Continuity

Life or Something Like It
Originally uploaded by Contrary Goddess.

In living life on the farm, there is always something to do. You cannot be bored unless you choose to be bored. And there is always a choice of what to do next.

When it comes to brakes, though, well, it becomes a priority. As much work as I normally do, and I do a lot of work normally, working on that truck for a couple of days has made muscles I didn't know I had sore. Plus I have scrapes in odd places.

Oak Limb
Originally uploaded by Contrary Goddess.

And it is winter, so there is always wood. Since we're having quite a warm spell here, I didn't want to burn the good, harder wood we have in stash, so I wandered the woods to look for downed limbs, then dragged them to the sawhorse to be sawn. That big one is probably 20 feet long, and the little one leaning on the horse was once part of the big one. So I got a good amount of wood, and only fell hard once dragging that in, so there are a few more sore muscles and a bruise or two.

There is a county song, Coal Mine, that has the line, "at midnight I like callused hands" and I so feel that way. I love calluses & scars, knotty muscles and real know-how, stuff like that. And there is, I believe, a no nonsense attitude that comes with living this life.

We are coming up on the third year that the cow has been fresh. That's pretty amazing. Her supply is down some for the winter but it is still two gallons a day. Garden work for next year is beginning in earnest, and at least two of the goats have been in heat . . . if the billy has done his thing. Waiting for cold to kill a wether. Last weekend of December is tentatively set as community pig killing for this year, subject to change.

It is really only in the winter you get to totally see this, although it is there all the time.

Mistletoe
Originally uploaded by Contrary Goddess.

Mistletoe. Also, I never seem to see the holly trees except in the winter. I always want to landscape (should we ever get around to that) around the house with laurel and holly. I can see these, and one other knot of the stuff, from where we set up the sawhorse this year.

Except we need to make a new sawhorse. And a new pig trough (he delights in destroying them). Things left to do on another day.