As many of us, I read a lot in school and some of my early favorites were about rural life. I started in early grade school with illustrated large full page books. Cows and horses with red barns and lots of square hay bales. Often a windmill if the page was long enough.

There weren’t any books or pages that mentioned the monetary pressures to large or small farms. The image was bucolic and drew me in to what seemed akin to the first garden of all. The early photos of the whole family, arrayed on the steps of a grey boarded farmhouse with a field at the edge of the photo. The size of the families was arresting to me. Ten or twelve young children and grandparents in the rockers. The newer farm photos had JD 8N’s or Farmall C’s casually parked close that one could run out, leap on over the massive differential and eventually get it started.

The homestead stories around here are told at local eateries and town parades by an old timer standing nearby: “ I’ve seen you around, live nearby?” I answer the size, location and my last name (along with how many decades living there. A short conversation can start. My last name is Scandinavian and several farms are run by them. It appeared I was accepted as normal.

A young man living with us was helping with our repair shop and a close neighbor mentioned He had an old Chalmers C gleaner that needed work. We filled up the gigantic tires and it was close by and easy to drive over. The beaters for grain were wood and the chains driving them looked worse for wear. Not wood.

We got the old thing running and there was promise. Tilling with loaned JD 2520 and then had spreading Heritage wheat, we waited for rain. The crop was not bodacious but with another field nearby from the gleaners owner, we had enough wheat to farrow and store. Hand flipping the grain to get what the shakers let through. It made terrific bread.

I sat in the cab while it was running and all I could see was the field under me. No thanks, It felt tipsy to say the least. Farming at the basic 1940’s level. It worked. We have a small barn with Wilber the talking horse style stall and we had a few horses. Had is the operative word. A reasonable pasture next to the driveway and we were in. Horses got sold, pasture and fence are overgrown and the wheat field is empty and lumpy from Incorrect plowing.

The Gleaner is parked back at the neighbors along with the Ford 8N but our half century farmstead still stands. Our youngest son owns a new Kabota Tractor and does everything around here that needs a strong and talented hand. Carpentry to mowing and tilling the fabulous garden with 14 foot fence to eliminate deer after hours shopping for flowering food. I do what I can with the fire wood and garden and sit on the porch swing and listen to the Kabota mowing trails.

I can see the garden close by and I thank God for this gift of family and Land to live on.

It’s as good as it gets. Jack Photo of our son, Soren in the woodshed