A day on the farm
I sit here with a hot cup of coffee, listening to updates about the Milton hurricane. Knight (our beautiful, big German Shepherd rescue) is resting his head on my lap.
I am thinking about the travesty that has already befallen our country, and the horror that Milton will bring with it. I used to be in EMS. I was in EMS for over a decade. I wore quite a few hats, as an EMT, a firefighter and reserve police officer. I sometimes regret leaving that field, since I have ALL the training, confidence and desire to save people. I created a life that is difficult to leave. Our farm critters rely on us for everything. Finding a farm sitter is hard, and expensive. When I was young, I could load up my K9 SAR shepherds and just take off and join up on various rescue missions. Now, I sit back, pray, and do my best to donate money, goods etc. to rescue efforts. I wonder about my life choices, none of which I regret. I do feel a pang of guilt? I think it’s guilt, that with all of my training, certifications and experience, I am basically off duty/on leave forever from EMS/911. A big part of that decision, was motherhood, thinking about the extremely dangerous situations I had been in (from being shot at, exposure to blood borne pathogens, etc…to the heavy dose of carcinogens I was exposed to as a firefighter. Our bunker gear is filled with cancer causing agents, and modern “advancements” in building materials have resulted in a chemical nightmare for our fire rescue personnel. I actually left fire before we even tried for a baby, and went on a whole body cleanse. People just do not understand, that not only are our firefighters putting themselves in physical harm from responding to emergencies, but every single day their gear goes on, and they go into an active fire…their risk of developing cancer SKYROCKETS…and the types of cancer that my brothers and sisters are developing are unable to be treated for the most part, it also goes hand in hand with heart disease, due to the lifestyle.
ANYWAY…
A morning on the farm is pretty much the same every day. I wake up, I have a cup of coffee, let the birds out, I open the farm stand, then dump and scrub water buckets, refill them, collect eggs, and make sure everyone has what they need. We use really big feeders. Our feeders hold about 100lbs of grain. They are provided fresh veggies and supplemental protein (in the form of bugs) every single day. Everyone has a head to tail to toe assessment and I go back inside and normally I wake up my daughter to get her ready for school. Farm mornings are early. They would be even earlier if we were working with dairy, or currently with produce.
I then take my kiddo to school, and when I arrive home I feed our pig, Benedict, and the goats. I often go down and hang with my goats while drinking another cup of coffee. Our littles, Snuggly (aka Gomez) and Buggly (aka Pugsly) often prefer snuggling me over eating. Their little vocalizations are the cutest, and they really love attention.