2.8.26
The gentle sound of a steady rain woke me up this morning. A very welcome sound. As I lay in bed thinking about what the day ahead had in store for me, I listened to the soft rain and felt thankful for it. “It’s finally raining, dearest,” I said as I gently touched the face of my Darrell smiling at me from his picture frame on the bedside table. “We need this so much.” Swinging my legs out of bed I headed into the living room to let Bonnie dog outside before putting the kettle on for my first cup of tea of the day, then, stood a moment at the open front door. There is something so soothing about the sound of rain.
This past week has been a rather busy, albeit a rather challenging one. Dallas, our neighbour and his good wife Cindy, have been indispensable in helping with the clearing of a woodlot down by the milkhouse. This area which used to be my sow’s paddock, a 10-acre strip of land where the girls would spend most of the year, had a thick stand of trees that sorely needed attention. Between the bug killed ones cut down a couple of years ago by Darrell and the ones that had blown down last year, it was a higgledy piggledy mess. After grandson Evan and I had whacked many of the downed trees into more manageable lengths with a chainsaw, Dallas came over with his mighty little skid steer and has spent several days clearing and piling the mess into burn piles.
After my milking and feeding chores were done, Dallas would arrive and we would get cracking. While he ran the skid steer, I would nip about here and there with my chainsaw, cutting trees that had been missed or needed shortening for easier removal. Helping to pile logs into more manageable mouthfuls for the handy dandy grapple on the front of Dallas’s machine and then setting the subsequent burn piles alight.
This was grand exercise, but then my heart and pacer started to have a go at each other! They had been having the occasional disagreement for a while and all this strenuous activity of lugging a chainsaw about and piling brush just made the disagreement that much more noticeable! Cindy, bless her own warm heart, had been popping over for a bit in the afternoons to help and between her and Dallas, they have kept a close eye on me. If Dallas thought I was doing too much, I would hear him tooting the skid steer’s horn at me, admonishing me to go sit down on a stump for a while! What special folks they are!
This past week has been unseasonably warm and dry, perfect for working in the woodlot. Early mornings however are still quite brisk. One must bundle up against the chill before hard work and the sun have you eventually stripping off your gloves and hat and outer coat. The week before however saw some nasty freezing fog still lingering in our area. No matter how warmly you dress, that fog seems to seep right into your bones.
One frosty morning as I headed out to feed the cows, I was well bundled up with my trusty old wooly hat on my head to ward off the chill. As the sun finally started lifting the fog and the activity of loading hay into the trailer warmed me up, I doffed my hat, stuffing it unceremoniously into its usual spot behind the seat of the 4-wheeler. Now this spot has held my old hat in place perfectly safely time after time. Without a second thought I set off to feed to the beef cows in the big field, came back to the barn to refill the trailer with hay for the milk cows down in their paddock, then once more returned the four-wheeler and trailer to the barn before heading to the house. It was only then that I realized I had forgot to grab my old hat. No worries, I would get it later on.
Needless to say, with the activities of the day before me, I totally forgot about my old hat. Next morning, as I got ready to head out to milk Lady, my hat was not hanging in its usual spot. Drat! It must still be on the back of the four-wheeler at the barn I thought and with this fog it would be cold and damp. Oh, well.
Arriving at the barn I was distressed to find nary a sign of my old hat! Blast it! It must have fallen off the back of the machine when I was trundling about feeding the day before. No worries, I would find it. As I headed down to milk, while the rhythmical clicking of the pulsator pulled milk from Lady’s udder into the milk pail, I searched around the milk house for any sign of the wayward hat. Nothing. Once Lady’s udder had been considerably reduced in size and she was in with her calf, hungry for his breakfast, I headed back to the house, my mind on my old hat.
While driving through the big field to feed the cows, my eyes swept left and right as I tried to follow the same track I took the day before, sure my old hat would be laying on the ground waiting for me. Nothing. It must be in the milk cow paddock I thought. Now when I feed the milk cows, I take the exact same track with the four-wheeler and hay trailer every day. Drive through the gate, up a slight slope, park beside their feeder and fork in the hay before circling around the back of the feeder and heading down the exact same track and out the gate again. However, disappointment flooded through me when there was no sign of my dear old hat.
Now this old hat is very dear to my heart. Bought up in Alaska in 1980 and made in New Zealand of 100% wool, it has been my constant companion ever since. Darned here and there over the years after a pack rat took a nibble out of it while it lay for a few days in the back of our old truck. Patched around the edges after being frozen to the snowy ground when it came off my head after I fell and broke my arm while checking on a pregnant sow a few years ago. It has donned my head each year as I set off on early morning deer hunts and many times, been tossed on the ground beside me as I lay behind a cow assisting her with a difficult birth. It has been covered in mud, manure and all manner of things, seldom washed and dearly loved.
For the next three days I scoured the cow field on foot, going over and over the tracks where I had fed. Although sure I had not taken it off in the woodlot where I had been using the chainsaw, I still searched that whole area. Walking every inch of the milk cow paddock, hoping against hope one of the calves had picked it up out of curiosity brought me no joy. I could not believe I had lost my old hat! The feeling in the pit of my stomach was as devastating as if I had lost a dear friend, a sickening, discouraging loss that had me close to tears. “It’s only an old hat!” I scolded myself. Yet it was a dear and special old hat. A hat Darrell would constantly tease me about, a part of me and now it was gone.
The next day, refusing to wear any other hat despite the cold outside, I walked disconsolately towards the barn as it was time to feed to cows. Climbing on the four-wheeler I felt like crying, all over a silly old hat! “Oh, matey,” I said out loud, “I sure wish you could help me find my hat. Please, please help me find it!” Heading down to the milk cow paddock with a heavy heart, I opened the gate and started to drive up the slope towards their feeder where the girls stood patiently waiting. Then I saw it! Right in front of me, right where I had driven every single morning since losing my dear old hat, there it was. Not off to the side, not looking as if a cow or calf had been chewing on it, it was just there.
Tears filled my eyes as I jumped off the four-wheeler and gently picked it up. It was cold, it was damp but there it was in my hands. Returning to the house after feeding, I gave the old hat a gentle wash, one of only several it has had in its long life. Taking up my darning needle and yarn, I patched some of the holes I had been putting off doing for ages. Yes, it looks a wee bit tattered and worn, but what stories this old hat could tell if it could talk. What things it has seen over the years. I could not lose my old hat; I could not be without it and I think my dearest knew that.
As I head out to milk Lady, the rain is still gently falling. Putting on my coat and wellies, the last thing I reach for is my dear old hat. Once more it will don my head, keeping me warm and dry as with milker in hand I head off to start the day.
