!  As I went from one cupboard to another I set off a trap on purpose so it wouldn't get me while I looked.  No big deal.  Then I went to another cupboard.  I did not see the trap there until I set it off.  I felt no pain until I looked down and saw the blood blister forming on my finger.  Then the pain hit.  This was no little mouse trap.  It was a big trap.  I held my hand under running water and downed two Tylenol asap.  My kids knew something bad had just happened to mommy.  Fortunately it only got the top inch of my middle finger (you never know how often you use that finger until it is immobilized!)  My finger nail has the tell-tale signs of being whacked.  After sitting on the couch for probably 2 hours, the throbbing had simmered down.  I had texted my husband to let him know and within an hour he was home.  He knew it wasn't just about the pain with my finger.  I was so glad when he drove in.  What a guy.

It really is hard to explain to someone else why living on a farm is the greatest thing and the hardest thing we've ever done.  To an outsider, it is idyllic with the beautiful views, the country air, chickens walking around, clothes on the line, the nearest neighbour is not near, gardens, etc., but there is another side, a very hard side.  Country living is not for the faint of heart, I've written many times.  I truly did marry Renaissance Man.  He can literally do everything.  We could not live here if it weren't for his skill set.  But it does get tiresome even for someone who can do it all.  There isn't an endless amount of money to do all the work required and there is never enough time, especially now that he is at work full-time with a part-time job on the side and other contracts here and there, oh and farming, 8 kids, a needy wife, etc.  Plus, because we are living in everything old, it is literally undoing itself before we can get to it. 

Thankfully, others have gone before and understand.  My friend sent me a book written by a woman who homeschooled her 9 children and lived on a farm.  She put it perfectly, "It didn't take long for us to realize we were living in too many centuries.  Tim went to work in the twentieth century, keeping long hours.  He came home to the eighteenth century......"  That's kind of us.  As I was reading this late last night, I couldn't believe how similar our stories were.

When you have a farm with actual animals on it, you get rodents.  So then you get cats to take care of the rodents, but then you have too many cats!  It's always something... She wrote in the book, "As it turned out, rats were my limit.  I could not love my family if I lived in a house with rats.  The rats were like demons stealing my sanity away."  (or in my case, my fingers)  One day she found something in the pantry that was "gross and white and squiggly and it was the end for me."  She walked out the back door to the apple orchard and laid down under the apple tree and cried.  "I was never going to make it in the eighteenth century."  Long story short, they put the farm up for sale and sold it to a man who needed a place to hoard his stuff.  "I love that man so much," she wrote.  I couldn't believe how I was reading this very chapter on the very day that my finger had nearly been taken out because of rodents we are fighting in our eighteenth century home.  That afternoon, I, too had sat fighting back tears while my little 5 year old sat beside me trying to do his letters and numbers as good as he could so I wouldn't be sad.  He didn't know all the reasons my face was wet.  Pain from a stupid trap, pain from fighting an old home.....

I don't think we're at the "sell the farm" place yet.  We love it too much.  We've worked too hard to rebuild the ruins.  I think, however, it was good to read that what we are doing IS hard.  Rewarding? Yes, but hard.  I needed to acknowledge the fact that having my finger nearly taken off in a trap because of a war with rodents isn't easy.  When I read that other woman's war was so similar to mine it actually comforted me. 

So what is the takeaway?  Give up?  We aren't going to give up.  We heard it best a few weeks ago in church, "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you face trials of various kinds, for you know the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.  And let steadfastness have its full effect that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." James 1:2-4

That was the point in the other woman's book, too.  Children sanctify us.  Old homes sanctify us.  God even uses rodent traps to sanctify us.  What comes out of us isn't always pretty, but He can change us if we let Him use even things like our finger stuck in a trap!